Our landlords raised us $50 the day before Christmas.

I can't wait to hear the home-owner responses. "You should just BUY a house. Otherwise you're just throwing money away."I get sick of hearing that all the time. I make good money with very few bills but would still be strapped as hell to afford a decent house.

I manage a few buildings here in inner SE and rent-raise notices are going out in two weeks. Sorry guys. Hope you like Gresham.

Jim, You should just BUY a house. Otherwise you're just throwing money away.

Golly shucks, the transformation of PDX is just about complete. In less than a decade, we went from a town that had its own 'creative' class- artists, musicians, entrepenuers- putting cool shit together on a shoestring, if only because they loved what they did. AND, it could all be done on a blue-collar budget.
There's always been a steady stream of folks moving out here, to wit; the bridge across the Bering Strait, the Oregon Trail, etc. But, sheesh, folks,
now the latest surge seems to be a whole lot of soulless rich folks hell bent on living out some sort of hipster dream.
"Maybe if I move to Portland and pretend to like the rain, somebody will finally think I'm cool."
Yep.
Martin's comment about liking Gresham, although a bit of a stretch, isn't too far off the mark. Strangely, it is the chasing out of inner-SE and N/NE PDX of the locals of all stripes that has brought new life to 82nd AV.
You want a 24-hour city?
Come east and hang out, the affluent transplants that comprise the latest round of close-in, urban in-fill are a pretty dull crowd, we got the Tik-Tok, strip clubs o' plenty and all the other true-grit that has made PDX a cool and interesting place to live, regardless of what the rest of the nation is up to.

I don't know, Billyjack, I still don't venture east of--say--50th without a REALLY good reason. And most of the time that "really good reason" is because I'm looking for a good price on a pickup conopy or something.
For the most part, I've found (as an apartment manager) that most of the poeple that move out of their studios because of rising rents stay in the neighborhood; they just become roommate #4 in a 4-bedroom house.
Either that or they move back to Lansing, Michigan because their copy editor job didn't pan out and their part-time job at Starbucks didn't merit their StarSkills (tm).

We too got a rent increase notice back in November for January 2007 of $25 a month, but considering the steal this place is, it still would be way worth it considering the location (way inner NE) and size (1300 or so sq feet).

But we're moving in January anyway, so c'mon kids, it is line up time at the house!!!!! Hell if I'll give the address on here yet. I think the rent is way higher though for new tenants though...we've been here over 2.5 years.

Martin, I hate to say it, but I think you just proved Billyjack's point - Close-in eastside has been taken over by out-of-town hipsters. Meanwhile, locals have quietly been moving East and finding that we still have lots of great places to hang out and they're getting better all the time. I don't want to push the point because I'm not really looking forward to being chased out of another neighborhood when everyone finally realizes how cool it is. Have a great new year! We'll all be partying at the truck Canopy-orama.

$25/month? If you have a $600 or $700/mo apartment that's barely above inflation. You gotta figure taxes are going up on these places, too, as property values increase astronomically.

Sometimes it makes more sense to rent than to buy. In PDX right now, we're probably at the top of the market, so it's probably worth waiting. But given how fast the housing prices went up these last several years, if you could have afforded it, it was dumb not to buy. You could have sold and made big money or avoided paying even higher mortgages later. Either way.

But even my wife and I who make a decent living can't afford to buy a decent house in inner Portland. We live in the burbs, where even our house, bought for $150k 5 years ago is now worth $250k. But that wouldn't buy a dog house in Portland.

So don't buy, but maybe if you were worried about prices going up you should have leased. ;-)

If increases mean that my landlord is chasing off the assholes who come home at 2:30 a.m. and crank up their sound system, more power to him. He can raise it by $200 as far as I'm concerned if it means I don't have to live near 19 year old art students.