Tag Archives: rent

High Inflation hitting hard as child care surges 20%

Child-Care-higher-than-Rent

Important Takeaways:

  • Raising a child is getting more expensive – but the problem is worse in these 5 states
  • High inflation has made the price of just about everything in the U.S. more expensive — including how much it costs to raise a child.
  • “The cost of everything is rising,” said Matt Schulz, LendingTree chief credit analyst. “There’s so much that goes into child care, including rent, payroll, insurance and much more. When all those costs shoot up, the overall cost of child care does, too.”
  • The cost of child care surged nearly 20% between 2016 and 2021
  • That means the typical family is spending about $237,482 over the course of 18 years to raise a child — and that is excluding the cost of college.
  • However, new research published by SmartAsset suggests that the problem is even worse in some states.
  • Raising a child in Massachusetts costs an estimated $35,841 a year – the most expensive state in the country and nearly double the national average.
  • The annual cost of raising a child in Hawaii is $35,049, which includes about $19,500 for child care. One of the largest expenses in the Aloha State is housing, according to the study. Adding a child to a two-family household costs an additional $6,188 per year. By comparison, that adds about $4,983 in Massachusetts.
  • It is notably cheaper to raise children in a handful of Southern states.
  • Mississippi ranked as the least expensive, coming in with a total cost of $16,151. That is followed by Arkansas, Louisiana, Kentucky and Alabama.

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Cost of Living washes out any increase in wages

Amazon-Warehouse

Important Takeaways:

  • Amazon Workers Say They Struggle to Afford Food, Rent
  • Five years after Amazon.com Inc. raised wages to $15 an hour, half of warehouse workers surveyed by researchers say they struggle to afford enough food or a place to live.
  • The national study, published Wednesday by the University of Illinois Chicago’s Center for Urban Economic Development, asked US employees about their economic wellbeing, including whether they’d skipped meals, went hungry, or were worried about being able to make rent or mortgage payments.
  • Fifty-three percent of respondents reported that they’d experienced one or more forms of food insecurity in the prior three months, and 48% experienced one or more forms of housing insecurity. Workers who said they took unpaid time off after getting hurt on the job were more likely to report trouble paying their bills, the researchers found.

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Inflation costing Americans an extra $1,000 a month

Price-of-Gas-Inflation

Important Takeaways:

  • Joe Did That: Inflation Costs Americans an Extra $1K Monthly
  • Thanks to the wonders of Bidenomics, the average American is spending over a thousand dollars extra a month. Fortunately, Biden is focused on important things — like funding jihad supporters in Gaza and paying off student loans with taxpayer money the government cannot spare.
  • From Fox Business:
    • The typical U.S. household needed to pay $227 more a month in March to purchase the same goods and services it did one year ago because of still-high inflation, according to calculations from Moody’s Analytics chief economist Mark Zandi shared with FOX Business.
    • Americans are paying on average $784 more each month compared with the same time two years ago and $1,069 more compared with three years ago, before the inflation crisis began… when compared with January 2021, shortly before the inflation crisis began, prices remain up a stunning 18.94%.
  • Food, child care, and rent — the necessities — are devastatingly expensive under the Biden administration. Fox quoted Bright MLS chief economist Lisa Sturtevant, “Inflation has not just stalled, but it is moving in the wrong direction.” Unfortunately, low-income Americans — those who can least afford to spend more — are of course hardest hit by rising costs.

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Record rent soaring up 9.3% in Manhattan and 14% in Brooklyn

Manhattan Rent

Important Takeaways:

  • Rent in Manhattan soared to a record-high average of $5,588 in July, up 9% from 2022.
  • It’s hurting tenants struggling to find apartments they can afford. One apartment hunter said she can’t find a studio to suit her work-from-home needs for less than $5,000.
  • “I am considering not coming back to Manhattan,” she said.
  • “Rent went up at 9.3% in Manhattan. We saw it go up 14% in Brooklyn because now Brooklyn landlords are saying these people from Manhattan can’t afford it, how much can I raise my rent?” said Sanai.

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Wondering where your money went? Inflation has Americans paying extra $709 per month on regular household items

Important Takeaways:

  • Inflation forcing Americans to spend $709 more per month than 2 years ago: Economist
  • Scorching-hot inflation has created severe financial pressures for most U.S. households, which are forced to pay more for everyday necessities like food and rent.
  • Moody’s chief economist Mark Zandi made the statement Friday on X, formerly known as Twitter, as part of his analysis of July’s consumer price index report. Despite the jarring increase in cost, Zandi say inflation is moderating, with just a 0.2% increase from June to July.
  • “To be sure, the high inflation of the past 2+ years has done lots of economic damage. Due to the high inflation, the typical household spent $202 more in a July than they did a year ago to buy the same goods and services. And they spent $709 more than they did 2 years ago,” Zandi wrote.
  • The fed could resort to further interest rate hikes later this year, but Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell has not made any announcements.

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Residents in LA must now pay all debt accrued during Covid when there was the ‘Eviction Moratorium’

Important Takeaways:

  • Californians Struggling With High Rent Prices, End of Eviction Moratoriums
  • More than 768,000 households are behind on rent in the Golden State, with debts totaling more than $5 billion, putting approximately 721,000 children at risk of eviction, according to the National Equity Atlas—a collaborative data and analytics tool founded by Oakland-based Policy Link and the University of Southern California Equity Research Institute.
  • Residents in the City of Los Angeles are facing a deadline of Aug. 1 to repay all rental debt accrued between March 2020 and September 2021, with that from October 2021 to January 31, 2023, due by February 2024.
  • Average rent prices in California are $2,902 across all sizes and property types, according to online real estate listing company Zillow as of July 21.
  • Based on current listings in many areas like Orange, San Diego, Santa Clara, or San Francisco counties, homes with three bedrooms and space to accommodate a family cost at least $4,000 a month to rent.

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More Americans are struggling to keep up with rent, and in some cases, they’re no longer paying their rent

Revelations 13:16-18 “Also it causes all, both small and great, both rich and poor, both free and slave, to be marked on the right hand or the forehead, so that no one can buy or sell unless he has the mark, that is, the name of the beast or the number of its name. This calls for wisdom: let the one who has understanding calculate the number of the beast, for it is the number of a man, and his number is 666.”

Important Takeaways:

  • More Than Eight Million Americans Reportedly Behind on Rent
  • 8,070,524 people ages 18 or older in the U.S. aren’t caught up on rent payments. Put another way, 13.17% of the nation’s adult renters live in a household that charges them rent and are behind on payment.
  • Nationwide, 3,560,345 adults — 5.81% of adult renters — live in a household that doesn’t pay rent.
  • The states with the largest share of adults behind on rent payments are New York, Nevada and Louisiana.
  • Mississippi, West Virginia and Alaska are the states where the largest share of people live rent-free.
  • Over the past year, 53.03% of renters across the U.S. saw their rent increase, while 36.91% saw no increase and 1.75% saw a decline. The majority of those who saw their rent payments jump reported increases between $100 and $249 a month.

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Small Business owners struggle to pay rent

Revelations 18:23 ‘For the merchants were the great men of the earth; for by thy sorceries were all nations deceived.’

Important Takeaways:

  • Survey: A third of U.S. small businesses can’t pay rent because of inflation
  • 35% of U.S. small business owners “could not pay their rent in full or on time in June.”
  • “Most small business owners attribute this worsening situation to record-breaking inflation, which includes escalating gas, labor, and supply costs,” Alignable said. “Simply put, there’s less money available to pay the rent.”
  • According to the survey, rent increased for 48% of small businesses this month. Meanwhile, rent delinquencies have continued to increase all year.
  • A different survey found that 51 percent of all small businesses owners in the U.S. believe that rising prices could “force them to close their businesses within the next six months.”

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Feds scramble to get control of Rising Inflation and Interest Rates

Rev 6:6 NAS And I heard something like a voice in the center of the four living creatures saying, “A quart of wheat for a denarius, and three quarts of barley for a denarius; and do not damage the oil and the wine.”

Important Takeaways:

  • U.S. inflation rate leaps to 8.5%, CPI shows, as higher gas prices slam consumers
  • The rate of U.S. inflation leaped to 40-year high of 8.5% in March and showed little sign of easing up, explaining the new-found urgency at the Federal Reserve to quickly undo its easy-money strategy.
  • Rising prices are outstripping the fastest wage gains in four decades and surveys show inflation is the public’s biggest worry. It’s hurting Democrats at the polls ahead of the pivotal congressional elections in the fall.
  • High inflation is showing up everywhere: At gas stations, grocery stores, big-box chains such as Best Buy and online sellers like Amazon rents and housing prices have also surged.
  • The average cost of a gallon of regular gas in the U.S. rose to as high as $4.32 in March from $3.61 in the prior month and $2.87 a year earlier. In some parts of the country prices even topped $7 a gallon.
  • Grocery prices have escalated 10% in the past 12 months, the biggest jump since 1981.

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More expensive food, rents boost U.S. inflation; further increases anticipated

By Lucia Mutikani

WASHINGTON (Reuters) -U.S. consumer prices increased solidly in September as Americans paid more for food, rent and a range of other goods, putting pressure on the Biden administration to urgently resolve strained supply chains, which are hampering economic growth.

With prices likely to rise further in the months ahead following a recent surge in the costs of energy products, the report from the Labor Department on Wednesday could test Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell’s repeated assertion that high inflation is transitory. Powell and the White House have blamed supply chain bottlenecks for the high inflation.

Supply chains have been gummed up by robust demand as economies emerge from the COVID-19 pandemic. The coronavirus has caused a global shortage of workers needed to produce raw materials and move goods from factories to consumers.

“Today’s number, with food price inflation and shelter inflation moving higher, suggests growing pressure on consumers,” said Seema Shah, chief strategist at Principal Global Investors. “Keep in mind too that the recent rise in oil prices hasn’t yet fed through to the numbers – that’s still to come, while the renewed rise in car prices is also likely to drive inflation numbers higher in the coming months.”

The consumer price index rose 0.4% last month after climbing 0.3% in August. Food prices jumped 0.9% after increasing 0.4% in the prior month. Owners’ equivalent rent of primary residence, which is what a homeowner would receive from renting a home, increased 0.4% after gaining 0.3% in August.

Food and rents accounted for more than half of the increase in the CPI in September. Economists polled by Reuters had forecast the overall CPI would rise 0.3%.

In the 12 months through September, the CPI increased 5.4% after advancing 5.3% on a year-on-year basis in August.

Excluding the volatile food and energy components, the CPI climbed 0.2% after edging up 0.1% in August, the smallest gain in six months. In addition to rents, the co-called core CPI was lifted by a 1.3% increase in the cost of new motor vehicles, which marked the fifth straight month of gains above 1%.

A global semiconductor shortage has forced auto manufacturers to cut production. There were also increases in the prices of household furnishings and operations last month. Consumers also paid more for motor vehicle insurance.

But prices for airline fares and apparel as well as used cars and trucks all fell. The so-called core CPI rose 4.0% on a year-on-year basis last month, matching the gain in August.

HIGH ENERGY PRICES

Oil prices jumped on Monday to the highest levels in years amid a rebound in global demand after the pandemic. Though Brent crude futures fell on Wednesday, prices remained above $80 a barrel. Natural gas prices have also surged.

Expensive energy products would add to accelerating wage growth in exerting upward pressure on inflation. The government reported last week that average hourly earnings increased by the most in seven months on a year-on-year basis in September because of worker shortages.

With the number of people voluntarily quitting their jobs hitting a record high in August and at least 10.4 million unfilled positions, wage inflation is set to rise further.

“The right place to look for inflation is not just in the so-called inflation data itself, but also in the tighter labor market and associated wage growth,” said Andrew Hollenhorst, chief U.S. economist at Citigroup in New York.

“Firms confident of passing on input costs may make higher energy prices a driver of broader inflation.”

September’s CPI report will have no impact on the Fed’s timeline to begin scaling back its massive monthly bond-buying program. The U.S. central bank signaled last month that it could start tapering its asset purchases as soon as November.

Economists expect that announcement will come at the Nov. 2-3 policy meeting.

“The central bank has already said that inflation has met the threshold for tapering, it’s the job market that hasn’t,” said Ryan Sweet, a senior economist at Moody’s Analytics in West Chester, Pennsylvania. “The CPI could garner a reaction in the bond market as it could alter market expectations for the timing of the first rate hike by the Fed, which in our opinion, is still far off on the horizon.”

The Fed’s preferred inflation measure for its flexible 2% target, the core personal consumption expenditures price index, increased 3.6% in the 12 months through August, rising by the same margin for a third straight month. September’s data will be published later this month.

The Fed last month upgraded its core PCE inflation projection for this year to 3.7% from 3.0% in June.

Despite strong wage gains, high inflation is cutting into consumers’ purchasing power.

That, together with motor vehicle shortages, led economists to cut their gross domestic product estimates for the third quarter to as low as a 1.3% annualized rate from as high as a 7% pace. The International Monetary Fund on Tuesday slashed its 2021 U.S. growth forecast by a full percentage point, to 6.0% from 7.0% in July.

(Reporting by Lucia MutikaniEditing by Chizu Nomiyama)