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"The Times reported in July that 74 projects were under construction in downtown Seattle. Two-thirds of the buildings will be residential towers, with most bein

"The Times reported in July that 74 projects were under construction in downtown Seattle. Two-thirds of the buildings will be residential towers, with most being apartments for rent, not condos...Seattle has gone from one of the most affordable West Coast cities to one of the least, Aaron Terrazas, a senior economist at Zillow, told CNN Money. The city and developers have tried to alleviate that by building tons of apartments. Downtown has added 20,000 units in the past decade, with another 27,000 on the way...But nearly all the buildings are considered luxury real estate, with rents 40% higher than in older buildings. The dueling 41-story Insignia towers include amenities like a "sky retreat," an indoor lap pool and sauna, and a screening room...From 2005 to 2015, Seattle's median rent jumped by three times as much as the national figure did. In downtown Seattle, average rent has climbed to $2,400 a month, meaning you'd need to make about $96,000 to afford it." http://www.businessinsider.com/amazon-hq-photo-tour-seattle-make-any-city-wary-of-amazon-hq2-2017-12/#but-nearly-all-the-buildings-are-considered-luxury-real-estatewith-rents-40-higher-than-in-older-buildings-the-dueling-41-story-insignia-towers-include-amenities-like-a-sky-retreat-an-indoor-lap-pool-and-sauna-and-a-screening-room-16 http://www.businessinsider.com/amazon-hq-photo-tour-seattle-... And another article: http://gawker.com/how-amazon-swallowed-seattle-1724795265 http://gawker.com/how-amazon-swallowed-seattle-1724795265

bulldoa 9y ago
I acknowledge the problem, but at the same time I am not sure what is the solution. Should Amazon relocate to a brand new city where it is not possible to gentrified people or should amazon just relocate to other country and cause problem there? I would think both is not optimal since Amazon does provide a net positive impact on the local economy. And I would even argue that the city could take advantage of this new tax source to improve education and perhaps output engineer talents that is much in demand now and in the foreseeable future
cthalupa 9y ago
The problem is that average rent increasing isn't actually a good metric on how it is affecting the cost of living for people that previously lived there. This sounds unintuitive at first, but turns out to be fairly simple. The first thing to consider is that the density on new construction for these is significantly higher - a lot of land that had 80 units before might now have now have an additional 640. Most of these apartment buildings downtown are building up significantly higher than previous places. Going from 4 stories to 30+. Some seriously tall high rises. And then it's a good thing that these are targeted as luxury accommodations, because they're making the high income newcomers their targets - that means there are fewer of these newcomers targeting the existing housing increasing that price. Now, you have luxury housing that exists in much higher quantities than the previous housing - this has a disproportionate impact on the city average, but doesn't say anything about the impact on the majority of existing housing outside of these new constructions. That isn't to say it hasn't gone up as well, but you have to look at how much the supply of this existing housing has contracted and if that contraction has pushed the demand up enough that those prices have significantly increased as well. This isn't captured in looking at the average rent price of the city.

bulldoa 9y ago

I acknowledge the problem, but at the same time I am not sure what is the solution. Should Amazon relocate to a brand new city where it is not possible to gentrified people or should amazon just relocate to other country and cause problem there? I would think both is not optimal since Amazon does provide a net positive impact on the local economy. And I would even argue that the city could take advantage of this new tax source to improve education and perhaps output engineer talents that is much in demand now and in the foreseeable future

cthalupa 9y ago

The problem is that average rent increasing isn't actually a good metric on how it is affecting the cost of living for people that previously lived there. This sounds unintuitive at first, but turns out to be fairly simple. The first thing to consider is that the density on new construction for these is significantly higher - a lot of land that had 80 units before might now have now have an additional 640. Most of these apartment buildings downtown are building up significantly higher than previous places. Going from 4 stories to 30+. Some seriously tall high rises. And then it's a good thing that these are targeted as luxury accommodations, because they're making the high income newcomers their targets - that means there are fewer of these newcomers targeting the existing housing increasing that price. Now, you have luxury housing that exists in much higher quantities than the previous housing - this has a disproportionate impact on the city average, but doesn't say anything about the impact on the majority of existing housing outside of these new constructions. That isn't to say it hasn't gone up as well, but you have to look at how much the supply of this existing housing has contracted and if that contraction has pushed the demand up enough that those prices have significantly increased as well. This isn't captured in looking at the average rent price of the city.