An interesting term I recently learned from the real estate industry is not just NIMBY but for the ultimate extreme of people who start municipal political fights against new development, BANANA
Build
Absolutely
Nothing
Anywhere
Near
Anything
Build
Absolutely
Nothing
Anywhere
Near
Anything
If housing is an investment it means either demand went up (population growth), or supply did not go up (housing wasn't built).
I suspect that if you measure housing price adjusted for inflation per capita, you would get a measure of housing supply.
The fact that house owning individuals financially gain from limiting housing supply is, to me, the defining feature of class warfare, even if people don't think they are participating in it.
I think this is the basis for the statement "housing can either be affordable or an investment, but not both." Housing can either be in adequate supply (affordable) or limited (an investment).
The same people, of course, who have a 5-person verizon or tmobile LTE family plan and spend a huge proportion of their waking life glued to their iphone or android phone.