biglymonies t1_j98pmm5 wrote on February 20, 2023 at 2:43 AM

Reply to comment by OmniMegaGiraffe in What’s up with Bangor? by EmeraldMoose12

I've said it here before, but the "deluxe" apartments fill a large niche gap in the market in Bangor - high-earners who don't want to own a home in the area.

When I was living in Bangor, my options for rentals at the time were:

A couple of shitty crackdens on the low number streets for $600-700/m
New and Old Capehart apartments for $1,100-1,300/m
A single family home next to Broadway Park for $1,500/m
A "luxury" downtown apartment that I actually liked (with reserved parking!) for $2,500/m

I ended up picking the expensive place, which was a good thing for everyone in the area who was looking for a place to live at that time who also made less than or had a worse credit score/history than me. My neighbors were all physicians, business owners, or fellow tech people who also opted to live in that building over in other parts of town.

The sad part is, the "quality" of those "luxury" apartments is on par with units in other parts of the country that were going for 1/3 of the price.

Seyword t1_j98qg5n wrote on February 20, 2023 at 2:50 AM

$2500 a month to live in Bangor? 😬

biglymonies t1_j98ty2z wrote on February 20, 2023 at 3:19 AM

Yeah lol. We wanted to live near family for a bit before we moved back out of state. Neither of us are really in love with the area, so we figured getting a nicer apartment might make things more enjoyable for us.

I've lived in Bangor off and on since high school, and that apartment was definitely my favorite place I lived. It was newer, clean, didn't smell like cat piss, had central air, quiet upstairs neighbors, and reserved parking spots for us and guests.

The extra cost was definitely worth not having to deal with the stuff I went through at my previous Bangor rentals lol.

snackexchanger t1_j98uujf wrote on February 20, 2023 at 3:27 AM

I had a similar experience a couple years ago. I was renting a very nice, newly built, 600 sq ft apartment in Portland for $1800. Moving up to Bangor I was looking for something similar. Couldn’t find it. A comparable apartment within walking distance to work was $2,500/month and I couldn’t justify paying more for the Bangor apartment than I had been paying in Portland. I ended up in an 1,100 sq ft apartment in Orono for $1,200/month.

As someone who makes much more than the average Bangor salary I would have happily paid more for a place but I couldn’t justify paying that much more for no more space or amenities so I ended up competing with college kids. And who is going to rent to a college kid when the other option is a couple that works works full time and had previously been renting a place 50% more expensive?

raggedtoad t1_j9a5epj wrote on February 20, 2023 at 12:41 PM

Watch out, I made a similar point in a housing cost discussion a few weeks ago and got accused of supporting "trickle down housing" lmao.

biglymonies t1_j9a9czi wrote on February 20, 2023 at 1:20 PM

Oh fuck, you weren't kidding

raggedtoad t1_j9aai58 wrote on February 20, 2023 at 1:31 PM

There it is!

Yes, people actually believe building more quality housing units is bad for working class Mainers.

AssumptionLivid6879 t1_j9b4e5d wrote on February 20, 2023 at 5:09 PM

Over building “affordable housing” without filling out the spectrum of cost is what turns cities like Bangor into Drug Dens.

Historically Bangor has only developed public/private low income and no income expansions, which is why it brought such a strong collapse in the 80s/90s. The city then tried to curb all growth and expansion in the 90s by building new zoning laws, further backfiring the attraction of high income talent (why Hampden/Hermon blew up in popularity).

Most units outside of the 95 corridor are either trailer parks, “affordable” apartments (that are now drug dens), or private low jncome housing like Penquis.