I designed my dream log home, made the drawings, supervised every detail of its construction, and lived in it with my husband for 13 years until he passed away. During that time, we added naturalized landscaping, terraced vegetable gardens, and a large barn for the boy-toys. Log homes require constant maintenance. Particularly when they’re large with three levels. Then there’s the 200 feet of beach and 2 ½ acres of sloped woods. I can no longer maintain this alone. Especially feeding the hungry mouths of the wood stoves all winter.
I was not quite homeless, but there was a time, just after high school, when I was trying to be independent when I was largely living out of my car. I did this only because it was more convenient, but I wasn’t sleeping there. I was attending the local university and did not want to live at home, on the farm in the country. Before I had a car, I had had a job with a family with two little boys. Both parents worked and they needed child care at odd times of the day. They had only one car, but their work schedules did not mesh. I ended up being their driver and child care provider in the odd hours. I slept in a bed in a corner of their basement. It was a successful arrangement for all of us.
I’ve been playing the Powerball and Mega Millions the last few weeks: prizes are up near half a billion dollars, and the daydreams of how I would spend that money on my morning commute are well-worth the price of a ticket. The opportunity to spread random acts of kindness alongside organized philanthropy comprises most of these fantasies. A recent configuration involves giving cash offers to buy local houses at near asking price, and then selling them back at their true value to families who can’t match the inflated market or AirBnB offers.
For example, my family just paid over $300,000 for a home that, 2 years ago, would go for about $175,000, and it really isn’t worth much more than that, but we were desperate after a year-long fruitless search.
In this scenario, the imagined organization would buy the house for 300 grand, then turn and list it for 175. Now, this lottery–fueled fantasy means that my millions invested would be covering my losses quicker than I could buy houses, but, at the same time, it has me thinking about the possibility of those that have the means or the know-how coming together to create such an organization. Do we have regional community members who would be interested in some ideation of this (naive) plan? Are there government resources to help fund the gaps between purchasing and selling costs of each property? Even if this group purchased (or flipped) 2 houses per year, could families enter a lottery for the chance to buy them at the true assessed value? I mean, just in case I don’t win the lottery tonight.
Editor’s note: This was originally published by Adirondack Center for Writing as part of ANCA’s Dreaming of Home project. The prompt: Do you have ideas about programs or practices that might work to mitigate the housing crisis in the Adirondacks? Think as big or as small as you like.
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Responding to the housing crisis: Thinking BIG
By Melissa Butler
I’ve been playing the Powerball and Mega Millions the last few weeks: prizes are up near half a billion dollars, and the daydreams of how I would spend that money on my morning commute are well-worth the price of a ticket. The opportunity to spread random acts of kindness alongside organized philanthropy comprises most of these fantasies. A recent configuration involves giving cash offers to buy local houses at near asking price, and then selling them back at their true value to families who can’t match the inflated market or AirBnB offers.
For example, my family just paid over $300,000 for a home that, 2 years ago, would go for about $175,000, and it really isn’t worth much more than that, but we were desperate after a year-long fruitless search.
In this scenario, the imagined organization would buy the house for 300 grand, then turn and list it for 175. Now, this lottery–fueled fantasy means that my millions invested would be covering my losses quicker than I could buy houses, but, at the same time, it has me thinking about the possibility of those that have the means or the know-how coming together to create such an organization. Do we have regional community members who would be interested in some ideation of this (naive) plan? Are there government resources to help fund the gaps between purchasing and selling costs of each property? Even if this group purchased (or flipped) 2 houses per year, could families enter a lottery for the chance to buy them at the true assessed value? I mean, just in case I don’t win the lottery tonight.
Editor’s note: This was originally published by Adirondack Center for Writing as part of ANCA’s Dreaming of Home project. The prompt: Do you have ideas about programs or practices that might work to mitigate the housing crisis in the Adirondacks? Think as big or as small as you like.