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Comment by mutator | Hacker News Reader

The discourse around high density housing does not make it clear what specific type of development do advocates prefer. Its likely that the market will have to decide for itself, but if we end up with an abundance of just 1/2 bedroom rental apartments, targeted towards transient younger people, I fear it's just going to enrich the property management class, and families with kids/older parents looking for larger places and hoping to establish roots are still going to stuck fighting the pricing/supply wars.

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I think you are incorrectly missing that many larger units (both 3+ bedroom apartments and houses) are currently filled with singles or couples with roommates who would rather live alone in 1 or 2 bedrooms, but can't due to inadequate supply.

Building 1/2 bedrooms would help those people move out, freeing up larger units for families.

> I fear it's just going to enrich the property management class

The property management class benefits most from the current system with no construction and high rents. Building a bunch of 1/2 bedrooms, triggering lower rents, would cause them to lose money.

I wonder if this is true. There is significant risk in price changes for renting (or even HOA fees for condominiums), such that many middle class people might feel more secure living in their home with a near zero interest rate mortgage, if not a paid off mortgage.

On top of that, most jurisdictions (in the US) subsidize property tax rates for senior citizens, so there is a lot less price volatility for simply remaining in one’s home (or even moving to a different, but smaller detached single family home).

Unless a person specifically wants an urban lifestyle in a shared building, I don’t see much impetus to move out. Worst case, they get to stay in their home they have gotten used to and have space for visitors, best case they save a bunch of money and sleep easy knowing their costs are more controlled.

I was talking about renters moving out of larger apartments or shared homes into 1/2 bedroom apartments.

Middle class homeownership is basically dead in California due to the absurd price of housing. Almost everyone young who didn't inherit wealth or earn 90th percentile income is renting

As little as one experience is worth,

When I lived in socal, almost every person under 35 i knew there was living in a 2-4bd with roommates.

1bd and studios were very scace, and almost often prohibitively expensive.

So I second that creating a real offer for 1bd and studios would definitely free up family housing.

On top of that 1 and 2-person households still need housing. Building some for them is a good thing in my book

I'll choose tall apartments with 1/2 bedroom rental units over nothing every day.

The only people who don't like to see "young people" paying $2500 in rent instead of $3500 for a 400sqft studio are landlords.

The economics of 3BR family units are typically hard for developers to make money on. Bobby Fijan (https://x.com/bobbyfijan) is an example of a developer who is a vocal advocate of family-centric apartments and townhomes. His projects look amazing. He also talks about the challenges creating family housing.

Single stair reform is something that helps in terms of making more family sized units (aka 'homes').

I saw the author of this book give a talk earlier this year and found his point of view pretty convincing: https://islandpress.org/books/building-people#desc

Single stair is one of the reforms I'd most like to see.

At the time 2 stair requirements were adopted it was vital, with devastating urban fires a common occurrence. We have so many new options for both preventing fire and keeping evacuation routes accessible for hours that it's no longer required.

The regulation has a huge impact on the layout and form it's possible to build, and I think it's a huge driver of the visceral reaction against apartment living in the US and Canada.

Being able to build 4-8 storey apartments on a single lot with a central stair where every unit has windows on at least 2 walls would be a game-changer for north american urban spaces and a pathway out of the housing crisis.

> I think it's a huge driver of the visceral reaction against apartment living in the US and Canada.

On the one hand, maybe, but on the other hand, apartments (with the same number of bedrooms for the same COL-adjusted price) in the US are enormous compared to those in Asia and in Europe. I think the real source(s) of the visceral reaction(s) is, in no particular order, Americans' prioritization of personal independence over pragmatism (and I don't mean that pejoratively, though it can get stubborn at times), America's fairly weak renter protections/regulations, and the poor build quality of many American apartments (with dogshit sound and climate-proofing). I think it's a mix of a fundamentally American aversion to adding an additional person telling you what to do with genuine issues in the paradigm where you're paying up the ass for heating/cooling because your landlord doesn't particularly feel like installing double-pane windows, and at the same time your neighbors and neighborhood are obnoxiously loud.

You don't think that younger people need housing too?

How about all the empty nesters that are sitting on 4 bedroom homes but are unwilling to move. Are you going to propose legislation to make them?

Will you propose legislation to specially encourage more multi bedroom homes?

The attitude of "this doesn't benefit a narrow band of people that I want to benefit, therefore it must be stopped" is why California is in such a housing mess right now.

Yeah they currently could sell their 4 bedroom and buy a 2 bedroom for the same monthly mortgage because the high interest rates. No thanks.

Yeah, these incentives should be changed.

Unless we see unexpected side effects (like a lower number of housing or even more housing demands due to SB 79) I guess this will indirectly help the buyers looking for larger properties since so many people have no choice but purchasing a unnecessarily spacious house thanks to inflexible zoning.

Anything larger gets smeared as a "luxury apartment". There is no winning. Build, build, build, build. Public housing AND private housing. Just build. That's it.

> but if we end up with an abundance of just 1/2 bedroom rental apartments

That's still a massive win. To replace 10 single family homes supporting 2-3 people each with a 9 story building supporting many multiples of that is a win for society.

If the people chasing 3 and 4 bedroom apartments accepted smaller rooms, they could still be economical vs studio/1/2 BR apartments and condos.

I am curious what percentage of people would (or do) forego having kids if they do not think they can afford to buy (or eventually buy) a detached single family home.

I can’t say I would have been keen on having kids if I had to live in the quality of pretty much all the apartment buildings I have been in.

> That's still a massive win. To replace 10 single family homes supporting 2-3 people each with a 9 story building supporting many multiples of that is a win for society.

Not if society wants to own their home.

A condo is still property.

An abundance of 1/2 bedroom rental apartments would reduce the price of larger places, because there would be lower demand.

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