Occasionally a commenter will respond to my advocacy for universal single-payer not-for-profit health care by telling me that if I like socialism so much, I should move to Canada.
Evidently, I don't have to go that far north. A 45-minute drive up the Norwegian Boulevard takes me to Brookings, one of my favorite towns, where the city government runs all sorts of businesses. Utilities, booze, Edgebrook Golf Course, and now, rental property! KELO reports that the City of Brookings has bought two houses, for $149,900 and $172,500. The houses will be torn down to make way for an overpass if the DM&E starts running its coal trains through the city, but in the meantime, City Manager Jeff Weldon says Brookings might as well make some money, so the city will rent out those houses until bulldozers have to roll.
Side note: one rental property for sale here in Madison goes for $68,000. Even in bigger and swankier Brookings, $150–$170K must buy a pretty nice rental property.
Update 09:35: Brookings comrade Pat Powers comments that $172,500 seems a bit high to him, too. There is an interesting eminent domain angle to consider here. If government caused the house's value to sink by proposing an overpass int he nieghborhood, how much compensation does government owe that homeowner?
Comrade Cory:
ReplyDeleteWouldn't the city of Brookings have been better off if the homeowners were traded the Lake County Poor Farm for their property?
Dewayne Clarke just sold a two-story rental house on the corner northeast of the old Washington Grade School for $25,000 at public auction. That will certainly pay for itself with cash flow. Owning rental property is like having a second job and second income without all the extra hours or a normal job.
ReplyDeleteComrade! I'd take 9 acres at the lake over property in town any day.
ReplyDeleteRentals are great income. So how do you feel about city government competing in that market? Hmm... I wonder what the Madison housing study would tell us about the feasibility of the City of Madison buying rental properties to provide affordable housing....
Comrade Cory!
ReplyDeleteIt is not socialism in Brookings if the Republicans run it.
Which they do.
Comrade Todd
SD Watch http://www.southdakotawatch.net
They're called RINOs... Republicans In Name Only.
ReplyDelete