A young renter — who is also a member of the Boone Town Council — reflects on his and North Carolina’s affordable housing crisis.
By Dalton George
Beacon Media
It took a long time, and it was more money than I imagined spending, but I’m proud to say I’ve bought a house in my adopted hometown of Boone, N.C., where I serve on the Town Council.
Along the way, I’ve learned a lot about the meaning of having my own home. And I have gained a new window into this region’s and our state’s affordable housing crisis.
I was desperate to buy for a couple reasons: Running for office means that I have to commit to living within Boone’s six square miles as long as I serve.
Also, stability — and the promise that new development or skyrocketing rental rates won’t upend me — made me committed to finding a home of my own.
It was more difficult than I could have ever imagined. It’s a sellers market, as it long has been but fewer and fewer of those sellers are the types we may imagine. The market has shifted away from first-time and working class buyers to massive companies and the highest bidder.
I did manage to buy a house. It’s well-known because a man and his family that lived there was a staple of our town, known for his dry-cleaner business and unlimited kindness. When I try to explain to old timers where I live I usually resort to, “It’s X’s place!” (For his family and my privacy, I’m leaving his name out.)
No one fails to remember him. One lady remarked, “Oh, sweet X. His place was the only place I ever did any of my cleaning.”
In a sign of how things are going in North Carolina and this region, I didn’t buy from Mr. X’s family, but instead bought my house from an outside investor who registered it under a South Carolina LLC. They had every intention to make the home a rental, charging a boggling $2,500 or more a month — but for some reason those plans fell through.
They were pleasant to work with and I copped some discounts, but I still had to cough up a good sum of money. The irony is that if Mr. X was buying today, he’d have the same trouble I did, and Boone may have lost out on the man he was and the staple small business he provided.
I’m hardly the only one in this position. This housing crunch is felt by everyone, including vital public employees. Teachers, first responders, public works employees, and virtually every member of town staff have trouble finding an affordable home in our town limits, so they find themselves commuting in.
The stereotypes of officeholders exist for a reason, and the ongoing housing crisis is only making that worse. If the people who love these places can’t afford to live there, then our political leaders will look less like those they serve.
The cost of housing across North Carolina doesn’t just limit public employees and elected officials. It prevents new stories and characters, which is the soul of every place.
I will have to tighten my belt for the upcoming months and years. I don’t come from wealth, and I work for a nonprofit. The fact that I even made my humble starter home happen is nearly unheard of in our town, especially given my working-class background.
At one point I was so discouraged I remarked to a friend, “It feels like the place I love does not have a place for me to live.” And had this specific opportunity not come up, I may have found myself moving by the end of my term.
Not everyone is so lucky, and I wonder how many young leaders were displaced from these communities that are consistently under pressure and facing this housing crisis that the next generation of elected leaders can’t afford to live in the local communities they desire to lead.
I will not forget those folks, I will not forget the renters, and I won’t forget all of the young and working people in my town who want to be here long-term and are fighting every day to figure out how to make that work.
I’d be remiss if I didn’t point out that housing policy is often dominated by those that already own their homes. Many haven’t rented for years, and some approach the housing discussion more as an academic thought exercise than a crisis that needs to be solved.
Housing policy needs the General Assembly, and a federal government that works alongside local governments, to effectively address the housing crisis in their jurisdictions. It is by design that these branches of government try to shift the blame squarely on local governments, when in reality we have limited tools to address this crisis.
Let’s solve housing for everyone and elevate the stories of those who bust their tails to survive in the places they love.
