Posted on 12/25/2005 9:40:02 PM PST by MinorityRepublican
I was also in Boise last July. The town is huge compared to what it was just 15 years ago. All the prices for the nice newer homes, like suburbs of Eagle, which is just west of Boise are running at half a million and up.
I honestly don't know how those jobs there are supporting that, as the wages in Idaho are some of the lowest in the nation.
We (sister and I) were saying the same thing on my last visit to the pan handle this past summer. They're (sister and bro-in-law) are only up there via retirement. Their property value has increased almost 50% since they got there.
A good friend of ours lives in Boise. I was last there in 2001. She lives in the foothills on the way to Bogus Basin. Those too, I understand, have gone up like crazy. She said if she had to do it all over again, she'd be living in a place a fraction of the size she's in now.
It seems that no matter where you are (at least in the West), if you don't jump in on a house when the "gettin's good," you either a) can't afford it, or b) can't afford to move out of your existing house, and stay in the area.
Something is not right.
We were really blown away in the Boise Eagle area. Have friends up there and even they didn't know how people working in the Boise area could afford the home prices. They told us if you can make $15. an hour in Boise your doing pretty good. Yet most all the nicer homes there are now going for anywhere between $375,000 and $700,000. We went and looked. It was amazing. We saw some nice homes for about half a million, but no way I could work there for what the wages are in Idaho, and afford those prices.
Wait'll they get their first tax and utility bills. They better come with snowblowers, plows on their pickups and heavy winter clothes. They don't have caribou in the northern part of the state for no reason! If they came for the fresh air - they'll enjoy the summer grass burning by the Indian tribes and the grass farmers (cough cough) while they tell the locals NOT to use their woodstoves in the winter so the air quality is improved.
The company I used to work for had a collector who told me a sizeable portion of the newbies to Phoenix ended up abandoning their homes and taking root elsewhere. We moved to be closer to our children. In hindsight, glad we moved when we did.
I've lived her for 12 years and I've never had problems with batteries. In fact, the truck I traded back in August had a 5 year battery that was 7 years old and still going strong.
It might be because I...
1 -- don't buy cheap batteries from WalMart or AutoZone and
2 -- I actually maintain the batteries in my vehicles.
Even at "professional" wages, those kind of prices on a house doesn't come easy.
A lot of people are like me these days. I work from home for a company in Chicago. All I need are a couple of computers and an internet connection. I don't have a commute, so I'm not really contributing to the air polution. I only drove about 2500 miles in 2005.
That's fine for the wealthy that move in from out of state. But what about the majority that live and actually work in Idaho? Idaho has some of the lowest wages in the country. We saw homes we wouldn't even consider, in cookie cutter, track neighborhoods for 385k.
I don't think the locals are buying those. There is a large HP facility near Eagle and I know of lot of HP people live and can afford those.
We talked with people that worked for HP in Boise. Most are paid little, and they weren't happy at all. There was even a write up in the paper about the low wages HP was paying.
What do they consider low wage. I know a lot of people that work there and they are paid pretty well, over 100K. These are engineers and managers.
Nope sorry. You can have some of them now. They've overrun NC, and still they show up. If you do happen to figure out how to get rid of them though, please let us know..
My brother just moved to Raleigh-Durham, I can give you his address so you can let him know how you feel ;)
According to Wikipedia, Idaho is 14% Mormon.
Look, it's a known fact that Idaho has some of the lowest wages in the country. We spoke with quite a few people, all said the exact same thing.
I wasn't arguing low wage, I was just saying people from out of state are buying up the new/expensive homes in Meridian/Eagle/Boise.
That's what this thread was originally about, people moving to Idaho.
There are about 3500 people working at the HP facility.
You notice from the article that Nevada and Arizona are number one and two. Everyone fleeing from California, as we did!
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.