I got into a discussion on the increasing cost of housing and a colleague shared this video:
For $650 would you stay in this place?
For me, that’s a “hell, yeah!” it looks like fun!
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$650 in Midtown?
That’s a ‘hell, yeah’ from me, too.
Oh to be young in New York…
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This is cute and everything but does this place pass any kind of fire safety standards? That “upstairs” bed feels like a perfect smoke trap… Hope she has an alarm at least …
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Something that looks like a fire alarm shows up around 3m30s. So, not 100% a death trap. Anyway, no windows, tiny corridors, nothing that looks like emergency lights…I don’t want to imagine what happens in case of fire, so 90% death trap.
Back to the question, I may live in that place but not under that arrangement. It seems the landlord converted the living room of that flat into another “individual room”. So, charging the rent for original number of rooms + 1. With the shared bathroom, it’s like living in a shared flat with roomies. So, this arrangement is living cramped in a tiny room, no living room or real kitchen and still having to live roomies. Most of the downsides and none of the upsides of sharing a flat. I’d just go for the full roomies experience and enjoy the full flat instead. Price is not that different.
PS. there should be a ticking timer for that. Have a goal, work hard, accomplish the goal, get the f*** out of there.
Location, location, location!
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I’ve been living in 14 sqm studio (with own shower), comfortably. Once I moved to “regular” size apartment is short time I acquired tons of useless stuff which didn’t make me happier.
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I’d quite like to have just a base in the middle of manhattan. I’d just sleep/rest/chill there but spend the rest of my time elsewhere.
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What you’re looking for is a rent stabilised apartment like Cindy Lauper’s, right between central park and the Hudson river. For less than thousand bucks like she used to have that 4-room apartment for.
I couldn’t help but empathize with young people with low income that have to do this due to lack of options. Like the young woman in the video, it’s a strategy to move forward.
Well, it is also fun. As fun any risky and enjoyable activity, but no as daily life. So, it’s fun if you want to, not if you need to.
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@Roxi 20 years ago.
Here’s a twist on living in tiny spaces - this time a village of tiny houses as a strategy for aging:
https://www.nytimes.com/2025/08/07/well/eleven-women-nine-dogs-not-much-drama-and-no-guys.html
“Eleven women live at The Bird’s Nest, a tiny-house village in East Texas, a remote spot where the hay bales look as big as school buses and roads have numbers instead of names. The women, nine of whom are retired and range in age from about 60 to 80 years old, share the explicit goal of keeping one another company into old age, possibly until death.”
I’ve always liked the idea of ‘golden girl-ing’ it when the time comes. Beats being warehoused in an uber-expensive Altersheim. The idea of tiny houses set up on a property, rather than sharing a larger home, is an interesting one.
(If behind a paywall, apologies. NYT should allow a limited number of free reads per month, though.)
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Feusisberg in Ausserschwyz, most thought of for it’s low taxes and high housing prices, is doing something different:
The Gemeinde is looking into a plan to develop a 6300m2 farm land parcel into a mixed generation affordable neighborhood. 70% of the housing units will be barrier free units that would appeal to seniors, 30% will be lower cost housing to bring in younger families with children. Amenities such as a child care facility, a bakery/cafe, a senior center or Spitex point, as well as green spaces to share, would be incorporated into the development. The aim is to create a livable neighborhood for all.
The development will require zoning change, so lots of hoops to jump through before this gets going.
I love the initiative. Feusisberg used to be a farming village with a real community feel. Then prices exploded, it seemed luxury housing was all that was being built, and the village morphed into a Zürich dormitory suburb. Developments such as this are much needed to bring a sustainable way of living back to the village.
Switzerland desperately needs more housing - but we need to build with ‘community creating’ in mind. I’d love to see this kind of neighborhood become the norm for new builds.
Really hope this project gets the green-light.
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Expats and CxOs (and their partners) rarely join the fire-brigade or one of the other social functions needed as a fabric for society…
AFAIK, Monaco has had subsidized housing for low-income staff for a long time because waiters and cleaners aren’t going to rent 20k/month apartments.
Living with kids in the community, where 70% of neighbours are (Swiss) seniors? Thanks, but no thanks.
Had to look up what a CXO is “A chief experience officer (CXO) is an executive in the C-suite who ensures positive interactions with an organization’s customers.” Doesn’t seem that the message is getting through to designers of automated telephone enquiry lines,
My fire brigade story goes back to when we lived in Schönenbuch. Beautiful surroundings and a financial advantage if one joined the FB. My lack of German meant I nodded most of the time which resulted in my volounteering for the special ops unit. So next meeting, I get fitted up with an oxygen tank and told to crawl through the civil-defense tunnels. I had forgotten to mention that I suffer from claustrophobia. I made it, was all happy and then totally deflated when the instructor looked at my oxygen level in the tank. Silver lining in failure. The troop decided to dispense with my services, but I did not have to pay anymore.
I read CxO as umbrella term for CTO, CFO, CEO, etc aka top management.
and vice versa.
Seriously, it has never been the children that drove me up the walls but their parents. Mothers that loudly cackle on and on, giving neither the child nor the environment a moment of peace. Others just setting them out the door, putting their children on these cheap 19.99 frank plastic toys with hard plastic wheels letting them rattle back and forth for hours as if the declared goal was to have them brain dead before school starts. Would they shake these little heads by hand like tat they would get reported.
I see all these 80 year old wear headphones or are they expected to be deaf anyway?
But I know what you mean, Meloncollie, it would just need to be thought through very well.
My first house was in a town going through it’s ‘newly wed or nearly dead’ phase of the population cycle. The generation split was probably similar, maybe 40% the families on the street were young, 60% were were seniors.
I loved that neighborhood. The mix of generations was what made the community something special. The young folks brought energy, the older folks brought experience, we helped each other out - and developed strong friendships. A great vibe that would have not been possible if the neighborhood was heavily skewed to one generation or the other.
Now I’m ancient old crone. The houses in our Quartier are starting to turn over, young families are moving in - and I love it. Kinder sind Zukunftsmusik. Living in a place with a palpable ‘Zukunft’ might just keep my outlook younger.
I see real benefit to all in a mixed generation neighborhood. Circle of life, and all that.
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Our “elderly” neighbourhood is also newly acquiring kids. We jokingly call them “the terrorists,” and it is a delight to see little Oscar learn to ride a bike on our safe kinder-friendly lane with a very strict speed limit.
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Ha, I live near a Migros and the window of my home office is above a children playground. Lots of people every day. Mothers, fathers and their children are white noise that allow me to work. When they’re gone in the evening, I use music to shut up my wandering mind and focus on work.