That's a swamp cooler and is very commonly used in dry environments. It will help a lot in Arizona (well, maybe not that tiny thing, but a properly sized one) and not at all in Miami, due to the difference in ambient humidity.

I'm not an expert but my general understanding is that its unlikely you'd have both parents be narcissists. A true narcissist is too self absorbed to stay in a relationship with someone else who's also that self absorbed. Narcissists tend to be in relationships with people who have opposite traits, highly empathetic and easily manipulated. Not saying it can't happen but youtube isn't necessarily the best diagnostic tool.

If at all possible, I recommend you see if there are any counseling resources available to you at school or through your local government. Also recommend you read some actual books on the subject, not just get info from YouTube and the internet. Hopefully you live in a place with a public library. Many libraries have a way to check out ebooks and read them on a phone app, which may easier and more discreet.

And I'd urge you to remember two things.

First, it gets better. It can be hard to believe, and it can feel like forever, but it gets better.

Second, narcissism is just another reaction to a traumatic childhood. No one is born a monster. They're worthy of compassion, even if you can't have a functional relationship with them.

Or as I originally heard it, "going to bed is going to work."

This is something I know a fair bit about. If you don't build in areas susceptible to flooding in the first place (including but not limited to wetlands), you don't need to engineer around nature. And it turns out that our engineering design floods are not keeping up with real floods, so all that engineering is not really helping.

Plus, engineered structures need regular maintenance and we are generally not all that great at infrastructure maintenance. See the Libya damn disaster for just the mort recent example.

Banks don't buy properties, they foreclose on them. They will unload as fast as possible and take a write down.

Big hedge fund and other similar large investors don't hold onto money losers, and they care about maximizing their return. If the spread between rent and sales price is this high, I'd expect some of the ones that bought a while ago to be considering selling and taking their appreciation gains vs holding onto a cash flow that is multiples lower. Plus corporate lending is a completely different animal than homeowner loans and many of these properties will soon be needing to refinance into a much higher rate. Their owners will sell rather than take a huge hit to cash flow. And many of these bought properties 5-10 years ago and did capital upgrades that are now aging. They'll be looking to exit before the next upgrade cycle.

Smaller investors can get pretty badly burned in these markets and may not be able to hold on.

Not saying a crash is inevitable or even likely, but real estate is cyclical and we are almost certainly near the top of our current cycle.

Gotta admit, a week ago when people were posting about Lemmy I didn't see it working. There were something like 500 active users when I checked join-lemmy.org. That was just not enough of a crictical mass to make it work.

Now I've been here a few days (with another login at kbin) and if this volume of traffic keeps up (i.e., there's enough happening to be interesting and make it worth coming back), I think I can live without reddit. I'm happyt to be wrong!

We have a reasonable electorate, inasmuch as Trump has no chance of ever winning the popular vote and never did. What we don’t have is a rational electoral system where all votes are equal.

That take is only accurate in a country where this kind of thing is an anomaly. If this is allowed to stand, then it will become normal. I don’t want to live in a country without a free and independent press.

This is both terrifying and hilarious at the same time. The last paragraph is so good.

In another indication of the operators working to potentially inefficient quotas, Meta noted that the pages it had on Facebook, with around 560,000 followers, “were likely acquired from spam operators with built-in inauthentic followers primarily from Vietnam, Bangladesh and Brazil” meaning the pages “that mainly posted in Chinese and English were almost exclusively followed by accounts from countries outside of their target regions.”

Chances are they're long dead.

I mean, lots of people do. Just not the ones here on lemmy. But thanks for the compliment!

I'm probably somewhat unique here inasmuch as I'm a real estate agent and landlord and I have made an attempt to get into commercial real estate. But I've also been homeless in my adult life and grew up with very unstable housing, so I get the angst of many people here and don't discount it. Their feelings are completely valid.

I think the two things that people who are concerned about housing prices get wrong consistently are housing supply and the importance of financing.

Left leaning people are forever fighting against landlords and simultaneously yelling about gentrification and development. Here's the thing. Housing was affordable when we let people build densely with relatively few restrictions. Housing today is still most affordable in places where it's easy to build more. If that means the neighborhood character changes, oh well. Anywhere you get liberal people (and I count myself as very left wing) making rules about housing, you limit supply, prices go up. In the immortal words of pogo, we have met the enemy, and he is us. Take a look at Tokyo, the NYT did a great story about it recently, they have no problem destroying old neighborhoods to build more housing. As a result, it's remained shockingly affordable, and has a huge percentage of small businesses because rent is cheap for small non residential spaces, too. We need to stop clinging to our old buildings and allow growth. And I say that as a man who lovingly restored a 175 year old house. It is dumb. There should be 6 families living on the plot I own, but the neighbors would never allow it.

The other thing is financing. Commercial owners have a completely different borrowing structure from owner occupied housing. They don't have 30 year fixed rate low interest loans with low down payments and government programs to help them for x, y and z. Most commercial loans require refinancing every 5, 7, or 10 years. They also cost more than residential loans, both in up front costs and interest. So my personal residence is locked in on a 30 year note at 3%, but my rentals are in the 3.75-6% range and will require me to refinance in a few years at much higher rates. I have one that resets in 18 months. My interest rate is likely to go from 3.75 to 7.75. I owe about 100k on the house. My mortgage payments will go up $4000/year when that happens (on top of a $1000/year insurance hike last month). There's no possible way I can raise my rent enough to cover. So I would be in the hole every month. But the bank won't lend on a property that loses money every month. So either I come up with $100k cash or I sell the house. Sorry tenant, but you're getting kicked out at lease expiration next year because I have to sell the house to py back the lender. If it won't cash flow for me it won't for anyone else, either. So the only possible buyers are home buyers who want to live in it and it needs to be vacant. Yay for a home buyer, sad for my tenant (and for me, now I am out a cash flowing property that I'd prefer to hold). The tenant will yell about greedy landlords when I tell him to get out, but I literally have no option.

Same thing with how all big developments look the same now. All driven by lenders. They won't lend to a developer who wants to take on mom and pop businesses and quirky startups. The building is valued as a multiple of its rents, and so all the money chases national credit tenants or strong local chains that have proven they can oy high rents, and lenders all want to see recognizable name brands in those ground floor retail spaces. Developers hands are tied. Lots of developers would love to do something different but nothing different can get financed.

I could keep going but the text wall is long enough and my thumbs are tired.

Don't invest in Detroit real estate

This is the kind of post we used to have stickied answers for and a wiki when I was still a redditor at /r/boston. I'm not sure if those things are even an option on Lemmy.

There's an entire science to answering this question and I don't have the bandwidth to type it all out from scratch. But as briefly as I can state it, here's what you need to know about finding an apartment in Greater Boston.

• Our public transit is quite literally on fire most days and cannot be relied on. Stay as close to your job as you can.
• Our traffic is abysmal and parking is a full contact sport. Try not to own a car if don't have to.
• Our building stock is old and filled with lead paint, which is hazardous to young children.
• • landlords in Mass are legally required to de-lead a unit with a child under age 5 in it. They are not legally allowed to discriminate against families. However, it can cost $15-20k to de-lead a unit and there is no return on that investment in the form of a higher rent. So although discrimination against families with children is prohibited, in practice with the highly competitive market here it is easy for landlords simply to pick another applicant or find a non-prohibited reason to deny your application.
• Most of our old housing stock is in 2-3 unit buildings (aka 2-families or 3-families) without elevators and with small shared yards.
• • A "garden" in the US is an area where food or flowers are grown, if you just want a patch of grass it is a yard.
• Our rental market revolves around leases that start September first, with most landlords trying to get leases signed in the late spring and early summer. So if you show up next month, you will have very little to look at.
• The market is incredibly competitive, and bidding wars on apartments are not unheard of.
• You will almost certainly end up working with a rental agent.
• • Rental agents are universally disliked.
• You can expect to pay 4x rent to move in: first month, last month, one month security, and a 1 month fee to the agent. These are the only fees allowed by law (the law does allow a small fee for a new lock).
• Most apartments listed by agents are listed on the MLS (Multiple Listing Service). Apartments listed by private owners are not.
• • MLS listings can be found on a wide variety of websites but for some reason Coldwell Banker seems to have all of them for Boston rentals so you might as well use that
• • Non-MLS listings can be found on craigslist, facebook marketplace, etc.
• • Apartments.com has both.

On the plus side, your budget is realistic and will get you a nicely updated unit, we have excellent local parks and playgrounds (better on the Boston side of the Charles river, but still pretty good up north) so you may not need a private yard, and in Cambridge and Somerville it is practical to live without a car, especially if you're willing to commute by bike.

I'm a real estate agent. I don't do rentals and am not here soliciting a commission. I drew a map of areas I'd suggest you look at and put in the following criteria for my search (consumers cannot do a search like this, this is using a tool for professional agents only): 2+ bedrooms, 900+ sf, certified deleaded or lead paint flagged as "none" (because of a gut renovation or construction after 1978, the year lead paint was banned), price ceiling $4000. That returned only 31 hits. It will also include older buildings that have been completely renovated. Remove the bit about lead and you get almost 200 hits.

Here they are on a map:

It gives you a sort of heat map of where the apartments are, and all of those places are neighborhoods/cities I'd say you should consider.

Here are several units I would recommend taking a look at if you were on the market today. No affiliation with Coldwell Banker or any other firm, I work for myself and don't have a website so these are just the first hits that pop up when I search the MLS numbers:

https://www.coldwellbankerhomes.com/ma/somerville/60-newton-st-2/pid_54506667/ (typical of our housing stock, larger unit in older condition, excellent location a 2 minute walk to a phenomenal park with multiple playgrounds and within 15 minutes walk to many good restaurants, groceries, etc.

https://www.coldwellbankerhomes.com/ma/cambridge/29-wheeler-st-310/pid_54517037/ A bit farther out from your job and near a very busy section of road, but very close to the Fresh Pond which has acres of walking trails and parks, and also very convenient to groceries, coffee, etc.

https://www.coldwellbankerhomes.com/ma/cambridge/2-chester-st-2b/pid_54446379/ Phenomenal location in between Davis and Porter Squares and it has a small patio area

https://www.coldwellbankerhomes.com/ma/cambridge/27-west-st-6/pid_54634067/ Another great location, about a 3 minute walk from Sennott Park which is small but has a playground, and some other small playgrounds within easy walking distance.

https://www.coldwellbankerhomes.com/ma/arlington/1-watermill-pl-521/pid_53662391/ now you are getting a bit farther from your job in a more family-oriented town. Probably 15-20 minute drive to work, or a manageable bike ride. Older full service elevator building with a large common green space and close to quite a few parks, etc., at an attractive price.

I work in government. Biden has an excellent idea of what he's up against. And he saw how Obama and Clinton talked a good game but got out maneuvered by the right. He's an incredibly effective president, vastly better than I thought he'd be. He's managed to get so much done even with the right going full fascist against him, and he's done it without complaint or drama.

I am honestly baffled when I hear liberals complain about him. He's gotten more progressive goals across the finish line than any president since FDR, and he's not even 3 years in. Is he 100% perfect? No. But he's very very good. I'll take very very good over outright fascism any day of the week.

I guess google will just have to suck less if they want us to keep using it.

I love YouTube music. I get all the same songs as the other big services, plus free YouTube premium. Between my jam and habit and my quixotic quest to teach myself woodworking, I watch a LOT of YouTube videos.

My baby is almost 11 months old. His big brother is 5 1/2 years. I literally remember nothing about 4-6 month old babies. My only tips are that it's over before you know it, and that you don't need whatever it is that's in your Amazon shopping cart.

They literally stole the doors and windows

Well, you posted and have a username so you must have done something right. Welcome!

Serious answer, as someone who's been through years of therapy.

Pretty much everyone rich and powerful experienced intense trauma early in life. And one of the horrible ways our early childhood trauma plays itself out is by causi us to recreate it on younger generations. You don't just wake up one day as a child molester. That shit was visited upon you in some fashion when you were a child.

Our entire culture is based on generational trauma (strongly suggest you read the Myth of Normal by Gabor Mate).

People who seek power and fame are almost all incredibly damaged from a very young age. Not necessarily an excuse, but if you want to stop the cycle you have to be able to step back far enough to see it.