The great housing effect

Pyro Faranda

April 4, 2024

Welcome to Oregon, a lush plant-filled state along the Pacific coast. It's a desirable place to live of course, and favored by many for its scenic beauty and historical significance. With over four million state citizens, it’s surprising that this place holds the title for the third highest homeless rate in the country, according to a new federal count of homeless individuals in 2023.

A multitude of families in this state suffer from the inability to purchase a home, or even then if affordable; the home is not suitable to be lived in. Some houses are old trailer homes which were not built to last and have grown mold and wet spots, others are homes that have no ventilation systems or hot water heaters, and even rental homes are in a bad condition.

“A lot of people say housing is hard in Oregon,” said Becky Watwood, a Century Agate Realtor in Oregon.

This housing crisis began in 2008,when the Great Recession struck the Pacific Northwest. “The net worth of US households and nonprofit organizations fell from a peak of approximately $69 trillion in 2007 to a trough of $55 trillion in 2009,” says Robert Rich, of the Federal Reserve Bank of Cleveland. 

According to a report by the Federal Reserve History, The root cause was excessive mortgage lending to borrowers who normally would not qualify for a home loan, which greatly increased risk to the lender. 

The problem was forced up and down by many factors such as lack of adequate housing, increasing population, rising home prices, low income, limited affordable housing, and a housing shortage that resulted from the economic downturn.

This brought about the time of where houses were not being built as employment rates were low. With this, there was also a time where the interest rates had dropped a severe amount, only ranging from 2-3% of income. 

On the other hand, American Progress said, “For more than 80 years, the federal government has supported mortgage lending through a variety of policies, programs, and institutions. This support has helped enable millions of middle-class and aspiring middle-class families to buy homes.” Despite this success, some Conservatives continue to question the relevance and effectiveness of long-standing government housing policies.

This had rattled the state, with both the number of homeless people, and the amount of people who would get sick from their homes accelerating at a rapid rate. Many families were paying the same price as a two bedroom, two bathroom house only to be living in a one bedroom trailer home which was likely to be infested with black mold from the amount of rain we gather all over the state.

Housing began to gradually return to its average state over the years, in its ups and downs of course. In a sad turn of events for the world, the Covid-19 pandemic had struck terribly and that set everybody back a couple of years to recover and develop wise. 

Brookings residents find it difficult to own their own property. It's a desirable town, so renters also have a hard time securing housing. With both of these issues combined, many residents believe Brookings should focus more on developing more rentals and houses so people can move to the area more easily.

Photo Credit: https://picryl.com/media/23-macys-lane-ef52ff