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Comment by enraged_camel | Hacker News Reader

Playing devil's advocate here (which is my way of saying "bring on the downvotes"): because what they build can still generate negative externalities that affect their neighbors. So even though a 50-story building might be in compliance with zoning laws, it still blocks neighbor's access to a valuable, albeit non-essential resource (sunlight, cool ocean breeze, etc.) that probably factored into the price the original owner paid for their property.

In other words, you are free to build whatever you want on your own property, as long as its effects don't negatively impact the value of mine. (I personally will never block developments, but I think I would have a right to be pissed off as hell if something like that happened, still.)

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> In other words, you are free to build whatever you want on your own property, as long as its effects don't negatively impact the value of mine.

That is nowhere near a good enough rule. What if I buy commercial retail property in a bustling district, but over a few years the bustling industry shifts half a mile away, leaving my district with less foot traffic and thus negatively impacting the value of my property? Have those developers harmed me in a way that should be illegal?

You may be tempted to say “well, no, obviously that’s different.” And indeed, it is obviously different. But the challenge is coming up with a rule that actually works without needing you or someone to decide on a case by case basis what is “obviously” an exception.

And you’re (Not you personally) free to do what like on your property barring negative outcomes for the entire community. Imposing restrictions on land you don’t own certainly falls in that category.

Hence the stalemate I guess.

So first of all, you don’t have a right not to live in a shadow. Millions of people in cities all over the world deal with it every day. It’s not that bad (tbh it probably helps AC bills too). You have certain rights when you buy property, but “a view” isn’t one of them. If you want scenery, move to the country. It’s gorgeous!

Second, it’s frustrating that people only think of themselves. “What about my view?” What about the hundreds or thousands of people who can’t live near their jobs or their kids’ schools because of your precious view? What about the people who will be forced to drive in and get stuck in traffic, people who probably can’t bike because they’re forced to live in another town only reachable by a long highway trip? What about the people who are forced to pay higher and higher rents because everyone blocks development everywhere in the city?

Screw your view, honestly.

I can understand this point of view, and I don't own a house so I'm not really "defending" anything here. I'd love for housing to be cheaper and for more people to build in SF.

However, think about how you'd feel if you bought a house and spent most of your life savings on it (like most are forced to), only to find that it drops in value dramatically putting you underwater on the payments. It's not just about their "view". They paid for amenities which (whether we like it or not) include the view and environment.

I don't even have a solution - but it's not so simple as "give up your view so more people can live near their jobs".

That’s the other thing: real estate is not a guaranteed investment. If you invest money in a house and its value goes down, I’m sorry, but that’s the risk you take. A home is not a guaranteed investment vehicle, despite that being the outcome when NIMBYs vote and craft policy to make it so.

Also, I don’t think people’s home values drop all that dramatically when new housing is built. We’ve been putting this off for decades, but we’ve also been artificially inflating housing prices. Maybe your tiny bungalow ISN’T actually worth $500,000. Maybe decades of bad local policy have ballooned the price of your house at the expense of others.

And even so, even if building housing makes your house decrease in value, that’s still not a good reason to prevent development. I care much more they cities are healthy and plentiful housing than I do about some Boomers who got lucky with when they bought into the real estate market.

The solution is actually remarkably simple: build more housing. We did it before; plenty of other countries with more sensible zoning laws do it. There aren’t enough places for people to live. We can either start killing people, or we can put up some walls. Personally, I’m a fan of buildings.

Edit: typos (phone)

I agree with you in that I still think the right thing to do is build.

I also think it's really easy to say "sorry, you fucked up when you spent all your money on a house" if it's someone else. These aren't all "Boomers who got lucky" - they are also millennials buying their houses today at current rates.

I think we have to have more empathy for these people if we want to make progress.

If you can show me that building more housing causes everyone else’s property values to fall, I’ll believe you. Until then, these are the exact same arguments people use to prevent building any housing.

Remember, this all rests on the assumption that building housing necessarily depresses property values, and that isn’t a guarantee. You can tell because it goes further than that. It’s hard to build any housing at all. My city had about 100,000 people in it. I know some smart urban planners and they estimate it would take about 20,000 to 30,000 new units to stabilize our rental market. Not drive prices down, just stabilize. But we can’t even build ONE apartment building, let alone tens of thousands of units. Even if more housing would drive property values down (which it doesn’t necessarily), it would take so much housing before it ever got to that point.

And once again, we can have empathy and we can build housing. I promise one or two apartment buildings isn’t going to ruin grandma and grandpa’s home value. I promise.

>>That’s the other thing: real estate is not a guaranteed investment.

The types of people the parent is describing don't buy real estate as an investment. They buy it as an asset. And for most Americans, their house is their most valuable asset.

So can you not spare a shred of sympathy that they are hyper-conscious about what happens to the value of that asset?

Can you not spare a shred of sympathy for people who want to live in the city they work in but can’t because property owners won’t let them? Sorry, I don’t have a lot of sympathy for people who actively block building new housing because “screw you, got mine”. (Also, building housing doesn’t just tank the value of your home, trust me.)

>>Can you not spare a shred of sympathy for people who want to live in the city they work in but can’t because property owners won’t let them?

Of course I can. My sympathy goes both ways.

>> (Also, building housing doesn’t just tank the value of your home, trust me.)

I'm not talking about simply increasing the supply of housing. The specific example we are discussing is a new skyscraper blocking the view from an existing one.

In which case the property value should be fine. As far as view goes, I believe I addressed that further up (but to recap: thoughts and prayers for people who are so burdened by others having a place to live).

If you buy a property that has a magnificent view, but has an empty building lot next door, or an old dilapidated home ripe for being pulled down, then, in a transparent zoning situation, you'll be fully aware that you may be built out and you'll have no rights to prevent it.

That means you'll pay less for your property, and you get to enjoy your view for as long as it lasts, and keep some money in your pocket.

If on the other hand you do have all sorts of rights to prevent anyone from building out your view then that same house will cost you a lot more - perhaps more than you'll be able to afford.

Either of these situations seems fair, because you know the rules in advance.

Crappy situations arise when the rules are not clear. In that case, you don't really know how much you should pay for that house, and you may suffer immense angst when your view disappears.

>>You have certain rights when you buy property, but “a view” isn’t one of them.

I have a right to what I pay for. This is simply inarguable.

In most highrises, the view tends to make up a significant portion of the value. This is why units become more expensive the higher up they are: the view is better from a higher altitude.

So essentially, when a developer comes and builds another highrise next door, they are destroying a big part of the value of the original highrise units.

So, if I have a right to what I pay for, and someone is doing something to negatively affect that, the NIMBY argument becomes rather straight-forward.

(Again, these aren't my actual views. I'm simply saying I can sympathize with NIMBYs, even though I despise them.)

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