MovieChat Forums > The Overnighters (2014) Discussion > if everyone is coming to this town to ma...

if everyone is coming to this town to make this fantastic money?

posted 9 years ago by paulstar1
3 replies | jump to latest

How come they had to live at the church? Why not rent or build in town, unless all the work was seasonal.

The best jobs have been taken. These towns weren't developed to be tourist destinations. Landowner and Real estate companies take advantage of the situation by pushing up the price of land and Rent. These job seasonal in sense depending on weather conditions and if Oil boom dries up.

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[–] animositisomina35 9 years ago

Williston was/is reluctant to build housing because they knew the oil boom would go bust and the people would eventually go away. For that reason, the people who came didn't have many options in terms of permanent housing. A lot of people lived in their cars or hotels because there were very few opportunities to rent apartments or buy houses. At the height of the boom, it cost $2,400/month to rent a 1 BR apartment. That's $900/month more than it would cost to rent a comparable apartment in New York City or Los Angeles.

Similar booms have happened in the past and left behind ghost towns.

[–] zvelf-1 9 years ago

$2400 is a lot of money, but as a New Yorker, I'll just add a corrective and note that $2400 is less than the cost of an average one-bedroom in Manhattan. Los Angeles is a bit cheaper than NYC for the most part.