Prices up at my old apartment.

The weekend before I moved, I ran into the older quiet Bosnian guy who used to manage the building I was living in and still works for the property company, though not as building manager anymore.

He was saying he was tired, and had been painting apartments just across the city’s north border, and recently he had been working not 5, but 6 days a week, and was just tired.

We talked about that for a bit, and then I said I was moving, and we started getting into a conversation about the rents in the area where I’d lived for over 3 years.

“Too much, too much,” he was saying, since studios were almost $700 now.

“Yeah,” I was like, “But the apartments still sell.”

“All full now,” he was like, “No apartments in building.”

“See,” I was like, “And the kids are all young.”

“I don’t know, how can afford,” he was like.

“Because their parents have money,” I was like, “And when your parents pay your bills, an extra hundred dollars a month is nothing.”

“Yes,” he was like.

. . .