Sunbelt Blues The Failure of American Housing

Andrew Ross, Ramon de Ocampo

eAudio - 2021

"De Ocampo's performance is admirable. It is well paced, and he employs voices and strategic pauses to good effect. In sum, both the writing and narration are first-class." - AudioFile MagazineAn eye-opening investigation of America's rural and suburban housing crisis, told through a searing portrait of precarious living in Disney World's backyard.Today, a minimum-wage earner can afford a one-bedroom apartment in only 145 out of 3,143 counties in America. One of the very worst places in the United States to look for affordable housing is Osceola County, Florida.Once the main approach to Disney World, where vacationers found lodging on their way to the Magic Kingdom, the fifteen-mile Route 192 corridor in Osceola has... become a site of shocking contrasts. At one end, global investors snatch up foreclosed properties and park their capital in extravagant vacation homes for affluent visitors, eliminating the county's affordable housing in the process. At the... more