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Homeless in Hood River
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surfalex



Joined: 08 Aug 2008
Posts: 73

PostPosted: Mon Mar 16, 2015 11:38 am    Post subject: Homeless in Hood River Reply with quote

I know this might not be a windsurfing topic but I'll post it anyway.
My dreams of moving to the Gorge is finally coming true. However the HR rental market appears to be very limited. As of today we are still looking for a place to accommodate 2 adults 3 kids and our mid size dog.
If you have anything to rent or might know of anyone or anything, please PM me or send me an email at edholmfamily at gmail.com. We need something by 4/1 in Hood River

Thanks Alex



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isobars



Joined: 12 Dec 1999
Posts: 20935

PostPosted: Mon Mar 16, 2015 12:22 pm    Post subject: Re: Homeless in Hood River Reply with quote

surfalex wrote:
My dreams of moving to the Gorge is finally coming true.

That's FANTASTIC! Very Happy

surfalex wrote:
As of today we are still looking for a place

That sux. Crying or Very sad

Your original thread covered many options, and I can't add to them or help you directly. All I can do is encourage you to hang in there, as I and everyone else here think you made the right general choice. I hope you've not confined your location options too narrowly, considering the many nearby options others have suggested.

On the bright side, the river's warming ahead of schedule and winter never occurred, so you can just jump in the water and let the wife find a house.

Not totally kidding. My new bride found and secured our first apartment by parking herself physically at the local newspaper's classified section desk shortly before it went to press, because rentals lasted literally only minutes after each day's paper hit the streets. She snagged a good one within just days.

Or here's an idea: place one neatly dressed kiddo at each HR exit from I-84 holding a professionally printed sign that says, "We have food and a job. What we need is a home." S/he could hand out professional business cards to interested people.

Walk into every established business in HR and ask the owner, if a local, for leads. There are collective millennia of local history and contacts in those stores.

And if you're just talking rentals for now, expand your options. An extra local move next year beats the heck out of six people (the dog counts!) living in a Camry. Besides, you may decide soon enough that you like White Salmon or Mosier better than HR, and home ownership isn't the panacea it once was.

Mike \m/
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eastland



Joined: 02 Mar 2001
Posts: 9

PostPosted: Mon Mar 16, 2015 3:31 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

make sure to check Gorge.net classifieds along with Craigslist. I've always put my rental up on Gorge.net first and haven't needed CL. You might check with some realtors about renting a vacant For Sale house if you're in a bind. White Salmon has good schools too
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cgoudie1



Joined: 10 Apr 2006
Posts: 2597
Location: Killer Sturgeon Cove

PostPosted: Mon Mar 16, 2015 4:13 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

Also, I love my place in Hood River, but I never launch on that side of the
river. White Salmon is pretty convenient for some of the best sailing,
without the bridge ride.

-Craig
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mark



Joined: 10 Apr 2000
Posts: 181

PostPosted: Mon Mar 16, 2015 7:14 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

http://www.trulia.com/rental/3191557846-2920-May-St-Hood-River-OR-97031
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westender



Joined: 02 Aug 2007
Posts: 1288
Location: Portland / Gorge

PostPosted: Mon Mar 16, 2015 8:29 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

Gotta walk or bike to work?? Shocked
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WMP



Joined: 30 May 2000
Posts: 671

PostPosted: Fri Mar 20, 2015 10:18 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

Sorry to hear of your desperate homeless situation. I'm a landlord and have some very happy tenants who hit on the right place at the right time here. Unfortunately, there's many, many homeless folks in the Gorge who would really LOVE a place to call "home". Fact, I just got an email from some people who said that they would LOVE to lay down cash to rent one of my homes for the entire year (more than $12,000) if anything was available. This is the trend here, this is what you are up against my friend...... so many people looking for such limited housing.
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AfterDarkMark



Joined: 03 Oct 2011
Posts: 17

PostPosted: Sat Mar 21, 2015 6:31 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

SurfAlex - first off, good luck and best wishes to you and your family. I hope things work out how you want it, and your Dream can be reality. Your post brought back some bittersweet memories of when I thought my "moving to the Gorge" dream was going to come true. I moved to Hood River from Georgia in 1999. I wanted to escalate my sailing experiences to a level much higher up from the lame eastcoast scene. I had been out to the Gorge on vacation a few times and really loved it and the OR coast as well. Plus I liked all the extras that the Gorge and Mt.Hood has to offer. I had thought about Maui, but it's so expensive, and I didn't want to put my cats through the long quarantine. So the decision was made to move to Hood River and I arrived around the middle of July '99. In hind site, I sure wish I would have done more research, and made more arrangements. I had rented houses in GA, and there were plenty around at decent rents. I thought OR would be the same. WRONG. Real estate in the Gorge is nothing like GA! It is a very high demand place, a mecca for thrill sports nuts like all us here that read this forum. When I arrived, I could not even find a motel room anywhere to stay. Duh - peak of the season. I drove all over, in this massive rental moving truck, with car trailer, even back out to The Dalles, and found no rooms. That should have been my first huge clue! I ended up sleeping in the moving truck for 2 days. Finally, I managed to get with the one friend I had out here already (Joe Morgan, also from GA) and he helped me move my massive truck full of stuff into a big storage unit. (Including my ski boat!) This 10x30 storage space was about the only thing I had prearranged. Besides all my possesions, I came out only with savings and desire - no job, no home, nada. A tiny bit like an Oregon trail follower. I just wanted to be out here sailing in the golden land of (high wind and big swell) opportunity!
Anyway, I finally found a room at the Vagabond Lodge. That's a great place, but the bill was adding up fast. Eventually I found a Slipstream trailer at the Lone Pine Inn to rent cheaper, that was parked next to the Safeway in town. I'm grateful for that now, but back then it was a sad and unpleasant experience. My being homesick, missing my family and doubting my move from GA and split with my girlfriend there only added to my misery. I ended up being in that hot, cramped, stinky trailer for six damn weeks while I hunted for jobs and a better place to live. Other than having a place to sleep, the only thing good about it was that is rocked in the wind on the big days - a built-in dawn patrol alert system. Ha ha. Came in handy though...
Without a job, the landlords I talked to were understandably cautious and mostly non helpful. And job opps were super scarce. I thought I had a good one with the City of Hood River doing their graphic design until I found out the interview was just a sham, a ruse to make it look like they were considering candidates, when in reality they already had a person lined up. Anyway, I eventually found a room to rent in White Salmon. Yay! That was pretty cool. I liked it there. Very quiet and dark at night (awesome starry sky). A little country/boring, but that was okay since I planed to be back in HR eventually. Wrong. I never could find a decent creative graphics or design job, or anything else I was willing to do. I had worked enough in retail that I did not want to do that anymore, and so shops were out. There wasn't much left. So eventually I just gave up and moved to downtown Portland! I guess I wasn't willing to scrap so hard, as many others do, to stay in Hood River. I kinda wish I had stuck it out for a least a year. But the infamous dreaded winter there in HR may have made me move anyway...
The move to PDX seemed a disappointment and defeat at first, but it has worked out fine. I found lots of graphics work, and at one of those gigs I met my awesome girlfriend, whom I now know I was destined to be with. We live in lovely Tualatin now, a good spot, as I am equal distant to the coast, which I really enjoy, as to the Gorge. So yes, I gave up the dream of living right in the midst of windsurfing and mountain biking heaven, but it wasn't meant to be for me. At least not now. If I ever had the means to buy a truly great property out there in the Gorge, I certainly would be tempted. Especially now that I'm getting more into mountain biking.
So in conclusion, have Faith surfalex - there's a Grand Plan for you and it will all turn out as it is meant to be! May you and your family find contentment and wisdom within it. And happy sailing to you and all other forum readers (hello!) this 2015 season - we are almost there!! -KME Graphics & Music, aka AfterDarkMark.



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isobars



Joined: 12 Dec 1999
Posts: 20935

PostPosted: Sat Mar 21, 2015 8:38 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

Great story, Mark, and it reinforces everyone else's educated suggestions to look beyond HR. I couldn't handle Portland for many reasons, but there are a score of other towns in two states to consider. I've lived and/or crashed in or near most of them, and it's almost all good if for no other reason than we gotta drive to sail no matter WHERE our house is, so why not live in a place with broader appeal, including affordability? "The Gorge" is a couple of hundred miles long and has two shores full of town & country and a wide variety of climates to choose from. Even after living all over it for much of the past 25 years, I've been in my present location for 16 now by choice, all things considered, with no desire to live IN Hood River or its climate.
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surfalex



Joined: 08 Aug 2008
Posts: 73

PostPosted: Mon Mar 23, 2015 11:38 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

Interesting stories, they all feel way close to what we are going trough. Vagabond lodge, my wife has already done that. Living in travel trailer, that might have been the next move. Tucker park opens on 4/1, that option was on the table. However by networking and asking anyone and everyone we know in the area, we finally came across a gentleman that owns several properties in town. And yes, we are not homeless. Small furnished condo, no lengthy contract.. we are all set !!!
The rental market has not been the only hurdle along the way. Finding daycare for our daughter was extremely hard, even the afterschool program for our older kids had limited openings. Not to mention the job market. Somehow my wife managed to land a job right in town, I have a to drive to PDX a few times a week, not a big deal.
Big puzzle, all the pieces are finally coming together, all I need know is some big west wind days !!!!
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