4 ms·

Multi-family homes = poor people. Purchasing land for wildly-inflated amounts (remember, if you're not forcing someone to sell the seller has ALL THE LEVERAGE)

by xienze 8y ago

Multi-family homes = poor people. Purchasing land for wildly-inflated amounts (remember, if you're not forcing someone to sell the seller has ALL THE LEVERAGE) and renting out to low-income residents isn't exactly a sound business move.

deleted 8y ago
[deleted]
adrianN 8y ago
You realize that most cities in Europe contain mainly multi family homes and apartment buildings? Look at Paris for example. Rents in luxury apartments are still sky high and poor people can't afford the city center. edit: I hear Manhatten is an example in the US for an area where apartments!=poor people (except in sitcoms).
- drewmate 8y ago
  I've observed the same re: the culture difference in NYC and other American cities. New York got dense before the advent of the automobile, so generations (both rich and poor) have lived there in apartments of varying quality. Other cities (like San Francisco) had some density but plenty of open land when cars became widespread, so the rich spread into the available land, and the poor stayed in (or immigrated to) the existing density. This is no longer the reality (it's basically rich people everywhere now) but the stigma of living in apartments remains and likely will until a generation or two has grown up in them.
- seanmcdirmid 8y ago
  Paris is famous for its height restrictions inside La Defense, though it is all multi-unit housing, they are only 5 stories or so. Of course, this maintains lots of charm.
  - adrianN 8y ago
    It's also one of the cities with the highest population density. Dense housing doesn't mean twenty stories.
    - seanmcdirmid 8y ago
      Yes. Tokyo is similar.
cgriswald 8y ago
Redwood City, CA has built several highrise apartment buildings in the last decade, with more construction ongoing. The low end of rents for these buildings is $3000 for a studio apartment. On the high end, they can be ten figures. There are no poor people living in these apartments, except those made poor by high rents. The poor people largely live in North Fair Oaks (AKA Little Mexico), Redwood Oaks, or Roosevelt neighborhoods. These neighborhoods are almost unnavigable due to the cars parked on the streets from all the people crammed into single-family homes. There are a few apartment complexes, but these are almost all low-rises and rents even there are $1500 at the lowest. At minimum wage, that's about 50% of income for a fulltime worker for a shitty apartment in a shitty neighborhood. It will be a long, long time with a lot of building before it becomes unprofitable to buy the expensive land and build multi-family homes on it here. And Redwood City is about as far as you can get from San Francisco and San Jose while still being on the peninsula. Cupertino is right next to San Jose and I imagine rents are at least comparable, if not higher.
JamesBarney 8y ago
No they purchase the land build a very nice apartments and rent them out to upper middle class young people. But yesterday's upper middle class apartment complex plex is today's middle class complex, and tomorrow's affordable complex. Also the well off people who live in the nice complex arent bidding up the prices of old multifamilies as much because of more housing stock.

by xienze 8y ago

deleted 8y ago

[deleted]

adrianN 8y ago

You realize that most cities in Europe contain mainly multi family homes and apartment buildings? Look at Paris for example. Rents in luxury apartments are still sky high and poor people can't afford the city center. edit: I hear Manhatten is an example in the US for an area where apartments!=poor people (except in sitcoms).

drewmate 8y ago
I've observed the same re: the culture difference in NYC and other American cities. New York got dense before the advent of the automobile, so generations (both rich and poor) have lived there in apartments of varying quality. Other cities (like San Francisco) had some density but plenty of open land when cars became widespread, so the rich spread into the available land, and the poor stayed in (or immigrated to) the existing density. This is no longer the reality (it's basically rich people everywhere now) but the stigma of living in apartments remains and likely will until a generation or two has grown up in them.
seanmcdirmid 8y ago
Paris is famous for its height restrictions inside La Defense, though it is all multi-unit housing, they are only 5 stories or so. Of course, this maintains lots of charm.
- adrianN 8y ago
  It's also one of the cities with the highest population density. Dense housing doesn't mean twenty stories.
  - seanmcdirmid 8y ago
    Yes. Tokyo is similar.

cgriswald 8y ago

Redwood City, CA has built several highrise apartment buildings in the last decade, with more construction ongoing. The low end of rents for these buildings is $3000 for a studio apartment. On the high end, they can be ten figures. There are no poor people living in these apartments, except those made poor by high rents. The poor people largely live in North Fair Oaks (AKA Little Mexico), Redwood Oaks, or Roosevelt neighborhoods. These neighborhoods are almost unnavigable due to the cars parked on the streets from all the people crammed into single-family homes. There are a few apartment complexes, but these are almost all low-rises and rents even there are $1500 at the lowest. At minimum wage, that's about 50% of income for a fulltime worker for a shitty apartment in a shitty neighborhood. It will be a long, long time with a lot of building before it becomes unprofitable to buy the expensive land and build multi-family homes on it here. And Redwood City is about as far as you can get from San Francisco and San Jose while still being on the peninsula. Cupertino is right next to San Jose and I imagine rents are at least comparable, if not higher.

JamesBarney 8y ago

No they purchase the land build a very nice apartments and rent them out to upper middle class young people. But yesterday's upper middle class apartment complex plex is today's middle class complex, and tomorrow's affordable complex. Also the well off people who live in the nice complex arent bidding up the prices of old multifamilies as much because of more housing stock.