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Comment by pj_mukh | Hacker News Reader

Are there any public meetings with the developer stepping up and saying “I need to make money, please approve!”. That seems… counter productive

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It’s usually them saying something more like “this will bring jobs”, “growth is inevitable” etc…

And by jobs what they mean is that they will import labor to build housing you can't afford in your neighbourhood.

A new house makes every other lower quality house cheaper by providing an alternative. What matters is the total supply of the houses as good or better as the one you want.

Assuming a perfectly efficient market sure. But in reality an expensive house next door raise the price of the cheap house next door because home prices are heavily influenced by the amount banks will loan, and appraisals are heavily influenced by nearby property values.

Plus other reasons like people want to live in good school districts and higher income areas tend to have better schools.

This is well studied, and I don't believe that's true: a luxury development _reduces_ rents in the immediate surrounding area.

Then studies aren’t conclusive.

Many studies find a small net drop in rent (1-5%). But other studies show no aggregate drop in rent. And importantly show an increase in rent for lower quality apartments.

Also for single family homes, nearby property values generally rise.

https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/07352166.2026.2...

Both can be true. The luxury development can increase value for neighbors while making surrounding areas cheaper

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