They both work in industries where face to face communication is a competitive advantage. It’s easy to forget that not every job is naturally compatible with remote work like it is for those of us who type on computers all day.
It's not one or the other (moving in or out), it's about getting what you (the individual) wants, and being smart about timing and using world events to your advantage, not disadvantage.
Some people wanted to move away from SF, some wanted to move in. It was an opportunity for either.
There’s another nearby building that’s extremely similar (same developer, I believe, and very similar floor plans, appliances, and amenities). Last summer comparable units in that building were priced the same as in my building, but are now a ludicrous 20-25% higher than my building.
Rents have gone up since then from my understanding, but they're still below what they were several years ago. https://www.zumper.com/rent-research/san-francisco-ca
In SOMA/Mission? That's genuinely somewhat affordable for tech workers.
You'd get a terrible studio in Manhattan for that, plus all sorts of fees.
San Francisco's reputation is letting itself down. The house price bubble must only be for 3BR family homes with a yard in San Jose/Palo Alto.
But even in the most desirable neighborhoods, rents are still down about 10-15% compared to pre-COVID
To say: Areas that appear less like traditional neighborhoods with single family homes and more large modern condo buildings.
Our building, and many around ours are largely condos, not rentals. They don't look like traditional houses, but even in this more modern area with multi story buildings and retail all over the 1st floor it's not that it's a place that people don't want to buy homes, it's that there are no "homes" to buy, just condos.
Hayes Valley has tons of condos - homeowners want to buy here. Homeowners don't really want to buy at 6th and Mission and a Condo there would be heavily discounted per sqft.
Mission Bay also feels like a neighborhood - calm, some park space, all condos
Rents are still significantly less around here than before the pandemic.
Curious, Why aren't properly prices droping to reflect the loss in population.
Housing prices have been out of whack with fundamentals (cash flow) since at least ‘12-‘13.
They aren't betting the market will come roaring back, they are betting that they can corner the market and housing will be a subscription just like everything else they sell.
Rent seekers aren't going anywhere, and the cost is really immaterial to them for the most part. They don't need cashflow, they need a monopoly.
With remote work becoming more of the norm, what if the labor market doesn't move back?
They'll have a monopoly that few ever pay rent on, and they'll go broke (while the houses rot).
If renters become the majority, it's suddenly no longer viable to limit new housing through regulation. Markets are nowhere near the fundamental limits of homes per square meter of the state that's good to live in.
Theres a good number of companies that are open about increasing their housing portfolios. Even construction companies that built thousands of starter homes per year converting to rentals only.
These are long term changes, and not a quick cash grab at the bottom of the market.
I feel like this is a myth, do you have research to back this?
As a 20+ year home owner, I've never been asked to support anything to increase land/housing value (not that I'd want to, since that means higher taxes for me, which I'd rather not).
I don't think this homeowner cabal to increase values actually exists. If it does, nobody invited me and nobody invited any of my homeowner friends (which is all my friends) either, so it can't be a very large group.
Details of the proposal matter of course, but in general I'd rather not support home values going up because that just means higher taxes for me in exchange of nothing since I continue to live in the same house which is unchanged.
Because I got those all the time. If I didn't show up (which I often did, as a homeowner in the area just to see what they were proposing), all the old folks in the area (90% who owned) definitely did to shoot it down or ask for crazy demands that jack up the price. Sometimes they just filibuster in the vein of 'onion on my belt'.
You'll see big boards up talking about 'Planning Commission Meeting' or 'Meeting on a Proposed Development' at the site of any proposed work, public notices in the paper, and developers in an area are usually required to send notice mailers to every address in the area too in advance.
Those are typically what you see. People generally don't propose a zoning change titled 'Plan to screw over all the poor renters and make the homeowners rich', since that's a bit too obvious and would get thrown out in court. It would be something like 'Plan to develop lot XYZ into high density residential' (which may get shot down).
Many folks (including planning commissions) are happy to ask for on the surface reasonable stuff that makes projects economically unviable, or complain about how the extra traffic from all those people will place an undue burden on them and ruins their quality of life and 'the neighborhood character'. Those complaints are also real - having more people in a small place DOES increase traffic (even with public transit), DOES change quality of life and neighborhood character (better or worse depending on who you are), etc. Adding more parking WOULD be nice for many people, even if there isn't space for it on the lot (why not do a underground parking garage then! $$$)
Which if the planning commission doesn't weigh heavily will result in a rather short tenure for them, in my experience.
All of which raises property values, and decreases the overall number of people who can have accommodation in an area by reducing density.
No, never. That's not the granularity of questions that bubble up to the ballot. Those planning and permit commissions do whatever they do mostly behind closed doors, they certainly never ask the electorate.
Also, if there are cities where this level of question does go on the ballot, it's the same ballot for everyone. So both homeowners and renters in that city get to vote on that, so it's not like there is any special influence power in being in one group or the other.
There are also always hearings around higher density zoning and people turn out tooth and nail to oppose those at counsel meetings. On thing that is interesting, is people generally like the idea of more housing but when you say, 'We're going to add these 4 blocks near your house to the high density core', either people like it less or the people who like it less come out in droves and throw a fit.
You want to have a monopoly on housing in a major city? I’d be hard pressed to point out an industry where that would be harder. You have literally millions of competitors.
Meanwhile most of San Francisco is just streets of old single-family homes.
See https://westlinevillage.com/townhouse-vs-single-family-whats...
South of the Mission take a look at Oceanview/Merced Heights/Ingleside (OMI). That's largely SFH. BVHP (Bayview + Hunters Point) as well and parts of it are visible from Caltrain. Heading west you'll find basically all of the Presidio, Forest Hill, Sunset, and Richmond neighborhoods are SFH or maybe low-rise apartment buildings.
A lot of the single family houses in SF have walls right up next to each other but do not actually share a wall. While Forest Hill properties historically had racially themed covenants, most of those neighborhoods predate HOAs and the worst of the covenants have been discarded.
https://japanpropertycentral.com/2021/12/housing-in-tokyo-is...
The 23 wards of Tokyo are 5 times the land area of SF city proper.
>Nakano ward’s density of 21,956/km2, does rank a little closer to Manhattan (around 28,000/km2).
NYC is quite large. Huge areas of the Bronx, Brooklyn, Queens, and Staten Island have low-risers or single family homes.
Which if course brings the average down.
I agree that the link's comparison of Tokyo 23 Wards with all of NYC is not an appropriate comparison. But not necessarily because of single-family housing as you describe. Even for Nakano Ward (with population density nearing Manhattan's), 20.8% of residential buildings are detatched single-family homes and 48.9% of residential buildings are less than 3 stories tall [0], surely a higher proportion than several NYC boroughs. Its high density is more due to having fewer areas with offices, narrower streets (compared to NYC), and barely any green space.
[0] https://www.city.tokyo-nakano.lg.jp/dept/505700/d026142_d/fi...
This isn't true, even if you limit it to cities with population over 100k. New York City, Jersey City, and Paterson, NJ are all more dense than SF.[0] San Francisco is effectively tied with notoriously anti-development Cambridge, MA. Quite a few smaller cities around the country are more dense as well.[1]
The housing situation in San Francisco is nothing to be proud of, unless you think that having the highest median home prices or median rents is a laudable achievement.
[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_United_States_cities_b...
[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_United_States_cities_b...
The out of towners, who are mostly Blackrock, is just a fella with a spreadsheet tracking new dwelling approvals vs demand.
All the Bay Area has to do is approve new dwellings. The issue is the politicians are landlords with investment properties.
It's also difficult to imagine demand increasing again and prices falling or even staying level. The issue with SF, NYC, London, etc. is sqr miles are effectively fixed and zoning limits how many residential units you can add to the market.
My money is on either this census data or property value data simply being wrong. Housing is a famously inelastic market and a 6.4 % drop in demand should lead to a double-digit decrease in rents and values.
I’d also assume people who bought a place are less likely to sell and leave than someone renting.