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The reasons behind the housing supply crisis are many, and the situation can seem intractable. I have been assisting architect Eugene Lew with a comprehensive

The reasons behind the housing supply crisis are many, and the situation can seem intractable. I have been assisting architect Eugene Lew with a comprehensive and audacious solution to this problem. If you are interested in reading a draft version of his white paper, DM me on https://twitter.com/jamiepitts https://twitter.com/jamiepitts. The concept is tailor-made for the west districts of SF but can be applied to any city. It combines finance, architecture, land-creation, community involvement, and propagation, and the output is a nonsubsidized 3BDR, 2BA home for households with incomes between $100,000 and $150,000. There are 15 homes in a six story elevator building, and the goal is to build hundreds of them across SF.

ilamont 10y ago
If 300 units are built it will help 4500 middle-income households. That's great, but how many middle-income households will still be unable to find affordable housing, therefore keeping market-rate rents sky-high? I think the solution is not trying to cram more units into a small area. Manhattan has done that for decades, and it's still not enough to balance supply and demand. Rather, it's to encourage business development and residential living elsewhere, either nearby or far away. We're seeing that with Oakland and northern NJ but there are many more opportunities to expand this to other areas of the country. A lot of credit goes to southern states which encouraged (through tax breaks and other incentives) heavy industry to set up shop in smaller cities and rural areas. What will it take Google, GE, or Microsoft to move a big chunk of their respective operations away from San Francisco, Boston, and Seattle?
- twblalock 10y ago
  > What will it take Google, GE, or Microsoft to move a big chunk of their respective operations away from San Francisco, Boston, and Seattle? It's a chicken and egg problem: companies don't want to invest in cities where there aren't a lot of qualified workers, and workers don't want to move to cities where there aren't a lot of jobs. Furthermore, the most competitive workers tend to move to the cities you mentioned, so companies located in those cities can stay where they are and enjoy having the best workers come to them. Consider the Sacramento area: it's about 2 hours from Silicon Valley by car, with significantly cheaper housing, and plenty of well-connected people because Sacramento is the state capital. Why doesn't that area have a booming tech economy? Because the most competitive tech workers from Sacramento have already moved to the Bay Area. Bay Area companies don't need to open offices in Sacramento to attract those workers.
  - BWStearns 10y ago
    I don't think it's illegal to collude to improve a second tier city's economic prospects. Large tech cos have proven their inclination and ability to cooperate to influence markets before, why not put that collaborative spirit to work for good and profit?
    - twblalock 10y ago
      If tech companies would benefit from doing that, why haven't they done it already? The simple answer is that they would not benefit by doing that. They can just sit tight in Silicon Valley, Seattle, and New York while the best talent comes to them.

ilamont 10y ago

If 300 units are built it will help 4500 middle-income households. That's great, but how many middle-income households will still be unable to find affordable housing, therefore keeping market-rate rents sky-high? I think the solution is not trying to cram more units into a small area. Manhattan has done that for decades, and it's still not enough to balance supply and demand. Rather, it's to encourage business development and residential living elsewhere, either nearby or far away. We're seeing that with Oakland and northern NJ but there are many more opportunities to expand this to other areas of the country. A lot of credit goes to southern states which encouraged (through tax breaks and other incentives) heavy industry to set up shop in smaller cities and rural areas. What will it take Google, GE, or Microsoft to move a big chunk of their respective operations away from San Francisco, Boston, and Seattle?

twblalock 10y ago
> What will it take Google, GE, or Microsoft to move a big chunk of their respective operations away from San Francisco, Boston, and Seattle? It's a chicken and egg problem: companies don't want to invest in cities where there aren't a lot of qualified workers, and workers don't want to move to cities where there aren't a lot of jobs. Furthermore, the most competitive workers tend to move to the cities you mentioned, so companies located in those cities can stay where they are and enjoy having the best workers come to them. Consider the Sacramento area: it's about 2 hours from Silicon Valley by car, with significantly cheaper housing, and plenty of well-connected people because Sacramento is the state capital. Why doesn't that area have a booming tech economy? Because the most competitive tech workers from Sacramento have already moved to the Bay Area. Bay Area companies don't need to open offices in Sacramento to attract those workers.
- BWStearns 10y ago
  I don't think it's illegal to collude to improve a second tier city's economic prospects. Large tech cos have proven their inclination and ability to cooperate to influence markets before, why not put that collaborative spirit to work for good and profit?
  - twblalock 10y ago
    If tech companies would benefit from doing that, why haven't they done it already? The simple answer is that they would not benefit by doing that. They can just sit tight in Silicon Valley, Seattle, and New York while the best talent comes to them.