Photo credit: Getty Images
You almost certainly know that we have been on the forefront of calling out the rental crisis in Arizona. Scottsdale is now in the top 10 nationally when it comes to rent increases with no sign of abatement. While it is easy to look at numbers and percentages and marvel from an academic perspective, when you look at real life stories of the impact that this has been having, it makes this crisis very real.
This is why when we came across this story, we absolutely had to share; it details the unfortunate story of a man whose rent increased $826 a month above what it had been previously, a jump of 34% with next-to-no apparent warning. For nearly anyone who is not wealthy, an extra $826 a month to pay out just to live would range anywhere between a major imposition to entirely crippling.
We can point fingers at the complex, the management company, the landlords, whomever we choose. But we should also be honest to ourselves and others about this crisis; for every person whose devastating story hits the wire, there are dozens, hundreds, perhaps even thousands others locally who didn’t have the luxury of their story being told. Countless others who must deal with this crisis in silence, who don’t have an advocate to help.
That is the true story when it comes to the rental crisis in Arizona: the thousands who suffer in silence, the families uprooted, the dreams dashed, the quality of life evaporating. This is why it is not simply an issue or a problem; it is a full blown crisis.
So what can we do? If you’re a regular reader, you know what we believe: that we absolutely must increase the supply of housing in order to help drive down costs. It’s Economics 101, the supply/demand curve. We must not let perfect be the enemy of good insofar as building standards go. We must build.
Until then, we must keep highlighting these individual stories of suffering at the hands of NIMBYism. Without real human stories, it is purely an academic exercise. The stories of people like Mr. Moloi, highlighted in this story, are what put a much-needed human face on this problem.
We hope that you internalize stories like this, that you do your best to empathize with the actual suffering caused by our area’s policies. And when you come to the conclusion that this should not be acceptable in such an otherwise fantastic place, to push your elected leaders to rectify this the best way possible: by increasing supply.