”I’m Back to Renting…
I didn’t think I would be back to renting…but 6% interest! That’s crazy…maybe I should move back to New York.”
That woman had just sold her house in Allentown. She said “6% interest rate” with the shock and awe of someone who felt the effect of the extra $300+ per month that a high interest rate like that adds to a mortgage payment. Anyone who bought their home in 2021 in Allentown, like she did, watched their property double in value in these five years.
By talking to her I learned that is only a good thing if, when you sell your house you can afford to pay the rent – which has also doubled.
Most of her family still lives in the Bronx; and some of her work as a medical translator happens in NYC, too. The commute is worth it, only if Allentown is affordable…and it was…
Until it wasn’t. The August 27, 2025 Sunday New York Times Real Estate section made Allentown look idyllic – a sun-dappled Southern suburb of NYC. I don’t suppose we can blame the Times for that late 2025 steep upward angle on the house price index below. The Times was only chronicling a market boom with its own momentum.
My parents bought a home in a similar Pennsylvania small city in 1980 for $40,000; it is now worth ~$150,000. This graph makes sense for PA until 2020.
That New York Times profile could have been a success story about building more housing. It cites the transformation of brick warehouses alongside new construction as adding 1,500 units to Allentown. These, however, seem to be higher end apartments with “amenities like pools, rooftop decks and parking” – that all compete for “empty nesters and young professionals”. Half of the mortgage applications come from out-of-state.
The Times quotes a developer that touts the city’s “diversity”, and then made a quick note about the “Hispanic population” that makes up half of Allentown proper: “Much of this core population is of more modest means, and has been somewhat left behind in the development.” They follow that sentence with this photo…
Big beautiful murals urging disenfranchised populations to vote … hmmm. Then, the NYTimes profile moves onto all the beautiful benefits of moving to Allentown; amenities like pools and parking included.
Okay. So, the boom didn’t help the Latin half of that city.
Not just didn’t help…hurt. The boom is hurting the Latino residents. This May the New York Times did a separate piece on Allentown that is almost like a follow-up. It is titled,
“We’ve never had it this bad.”
The Times quotes a mortgage loan officer and investor in the Allentown area, saying that she bought an 1,800-square-foot house with one and a half bathrooms in what had been a very affordable area in Allentown for $150,000 in 2024. She sold it a year later for $295,000. Again, that sounds like a good thing…until she clarifies what that means for her clients: “Rising costs have led to rising debt among her clients, who are almost all Latino, she said. That is making it harder to get a mortgage… She said she is seeing foreclosures for the first time since the financial crisis nearly 20 years ago.”
That chart above is from the US Federal Housing Finance Agency. The front page of that website has this reassuring image:
In our wildest dreams, what is in that fancy leather-bound folder? Is he scribbling out that upward swing? Does the president and/or the Republican party want to win over Allentown voters who are having trouble paying their mortgages? The ones having trouble getting mortgages in the first place? If this voter I spoke to saw that image and assumed he is here to help, would she vote for a Republican?
“I would never ever ever ever vote for a Republican.”
She actually said that in response to, “Would you consider voting for a Democrat?” Not a swing voter. She was on the swing voter list. Huh. Maybe her information was not yet in the system. Noted. Every single Spanish-speaker I called (she and I spoke in English, but she mentioned that her family and her job involve speaking to Spanish-only people) said that they only vote Democrat.
“I love Mamdani.”
If I were a struggling Allentown voter, I would not love the New York Times real estate article and put some hope into that photo of Trump signing something that might ease my mortgage burden. But, according to voters I called with Swing Left’s PA-7 phonebank, and further corroborated by the New York Times follow-up; Allentowners are “waning Republicans” and “staunch Democrats” that are not fooled by the president and his congressmen.
If you want to read the Times reporting on Allentown, this article from last August, this one from a few weeks ago and this one about JD Vance’s visit give you that reporter perspective that everyone has access to. If you want a very accurate picture of the swing voters that will decide the balance of Congress…and the future of the world…call them. Swing Left Alliance shares what we learn with a kind and sophisticated Democratic canvassing organization called Ground Truth. You get firsthand knowledge of what ideas are determining our fate; while doing the single most effective thing to influence our elections.
Let’s end with an inspiring mural of another happy looking little girl in Allentown and the caption that accompanies it: “Voters in eastern Pennsylvania say the economic lives of working class people are precarious. Residents are moving back in with their parents, putting off car repairs, driving less to save gas and preparing their food at home.”….I’m noting a tone and content mismatch…
