The Newest Trend In New York Real Estate: RVs?
First the upscale dumpster, then the significantly less upscale Bushwick bus, and now this story about New Yorkers gaming the system by living in RVs? It’s official. Living in vehicles is the newest way frontier in the collective lowering of standards we do everyday in order to continue living in New York.
From the LA Times‘ account of a Park Slope native now using a $5,000 1996 Gulf Stream as a way to stay in his now-unaffordable old neighborhood:
As the most expensive city in the country gets even pricier, Cintron and other New Yorkers are taking drastic steps to survive the most brutal real estate market in the United States. They are ditching sky-high rents and buying secondhand recreational vehicles.
“I’ve got everything,” said Cintron, a husky 34-year-old with a close-cropped beard and gold chain, as his fan and portable air conditioner whir. “I’m comfortable here.”
“It’s bad out here,” Cintron told the paper. “All the yuppies came in and that changed everything.” City law is murky enough on this that if you’re willing to commit, you can more or less get away with it, but then, there are obvious downsides such as instability and unreliable access to electricity. “The ladies aren’t really kicking down the door,” one St. Johns student (and current Dodge Minnie Winnie resident) told the paper. Still, better than dealing with roommates.
Follow Virginia K. Smith on Twitter @vksmith.
