But those “people” who are willing to pay arent people actually from Richmond or even living in it, it now consist of opportunistic slum lords and the parents of VCU and UofR kids Chadley and Olivia in NoVA who make 300k+ a year and will pay whatever they need for off-campus housing at universities that “can’t keep up” with on-campus student demand. $1800 rent seems perfectly reasonable when they’re paying triple that in Nova, even when the same RVA property was half that price 2 years before.

There’s clearly been a huge onset of gentrification fueled by greed and opportunity in the last few years...and when that isn’t matched with meaningful improvements to the life of the people that actually live in the area it’s affecting, it should be noted as an issue. Anyone that’s lived in Richmond a meaningful amount of time i.e 4+ years can see what’s happening to the city

The issue is when Landlords keep increasing rent every year, slowly pushing tenants out and then skyrocketing the price once they’re gone. At a certain point it feels like greed is coming too far into play when these rent spikes aren’t being matched with any wage increases or even improvements to Richmond’s schools, infrastructure, etc.