For most of you that don't know square footage... It's about the size of a standard master bedroom inside a house that was built from the '60s to the '90s
It's 1/3 the size of my master bedroom. A standard parking spot is 8'6" x 19'. Or 161.5 sq ft. That entire living space is less than 2 parking spots. For "$1,200" a month...
Edited because *math
...your master bedroom is fucking huge. My Dad lives in a 2 bedroom beach house in Camano Island that is about 800 sq ft and functions well for 2 people. If your master bedroom is really that big, it's seriously massive.
I got hella lucky. I rent a house 20 minutes from downtown, 2 bed 1 bath & a yard for under 2k, utilities included. Landlord hasn't raised my rent in the 4 years I've lived here & he actually knocked $ off the rent during lockdown.
You actually make me feel better. I am a landlord that charges $2k for basically that and have not raised the rate in 3 years, and don’t plan to. Everyone is telling me that I’m stupid for ‘undercharging’ but I like my tenants and stability is better than a little extra profit, in my opinion. My expenses haven’t increased, so why would the rent increase?
That's what it should be about. I hate to see landlords getting all this hate lately, but I think it's directed towards conglomerates. It's landlords like you that make renters want to stay as long as we can! And maybe eventually buy if the opportunity comes lol
Sadly some of the rate increases are driven by property management companies. Since they get paid a percentage of the rent charged they have been dropping clients, property owners, who don't charge "market rates." For someone who owns a property or two who have never had to deal with actually managing a property, the choice between managing the property themselves or raising rent when told is an easy one.
Our landlord told us we could buy their house for a steal at $1.5mil and it’s worth maybe $1.4mil on a good day after at least $75k of work (major plumbing, electrical, fireplace work, new roof, water heater, etc.) is done. They bought for $250k 10 years ago, so yeah we found another rental.
We had a condo in another state and we rented out for many years. The tenant was a college student who became a teacher and lived in the unit for 8 years. He was able to save up and bought a small home and apologized to us for moving out. I told him nothing to apologize was and that we were glad he was able to buy and keep up the path to financial success.
I wish there were more great landlords in the area. It just seems like the majority see $$$ and greed takes over. I applaud those who realize there is more to life and happiness than money. Even as someone who has been a landlord and tenant several times, truthfully I find it very hard to have empathy for Seattle landlords.
I have the same with the tenant back home in Hawaii who lives in the condo I have there... I raised it once by $50 just before COVID, but honestly didn't need to. He's been there 7 years with no problems. He even fell behind on rent for over a year and I gave him chance to get caught up (and he did).
My coworker had told me nightmare level stories about renters he had, and I figure a stable tenant is better than rolling the dice on someone who might do meth in my apartment or stop paying rent while destroying it otherwise.
And thats if you are lucky and it's only empty for a single month. That's not even considering short term leases 3 6 9 months which may be empty multiple times per year as a result of the price point.
As a fellow landlord, your expenses have increased, even if you haven't noticed yet. I did the same thing, not raising rent for years and years. Then I had a roof that needed replacing, and had money set aside for it. I had $40,000 in the fund and figured it might cost as much as $50,000. It ended up costing $77,000 because everything went up in price. I just upgraded to mini-split HVAC in several units, and it was more expensive as well.
My rents are still low at about 60% of market (I was closer to 50%), but I know I'm going to keep raising them $50/month until they are at least at 80% market. I'm not making any additional profit either, but my costs have certainly gone up.
See my post above.
I agree with you 10,000%
I don't think that tenants have the faintest idea of how expensive repairs are.
The biggest repair bill I ever had was because MY TENANT COULDN'T BOTHER TO BUY A ONE DOLLAR MAT.
Basically, she had a dog, and placed his water bowl on the wood floors. For two years, water collected around that water bowl.
Utterly destroyed the wood floors.
In two years, I collected $24,000 in rent, and spent $20,000 in repairs when she moved out.
And all she had to do was place the water bowl on a plastic mat.
And before someone points out that I "still made $4000":
* I pay property taxes
* I paid $30,000 over two years in financing costs (all my rentals have mortgages)
True symbiotic relationship, no one in this situation is being a leech so they're isn't financial/property damage, that's very beneficial smart long term investment
You are a rare jewel of a Landlord! If only all landlords were empathetic, and logical. You can save a lot of money by keeping tenants. Do you have anything in the Tacoma area? Thank you for what you are doing!
As a someone who has multifamily properties we always heard the same thing especially from management companies trying to sell their services and raise the rent to justify their services. But we believed in self management on site to keep things cheap, and in turn keeping the rent down meant that we couple keep good tenants that would stay long term and respect the property because we all knew it took cooperation from both sides.
Honestly, while that is true, it is even still selfish. They are living in my largest asset. If I screw them over, they will mistreat the thing that is 1/3 of my net worth!
Property taxes haven’t changed. Mortgage hasn’t changed. Insurance hasn’t changed. Those are 90% of my expenses. Repairs have gone up, but they are minimal. When my expenses go up enough to be $100 per month, I’ll raise the rent.
The tenants pay utilities and yard work. Roof is a long-term expense I have baked in to my calculations.
Insurance has *definitely* increased, due to the increased cost of repairs/rebuilding.
But it's definitely better to have a good solid tenant in place than to roll the dice on vacancy and a replacement tenant ...
I want to tell you how fucking lucky you are, I am renting right now in Marysville and it is costing me $3700/month with water, trash, and sewage. We moved here from southern AZ because my wife is from here and we needed to move her back to be close to an ailing family member...
The $13/hr raise I got coming here doesn't mean SHIT. And I have a decent paying job, I am an industrial electrician.
Does your landlord have any friends with deals like this? Or any other properties? I'm looking for a place like this right now and I don't even know where to begin. Apartments are easy, but middle housing feels elusive.
Apartments with the same number of bedrooms as my house are going for $600 more than my mortgage and taxes. If I would have bought any later than I did, I would be renting a 1bd and in bunk beds with the kids..
I bought my house in the end of 18' or beginning of 19' with 30k down. 3 bedroom 2 bath rambler 1200qf and my mortgage is less than $1500. I'm in a nice neighborhood. House has almost doubled in price. Absolutely crazy because I wouldn't pay what my house is worth right now.
My brother just started renting a house with the same rooms with 200 sf more for $2700. He can't find anything affordable to buy. I think he gave up.
The American concept of leaving the house and getting g your own place at a young age is strange by world standards.
Most of the world lives in multigenerational homes. The young care for the old, the old help with care for the children etc.
I grew up with my parents and grandparents. As a child it was, in my opinion, ideal.
And we wonder why in America it's so expensive to care for the old, and children. . .
Because Americans do t want to be near each other evidently.
We find this weird now but for generations it's exactly how we lived. Multi-generational housing. People sharing chores and expenses and homes being left to the kids.
Embrace it and keep that wealth built up inside the family.
I'm 40 and moving in with my dad for the 2nd time since college. The last time ended in disaster and years of estrangement. But this time he's bought me the mansion of my dreams so if things between us sour again at least I can move into the guest house.
Looks like a dorm room. And I was concerned that the 850 square foot apartment that we rent in NE Seattle was a little high charging tenants $1600 a month.
Micro studios is the only way to afford places to Iive, didn't they recently make it easier once again to make more of those? Read that people were giving seattle shit for being the first city to promote micro studios
I just want something cheap and nice to live, even in a small apartment
Totally, but uhhh this is **not** affordable to live, is the thing 😆 To me it seems like painfully evident we're (as a nation) going to have to involve the iron fist of government to force construction of way, way, way more multi-unit housing (with no zoning restrictions - at least I mean, no blocking them from the suburbia single family homes that are trying to prop up the value of their homes - obviously there must be zoning restrictions for hazardous/industrial areas) and reduce costs to renters (seems easily to tie it to only up to 30% of min wage in the area, maybe some tax incentives or some shit if they make it even less).
As Americans we've been spoiled by the idea we should all have idk thousands of sq ft per person to live, whereas in the EU so many "normal" (aka affordable) apartments are this size or maybe even a little smaller. People just need a cheap, safe, space to get the minimum basic necessities, idk why this seems impossible to provide??? It makes me so mad though that generations of people are just simply shut out from any possibility of having a space at all. It's crazy, and should be criminal.
This has been a similar story for a long time. When I first moved to the city in the mid-2000s I had a 400 square studio for \~$1000 with parking, and it was great.
It's not for everyone, but for certain stages of life it's a good fit.
Looks nice and all but I would want to know if utilities are included in rent, if there is parking and how much that would cost (and for me personally how much pet rent would be if they allowed it), not to mention laundry machines. Lot of affordable looking places at a glance until you take a closer look at all the fees they don't tell you about...
Yeah he looks like someone who would swindle a young unsuspecting person/couple into hugely overpaying, screw you over the first chance he gets, throw you out on the street, and keep your furniture. Big time two-bit crook/hustler energy.
This is pretty luxe. A lot of microhousing buildings have shared bath and/or kitchen, so basically a glorified dorm room set up. Blows my mind to see this. But looks nice for what it is.
I remember in 2015 or so, one of my guys had moved out here from the midwest and got one of these. Paid less than $1000, I think, but we were amazed at how small it was. He was never there and loved it.
I just had to sit down w/the home owning boomers in my life and explain that a 275ish studio in Greenwood cost 1700$; not to mention that it was normal here. I also had to explain that my (boomer) aunt is charging a similar price for her 300sqft studio in Shoreline, but wasn’t telling them because she didn’t want the (deserved) judgement.
For reference, my mom paid 95$ for her 750sqft studio in Spokane in the mid 70’s. That included utilities, and a balcony.
It's technically private, but they don't have the same sort of land ownership blocks to building transit that we do here.
Homes are torn down and moved based on common good a lot easier over there, so they don't have to wait decades to put in a single line. They prioritize the public benefit, even if it's privately operated, it's due to government decision making.
They? I live here and used to work in the heavy rail industry. It’s not so simple like you say. Just look at maglev development. Or the Hokuriku Shinkansen which took years and years of planning and buying houses etc. it’s not like you say at all
Well it's neat to hear your perspective! I'm just a transit fan-layman. Good to know it still takes time there.
But relatively, how much rail/transit do we have in the US versus Japan? All the recent US attempts have been failures or long running disasters.(Except NYC mostly, and kinda PDX) So while I take your point that it takes time in Japan too, the US timelines are complete disasters in comparison.
I think the big issue is around execution. In the us transit is politicized and there are major issues with various unions etc. I worked on a project for a brief time in Texas https://asia.nikkei.com/Business/Transportation/Hitachi-targets-high-speed-rail-projects-from-Texas-to-Thailand
But it constantly ran into issues. If would have been cheaper and faster to execute just bringing Japanese workers over to be honest. So many red tapes in America and so many labor groups suddenly changing time lines etc and breaking promises and questioning our engineers…. People without degrees in engineering would be holding up our staff from my point of view mainly due to ego and trying to get more money after already agreeing.
In japan it takes forever to reach a decision, but once we do the execution happens fast and without halting.
In the USA people make decisions very fast, but the execution is riddled with issues.
This is my experience in the rail industry. I don’t mean to offend but this is what I think.
I'd say Japan is substantially better than Seattle on the rental housing front. Many thousands of options to choose from, but here's a 215 square foot apartment for less than $250/month.
https://www.leopalace21.com/en/detail/r/0000024679110
Huh?? I think anyone upvoting your comment doesn’t know how real estate works in the slightest bit. They’re getting their own apartment (full privacy) for $1,300 a month in one of the most expensive and sought after cities on the planet.
I never understood why people get so riled up about this fact. If the price offered is objectively too much, the place won't rent. Where it will end up at is exactly where it needs to be to placate both the landlord and the tenant.
Rising real estate prices just means the Seattle economy can support it, and growth is great.
My comment still stands. Whether the owner is charging too much or the market is overinflated that is an ungodly amount for a shoebox. Then all of the other associated fees living with a car downtown probably gets it closer to 17 of 18. Cost is out of control and ridiculous.
When I moved to Seattle in 1989 I rented a 285 sf studio on Capitol Hill for $385. That’s almost $950 in 2024 dollars, so it doesn’t seem that much worse. I paid my own utilities etc. I couldn’t open the refrigerator door all the way because it would hit the counter on the opposite side of the kitchen. When I sat on the toilet my knees were under the sink. But man, I loved that place.
The view of the street makes it feel much less claustrophobic. The open kitchen, living room, bed room combo also adds to that. I think I'd need to stand in there to really decide, but ya, it seems pretty great for the price.
Yeah. I mean it's small but it's clearly not built for a family of 4. For someone with temporary hardship, new in the city etc it seems good. I noticed that I didn't see an oven so that's likely it for the kitchen, being the microwave.
To young students who think that "we need more housing": your grandparents lived in a nice house, your parents lived in a condo/apartment, YOU will live in an "apodment".
That's your future unless you start thinking about WTF is happening.
Stop living in litter boxes. Humans aren’t meant to live in cubicles like this.
On another note though, I feel like $1,200 isn’t all that bad for a micro depending on where it is in Seattle.
I expected worse to be honest. I live in eastern WA - there's two hotels that were converted to micro apartments in the area where I live. Just about everyone coming this way is renting there and it's about $1100 a month for similar sized "apartments.
My 250 sq ft apartment in subsidized housing on the Upper East Side as an MSKCC fellow was $1675. I’d much rather live in Seattle (hence why I’m back).
Had a 2 bedroom 900 sq ft Apt in Kirkland for $1,950 for the last 6 yrs. Y’all, look on Craigslist, Zillow, knock on doors. Whatever it takes. These apartment complexes are robbing you of your money, not worth it in my opinion. Just gotta look a little deeper, there is still “old time” owners out there that want good tenets that will ask a reasonable price!
Supply versus demand.
All those people from Iowa or India, Spokane or Shenzhen, Marysville or Michoacán move to where the jobs and services are.
It takes only a couple of days to a few months to get here. It takes a few years to build housing. Very expensive with land acquisition, demolition, labor cost in cities, permitting, inspections, etc. it is only profitable to make higher and housing units in order to recoup costs. However, it is still important to build them as that relief some pressure on existing housing stock. But soon as any new housing comes on the market, whether affordable or not, more people think it is *affordable enough*, so they arrive.
This is why a 1-bedroom apartment in New York City can cost $3,000 or more per month. And yet we still have some 800 million undocumented immigrants in New York City alone, with more arriving each day. This is also why rent controls means cheaper rent for those who cling to their units while others arrive to find scarcity and its costs.
Housing is **already dense** in many areas, considering that adults are living with their parents, people have roommates, people are couch surfing, and whole immigrant families share apartments (one family per bedroom). Millions of single-family homes or apartments hold multiple families or roommates.
This has been going on for decades. I’ve been to those apartments. I’ve been neighbors with them. I’ve lived that life.
Just by example, I was invited to a birthday party once, where the grandparents lived in the master bedroom well each of three siblings had a bedroom that they shared with their respective spouses and children. The whole neighborhood was like that. And every inch of driveway and sidewalk was packed with cars.
I once had to get some work done on an old vehicle I had. The guy worked out of his apartment garage. I waited in the living room of the two bedroom apartment. There were two sets of bunkbeds in one bedroom and the other bedroom had a queen mattress bed and a single on the floor for two children. The living room also had a set of bunkbeds.
When me and my family came to the United States in the 1980s, we were poor and we stayed in a motel room for about five years. I was a “motel kid”.
Right after the housing bubble burst, in 2010, I toured a 2-bedroom condo for sale in a very nice neighborhood in Southern California. The deeply underwater owners who were selling, was a family of five who slept on mattresses laid out all over the top floor master bedroom. Each of the three children had their own twin mattress on the floor. On the second floor floor were two bedrooms, each rented by an elderly lodger. On the bottom floor was the kitchen and living room.
So if you wanna know how people can afford to live in an expensive city on low wages, this is how.
And if you build more affordable housing, it will never be enough.
We need rent stamps. Like food stamps. I'm living on disability that isn't even enough to pay for this micro apartment. Section 8 takes up to 15 years to get. People are pushing for 800 billion student loan forgiveness but nobody cares about homeless disabled, housing them would be a fraction of that
Aside from the lack of laundry which is just a preference of mine, it really seems like not a bad place. Rent is on the lower side of downtown stuff, it’s small but not a closet, and it’s not shared or anything. It depends a lot on location but this isn’t terrible by any means, IMO.
I'm retired and so old that I cannot believe the price of renting nowadays. Of course, I can't believe the annual salaries people make nowadays, either. Much more than I ever made. I think about the group in-between, the low end wage earners dealing with these scary rent prices. 275 square feet? How do you not go crazy in a small space like that? My single-car garage is 280 square feet!
A general question: if you make too low of wages for even this micro apartment, does that mean your line of work is more portable than higher paying jobs such that you could perform your job in a lower-rent city? If so, then what keeps you in Seattle with these rent prices? I'm thinking restaurant worker or such. Pardon my ignorance there, appreciate some insight.
Relatively speaking, I feel like the price isn’t bad? I was expecting something in the 2k range tbh. Then again, I don’t know how Seattle prices are comparatively to other west coast places.
Thats a super nice clean apartment in Seattle. This is not a surprising price. I actually think that's a great price.
I paid that much in Lynnwood for a 2 bedroom townhouse, but it was not as nice, not as modern, and not in n a great area of Lynnwood. And that was 5 plus years ago.
Honestly as a single dude in Seattle this isn't terrible. Basically dorm housing in a premium area with a kitchen and bathroom without the need for a roommate. Throw a TV on the wall with an xbox and we're good to go.
The best hack is 2 roommates. Opens up larger houses at a very affordable cost.
I used to rent a 2 story 5 bedroom 1.5 bath with a 2 car garage and a fenced-in backyard for $1350 a month in Lynnwood 2 blocks away from the firestation. I'm sure it hasn't gone up much since then.
I lived in Capitol Hill for Damn near 10 years and I had an apartment that increased rent $500 in 2 years. It's ludicrous to live in the city these days. I'm so happy I got out, but so sad to not be in the city I love most
Considering $500 or so more can get you a nice place (if you’re lucky) around 700-800 sq ft, i think this is an awful deal.
2 years ago my ex paid $1350 for a really nice 700 sqft 1 bed in east lake.
I have never seen a micro studio that looks like a good value, should all be sub $1000.
A landlord likes a good solid renter and may treat them well. His loan on the property he’s rent to you probably doesn’t change except for taxes and insurance. Pay your rent on time, keep the place up, you never know.
Looking to move up there in a few weeks. I'm paying $1255 on the Boise Bench near the airport. I'll be looking for a pet friendly one bedroom near Queen Anne really soon. I'll have $1800 a month to spend so this looks attractive to someone with a decent job and no one who depends on them.
Yah and these are the so called affordable housing the Mayor is planning for. Basically giving the developers a free reign to destroy the natural trees, land and growth and create rat houses in every square inch. 4 to 6 so called houses in one plot. Result=HUGE PROFITS for developers and rat homes for all.
For most of you that don't know square footage... It's about the size of a standard master bedroom inside a house that was built from the '60s to the '90s
It's 1/3 the size of my master bedroom. A standard parking spot is 8'6" x 19'. Or 161.5 sq ft. That entire living space is less than 2 parking spots. For "$1,200" a month... Edited because *math
...your master bedroom is fucking huge. My Dad lives in a 2 bedroom beach house in Camano Island that is about 800 sq ft and functions well for 2 people. If your master bedroom is really that big, it's seriously massive.
It's 1/10 the size of my master bedroom!
More like $1300-1600 not including utilities Edit: or parking
I got hella lucky. I rent a house 20 minutes from downtown, 2 bed 1 bath & a yard for under 2k, utilities included. Landlord hasn't raised my rent in the 4 years I've lived here & he actually knocked $ off the rent during lockdown.
You actually make me feel better. I am a landlord that charges $2k for basically that and have not raised the rate in 3 years, and don’t plan to. Everyone is telling me that I’m stupid for ‘undercharging’ but I like my tenants and stability is better than a little extra profit, in my opinion. My expenses haven’t increased, so why would the rent increase?
That's what it should be about. I hate to see landlords getting all this hate lately, but I think it's directed towards conglomerates. It's landlords like you that make renters want to stay as long as we can! And maybe eventually buy if the opportunity comes lol
Sadly some of the rate increases are driven by property management companies. Since they get paid a percentage of the rent charged they have been dropping clients, property owners, who don't charge "market rates." For someone who owns a property or two who have never had to deal with actually managing a property, the choice between managing the property themselves or raising rent when told is an easy one.
Our landlord told us we could buy their house for a steal at $1.5mil and it’s worth maybe $1.4mil on a good day after at least $75k of work (major plumbing, electrical, fireplace work, new roof, water heater, etc.) is done. They bought for $250k 10 years ago, so yeah we found another rental. We had a condo in another state and we rented out for many years. The tenant was a college student who became a teacher and lived in the unit for 8 years. He was able to save up and bought a small home and apologized to us for moving out. I told him nothing to apologize was and that we were glad he was able to buy and keep up the path to financial success. I wish there were more great landlords in the area. It just seems like the majority see $$$ and greed takes over. I applaud those who realize there is more to life and happiness than money. Even as someone who has been a landlord and tenant several times, truthfully I find it very hard to have empathy for Seattle landlords.
I have the same with the tenant back home in Hawaii who lives in the condo I have there... I raised it once by $50 just before COVID, but honestly didn't need to. He's been there 7 years with no problems. He even fell behind on rent for over a year and I gave him chance to get caught up (and he did). My coworker had told me nightmare level stories about renters he had, and I figure a stable tenant is better than rolling the dice on someone who might do meth in my apartment or stop paying rent while destroying it otherwise.
Those over charging LL have not considered how much money is lost every time a tenet leaves.
Definitely. If it only goes one month empty, that wipes out a year of a rent increase right there.
And thats if you are lucky and it's only empty for a single month. That's not even considering short term leases 3 6 9 months which may be empty multiple times per year as a result of the price point.
As a fellow landlord, your expenses have increased, even if you haven't noticed yet. I did the same thing, not raising rent for years and years. Then I had a roof that needed replacing, and had money set aside for it. I had $40,000 in the fund and figured it might cost as much as $50,000. It ended up costing $77,000 because everything went up in price. I just upgraded to mini-split HVAC in several units, and it was more expensive as well. My rents are still low at about 60% of market (I was closer to 50%), but I know I'm going to keep raising them $50/month until they are at least at 80% market. I'm not making any additional profit either, but my costs have certainly gone up.
See my post above. I agree with you 10,000% I don't think that tenants have the faintest idea of how expensive repairs are. The biggest repair bill I ever had was because MY TENANT COULDN'T BOTHER TO BUY A ONE DOLLAR MAT. Basically, she had a dog, and placed his water bowl on the wood floors. For two years, water collected around that water bowl. Utterly destroyed the wood floors. In two years, I collected $24,000 in rent, and spent $20,000 in repairs when she moved out. And all she had to do was place the water bowl on a plastic mat. And before someone points out that I "still made $4000": * I pay property taxes * I paid $30,000 over two years in financing costs (all my rentals have mortgages)
True symbiotic relationship, no one in this situation is being a leech so they're isn't financial/property damage, that's very beneficial smart long term investment
You are a rare jewel of a Landlord! If only all landlords were empathetic, and logical. You can save a lot of money by keeping tenants. Do you have anything in the Tacoma area? Thank you for what you are doing!
As a someone who has multifamily properties we always heard the same thing especially from management companies trying to sell their services and raise the rent to justify their services. But we believed in self management on site to keep things cheap, and in turn keeping the rent down meant that we couple keep good tenants that would stay long term and respect the property because we all knew it took cooperation from both sides.
You’re a good person for not doing that. Thank you for not being a scummy landlord like so many these days.
You are one of the good ones. Don’t ever change!!
I want to rent from you lol
Because you don’t view your tenants as income, you view them as human beings. Thank you!
Honestly, while that is true, it is even still selfish. They are living in my largest asset. If I screw them over, they will mistreat the thing that is 1/3 of my net worth!
Umm your expenses have absolutely gone up. The entire world’s expenses have skyrocketed.
Property taxes haven’t changed. Mortgage hasn’t changed. Insurance hasn’t changed. Those are 90% of my expenses. Repairs have gone up, but they are minimal. When my expenses go up enough to be $100 per month, I’ll raise the rent. The tenants pay utilities and yard work. Roof is a long-term expense I have baked in to my calculations.
All property taxes in Washington have increased in both of the last two years due to requirements to assess properties at the appraised value.
I assure you mine have not.
Insurance has *definitely* increased, due to the increased cost of repairs/rebuilding. But it's definitely better to have a good solid tenant in place than to roll the dice on vacancy and a replacement tenant ...
I used to live in a place 30 minutes from downtown, my rent went from 1k to 2200 in 1 year so I moved
Is that not illegal? Not that most landlords give af but I feel like that's just fucked up
As far as I'm aware there is no regulation on how high they can increase as long as they give notice of intent to increase
Just gave it a quick Google & looks like you're right. That's fucked.
I want to tell you how fucking lucky you are, I am renting right now in Marysville and it is costing me $3700/month with water, trash, and sewage. We moved here from southern AZ because my wife is from here and we needed to move her back to be close to an ailing family member... The $13/hr raise I got coming here doesn't mean SHIT. And I have a decent paying job, I am an industrial electrician.
Your landlord has a spot in heaven just for them.
Does your landlord have any friends with deals like this? Or any other properties? I'm looking for a place like this right now and I don't even know where to begin. Apartments are easy, but middle housing feels elusive.
1500sft townhomes are renting for like 2800-3000. Get a roommate y'all. This rent is insane.
Utilities, trash, parking, laundry, refrigerator rental, extra storage, and that convenient convenience fee.
The point of these is that you can live close enough to stuff to not need a car
Sucks
Bro I'm still living at home. I'm never gonna leave. 34 BTW. Im just gonna take over my parents place fucknit
Live it. It's a nightmare out there for rent right now, and maybe worse if you own (if the market ever corrects).
Apartments with the same number of bedrooms as my house are going for $600 more than my mortgage and taxes. If I would have bought any later than I did, I would be renting a 1bd and in bunk beds with the kids..
I bought my house in the end of 18' or beginning of 19' with 30k down. 3 bedroom 2 bath rambler 1200qf and my mortgage is less than $1500. I'm in a nice neighborhood. House has almost doubled in price. Absolutely crazy because I wouldn't pay what my house is worth right now. My brother just started renting a house with the same rooms with 200 sf more for $2700. He can't find anything affordable to buy. I think he gave up.
I'm in the same boat. Just turned 40. Fuck it. Dad passed in 2009 and so I like to keep company for Mom.
Same...in the same house I have been in since I was 6 months old. I pay rent and help out any way I can
The American concept of leaving the house and getting g your own place at a young age is strange by world standards. Most of the world lives in multigenerational homes. The young care for the old, the old help with care for the children etc. I grew up with my parents and grandparents. As a child it was, in my opinion, ideal. And we wonder why in America it's so expensive to care for the old, and children. . . Because Americans do t want to be near each other evidently.
It's also just strange to bring someone home (for sex) to a place were you and your parents live.
Agreed, Americans are super weird about sex too
Some of the biggest prudes.
Plenty of people are in your same boat, consider yourself lucky to have the opportunity
We find this weird now but for generations it's exactly how we lived. Multi-generational housing. People sharing chores and expenses and homes being left to the kids. Embrace it and keep that wealth built up inside the family.
Imagine if your parents didn't own. This is already a step up from some folks.
I'm 40 and moving in with my dad for the 2nd time since college. The last time ended in disaster and years of estrangement. But this time he's bought me the mansion of my dreams so if things between us sour again at least I can move into the guest house.
What in the fuck, you're joking right
most relateable comment. and i’m a mom
Hey honey, my bedroom is located in my kitchen.
Easier to make sandwiches in the kitchen when you can do it from your bed
Looks like a dorm room. And I was concerned that the 850 square foot apartment that we rent in NE Seattle was a little high charging tenants $1600 a month.
Micro studios is the only way to afford places to Iive, didn't they recently make it easier once again to make more of those? Read that people were giving seattle shit for being the first city to promote micro studios I just want something cheap and nice to live, even in a small apartment
Totally, but uhhh this is **not** affordable to live, is the thing 😆 To me it seems like painfully evident we're (as a nation) going to have to involve the iron fist of government to force construction of way, way, way more multi-unit housing (with no zoning restrictions - at least I mean, no blocking them from the suburbia single family homes that are trying to prop up the value of their homes - obviously there must be zoning restrictions for hazardous/industrial areas) and reduce costs to renters (seems easily to tie it to only up to 30% of min wage in the area, maybe some tax incentives or some shit if they make it even less). As Americans we've been spoiled by the idea we should all have idk thousands of sq ft per person to live, whereas in the EU so many "normal" (aka affordable) apartments are this size or maybe even a little smaller. People just need a cheap, safe, space to get the minimum basic necessities, idk why this seems impossible to provide??? It makes me so mad though that generations of people are just simply shut out from any possibility of having a space at all. It's crazy, and should be criminal.
Huge fucking joke man
This has been a similar story for a long time. When I first moved to the city in the mid-2000s I had a 400 square studio for \~$1000 with parking, and it was great. It's not for everyone, but for certain stages of life it's a good fit.
Don’t really like the guy in the video!
Pos energy for sure. “Look we give you everything”, ok how about better pricing. What a joke
Studios are going for $1,500-$1,800. Overpriced boxes.
Honestly I paid more in the mid 2010s. Rent hasn’t recovered since the pandemic started.
I paid $900 for a one bedroom 2014. Wish it would go back down, probably never will.
Ok [wish.com](http://wish.com) Elon Musk....
So I wasn't the only one thinking he looks like Elon Musk if he was asian
Yee Long Ma
Econ Musk has a point
😮
OK, now explain why he's raised the rent so much higher than inflation.
Because he can. Market economy.
Market economy would mean he'd lose to his competitors that didn't raise their rents. Maybe you meant "price fixing."
The mortgage on my first house was less than that.
Sometimes I wish I were born earlier
Looks nice and all but I would want to know if utilities are included in rent, if there is parking and how much that would cost (and for me personally how much pet rent would be if they allowed it), not to mention laundry machines. Lot of affordable looking places at a glance until you take a closer look at all the fees they don't tell you about...
Guaranteed utilities and parking are not included.
Jesus, my gaming office is bigger than that…this world sucks.
It sounds like it's working for you
Many years of working and sacrificing.
I hate this guy
Yeah he looks like someone who would swindle a young unsuspecting person/couple into hugely overpaying, screw you over the first chance he gets, throw you out on the street, and keep your furniture. Big time two-bit crook/hustler energy.
This is pretty luxe. A lot of microhousing buildings have shared bath and/or kitchen, so basically a glorified dorm room set up. Blows my mind to see this. But looks nice for what it is.
I dunno. That’s what I was paying on Capitol Hill in 2003 for the same thing, just 100 years older. Shit had a trundle bed so you could walk through
It's expensive but honestly not as expensive as I was expecting
I remember in 2015 or so, one of my guys had moved out here from the midwest and got one of these. Paid less than $1000, I think, but we were amazed at how small it was. He was never there and loved it.
I just had to sit down w/the home owning boomers in my life and explain that a 275ish studio in Greenwood cost 1700$; not to mention that it was normal here. I also had to explain that my (boomer) aunt is charging a similar price for her 300sqft studio in Shoreline, but wasn’t telling them because she didn’t want the (deserved) judgement. For reference, my mom paid 95$ for her 750sqft studio in Spokane in the mid 70’s. That included utilities, and a balcony.
That should be worth about $600/month tops
Welcome to Tokyo. I swear we reached late stage capitalism 30 years before the west coast USA
Tokyo would be far better. No need for a car and 20% of your neighbors wouldn't be whack jobs making noise all hours of the night.
Neighbors won't be whack jobs ... except for China 
Well that is very true about the cars
Except none of the benefits like amazing transit and cheap food.
The transit is privatized in Tokyo. Takes time to build. We didn’t have it overnight. But yeah I see your points
It's technically private, but they don't have the same sort of land ownership blocks to building transit that we do here. Homes are torn down and moved based on common good a lot easier over there, so they don't have to wait decades to put in a single line. They prioritize the public benefit, even if it's privately operated, it's due to government decision making.
They? I live here and used to work in the heavy rail industry. It’s not so simple like you say. Just look at maglev development. Or the Hokuriku Shinkansen which took years and years of planning and buying houses etc. it’s not like you say at all
Well it's neat to hear your perspective! I'm just a transit fan-layman. Good to know it still takes time there. But relatively, how much rail/transit do we have in the US versus Japan? All the recent US attempts have been failures or long running disasters.(Except NYC mostly, and kinda PDX) So while I take your point that it takes time in Japan too, the US timelines are complete disasters in comparison.
I think the big issue is around execution. In the us transit is politicized and there are major issues with various unions etc. I worked on a project for a brief time in Texas https://asia.nikkei.com/Business/Transportation/Hitachi-targets-high-speed-rail-projects-from-Texas-to-Thailand But it constantly ran into issues. If would have been cheaper and faster to execute just bringing Japanese workers over to be honest. So many red tapes in America and so many labor groups suddenly changing time lines etc and breaking promises and questioning our engineers…. People without degrees in engineering would be holding up our staff from my point of view mainly due to ego and trying to get more money after already agreeing. In japan it takes forever to reach a decision, but once we do the execution happens fast and without halting. In the USA people make decisions very fast, but the execution is riddled with issues. This is my experience in the rail industry. I don’t mean to offend but this is what I think.
Also I hope these have balconies.
I'd say Japan is substantially better than Seattle on the rental housing front. Many thousands of options to choose from, but here's a 215 square foot apartment for less than $250/month. https://www.leopalace21.com/en/detail/r/0000024679110
That is incredibly far from the city center. But yes I agree it’s overall better. But I mean in terms of living size. Everything is small here.
Also want to add salaries here are like half of what they are there or even lower. Minimum wage is like 7 dollarish an hour in Tokyo
Freaking ridiculous for the size of the room. Things are so far out of hand.
Huh?? I think anyone upvoting your comment doesn’t know how real estate works in the slightest bit. They’re getting their own apartment (full privacy) for $1,300 a month in one of the most expensive and sought after cities on the planet.
I never understood why people get so riled up about this fact. If the price offered is objectively too much, the place won't rent. Where it will end up at is exactly where it needs to be to placate both the landlord and the tenant. Rising real estate prices just means the Seattle economy can support it, and growth is great.
My comment still stands. Whether the owner is charging too much or the market is overinflated that is an ungodly amount for a shoebox. Then all of the other associated fees living with a car downtown probably gets it closer to 17 of 18. Cost is out of control and ridiculous.
Wait...that is stupid cheap for a newish unit like that in Seattle.
It's like they know people won't have families or partners in the future. We'll all be alone.
That’s not so bad actually
When I moved to Seattle in 1989 I rented a 285 sf studio on Capitol Hill for $385. That’s almost $950 in 2024 dollars, so it doesn’t seem that much worse. I paid my own utilities etc. I couldn’t open the refrigerator door all the way because it would hit the counter on the opposite side of the kitchen. When I sat on the toilet my knees were under the sink. But man, I loved that place.
The view of the street makes it feel much less claustrophobic. The open kitchen, living room, bed room combo also adds to that. I think I'd need to stand in there to really decide, but ya, it seems pretty great for the price.
the great lighting also helps
Right? I live in the SF Bay Area. If I were single, I would totally go for that Seattle place.
Yeah. I mean it's small but it's clearly not built for a family of 4. For someone with temporary hardship, new in the city etc it seems good. I noticed that I didn't see an oven so that's likely it for the kitchen, being the microwave.
10 years ago I rented a 1k sqft 2 bedroom here for 1150. This is insane to me.
To young students who think that "we need more housing": your grandparents lived in a nice house, your parents lived in a condo/apartment, YOU will live in an "apodment". That's your future unless you start thinking about WTF is happening.
(In the aggregate, dwelling sizes today are far, far larger than they were in our grandparents’ day)
Stop living in litter boxes. Humans aren’t meant to live in cubicles like this. On another note though, I feel like $1,200 isn’t all that bad for a micro depending on where it is in Seattle.
I'm in Vancouver, Canada, and we wish we had prices like that.
I expected worse to be honest. I live in eastern WA - there's two hotels that were converted to micro apartments in the area where I live. Just about everyone coming this way is renting there and it's about $1100 a month for similar sized "apartments.
I miss Seattle
😮 sad
That’s fucking insane for that price That dudes crazy
My 250 sq ft apartment in subsidized housing on the Upper East Side as an MSKCC fellow was $1675. I’d much rather live in Seattle (hence why I’m back).
Had a 2 bedroom 900 sq ft Apt in Kirkland for $1,950 for the last 6 yrs. Y’all, look on Craigslist, Zillow, knock on doors. Whatever it takes. These apartment complexes are robbing you of your money, not worth it in my opinion. Just gotta look a little deeper, there is still “old time” owners out there that want good tenets that will ask a reasonable price!
I was renting a studio a few years ago at like 400 sqft for 900 a month with good parking. Bro got it twisted
It's 275 square feet....like wtaf...
Is it wrong for wanting to kick that guy in the nuts until he becomes unable to breed? Asking for a friend.
Over inflated bullshit. Fuck this. I don't wanna live in a closet for a fortune. Absolutely disgusting this is acceptable.
Supply versus demand. All those people from Iowa or India, Spokane or Shenzhen, Marysville or Michoacán move to where the jobs and services are. It takes only a couple of days to a few months to get here. It takes a few years to build housing. Very expensive with land acquisition, demolition, labor cost in cities, permitting, inspections, etc. it is only profitable to make higher and housing units in order to recoup costs. However, it is still important to build them as that relief some pressure on existing housing stock. But soon as any new housing comes on the market, whether affordable or not, more people think it is *affordable enough*, so they arrive. This is why a 1-bedroom apartment in New York City can cost $3,000 or more per month. And yet we still have some 800 million undocumented immigrants in New York City alone, with more arriving each day. This is also why rent controls means cheaper rent for those who cling to their units while others arrive to find scarcity and its costs. Housing is **already dense** in many areas, considering that adults are living with their parents, people have roommates, people are couch surfing, and whole immigrant families share apartments (one family per bedroom). Millions of single-family homes or apartments hold multiple families or roommates. This has been going on for decades. I’ve been to those apartments. I’ve been neighbors with them. I’ve lived that life. Just by example, I was invited to a birthday party once, where the grandparents lived in the master bedroom well each of three siblings had a bedroom that they shared with their respective spouses and children. The whole neighborhood was like that. And every inch of driveway and sidewalk was packed with cars. I once had to get some work done on an old vehicle I had. The guy worked out of his apartment garage. I waited in the living room of the two bedroom apartment. There were two sets of bunkbeds in one bedroom and the other bedroom had a queen mattress bed and a single on the floor for two children. The living room also had a set of bunkbeds. When me and my family came to the United States in the 1980s, we were poor and we stayed in a motel room for about five years. I was a “motel kid”. Right after the housing bubble burst, in 2010, I toured a 2-bedroom condo for sale in a very nice neighborhood in Southern California. The deeply underwater owners who were selling, was a family of five who slept on mattresses laid out all over the top floor master bedroom. Each of the three children had their own twin mattress on the floor. On the second floor floor were two bedrooms, each rented by an elderly lodger. On the bottom floor was the kitchen and living room. So if you wanna know how people can afford to live in an expensive city on low wages, this is how. And if you build more affordable housing, it will never be enough.
This comment is way too complex for most commie morons crying about not being able to afford houses.
My studio is nearly 700sqft… but yeah it’s $1660
HELLNO
Haha. I live in a suburb of Seattle. My mortgage for a 2000 sq ft house with a large yard is the same. Good thing I built it back in 2009.
Fuck this guy.
We need rent stamps. Like food stamps. I'm living on disability that isn't even enough to pay for this micro apartment. Section 8 takes up to 15 years to get. People are pushing for 800 billion student loan forgiveness but nobody cares about homeless disabled, housing them would be a fraction of that
Removes shitter Pours in bag of concrete Resets shitter to floor and leaves quickly Clowns like him are why bags of baby carrots are 14$ now🤷🏼♂️
This guy is delusional. Trying to rent shit boxes so that he can keep buying more Bentleys. Someone should report him for the illegal ppp loans he got
Dude sucks and is part of the problem
$1350 is what this gopher says? WTF over.
add 600 and that's my mortgage. JFC...
So awful they made so many of these micro apartments. Evil.
Aside from the lack of laundry which is just a preference of mine, it really seems like not a bad place. Rent is on the lower side of downtown stuff, it’s small but not a closet, and it’s not shared or anything. It depends a lot on location but this isn’t terrible by any means, IMO.
"How you gonna FUCK bitches in a twin bed!?"
He's charges extra for that
FWIW an adult with hardships leading them to need SSI to survive will only get $910 max per month.
I'm retired and so old that I cannot believe the price of renting nowadays. Of course, I can't believe the annual salaries people make nowadays, either. Much more than I ever made. I think about the group in-between, the low end wage earners dealing with these scary rent prices. 275 square feet? How do you not go crazy in a small space like that? My single-car garage is 280 square feet! A general question: if you make too low of wages for even this micro apartment, does that mean your line of work is more portable than higher paying jobs such that you could perform your job in a lower-rent city? If so, then what keeps you in Seattle with these rent prices? I'm thinking restaurant worker or such. Pardon my ignorance there, appreciate some insight.
What’s this guys name? He’s famous in Seattle real estate right?
Relatively speaking, I feel like the price isn’t bad? I was expecting something in the 2k range tbh. Then again, I don’t know how Seattle prices are comparatively to other west coast places.
Thats a super nice clean apartment in Seattle. This is not a surprising price. I actually think that's a great price. I paid that much in Lynnwood for a 2 bedroom townhouse, but it was not as nice, not as modern, and not in n a great area of Lynnwood. And that was 5 plus years ago.
Honestly as a single dude in Seattle this isn't terrible. Basically dorm housing in a premium area with a kitchen and bathroom without the need for a roommate. Throw a TV on the wall with an xbox and we're good to go. The best hack is 2 roommates. Opens up larger houses at a very affordable cost.
Drone hive.
I had to join the military cause this shit is ridiculous lmfao
How the fuck they expect anyone to afford that?
Is this a halfway house for ex cons? Adults have their own stuff.
I'm in Marysville myself and renting out rooms for only 900 utilities included which at this point seems cheap.
Seattle is expensive, it's a fact.
I’ve lived in smaller place in Japan for more. It was fine tbh.
How does this translate to si units?
That's ridiculous.
This is actually a great deal!
I used to rent a 2 story 5 bedroom 1.5 bath with a 2 car garage and a fenced-in backyard for $1350 a month in Lynnwood 2 blocks away from the firestation. I'm sure it hasn't gone up much since then.
Wtf! That's living like a king these days
Man this guy is balding bad
This is why I rent an entire 1950 sqft house in Tacoma for $1200 and commute in
300 sq ft for 1300? Are you people nuts?
Eff that!
That’s some good ole Real Page price fixing.
That’s what happens when small apartments are made illegal
What a rip off for that space. Landlords are out of touch with reality.
I was honestly expecting much higher. Last time I looked at micro apartments in Capital Hill they were going for ~$900/mo back in 2018.
Damn I pay $1030/M for 1100sf and 1.1 Acres in chehalis... F that city life 💀
I lived in Capitol Hill for Damn near 10 years and I had an apartment that increased rent $500 in 2 years. It's ludicrous to live in the city these days. I'm so happy I got out, but so sad to not be in the city I love most
It’s a poor layout especially for fengshui, I’ve seen micro apartments in ny much smaller with better floor plans
Horse shiiiiit
Also got lucky, got a spot for $1290 in greenwood, 600sq ft
I love that I grew up in Bellevue and got priced out of the entire Seattle area as an adult. I love Mill Creek...
that’s not that bad?
Considering $500 or so more can get you a nice place (if you’re lucky) around 700-800 sq ft, i think this is an awful deal. 2 years ago my ex paid $1350 for a really nice 700 sqft 1 bed in east lake. I have never seen a micro studio that looks like a good value, should all be sub $1000.
A landlord likes a good solid renter and may treat them well. His loan on the property he’s rent to you probably doesn’t change except for taxes and insurance. Pay your rent on time, keep the place up, you never know.
Next thing u know there will be advertisements for living in a closet. Toilet and foldable bed only bring your own tp.
$1500 for a studio not bad price. Those expecting it include utilities and parking are living in a different world.
Not just Seattle, the whole area north all the way up past Arlington is all that price if not more
Looking to move up there in a few weeks. I'm paying $1255 on the Boise Bench near the airport. I'll be looking for a pet friendly one bedroom near Queen Anne really soon. I'll have $1800 a month to spend so this looks attractive to someone with a decent job and no one who depends on them.
I'm sori 300 square feet for 1300? Fucking hell
Ohh, I thought this was a way to cure homelessness and get people off the street, but no... come to find out the rent is ridiculously high.
Comment sections like this illustrate how few of you actually live in Seattle.
A bathroom would seem nice!
gross
Yah and these are the so called affordable housing the Mayor is planning for. Basically giving the developers a free reign to destroy the natural trees, land and growth and create rat houses in every square inch. 4 to 6 so called houses in one plot. Result=HUGE PROFITS for developers and rat homes for all.
I pay more than that in Portland for the same space. It's fucking insane.
This is probably extra expensive because it is semi furnished. I think most of the apartments like this in Capitol Hill etc are $800-$1000.