Yet we broadly refuse to dismantle a century of ever-tightening restrictions on what can be built nor simplify or eliminate processes that slow down and drive up costs for the little that's legal.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2023/10/20/housing-s...
I would love to think that remote work will solve some of this, but myself and many others do not find that fulfilling or sustainable in the same way as even being in the office 2-3 days a week. RTO is increasingly becoming a trend, which I personally find unfortunate but can understand.
We can and should get rid of some dated zoning restrictions and ineffective leaders but it’s not going to be a panacea by any means.
Commuting to the office wouldn’t be so bad if it just meant taking a train for 20 minutes while you read HN.
I’m lucky enough to live with my parents in a rural area, but if I ever move out to San Francisco or NYC for work I will probably try to find the smallest possible apartment. I don’t need a kitchen or table. I just need a bed, wardrobe, and lockable door. I’ve spent enough time in hostels around the world to know I could make it.
As a single person, I do not think living in a city is that big a challenge. Sure it’s expensive, you still have to hustle, but you can get a studio or roommates or even live with family, that is how people get by.
Once you are partnered and have kids it becomes much more challenging. I know someone who raised a family of five kids in a 2BR in Chicago, it can be done. But it’s a cultural issue: that is what poor people do, and nobody wants to feel poor. So we expect to have a big house that is unaffordable in the city and we move to cheaper climes and commute.
The nuclear family is a big part of the problem. Going back to multi-generational housing with little private space is not a super popular option, but Gen Z seems to be dipping their toes…
It's weird that this is such a common thought in a world where Tokyo exists.
You can build an almost unlimited number of floors on that limited land, and it has been done with brilliant results!
Building on these gives the developer a perpetual abeyance on any capital gains, they don't have to pay tax on their profit at all! These QOZs were intended to incentivize the development of land in rural areas where development is not being done by the capital class, but are being abused to put money in the pockets of the rich to ensure there's somewhere to keep the slave class close by all the tech bros so they can cook their lunch.
Heaven forbid they were actually used in rural areas and created jobs where these humans could leave the city and seek some semblance of self-determination.
When two things happen concurrently, it can be hard to tell cause and effect apart.
In reality, real estate speculation is driven by the simple fact that prices always go up, making it one of the best investments there is for those with enough cash.
If you legalize massive housing construction, housing prices will start going down, and the speculation money will have to go elsewhere.
To discourage speculation, governments should impose land value tax, but not property tax, to encourage efficient use of land. You'll also need to pair with other reform, like changing how zoning should be done, how transportation is planned, and so forth.
If more houses are built, prices will go down.
Has anyone done some math on the housing density that is most economical? My guess would be that the height limit would be close to five or six stories before the engineering to go higher was excessive, but that is just a wild guess. Courtyards down to ground level so people can have an external view seem wasteful from a heating and cooling perspective, most people don't want to live with no windows.
The real solution would be to fight the speculation and accept acces to a home as a human right. So prohibit/tax unrented rentals, progressively taxes owning multiple homes.
I live in a poorer EU country where foreign money bought everything they could. They dont even bother renting it out because increase of the value of the properties is where the money is. If they started to rent the evaulations would fall.
The answer is to remove housing as an investment vehicle. Also prohibiting the ownership of multiple houses by a single individual or institution.
No, it's driven by supply and demand.
Unfortunately a lot of folks think that housing doesn't follow the same simple economic rules that we've observed for all other physical goods. So they don't allow supply and we continue to spiral deeper and deeper into a housing crisis.
If housing were abundant, we wouldn't be reading articles about the rise of living in cars.
Further, there isn't unlimited demand at every price point. When you constrain supply to the point that high-end demand can consume more than total possibly supply, of course builders only build to the high end of the market.
Finally, we've made the high end of the market the only thing which can possibly pencil out by driving up costs. Planners demand low floor area ratios, high parking rates, articulated facades, parks dedications, high impact fees - that money ultimately comes from the buyer or the renter. So by making those demands you price out increasingly large portions of the population.