December 6, 2025 • 33 mins
In LA, rent prices have fallen 5% on average since the peak in 2022 during the Covid pandemic. Reports suggest rent prices will continue to decline. Rent control has been bad for housing in LA. Vacancies have hit a record high of around 7% for several months, following a surge in property developments. In tandem with falling rent prices, reports suggest around 7,000 children are missing from the LA school system, likely related to the deportation of illegal immigrants. And with attendance in public schools dropping, classes are getting smaller, which means specialized attention and a better quality of education. In 1980, the average Southern California salary was $20,000 annually, and the average house cost was $60,000. Back then, people were able to save up the downpayment for a home. Now, the average salary in Southern California is $60,000 while the average cost of a starter home is $869,000, with 20% down.
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
You're listening to KFI AM six forty on demand.
Speaker 2 (00:07):
With you on a Friday. Good to have you along
with us. Rents are coming.
Speaker 3 (00:10):
Down, Yeah, cour We've got an exclusive early read on
November rent data out tomorrow, and it shows that continued
new supply and weaker demand are pushing vacancies up and
rents down.
Speaker 2 (00:21):
Rents down. It's amazing, right, I mean, when do you
ever hear that? But the apartment rents fell one percent
in November from October. Uh, it was the fourth consecutive
month over month decline and now they are falling five
percent total since their peak in twenty twenty two. Five
(00:44):
percent's not insignificant. Now this is an average, but it's
going in the right direction. And everybody talks about the
unaffordability of southern California, and because what they're saying is
the rent is too high, and everybody's trying to figure out,
how do we stop the rent from going up. Let's uh,
let's bring in rent control, let's have a rent freeze,
(01:05):
let's hang the landlord from his Buster Browns. And none
of that works. The rent control thing really backfired. That
was a dumb idea. Those of you that thought you
can control rent by just making the city council in
charge of telling the landlord how much they can raise
the rent. That backfired on you because what they did
is come up with a formula that was depending on
(01:28):
what city you're in, or if the in LA or
if the statewide one where it's like inflation plus CPI,
or they come up with some number and guess what
inflation went through the roof during the Biden administration. And
the consumer price index is always higher than your your weight,
like you raise you're going to that you didn't get,
(01:51):
so your rent went up higher than the landlord would
have raised it. And they always raise it the maximum
amount that they can because they have to. So rent control.
Really stupid move, really bad idea for keeping rents under control.
The best thing for keeping rents under control is have
(02:13):
more apartments. But environmentalists don't like more apartments, and people
that don't like cars don't like more apartments, and people
that don't like people don't like more apartments. And there
are people in Sacramento that don't like people. They don't
say it like that, but really what they're saying when
(02:34):
they constrict your ability to get power, constrict your ability
to get water. What they're saying is we don't want
houses because we don't want people, because they believe people
encroach upon the environment. So it's very hard to get
housing built to accommodate the rate of growth in California
(02:54):
in the last twenty years. So that puts a shortage
of apartment buildings and that causes the rents to rise. Okay,
there you go, little economics lesson. But now the rents
are coming down.
Speaker 3 (03:06):
The national median monthly rent for apartments fell one percent
in November from October and now stands at one thousand,
three hundred sixty seven dollars.
Speaker 2 (03:13):
One thousand, three hundred and sixty seven dollars. That's a
national average. Yeah, I mean most places in America I
wouldn't want to live.
Speaker 3 (03:25):
Three hundred sixty seven dollars. It was the fourth consecutive
month over month decline.
Speaker 2 (03:29):
See now that's big, fourth consecutive month over month decline.
Remember the lou Penrose rule, it's not where the numbers are,
it's the direction the numbers are going. And there's every
reason to believe that it'll be the fifth month in
a row, because that's the way things work.
Speaker 3 (03:47):
It was the fourth consecutive month over month decline. Apartment
rents are now down one point one percent from November
of last year, and have fallen five point two percent
from their twenty twenty two peat.
Speaker 2 (03:58):
Okay, so since we haven't increase the supply, the only
thing that could have happened is we've decreased the demand.
And here's one thing that has happened in the last
three hundred and twenty days. President Trump has deported two
million illegal aliens. And I've been saying this for so long.
People that talk about affordability in southern California and decry
(04:23):
the ice raids, where do you think the illegals are living?
They're living in your housing stock. Like when they go
home from the home depot parking lot, where do you
think they go. They're not living in Section eight housing
because they can't qualify for Section eight housing. You can't qualify.
I mean, you know how long you'd have to wait
(04:43):
to get into Section eight housing. So like you, an
actual American living in Los Angeles, You're not going to
get into Section eight housing. Forget it. It's like trying
to get into rent control in Santa Monica. No chance
you'll be dead before that day opens up. So they're
not getting into low income housing, they're not getting into
Section eight housing. They're living in what we call market
(05:07):
rate housing. But they're just living eight of them in
a two bedroom. And you know this to be true.
I don't have to spell it out for you. And
now that the illegals are leaving or being deported or
one way or the other not here any longer. You
have all these vacancies. Well, vacancies causes prices to fall
(05:32):
because the owner of the building, whether it's a real
estate investment trust and it's run by a property management company,
or if it's you know, a couple of chiropractors and
Marina del Rey that own like six four plexes in
Silver Late whatever like whatever they whether it's a independent
rental property owners or big corporations that own large apartment
(05:55):
complexes and communities, whatever it is, if there's a lot
of vacancies, they will lower the price to fill those
vacancies because they would rather have somebody in that apartment
for two thousand dollars a month than let it hit
empty for twenty four hundred dollars a month. And that's
how you bring rents down. So it's happening. We're starting
(06:16):
to see the positive impacts of immigration reform, and that's
what we're experiencing. And I think this is just the beginning.
I think that we're seeing a trend line that is
four months in a row and the lowest rents since
in five years. I think we're going to see a
significant increase in the quality of life and affordability in
(06:39):
areas that were well known to be overwhelmingly occupied by
illegal aliens. I mean, there's just nothing else left in
the equation now.
Speaker 3 (06:51):
Vacancies hit a record high of seven point two percent
in October that was unchanged in November. This index dates
back to twenty seventeen.
Speaker 2 (07:00):
So record vacancies in southern California. When do you ever
remember hearing that it was impossible to get an apartment?
It's constantly impart that that's why the rents are so high,
because you're gonna run around to find like they're going
up and up and up. So record vacancies pretty good.
Speaker 3 (07:17):
It comes after a really historic Surgeon apartment construction brought
on big by the pandemic.
Speaker 2 (07:23):
I don't remember that, uh, But the only people that
are not happy about this are the owners of the
apartment buildings, the real estate investment trust. They don't like
having to lower the rent. But look, every once in
a while, the renter gets to win one, and the
renter is winning one.
Speaker 3 (07:37):
Apartment reads names like Avalon Bay, Equity Residential and Camden
Property Trusts are all.
Speaker 4 (07:43):
Down yere to date.
Speaker 3 (07:44):
On the bright side, monthly rental renewals are strong.
Speaker 2 (07:47):
That's right because people like that new rent eight hundred.
So let's let's let's open up the telephone lines and
find out here eight hundred five to two oh one
KFI eight hundred five to two oh one, five three four,
And if you're listening live, you can call us using
the iHeartRadio app using the talkback MIC. Rents are going down?
Are you going to give Trump credit for eliminating the
(08:09):
supply of tenants? Lou Penrose on KFI AM six forty
live everywhere on the iHeartRadio app.
Speaker 1 (08:18):
You're listening to KFI AM six forty on demand.
Speaker 2 (08:23):
Blue Penrose with you whatt a Friday Night talking about
new CNBC numbers that show rents are coming down and
it's a really good thing. There are positive impacts to
this administration, and we're beginning to feel it right here
(08:44):
in Southern California. As people are being removed voluntarily or otherwise,
there are more vacancies. And there's no question that this
will increase the quality of life for people that live
in Los Angeles and greater southern California, no question at all.
(09:04):
So we will see the rents continue to fall as
more and more illegals get deported. The next thing that
will happen, and this is another good quality of life thing,
is you will see attendance in your public schools drop,
which means you'll finally have what the California Teachers Association
(09:30):
have been belly aching about forever, and that is smaller
class sizes. That's good for you. That means your daughter
gets more time with her third grade teacher to learn, Matt,
your son gets more time with the kindergarten teacher. Right.
(09:51):
This is a good thing. I saw in the Los
Angeles Times this headline that seven thousand students are miss
from the Los Angeles Unified School District because of all
the you know, all the fear about the ice raids,
and I thought missing. They're not missing. They've either gone
home or their parents are not taking them to school.
(10:13):
This is good. This is a good thing. This means
that teachers finally have manageable classrooms and they're not going
to keep them out of school forever. They've they've taken
them out of school and the plan is to go home.
I assume I don't think you have a bunch of
illegals homeschooling. So the the the ripple effects of these
(10:38):
of these policies are creating a huge boost to the
quality of life to so many of us here in
southern California. And uh, it's it's really just the beginning.
But the rents are a big one.
Speaker 3 (10:52):
Yeah, Court, We've got an exclusive early read on November
rent data out tomorrow and it shows that continued new
supply and weaker demand are put wishing vacancies up and
rents down.
Speaker 2 (11:02):
That's right. Weaker demand means the illegals have been deported.
That's what that's code word. That's CNBC codeword for weaker demand.
Because we're all still here, we haven't gone anywhere. All
we're doing is waiting for the rent increase. We're all
still in the apartment saying I don't know how I'm
ever going to be able to afford a house. I
don't understand how my parents did it. I don't know
(11:24):
what's going on. I guess I'm just going to be
a renter for my whole life. And the rent continues
to go up. I need to call city Hall and
tell them to do a rent freeze. I need to
join Tenants United, that maniac group, and you know, get
mad at the landlord right like we have been sitting
here yelling at the supply and demand curve, as if
(11:47):
the laws of supply and demand are listening to us
all the while, all the illegals I've been occupying our
housing stock. And in two hundred and nineteen days, President
Trump has been president for two hundred nineteen days. It's
only been two hundred and nineteen days. There are are
eleven hundred and forty one more days of this administration.
(12:10):
He has removed two million illegals, and most illegals were
in southern California, so a large percentage of that two
million number comes from southern California. And all of a sudden,
we see rents starting to decrease, and people are, you know,
examining it on CNBC, and I'm thinking it's pretty clear.
(12:31):
I know it's not politically correct to say, something really
good for California is happening because Trump is deporting all
the illegals. But I'm here to tell you something really
good for southern California is happening because Trump is deporting
all the illegals. And I don't know what the number is.
(12:54):
Nobody really does because it's impossible to count illegals since
they're illegal. But I don't know if two million is
a large percentage or a small percentage. I've heard that
there are ten million illegals in California, twelve million. Some
people say, now it's more like nineteen million. I don't
know what it is, but two million is a percentage
of whatever the total is, there's no question about it.
(13:16):
I don't know if it's a double digit percentage. I
don't know if we're just if it's just a drop
in a bucket. But if rents are beginning to cut down,
we're moving in the right direction. We're doing something right.
And like I said, we're only just a couple hundred
days into this administration. We have eleven hundred more days
to go, and they have doubled the budget of Immigration
and Customs enforcement that was in the One Big Beautiful
(13:38):
Bill so they're hiring. Now there's a learning curve. You
got to train these ice agents because everybody is every
Karen is out there with a cell phone camera making
an illegal alien raid movie. Who they're showing this footage
too is beyond me. I have no idea. Every time
I see this stuff on social media, there is some
(14:01):
maniac liberal white woman and she's holding a cell phone
camera while a Immigration and Customs enforcement agent is making
a lawful arrest and throwing the illegal in the back
of the ice van. And she's screaming about a warrant
and due process and she's filming the whole thing, and
she's screaming that she has a right to film, and
(14:22):
the ICE guy is like, yeah, ma'am, you have a
right to film. Just please step back, you know, because
we're wrestling with an illegal here, very dangerous. And I
always think to myself, who are you showing this video to?
Like where do you plan on showing this? Was there
some kind of an illegal alien film festival that I missed?
(14:43):
Is there a short film festival going on in Santa Monica?
And where all the Karens are gonna loop together this video?
Like who are you gonna show this movie to But anyway,
yeahs as all of that is going on, so these
all these ice agents have to be trained. There's a
learning curve for that because everybody's watching them. And so
(15:04):
they'll be double the amount of operation that we've seen
in just the last nine months, and we've already we
have two. We're two million to the good and rents
it down and vacancies are up, which will cause the
rents to go down even more. So it is having
(15:27):
an impact, there's no question about it. And as I said,
the next thing will be come September, you're gonna go
to school and you're gonna say, like, wow, this is
a much more manageable classroom. These classrooms are smaller. This
is great. My kid is getting more individual attention, the
teacher isn't overwhelmed. That'll be the next thing, and that
(15:50):
will be good. Then you'll start to see test scores
go up and your kids will be happier, and then
teachers will be happier, so they won't be bitching about,
you know how they're underpaid, underappreciated. So Sacramento will get
that pressure off them because teachers actually are happy to teach,
they just don't want to be teaching a thirty four
(16:11):
child classroom, a third of which are foreigners who don't
belong there. So these are all positive things. I'm very
very happy about it all, and you should be too.
So what will be the next right I told you,
we'll certainly get Rents will come down, You'll have more vacancies,
the classrooms will be much more manageable. I think we'll
(16:34):
start to feel a lot more elbow room in southern California.
And I think these are all just quality of life
issues that we can all look forward to. So we'll
get into all that when we come back. Also, we
got to get into this e bike story. The e
bike is the most popular gift under the tree this year.
The e bike is the cabbage Patch doll of twenty twenty.
(17:01):
So many people are gonna be getting e bikes. So
many teenagers are going to be getting e bikes, and
everyone's going nuts because everybody that drives hates e bikes
and all the city council members hate e bikes. But
on Christmas Morning, there's gonna be a lot of e
bikes unwrapped, which means come the first week of school
in January, there's gonna be tons more e bikes, So
(17:21):
we're gonna have to figure out how to wrestle with that.
We'll tell you all about that. That's all coming up
next to Lou Penrose on KFI AM six forty Live
Everywhere on the iHeartRadio app.
Speaker 1 (17:30):
You're listening to KFI AM six forty on demand.
Speaker 2 (17:35):
Blue Penrose with you on a Friday night, talking about
rents coming down for the first time in a long time.
Vacancy is up, and that's a good thing. I think
the pressure of the affordability of housing has been too
much for too long for those of us here in
southern California, and it wasn't always like that. So now
(17:59):
that rents are coming down and we can breathe a
little bit and have some money to look at and
we can make a you know, some different decisions and
maybe even save to one day not be a renter. Mario,
what what's your rent looking like? Are you seeing flattening
or you're seeing just NonStop rent increases?
Speaker 4 (18:15):
You know, for a one bedroom apartment that I've been
living in for now eleven years, it's a it's at
roughly about thirteen hundred.
Speaker 2 (18:21):
Yeah, that's about right, thirteen hundred, But hasn't been going
up every year, only.
Speaker 4 (18:26):
About like sixty dollars, right, it's a little bit. I
think that's still pretty generous compared to everywhere else.
Speaker 2 (18:32):
So what I'm so, let's say I'm trying to do
the math. Now, how about Nick is NII? Does NICKI
even live in an apartment for some reason? I feel
like you live on a cloud or something.
Speaker 5 (18:43):
I live because I'm an angel. I don't know why,
just like I'm an anomaly, I have a mortgage. I
live by myself in a two bedroom, two bathroom apartment
condo on the West Side, with its own laundry. So
don't even bring me into this conversation.
Speaker 2 (19:01):
I know you know why you're not an anomaly?
Speaker 4 (19:03):
Do you do?
Speaker 2 (19:04):
You know? The single largest category of clothes of real
estate closings in southern California are women. Women under the
age of forty.
Speaker 5 (19:15):
I'm not a woman under the age of forty, though
I just sound like it.
Speaker 2 (19:21):
No, but I mean that it doesn't have to be
under the age of forty. But that's the thing that's
the growing population and people that women are like women
are buying real estate is very very new.
Speaker 5 (19:34):
I'm an immigrant, but I am a lawful permanent resident
Green card holder.
Speaker 2 (19:39):
So look at you. I've been vetted. Well, I appreciate that,
all right. So all right, so you're not renting, You're
you're doing as you're a Yes, I'm sure for living
in the American dream, I'm trure. While Mario is sitting
thirteen years in a studio waiting for something to happen.
You know, it's a one bed room for me thirteen
(20:01):
hunt for a one bed.
Speaker 5 (20:02):
That's an amazing price, by the way.
Speaker 4 (20:04):
For that is a pretty good price. Exactly why I've
been there for eleven years. I'm not leaving with that price.
Speaker 2 (20:10):
So when I moved to southern California, and so this
is nineteen ninety, so we were twenty twenty six, so god,
thirty twenty five years ago, thirty five years ago. Now,
two bedroom, two bath in an apartment complex with gated
parking right on Washington and Lincoln, like right there, just
just north of Marina del Rey, walking distance to Venice Beach,
(20:34):
just south of Santa Monica. Eight hundred dollars a month. Wow,
that was nineteen ninety and I didn't have a job.
I mean, I had some savings when I first came
when I first came, my roommate had already moved to
southern California. He was working painting sets for some studio lot.
And I got a job, you know, within a couple
(20:55):
of weeks and eight hundred dollars we spent. It was
four hundred dollars each, and I feel like we were
making not much more than minimum wage. And we had cars.
Speaker 5 (21:06):
How many bedrooms?
Speaker 2 (21:07):
Was it two bedroom?
Speaker 5 (21:08):
And did you say Jefferson and Lincoln.
Speaker 2 (21:11):
No, it was Lincoln at Lincoln in Washington. Yeah, that's
my neighborhood. Like right, there's a gas station right on
the corner, and then back a little bit on Washington
is a couple of you know, four or five story
apartment buildings. Neighborhood, beautiful neighborhood. And it was it was
totally manageable, and we had discretionary income. So we would
(21:33):
go out drinking and go to you know, go to
go to all the all all the doings, all all
in and around you know, Venice Beach.
Speaker 5 (21:40):
Did you have any pets in that point? Do you
know what also sucks about.
Speaker 2 (21:45):
And have a dog anything?
Speaker 5 (21:46):
They all end up in kill shelters because you have
to pay additional rent for your cat, your dog, your hamster.
So people have to give up their beloved fur babies.
I understand the kill shelters, So that's another thing to
think about with.
Speaker 2 (22:00):
Can't be a twenty two year old guy with a
dog in Los Angeles, It's just not possible.
Speaker 5 (22:05):
How's he gonna get the girls?
Speaker 2 (22:06):
Then?
Speaker 5 (22:06):
If he doesn't go to the dog park with his
cute little bow.
Speaker 2 (22:09):
Wow, that's not where the girls are. When the boys
call on a Friday afternoon and say we're headed to Vegas,
you're not going to say, oh, I gotta get a
dog sitter. You're gonna say I'm in. And that's the
way we live life. But yeah, I mean, I just
remember being very affordable. I never thought that that southern
California was unaffordable, and I don't think anyone else talked
about it being unaffordable. But something happened from basically two
(22:34):
thousand and five ish to twenty twenty five ish that
the rents just skyrocketed and houses just skyrocketed, so people
stayed in the apartments and everything just kind of froze up.
And now is the first time in literally twenty years
that we're starting to see some of those rents coming
down in some of the vacancies, which get people choices,
(22:56):
and things are starting to move around a little bit.
So I do think better opportunities are coming. I think better,
you know, better real estate conditions are coming to Southern California,
because it should be like that for everybody, like you
ought to be able to move. In my case, I
had graduated college, I was looking at going to law
school at Pepperdine and came out to Southern California and
(23:20):
I had a friend here, so he needed a roommate.
I needed a place to live, and boom, there we
were in the center of the world, paying four hundred
dollars each and making a little bit over minimum wage
and still having money to pay the light bill, the
you know, and gas in the car and frolic around
and do whatever we wanted. Like that, I never felt
(23:43):
a pinch like it was never a time where I
thought I don't have enough money for food or I
don't have enough money for gas. Yet today people are
making way more than what I was making in nineteen ninety,
and they are strapped at the end of the month
all the time, and everybody's feeling anxiet and having all
kinds of concern, and I don't want you to have concern.
(24:05):
I want you to be free to go drive around
and go talk to the weirdos. I'm Venice Beach like
I did. That's what Southern California living is all about.
So as the rents come down, I do think we'll
see some of the pressures come off, and I think
that's a good thing, and we'll go forward, all right.
When we come back, we cannot not do this story,
(24:25):
so I'm going to throw it at you. The engagement
has been set. Travis Kelsey and Taylor Swift have announced
the day of their wedding. It's happening next year, and
that's very exciting if you're interested in that wedding. This
will be the royal wedding for the Americans. There's no
question between the Swifties and the Kansas City Chiefs fans.
(24:46):
I don't know what's going to happen to the Chiefs,
but this is going to be a big wedding. I'm
sure everyone's gonna watch it. But what's most interesting is
the date she chose. And you Swifties already know what
date it is without it even looking at the story.
But this number seems to work for Taylor Swift and
(25:06):
I don't know if it's numerology or she just really
found herself a real lucky number or something, but the
backstory on why she chose this wedding day is fascinating
to me. We'll tell you all about it. Coming up next,
Lou Penrose on KFI AM six forty Live Everywhere on
the iHeartRadio app.
Speaker 1 (25:25):
You're listening to KFI AM six forty on demand.
Speaker 2 (25:33):
Lou Penrose with you on a Friday night. Good to
have you along with us. Coming up following the News
at nine, The e bike is going to be the
most popular gift under the Christmas tree this Christmas season.
The e bike is the cabbage Patch doll of twenty
twenty five. They're being sold like hotcakes and they're not inexpensive,
(25:55):
but everybody's getting them. And the e bikes are controversial because,
unlike the cabbage Patch dolls, everybody that drives a car
hates these e bikes and now a lot of city
councils hate these e bikes, but the kids love them
and the kids are winning. And as soon as it's
back to school in January, there's going to be more
(26:16):
e bikes on the road. So we'll go through the
whole story right now, talking about CNBC report showing that
for the fourth consecutive month, rents are falling, and that's
good for you, and it's a really, really, really good
thing for affordability.
Speaker 4 (26:34):
What's okay if I well this Kuy's are more total moron.
Speaker 6 (26:39):
It's because the Libs have taken over Sacramento and they're
giving all your money out to everybody out that can't
afford to live here. So they're getting they're getting the kickbacks,
and the working man is breaking his back. That's what
happened the Libs took over.
Speaker 2 (26:55):
I appreciate the call. I think the Liberals in California
have been pretty consistent. I don't think California has become
more liberal than it's been in the last twenty years.
I think I know what's happened, and I'm not sure
how to solve it, so I hesitate to throw it
out there, but I will. So here's the reality of
(27:18):
southern California. In nineteen eighty, the average salary in southern
California was twenty thousand dollars a year. Can you believe
that twenty thousand dollars a year. The average cost of
a starter home was sixty thousand dollars, three times as much.
Now that's hard to do. You've been making twenty thousand
(27:41):
dollars a year. It's hard to say for a sixty
thousand dollars home. But it could be done. Well, it
was done. Our parents did it. And what happened was
people saved. They were and the phrase was, I'm saving
for a home. Oh are you guys going on vacation?
We're you going on vacation this year? We're not. We're
saving for a home. Oh, you guys are gonna be
(28:03):
You know you have any plans for now? We're saving
for a home. When are you gonna buy a new car? Well,
we're saving for a home. People saved for a home
like four years, for like sometimes three years now a
down payment on sixty thousand dollars on a sixty thousand
dollar home, you could pull that off. Saving for a
(28:24):
home on a twenty thousand dollars a year salary, it's doable, right,
what do you need? I mean five percent? And you
know you put the money away every month in the envelope,
and then after three years you got the money for
the down payment and you're still working. You got the job,
you qualify for the mortgage, and boom, there you are.
You're in the home. And that's who lived in all
(28:45):
the homes that we see in southern California, all these
little homes right in Burbank and all these little homes
throughout the Southland, not just in Los Angeles, but out
and you know, in the Inland Empire and down through
Orange County and North Orange County, Anaheim. People saved for
a home and they bought a home, and those homes
were sixty seventy thousand dollars and they lived in them
(29:09):
and raised families in them. Okay, that's nineteen eighty. Fast
forward forty years. Here we are average average salary in
southern California sixty thousand dollars, average cost of a starter
home eight hundred and sixty nine thousand dollars. There is
(29:34):
no way you were saving a and now they want
twenty percent down and mortgage insurance. It is no way
you're saving a down payment on a sixty thousand dollars year. Actually,
you and your wife could each make sixty thousand dollars
a year, one hundred and twenty thousand dollars a year
household income. There is no way you are buying an
(29:54):
eight hundred thousand dollar home or a nine hundred thousand
dollar home, and that like, you know, quote unquote million
dollar home. It looks exactly the same as the sixty
thousand dollar home that your parents brought. I just saw it.
I was just visiting. I was at a house warming
party in Burbank. Beautiful little cottage, very close to the
(30:16):
Warner Brothers studios and one two two bedroom, two bedroom,
too bad, nice backyard. Million bucks. So what has happened
is our wages have not grown at the level at
the same rate as our needs. Like we have to live.
(30:41):
You have to have shelter, and you have to drive,
got to have a car, and you gotta have food.
It's pretty much it and a cell phone. And we
you know, we did, we got we got a triple
of our wages average wage twenty thousand hours. Now average wage,
well that we've twenty twenty so would say it's seventy
(31:01):
two thousand dollars in southern California. But everything else has
grown way way more. And that's the reality. I don't
know how to fix that. I think people need to
earn more, like people need to be paid more money.
I think we're worth a lot more than we're being paid.
I think we are more productive than we've ever been.
That you can be reached by your boss on your
(31:24):
cell phone at all times. You can put all kinds
of rules in the employee handbook that you want. The
reality is you're picking up the phone if the boss
calls because you don't want to be the difficult employee,
not if you want growth in the firm or growth
in the company. So your brain is in the job
all the time. That's good for the productivity of you
(31:47):
and your work. Like your work benefits from your brain
partially thinking about work almost all the time, right, so
you're more productive. You don't check out or clock out
at five o'clock on Friday and then clocking on Monday
and start a front. Like your brain is constantly processing
(32:07):
depending on what you do for a living, and you're
not really getting compensated for that extra time. And because
of the tools that we have, because of Excel, spreadsheets
and email, you can do a lot more. You don't
think you can. But let me tell you. I have
worked in federal agencies and I've seen the index card
(32:34):
to email arc. Literally when you're looking for information and
you're going through files in file cabinets to where all
of that's digitized, and you literally hit a keyword in
a search bar and all the files that would have
taken hour. That's if the files were kept on property.
(32:54):
You have to go off property to some storage, you
have to go find files like that's the way it
used to happen. Now your productivity is way way better,
far more accelerated, and you're getting paid more, but not
nearly as much more as you're worth. That's the way
I see it. And I don't know how to get that,
(33:17):
how to fix that all really quickly, but I think
our salaries need to do. All of our salaries need
to just go up, and then we'll be able to
finally afford that starter home for eight hundred and sixty
nine thousand dollars. Lou Penrose on KFI AM six forty
live everywhere, on the iHeartRadio app
Speaker 1 (33:34):
KFI AM six forty on demand
You're listening to KFI AM six forty on demand.
Speaker 2 (00:07):
With you on a Friday. Good to have you along
with us. Rents are coming.
Speaker 3 (00:10):
Down, Yeah, cour We've got an exclusive early read on
November rent data out tomorrow, and it shows that continued
new supply and weaker demand are pushing vacancies up and
rents down.
Speaker 2 (00:21):
Rents down. It's amazing, right, I mean, when do you
ever hear that? But the apartment rents fell one percent
in November from October. Uh, it was the fourth consecutive
month over month decline and now they are falling five
percent total since their peak in twenty twenty two. Five
(00:44):
percent's not insignificant. Now this is an average, but it's
going in the right direction. And everybody talks about the
unaffordability of southern California, and because what they're saying is
the rent is too high, and everybody's trying to figure out,
how do we stop the rent from going up. Let's uh,
let's bring in rent control, let's have a rent freeze,
(01:05):
let's hang the landlord from his Buster Browns. And none
of that works. The rent control thing really backfired. That
was a dumb idea. Those of you that thought you
can control rent by just making the city council in
charge of telling the landlord how much they can raise
the rent. That backfired on you because what they did
is come up with a formula that was depending on
(01:28):
what city you're in, or if the in LA or
if the statewide one where it's like inflation plus CPI,
or they come up with some number and guess what
inflation went through the roof during the Biden administration. And
the consumer price index is always higher than your your weight,
like you raise you're going to that you didn't get,
(01:51):
so your rent went up higher than the landlord would
have raised it. And they always raise it the maximum
amount that they can because they have to. So rent control.
Really stupid move, really bad idea for keeping rents under control.
The best thing for keeping rents under control is have
(02:13):
more apartments. But environmentalists don't like more apartments, and people
that don't like cars don't like more apartments, and people
that don't like people don't like more apartments. And there
are people in Sacramento that don't like people. They don't
say it like that, but really what they're saying when
(02:34):
they constrict your ability to get power, constrict your ability
to get water. What they're saying is we don't want
houses because we don't want people, because they believe people
encroach upon the environment. So it's very hard to get
housing built to accommodate the rate of growth in California
(02:54):
in the last twenty years. So that puts a shortage
of apartment buildings and that causes the rents to rise. Okay,
there you go, little economics lesson. But now the rents
are coming down.
Speaker 3 (03:06):
The national median monthly rent for apartments fell one percent
in November from October and now stands at one thousand,
three hundred sixty seven dollars.
Speaker 2 (03:13):
One thousand, three hundred and sixty seven dollars. That's a
national average. Yeah, I mean most places in America I
wouldn't want to live.
Speaker 3 (03:25):
Three hundred sixty seven dollars. It was the fourth consecutive
month over month decline.
Speaker 2 (03:29):
See now that's big, fourth consecutive month over month decline.
Remember the lou Penrose rule, it's not where the numbers are,
it's the direction the numbers are going. And there's every
reason to believe that it'll be the fifth month in
a row, because that's the way things work.
Speaker 3 (03:47):
It was the fourth consecutive month over month decline. Apartment
rents are now down one point one percent from November
of last year, and have fallen five point two percent
from their twenty twenty two peat.
Speaker 2 (03:58):
Okay, so since we haven't increase the supply, the only
thing that could have happened is we've decreased the demand.
And here's one thing that has happened in the last
three hundred and twenty days. President Trump has deported two
million illegal aliens. And I've been saying this for so long.
People that talk about affordability in southern California and decry
(04:23):
the ice raids, where do you think the illegals are living?
They're living in your housing stock. Like when they go
home from the home depot parking lot, where do you
think they go. They're not living in Section eight housing
because they can't qualify for Section eight housing. You can't qualify.
I mean, you know how long you'd have to wait
(04:43):
to get into Section eight housing. So like you, an
actual American living in Los Angeles, You're not going to
get into Section eight housing. Forget it. It's like trying
to get into rent control in Santa Monica. No chance
you'll be dead before that day opens up. So they're
not getting into low income housing, they're not getting into
Section eight housing. They're living in what we call market
(05:07):
rate housing. But they're just living eight of them in
a two bedroom. And you know this to be true.
I don't have to spell it out for you. And
now that the illegals are leaving or being deported or
one way or the other not here any longer. You
have all these vacancies. Well, vacancies causes prices to fall
(05:32):
because the owner of the building, whether it's a real
estate investment trust and it's run by a property management company,
or if it's you know, a couple of chiropractors and
Marina del Rey that own like six four plexes in
Silver Late whatever like whatever they whether it's a independent
rental property owners or big corporations that own large apartment
(05:55):
complexes and communities, whatever it is, if there's a lot
of vacancies, they will lower the price to fill those
vacancies because they would rather have somebody in that apartment
for two thousand dollars a month than let it hit
empty for twenty four hundred dollars a month. And that's
how you bring rents down. So it's happening. We're starting
(06:16):
to see the positive impacts of immigration reform, and that's
what we're experiencing. And I think this is just the beginning.
I think that we're seeing a trend line that is
four months in a row and the lowest rents since
in five years. I think we're going to see a
significant increase in the quality of life and affordability in
(06:39):
areas that were well known to be overwhelmingly occupied by
illegal aliens. I mean, there's just nothing else left in
the equation now.
Speaker 3 (06:51):
Vacancies hit a record high of seven point two percent
in October that was unchanged in November. This index dates
back to twenty seventeen.
Speaker 2 (07:00):
So record vacancies in southern California. When do you ever
remember hearing that it was impossible to get an apartment?
It's constantly impart that that's why the rents are so high,
because you're gonna run around to find like they're going
up and up and up. So record vacancies pretty good.
Speaker 3 (07:17):
It comes after a really historic Surgeon apartment construction brought
on big by the pandemic.
Speaker 2 (07:23):
I don't remember that, uh, But the only people that
are not happy about this are the owners of the
apartment buildings, the real estate investment trust. They don't like
having to lower the rent. But look, every once in
a while, the renter gets to win one, and the
renter is winning one.
Speaker 3 (07:37):
Apartment reads names like Avalon Bay, Equity Residential and Camden
Property Trusts are all.
Speaker 4 (07:43):
Down yere to date.
Speaker 3 (07:44):
On the bright side, monthly rental renewals are strong.
Speaker 2 (07:47):
That's right because people like that new rent eight hundred.
So let's let's let's open up the telephone lines and
find out here eight hundred five to two oh one
KFI eight hundred five to two oh one, five three four,
And if you're listening live, you can call us using
the iHeartRadio app using the talkback MIC. Rents are going down?
Are you going to give Trump credit for eliminating the
(08:09):
supply of tenants? Lou Penrose on KFI AM six forty
live everywhere on the iHeartRadio app.
Speaker 1 (08:18):
You're listening to KFI AM six forty on demand.
Speaker 2 (08:23):
Blue Penrose with you whatt a Friday Night talking about
new CNBC numbers that show rents are coming down and
it's a really good thing. There are positive impacts to
this administration, and we're beginning to feel it right here
(08:44):
in Southern California. As people are being removed voluntarily or otherwise,
there are more vacancies. And there's no question that this
will increase the quality of life for people that live
in Los Angeles and greater southern California, no question at all.
(09:04):
So we will see the rents continue to fall as
more and more illegals get deported. The next thing that
will happen, and this is another good quality of life thing,
is you will see attendance in your public schools drop,
which means you'll finally have what the California Teachers Association
(09:30):
have been belly aching about forever, and that is smaller
class sizes. That's good for you. That means your daughter
gets more time with her third grade teacher to learn, Matt,
your son gets more time with the kindergarten teacher. Right.
(09:51):
This is a good thing. I saw in the Los
Angeles Times this headline that seven thousand students are miss
from the Los Angeles Unified School District because of all
the you know, all the fear about the ice raids,
and I thought missing. They're not missing. They've either gone
home or their parents are not taking them to school.
(10:13):
This is good. This is a good thing. This means
that teachers finally have manageable classrooms and they're not going
to keep them out of school forever. They've they've taken
them out of school and the plan is to go home.
I assume I don't think you have a bunch of
illegals homeschooling. So the the the ripple effects of these
(10:38):
of these policies are creating a huge boost to the
quality of life to so many of us here in
southern California. And uh, it's it's really just the beginning.
But the rents are a big one.
Speaker 3 (10:52):
Yeah, Court, We've got an exclusive early read on November
rent data out tomorrow and it shows that continued new
supply and weaker demand are put wishing vacancies up and
rents down.
Speaker 2 (11:02):
That's right. Weaker demand means the illegals have been deported.
That's what that's code word. That's CNBC codeword for weaker demand.
Because we're all still here, we haven't gone anywhere. All
we're doing is waiting for the rent increase. We're all
still in the apartment saying I don't know how I'm
ever going to be able to afford a house. I
don't understand how my parents did it. I don't know
(11:24):
what's going on. I guess I'm just going to be
a renter for my whole life. And the rent continues
to go up. I need to call city Hall and
tell them to do a rent freeze. I need to
join Tenants United, that maniac group, and you know, get
mad at the landlord right like we have been sitting
here yelling at the supply and demand curve, as if
(11:47):
the laws of supply and demand are listening to us
all the while, all the illegals I've been occupying our
housing stock. And in two hundred and nineteen days, President
Trump has been president for two hundred nineteen days. It's
only been two hundred and nineteen days. There are are
eleven hundred and forty one more days of this administration.
(12:10):
He has removed two million illegals, and most illegals were
in southern California, so a large percentage of that two
million number comes from southern California. And all of a sudden,
we see rents starting to decrease, and people are, you know,
examining it on CNBC, and I'm thinking it's pretty clear.
(12:31):
I know it's not politically correct to say, something really
good for California is happening because Trump is deporting all
the illegals. But I'm here to tell you something really
good for southern California is happening because Trump is deporting
all the illegals. And I don't know what the number is.
(12:54):
Nobody really does because it's impossible to count illegals since
they're illegal. But I don't know if two million is
a large percentage or a small percentage. I've heard that
there are ten million illegals in California, twelve million. Some
people say, now it's more like nineteen million. I don't
know what it is, but two million is a percentage
of whatever the total is, there's no question about it.
(13:16):
I don't know if it's a double digit percentage. I
don't know if we're just if it's just a drop
in a bucket. But if rents are beginning to cut down,
we're moving in the right direction. We're doing something right.
And like I said, we're only just a couple hundred
days into this administration. We have eleven hundred more days
to go, and they have doubled the budget of Immigration
and Customs enforcement that was in the One Big Beautiful
(13:38):
Bill so they're hiring. Now there's a learning curve. You
got to train these ice agents because everybody is every
Karen is out there with a cell phone camera making
an illegal alien raid movie. Who they're showing this footage
too is beyond me. I have no idea. Every time
I see this stuff on social media, there is some
(14:01):
maniac liberal white woman and she's holding a cell phone
camera while a Immigration and Customs enforcement agent is making
a lawful arrest and throwing the illegal in the back
of the ice van. And she's screaming about a warrant
and due process and she's filming the whole thing, and
she's screaming that she has a right to film, and
(14:22):
the ICE guy is like, yeah, ma'am, you have a
right to film. Just please step back, you know, because
we're wrestling with an illegal here, very dangerous. And I
always think to myself, who are you showing this video to?
Like where do you plan on showing this? Was there
some kind of an illegal alien film festival that I missed?
(14:43):
Is there a short film festival going on in Santa Monica?
And where all the Karens are gonna loop together this video?
Like who are you gonna show this movie to But anyway,
yeahs as all of that is going on, so these
all these ice agents have to be trained. There's a
learning curve for that because everybody's watching them. And so
(15:04):
they'll be double the amount of operation that we've seen
in just the last nine months, and we've already we
have two. We're two million to the good and rents
it down and vacancies are up, which will cause the
rents to go down even more. So it is having
(15:27):
an impact, there's no question about it. And as I said,
the next thing will be come September, you're gonna go
to school and you're gonna say, like, wow, this is
a much more manageable classroom. These classrooms are smaller. This
is great. My kid is getting more individual attention, the
teacher isn't overwhelmed. That'll be the next thing, and that
(15:50):
will be good. Then you'll start to see test scores
go up and your kids will be happier, and then
teachers will be happier, so they won't be bitching about,
you know how they're underpaid, underappreciated. So Sacramento will get
that pressure off them because teachers actually are happy to teach,
they just don't want to be teaching a thirty four
(16:11):
child classroom, a third of which are foreigners who don't
belong there. So these are all positive things. I'm very
very happy about it all, and you should be too.
So what will be the next right I told you,
we'll certainly get Rents will come down, You'll have more vacancies,
the classrooms will be much more manageable. I think we'll
(16:34):
start to feel a lot more elbow room in southern California.
And I think these are all just quality of life
issues that we can all look forward to. So we'll
get into all that when we come back. Also, we
got to get into this e bike story. The e
bike is the most popular gift under the tree this year.
The e bike is the cabbage Patch doll of twenty twenty.
(17:01):
So many people are gonna be getting e bikes. So
many teenagers are going to be getting e bikes, and
everyone's going nuts because everybody that drives hates e bikes
and all the city council members hate e bikes. But
on Christmas Morning, there's gonna be a lot of e
bikes unwrapped, which means come the first week of school
in January, there's gonna be tons more e bikes, So
(17:21):
we're gonna have to figure out how to wrestle with that.
We'll tell you all about that. That's all coming up
next to Lou Penrose on KFI AM six forty Live
Everywhere on the iHeartRadio app.
Speaker 1 (17:30):
You're listening to KFI AM six forty on demand.
Speaker 2 (17:35):
Blue Penrose with you on a Friday night, talking about
rents coming down for the first time in a long time.
Vacancy is up, and that's a good thing. I think
the pressure of the affordability of housing has been too
much for too long for those of us here in
southern California, and it wasn't always like that. So now
(17:59):
that rents are coming down and we can breathe a
little bit and have some money to look at and
we can make a you know, some different decisions and
maybe even save to one day not be a renter. Mario,
what what's your rent looking like? Are you seeing flattening
or you're seeing just NonStop rent increases?
Speaker 4 (18:15):
You know, for a one bedroom apartment that I've been
living in for now eleven years, it's a it's at
roughly about thirteen hundred.
Speaker 2 (18:21):
Yeah, that's about right, thirteen hundred, But hasn't been going
up every year, only.
Speaker 4 (18:26):
About like sixty dollars, right, it's a little bit. I
think that's still pretty generous compared to everywhere else.
Speaker 2 (18:32):
So what I'm so, let's say I'm trying to do
the math. Now, how about Nick is NII? Does NICKI
even live in an apartment for some reason? I feel
like you live on a cloud or something.
Speaker 5 (18:43):
I live because I'm an angel. I don't know why,
just like I'm an anomaly, I have a mortgage. I
live by myself in a two bedroom, two bathroom apartment
condo on the West Side, with its own laundry. So
don't even bring me into this conversation.
Speaker 2 (19:01):
I know you know why you're not an anomaly?
Speaker 4 (19:03):
Do you do?
Speaker 2 (19:04):
You know? The single largest category of clothes of real
estate closings in southern California are women. Women under the
age of forty.
Speaker 5 (19:15):
I'm not a woman under the age of forty, though
I just sound like it.
Speaker 2 (19:21):
No, but I mean that it doesn't have to be
under the age of forty. But that's the thing that's
the growing population and people that women are like women
are buying real estate is very very new.
Speaker 5 (19:34):
I'm an immigrant, but I am a lawful permanent resident
Green card holder.
Speaker 2 (19:39):
So look at you. I've been vetted. Well, I appreciate that,
all right. So all right, so you're not renting, You're
you're doing as you're a Yes, I'm sure for living
in the American dream, I'm trure. While Mario is sitting
thirteen years in a studio waiting for something to happen.
You know, it's a one bed room for me thirteen
(20:01):
hunt for a one bed.
Speaker 5 (20:02):
That's an amazing price, by the way.
Speaker 4 (20:04):
For that is a pretty good price. Exactly why I've
been there for eleven years. I'm not leaving with that price.
Speaker 2 (20:10):
So when I moved to southern California, and so this
is nineteen ninety, so we were twenty twenty six, so god,
thirty twenty five years ago, thirty five years ago. Now,
two bedroom, two bath in an apartment complex with gated
parking right on Washington and Lincoln, like right there, just
just north of Marina del Rey, walking distance to Venice Beach,
(20:34):
just south of Santa Monica. Eight hundred dollars a month. Wow,
that was nineteen ninety and I didn't have a job.
I mean, I had some savings when I first came
when I first came, my roommate had already moved to
southern California. He was working painting sets for some studio lot.
And I got a job, you know, within a couple
(20:55):
of weeks and eight hundred dollars we spent. It was
four hundred dollars each, and I feel like we were
making not much more than minimum wage. And we had cars.
Speaker 5 (21:06):
How many bedrooms?
Speaker 2 (21:07):
Was it two bedroom?
Speaker 5 (21:08):
And did you say Jefferson and Lincoln.
Speaker 2 (21:11):
No, it was Lincoln at Lincoln in Washington. Yeah, that's
my neighborhood. Like right, there's a gas station right on
the corner, and then back a little bit on Washington
is a couple of you know, four or five story
apartment buildings. Neighborhood, beautiful neighborhood. And it was it was
totally manageable, and we had discretionary income. So we would
(21:33):
go out drinking and go to you know, go to
go to all the all all the doings, all all
in and around you know, Venice Beach.
Speaker 5 (21:40):
Did you have any pets in that point? Do you
know what also sucks about.
Speaker 2 (21:45):
And have a dog anything?
Speaker 5 (21:46):
They all end up in kill shelters because you have
to pay additional rent for your cat, your dog, your hamster.
So people have to give up their beloved fur babies.
I understand the kill shelters, So that's another thing to
think about with.
Speaker 2 (22:00):
Can't be a twenty two year old guy with a
dog in Los Angeles, It's just not possible.
Speaker 5 (22:05):
How's he gonna get the girls?
Speaker 2 (22:06):
Then?
Speaker 5 (22:06):
If he doesn't go to the dog park with his
cute little bow.
Speaker 2 (22:09):
Wow, that's not where the girls are. When the boys
call on a Friday afternoon and say we're headed to Vegas,
you're not going to say, oh, I gotta get a
dog sitter. You're gonna say I'm in. And that's the
way we live life. But yeah, I mean, I just
remember being very affordable. I never thought that that southern
California was unaffordable, and I don't think anyone else talked
about it being unaffordable. But something happened from basically two
(22:34):
thousand and five ish to twenty twenty five ish that
the rents just skyrocketed and houses just skyrocketed, so people
stayed in the apartments and everything just kind of froze up.
And now is the first time in literally twenty years
that we're starting to see some of those rents coming
down in some of the vacancies, which get people choices,
(22:56):
and things are starting to move around a little bit.
So I do think better opportunities are coming. I think better,
you know, better real estate conditions are coming to Southern California,
because it should be like that for everybody, like you
ought to be able to move. In my case, I
had graduated college, I was looking at going to law
school at Pepperdine and came out to Southern California and
(23:20):
I had a friend here, so he needed a roommate.
I needed a place to live, and boom, there we
were in the center of the world, paying four hundred
dollars each and making a little bit over minimum wage
and still having money to pay the light bill, the
you know, and gas in the car and frolic around
and do whatever we wanted. Like that, I never felt
(23:43):
a pinch like it was never a time where I
thought I don't have enough money for food or I
don't have enough money for gas. Yet today people are
making way more than what I was making in nineteen ninety,
and they are strapped at the end of the month
all the time, and everybody's feeling anxiet and having all
kinds of concern, and I don't want you to have concern.
(24:05):
I want you to be free to go drive around
and go talk to the weirdos. I'm Venice Beach like
I did. That's what Southern California living is all about.
So as the rents come down, I do think we'll
see some of the pressures come off, and I think
that's a good thing, and we'll go forward, all right.
When we come back, we cannot not do this story,
(24:25):
so I'm going to throw it at you. The engagement
has been set. Travis Kelsey and Taylor Swift have announced
the day of their wedding. It's happening next year, and
that's very exciting if you're interested in that wedding. This
will be the royal wedding for the Americans. There's no
question between the Swifties and the Kansas City Chiefs fans.
(24:46):
I don't know what's going to happen to the Chiefs,
but this is going to be a big wedding. I'm
sure everyone's gonna watch it. But what's most interesting is
the date she chose. And you Swifties already know what
date it is without it even looking at the story.
But this number seems to work for Taylor Swift and
(25:06):
I don't know if it's numerology or she just really
found herself a real lucky number or something, but the
backstory on why she chose this wedding day is fascinating
to me. We'll tell you all about it. Coming up next,
Lou Penrose on KFI AM six forty Live Everywhere on
the iHeartRadio app.
Speaker 1 (25:25):
You're listening to KFI AM six forty on demand.
Speaker 2 (25:33):
Lou Penrose with you on a Friday night. Good to
have you along with us. Coming up following the News
at nine, The e bike is going to be the
most popular gift under the Christmas tree this Christmas season.
The e bike is the cabbage Patch doll of twenty
twenty five. They're being sold like hotcakes and they're not inexpensive,
(25:55):
but everybody's getting them. And the e bikes are controversial because,
unlike the cabbage Patch dolls, everybody that drives a car
hates these e bikes and now a lot of city
councils hate these e bikes, but the kids love them
and the kids are winning. And as soon as it's
back to school in January, there's going to be more
(26:16):
e bikes on the road. So we'll go through the
whole story right now, talking about CNBC report showing that
for the fourth consecutive month, rents are falling, and that's
good for you, and it's a really, really, really good
thing for affordability.
Speaker 4 (26:34):
What's okay if I well this Kuy's are more total moron.
Speaker 6 (26:39):
It's because the Libs have taken over Sacramento and they're
giving all your money out to everybody out that can't
afford to live here. So they're getting they're getting the kickbacks,
and the working man is breaking his back. That's what
happened the Libs took over.
Speaker 2 (26:55):
I appreciate the call. I think the Liberals in California
have been pretty consistent. I don't think California has become
more liberal than it's been in the last twenty years.
I think I know what's happened, and I'm not sure
how to solve it, so I hesitate to throw it
out there, but I will. So here's the reality of
(27:18):
southern California. In nineteen eighty, the average salary in southern
California was twenty thousand dollars a year. Can you believe
that twenty thousand dollars a year. The average cost of
a starter home was sixty thousand dollars, three times as much.
Now that's hard to do. You've been making twenty thousand
(27:41):
dollars a year. It's hard to say for a sixty
thousand dollars home. But it could be done. Well, it
was done. Our parents did it. And what happened was
people saved. They were and the phrase was, I'm saving
for a home. Oh are you guys going on vacation?
We're you going on vacation this year? We're not. We're
saving for a home. Oh, you guys are gonna be
(28:03):
You know you have any plans for now? We're saving
for a home. When are you gonna buy a new car? Well,
we're saving for a home. People saved for a home
like four years, for like sometimes three years now a
down payment on sixty thousand dollars on a sixty thousand
dollar home, you could pull that off. Saving for a
(28:24):
home on a twenty thousand dollars a year salary, it's doable, right,
what do you need? I mean five percent? And you
know you put the money away every month in the envelope,
and then after three years you got the money for
the down payment and you're still working. You got the job,
you qualify for the mortgage, and boom, there you are.
You're in the home. And that's who lived in all
(28:45):
the homes that we see in southern California, all these
little homes right in Burbank and all these little homes
throughout the Southland, not just in Los Angeles, but out
and you know, in the Inland Empire and down through
Orange County and North Orange County, Anaheim. People saved for
a home and they bought a home, and those homes
were sixty seventy thousand dollars and they lived in them
(29:09):
and raised families in them. Okay, that's nineteen eighty. Fast
forward forty years. Here we are average average salary in
southern California sixty thousand dollars, average cost of a starter
home eight hundred and sixty nine thousand dollars. There is
(29:34):
no way you were saving a and now they want
twenty percent down and mortgage insurance. It is no way
you're saving a down payment on a sixty thousand dollars year. Actually,
you and your wife could each make sixty thousand dollars
a year, one hundred and twenty thousand dollars a year
household income. There is no way you are buying an
(29:54):
eight hundred thousand dollar home or a nine hundred thousand
dollar home, and that like, you know, quote unquote million
dollar home. It looks exactly the same as the sixty
thousand dollar home that your parents brought. I just saw it.
I was just visiting. I was at a house warming
party in Burbank. Beautiful little cottage, very close to the
(30:16):
Warner Brothers studios and one two two bedroom, two bedroom,
too bad, nice backyard. Million bucks. So what has happened
is our wages have not grown at the level at
the same rate as our needs. Like we have to live.
(30:41):
You have to have shelter, and you have to drive,
got to have a car, and you gotta have food.
It's pretty much it and a cell phone. And we
you know, we did, we got we got a triple
of our wages average wage twenty thousand hours. Now average wage,
well that we've twenty twenty so would say it's seventy
(31:01):
two thousand dollars in southern California. But everything else has
grown way way more. And that's the reality. I don't
know how to fix that. I think people need to
earn more, like people need to be paid more money.
I think we're worth a lot more than we're being paid.
I think we are more productive than we've ever been.
That you can be reached by your boss on your
(31:24):
cell phone at all times. You can put all kinds
of rules in the employee handbook that you want. The
reality is you're picking up the phone if the boss
calls because you don't want to be the difficult employee,
not if you want growth in the firm or growth
in the company. So your brain is in the job
all the time. That's good for the productivity of you
(31:47):
and your work. Like your work benefits from your brain
partially thinking about work almost all the time, right, so
you're more productive. You don't check out or clock out
at five o'clock on Friday and then clocking on Monday
and start a front. Like your brain is constantly processing
(32:07):
depending on what you do for a living, and you're
not really getting compensated for that extra time. And because
of the tools that we have, because of Excel, spreadsheets
and email, you can do a lot more. You don't
think you can. But let me tell you. I have
worked in federal agencies and I've seen the index card
(32:34):
to email arc. Literally when you're looking for information and
you're going through files in file cabinets to where all
of that's digitized, and you literally hit a keyword in
a search bar and all the files that would have
taken hour. That's if the files were kept on property.
(32:54):
You have to go off property to some storage, you
have to go find files like that's the way it
used to happen. Now your productivity is way way better,
far more accelerated, and you're getting paid more, but not
nearly as much more as you're worth. That's the way
I see it. And I don't know how to get that,
(33:17):
how to fix that all really quickly, but I think
our salaries need to do. All of our salaries need
to just go up, and then we'll be able to
finally afford that starter home for eight hundred and sixty
nine thousand dollars. Lou Penrose on KFI AM six forty
live everywhere, on the iHeartRadio app
Speaker 1 (33:34):
KFI AM six forty on demand
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