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Comment by blackjack48 | Hacker News Reader

If any SF residents agree with the sentiment of this article, I'd recommend voting in the upcoming election. Props B & C will allow a project with new housing, retail, and open space to be built downtown. I support the project not because it's perfectly designed, but because it would set a terrible precedent for future development in the city if opponents successfully use the referendum process to block it. Ironically, many of the same people opposed to the project are the ones who are complaining the most about rising rents. Even though the project certainly isn't low- or middle-income housing, it will relieve some of the demand that would otherwise be placed on housing for lower incomes.

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Yes, Prop C is a ridiculous attempt to subvert the planning process. For the record, 8 Washington was approved by the Port Commission, Planning Commission and Board of Supervisors. And yet, here we are with this measure.

Another one to watch out for is the Mexican Museum Tower (706 Mission). There have been rumblings that a few of the owners in the Four Seasons Tower don't care for the tall building obstructing their views: http://www.socketsite.com/archives/2013/07/an_unfriendly_ult...

Depending on the results of the November ballot, we may be seeing more of these.

I'm not anti-development but your last statement is not necessarily guaranteed. These days new units are being sold off-plan before construction to wealthy international non-residents who simply want to park their money. They will remain empty. Unless there are provisions in the permits to prevent this, but it's difficult to enforce.

That is bad if true but if the alternative is for those investors to buy some other units elsewhere it's still useful to build this to prevent them from doing that.

Foreign investors seem to be biased towards new-build property, I'm not sure why. "Elsewhere" could easily mean an entirely different country.

Units in SF built after 1979 are not subject to rent control.

New builds involve dozens of units coming to market at once. Thus, sales and marketing teams can be employed to market the property overseas to these wealthy individuals. It's also far more predictable and doesn't require inspection and such. In some markets, such as Australia (possibly UK, I'm not sure), you don't pay property tax but you do have an upfront stamp duty. This duty is waived for purchases of new developments (another way foreign investors get to pilfer commonwealth countries and take advantage of so many of the benefits of living there without paying much tax at all).

> it will relieve some of the demand that would otherwise be placed on housing for lower incomes.

I don't know if this is necessarily true, in the same way that if you build an extra lane on a freeway you don't inherently reduce congestion - traffic simply expands to fill the available space.

Many people buying these new apartments and condos will be buying as an investment and renting out, which does nothing to help those in housing need.

That's because the increase in supply will be too small to undo the fact that the economy will still be heavily demand-driven. If you want to completely undo that, you need to saturate the demand. However, you can't get from here to there without that intermediate step.

Plus, on the margins, it will still increase supply and drop prices, as the price those can be rented out at are driven by supply and demand. Continue to reliably raise supply, and you'll also lower the value of those investments and cause them to sell out as they cease to be good investments.

The reason why that is an attractive strategy in the first place is that demand is grossly in excess of supply. Fix the root cause, the problem will go away.

San Francisco may not believe in market forces, but market forces believe in San Francisco.

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