Michael Grant 0:00
Who’s the villain in the homeowner’s story? Well, it’s many. The first one is the lack of affordable housing. Secondly, restrictive zoning prevents a variety of housing types. restored or just restrictive zoning. Okay, we talked about that.
David Grubb 0:25
Industry Professionals, no training.
Michael Grant 0:28
Well, that is a problem. Lack of, of construction labor, of lack of trained or quality construction labor, to say you got codes as it relates to land use, I’m not talking about that I’m talking about codes as it relates to building system fordable pricing, qualifying for a house loan qualification to be able to create a mortgage. Proximity to work is an issue.
David Grubb 1:02
Well, maybe the internet will take care of some of that, but
Michael Grant 1:05
Well, it has taken care of a good bit of it. Another problem that directly impacts. Homeownership is the inability to qualify for a loan. And when you have too many roadblocks, you can often give up so makes them feel frustrated, feel and defeated. That is totally unnecessary. The globalist movement to have everyone. There’s a global smoothing that says you will own nothing, and nothing and you will be happy. I think that’s bullshit.
Okay, the great wealth created in the United States was hugely the consequence of stability, stability within our family structure, and stability for our basic needs for shelter, food, and safety, those things. And that was, housing was a huge part of that story.
That’s why when the GI bill was introduced to help these men and women returning from World War Two, to get into the housing that they could afford, was a huge benefit term to our overall GDP and financial growth of our country. There are lots of things that went on there.
Those look at when it’s we started to see a decline. The decline started in the 60s when our federal policies and legislation began to destroy the family as a consequence of entitlement programs, when the father was was the family was incentivized for the father to leave shirt when a woman could make more money or get more money from the government because she didn’t have a man of the house.
Therefore, he was not around. When I was with the big brother program, I had a little brother named Stevie, and Stevie’s mother Stevie’s dad was not present and his life for that reason they lived in government housing. And if she worked in an effort to better herself and her inner children, then her subsidies would be cut out.
So when she what she did to work was under the table she did worse rest, waitress work, cleaning houses doing things that were she wasn’t reporting and taxes and also plan. And then Stevie had brothers and sisters with different dads. And so no man was a permanent fixture in his life. As far as the parchment involved with the big brother program.
David Grubb 4:26
One thing is the American dream, don’t have your own home. You know, so does that diminish the American Dream that future Americans may not be able to afford or get or have?
Michael Grant 4:42
Well, you’re, you either are an owner or you’re a renter. And when you are a renter, the benefit of that is the owner is responsible for the maintenance and upkeep of that of your house and Unless, of course, you’re responsible for its destruction.
And at that point, you know that the need can get yourself in trouble. But your landlord wants you there because he’s making money off of you. Now, if you buy your own house, and you pay for it in a timely fashion, and you’ve got it paid for now you have shelter, that you, you’ve eliminated the necessity of mortgage payments or rent. You still have your upkeep and maintenance and taxes and so forth.
But you’re so much better off financially if you own your home, or homeownership is one of the tenants of the American dream. And absolutely, yes.
David Grubb 5:45
So is it the same as the real issue? core issue? Is it the ability to own a house? ability? Well, it’s
Michael Grant 5:56
no longer just that. It’s no longer just that because what’s happened in our country, and this is escalating, it’s not de-escalating, is adequate housing. And if you don’t think it’s an issue, you go to any major city and look at what’s going on. In some of the overpasses, where you have whole tent cities, under these overpasses was a very real issue.
David Grubb 6:29
So adequate, I mean, that word could mean many different things. And I guess to fully understand the scope of that word,
Michael Grant 6:39
let me make it pretty simple. It gets down to having shelter where you have heat in the winter, and cool in the summer, when you as you need it, you have adequate sanitation facilities, so that you can you yourself can be clean and you’re secure, you’re in a safe and secure shelter where you are not threatened by somebody invading your shelter?
David Grubb 7:08
Well, I kind of think it’s scalable as well. Because, you know, if you had a specific kind of job, would you need a different or if you had a larger family, but we looked at it from that direction, then you would need then your adequate changes, the requirements that for your home, is now different. So it may not be the same for every person.
Michael Grant 7:29
It will not be the same for everyone, but certainly a family where you’ve got.
David Grubb 7:36
But the underlying principles are still there. Right? Correct. Safety, security, sanitation, good sanitation, you know, space, you know, if you have a larger family, then you have enough adequate space, right, you know, for your shelter. So I think that’s a really good time to really kind of wrap-around what the root cause of what’s going on.
Because, because it is scalable. And that’s kind of nice to be in. That’s kind of the issue. So in the opposite direction, if you’re single, if you’re a single person, how in the world you’re ever going to be able to afford something? That’s, that’s adequate. Right? Because now adequate is actually it’s priced so much far beyond this
Michael Grant 8:21
kind of a point-counterpoint to that, when and the how are you going to afford it, you can afford it because you’re not supporting a family. You can afford it because it’s just you and you can live in a 500 square feet of space, if that’s your comfort level and have the the the security and the safety and sanitation that you need to live it.
David Grubb 8:47
Right. So now we’re talking about the size of the shelter, right? Well,
Michael Grant 8:51
again, that’s your scalable issue, right? You know, if it should if you’re just one person, you can have something smaller, but if you’ve got four children, you obviously are going to need some additional bedrooms.
David Grubb 9:01
So if you’re single, then it’s over adequate.
Michael Grant 9:05
Well, you know, that’s, that’s 2000
David Grubb 9:07
square foot home and that’s all that’s available, and you don’t need a 2000 square foot, then it’s over adequate. That is it’s not proceed because you can’t send adequate it’s, it’s inadequate, and it’s not in
Michael Grant 9:21
your words. It’s that’s good news. Good question that lets us what’s the word we want, when it’s excessive is the word it’s either adequate or sufficient?
David Grubb 9:33
Well, it becomes inadequate. It will become unaffordable.
Michael Grant 9:38
Well, it can depend on us and if that’s an income issue, but
David Grubb 9:42
what still qualifies is it be as being adequate or inadequate, right. So now, so yeah, will it fill your needs? Yes. Do you need that much space? No. Can you afford that much space? No. So maybe there’s another adjective to go with it. But I kind of feel like there’s no adequate shelter is is like the baseline?
Michael Grant 10:09
I thank you, if we, you know, that we ask the question, if you’re the listener, then you say, you know, you’ve got to have thought about what is the housing model that you wish to see that you see yourself in?
Not just for yourself, but should you have a family? What is the housing model that is ideal for your family? And if not ideal, which is adequate for your family? Your son is ideal, but I mean, you know, what is your ideal can be many different things.
Depends on your lifestyle considerations. You know, when I was single, and I lived in one half of a duplex, in Dallas, Texas, it had three bedrooms and two bathrooms and most living room and dining room kitchen. And it was more than I needed. But I lived in all of it.
You know, I had one of the bedrooms was my office and the other bedroom was the guest room. But it was a very comfortable house. And it looked good, and you know, all that stuff. But when you know, and now when I got married, and I certainly plan to have a family, that I knew that I needed a different kind of house.
David Grubb 11:35
And your adequate housing should be available for all sides, families, and individuals. And we define adequate housing as having security and good sanitation.
Michael Grant 11:46
adequate housing should be the, you know, I’m careful the word should, but does that mean, just because you have 10 children, and you decided not to work that that the housing should be available to you? No, it doesn’t work that way.
This is, you know, this is an issue of Are You Being responsible in your in the way that you’ve conducted your life to be able to have a home? Now, when you’ve been responsible, and the system is working against you, that’s a different issue. You know, that’s what we have going on today.
You just a lot of people out there, like my daughter and her husband who make a six-figure income, and they can’t afford to buy a house. Yeah, that’s nuts.
David Grubb 12:31
Well, you know, maybe it’s maybe available is the wrong word. You know, housing should be allowed.
Michael Grant 12:43
It is allowed.
David Grubb 12:45
You know, it’s, I was just thinking about what you said about the individual being able to afford something, and they should take responsibility for affording it. In that, in that regard. So, you know, we’re allowing them to do so or not we, but I mean, just us as a society, you know, allowing them to have the size of the home, that’s going to be adequate for them, instead of restricting them. So this goes back to all the regulations and zoning and things, you know, if the zoning says, Hey, you can’t build that little tiny home here.
Michael Grant 13:24
And your zoning restrictions are part of that, that says, Look this, this, this neighborhood is down for 2000 plus square foot homes. So you can’t build a 1200 square foot home in here. It’s not, it’s not going to protect and preserve the value of the other houses in here.
So you need to meet this minimum requirement. Okay, I personally think there lies part of the problem. Now, there’s been a lot of different housing developments, that have addressed a variety of housing models so that they appeal to a much broader mix of people.
So the 55 Plus community is a good example of how a demographic has been targeted for housing, but they restrict it in a way that doesn’t allow your grandchildren to live with you if they need to. If you’ve got your grandchildren, facilities, no, your grandchildren can’t come to you can’t live with you.
Because you’re in a 55 plus community, you may live independently. And you may be able to live independently for another 30 years or so. But your grandchildren are not going to be allowed to live with you.
David Grubb 14:36
And yours, you’ve seen all that I think about just the loss of freedom, quite simply,
Michael Grant 14:42
well, it is a loss of freedom because we’ve created these you know, we’ve created the exclusivity and we created enclaves and restricted neighborhoods and that’s, you know, there’s a portion of that that makes sense. But on the other hand, we’re at a Really interesting place in the culture of the United States where it doesn’t work anymore.
So, you know, there’s communities in the United States, that have now done away with the ban on ad use and ad use and auxiliary dwelling unit. an ADU might be that little casita or cottage that you put in your backyard is hooked up to your power and your sanitation, sewer grid, or septic grid and your water. But that’s where your mom lives. But she’s got her the pool house, she got her.
She’s got her privacy, yeah, and her semblance of her independence, that she’s there in your sightline for you to be of assistance to her as she may need it. Or it may be your adult child that just the job market is just not providing them the income level that they need to have the house in a more conventional setting on their own, but they want likewise, they want their independence and their privacy. So they’re in the little cottage in the back,
David Grubb 16:18
are we gonna rename the mother-in-law suite as the teenager in the basement suite or the man-child suite?
Michael Grant 16:28
You know, whether it’s the mother-in-law, Tim lounge or whatever you want to call it, I mean, it’s it’s but it’s addressing the same problem, you got this, this broad demographic of people’s, whether they’re single individuals, whether they’re Millennials or they’re getting ready to kick the bucket. Their living needs are very different.
David Grubb 16:49
Yeah, there’s no in-between.
Michael Grant 16:52
Not much of one there is there’s some there’s, there’s not much
David Grubb 16:55
there’s a real lack of flexibility in the marketplace.
Michael Grant 16:59
Well, there’s, there’s a housing model that allows for multi-generational living. And what that means is that the grandparents, the parents, the adult children, or the children, and if they have adult children, the grandchildren can share a house, that’s very cultural.
In many, many countries, it’s very cultural. In India, it’s very cultural in Mexico, it’s not unusual in a lot of the foreign countries, because they’ve always done that it’s it’s a huge part of the culture, part of the culture and comfort to those families to know that your child is going to be able to come home and relate to their grandparents on a daily basis. So that’s, that’s a, that’s a very different housing model.
We, you know, we see this in a huge variety of different cultural communities that are out there, then you have is another whole wave of housing as needed for people who have special needs. And I’m not talking, you know, I’m not talking about people who are necessarily debilitated in a functioning unfunctional way, although there’s certainly some of those.
But if you if you’ve got a child who has Down syndrome, or you have a child that has Asperger’s, or something that really requires that they have a little bit of help, you can design a housing model where they can, again, have their independence, and also their dependents when that’s required.
So that I think that we have to rethink, reconsider all this now you can do that in a standard family, single-family home. But there are other ways to make that that quality of life that that’s created by that need. Just better.
Yes. Look what happened to us over the past two years, when we were mandated to shelter in place. When we were restricted from gathering five or more people, you couldn’t even have your family over for Thanksgiving. What was the consequence of all that? Depression, depression, divorce, abuse. None of it was really good.
If you’d had a family, a multi-generational family, in one household, we had grandchildren, adult children, parents, grandparents, where you got the support that you need we need from your family.
You would have been much better off So more emotionally and spiritually and very likely financially. This is a good segue into talking about a huge trend that’s beginning to emerge called cohousing. cohousing may be where the grandparents and the parents come together to buy the house, or the grandparents, the parents, and the adult children buy the house.
And they share the expense of that house. So that they can live in a nice home. And each contributes to the expense of that in a way that doesn’t break someone. financially.
David Grubb 20:43
You know, I have 18-year-old son living in my basement. years, so there’s no real place for him to go. You know, he has, yes, money for college, and he may even get a scholarship. Get the Hope Scholarship. But you know, that doesn’t mean he has, I certainly don’t have any money to, to help him with college. So we know, so he has money for tuition, but there’s no money or housing.
Okay, so you had already told your story. I mean, you mentioned it in the previous statement, but you said you know your daughter. So they’re living in Atlanta, or no living around into Wilmington, SHAN there with renting. Now, the rent,
Michael Grant 21:41
and the rent is going up 30% 30
David Grubb 21:44
I felt like I bet barely met caught off. You know, I escaped from the corporate world and was able to buy a home, which I knew I never could do as an entrepreneur, as a business owner in my industry. I knew that the bank would never loan me money. So I got a full-time job.
And then, while I had a full-time job, I purchased a home. And by the time I signed the papers on the home, I quit my full-time job. I mean, I literally leveraged employment, to buy a home to be able to pursue the lifestyle I want
Michael Grant 22:17
to plan you planned, what do I need to do to meet the requirement for a mortgage? And once I met that requirement, when the mortgage institution was satisfied that I was going to pay for pay make my payments for my house, I then had the freedom to go do my own thing. With the understanding that I’d my obligation to the mortgage company was still the same, I had to make my payments. But I was no longer relevant, relegated to a full-time job.
David Grubb 22:56
I knew what I believe I can do as an income, but I had to choose a
Michael Grant 23:00
home. That was within your means.
David Grubb 23:03
Yeah, well, you know, in pretty much off the grid. That point, you know, and 15 years ago, you know, moving to Ellijay was was basically off the grid, I knew I would never be able to afford anything in the city. That that was
Michael Grant 23:18
the added expense of living in the city made that housing model for you and your family. unattainable. Right. Okay. So that’s why I was saying that
if he started looking at all the different types of, you know, we talked about neighborhoods or towns, cities, neighborhoods, villages, whatever you want to label it. They’re all have carved out a demographic that is suitable for that area. You know, whether it’s cultural or economic.
There are so many different ways that so many influences that will determine where you decide you’re going to live. So as you as we start, and I think our catchphrase is always going to be, how are you going to create shelter? Are you going to create this for yourself?
David Grubb 24:24
And or for your family and
Michael Grant 24:25
your family? Right? What are the decisions that you need to make to be able to get there?
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