4 ms·

To put some perspective on this number, in my mid-sized city a temperature controlled 15x20 storage unit goes for $175/mo. Obviously a living space has differe

To put some perspective on this number, in my mid-sized city a temperature controlled 15x20 storage unit goes for $175/mo. Obviously a living space has different needs, but that's the kind of bar we should be thinking about when we consider affordable housing.

asah 7y ago
um, natural light and two means of egress in a fire? (which severely limits density) Also, plumbing incl waste, trash service, etc.
- rohit2412 7y ago
  We very well know that is not what costs money. Houses with everything you can suggest cost 200k$ in rural areas, but cost 2 million in metropolitan. Rent just follows the price.
DoreenMichele 7y ago
We've torn down more than a million SROs. SROs would be the closest thing to just giving people a room. They typically have shared bathroom facilities down the hall, a shared kitchen and the ability and permission to use a microwave, hot plate or similar to cook within the room. They typically have their own sink. They may have a private bath of their own in some cases, but generally have no kitchen. If you add a kitchen, it's now a studio apartment. I suspect the organizations promoting the concept of Missing Middle housing aren't for bringing back SROs. One site used to describe "residential above commercial" as fitting the definition of Missing Middle housing, but they seem to have changed it to "live-work." This excludes the idea of small units, like SROs, above a rental office or other commercial space in a downtown area. Maybe they did that to intentionally exclude SROs or maybe they aren't aware the change has this impact. Regardless of the logic, it suggests they aren't including SROs in their agenda. Reintroducing SROs and boarding houses would be one way to provide genuinely affordable spaces for small households, such as single individuals, childless couples and single parents. I think we could even improve on what typically gets provided in our remaining SROs which tend to be in old buildings. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Single_room_occupancy https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Single_room_occupancy
- maxsilver 7y ago
  > I suspect the organizations promoting the concept of Missing Middle housing aren't for bringing back SROs. Because they're a bad idea, that had terrible consequences, and most reasonable people have vowed never to repeat that mistake. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tenement https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tenement It's not like building real housing costs that much more. Trying to downgrade housing to make it cheaper is by scrimping 50sqft here, or a bathroom over there, is like the textbook definition of "penny wise, pound foolish". --- Housing is expensive because land is monopolized, hyper-overinvested, and carries zero risk because of government-guaranteed bailouts. Housing in cities is expensive for the same reasons, plus the inherently higher costs of higher density in construction. Housing is not expensive because an apartment is required to have running water, a functional toilet, and enough floorspace for a mattress. That's just simply not the issue.
  - DoreenMichele 7y ago
    That argument boils down to "I'd rather let poor people be homeless than allow less than middle class housing to exist at all." I spent nearly six years homeless. I got off the street by moving into an SRO. An SRO with access to electricity, heat, bathroom facilities etc beats the hell out of living in a tent, peeing in the bushes and living in fear of being rounded up by the police for being too poor for my existence to be legal. I'm working on resolving my personal problems and raising my income. I still struggle to make ends meet every single month. I'm not a drug addict and I don't have a mental health diagnosis. I do have two special needs sons who still live with me and I'm medically handicapped. If you really want to outlaw poverty, you basically need to start applying the death sentence to anyone who has intractable personal problems, no matter the cause. Beat up by your husband and no place else to go but a shelter? Oh, death penalty for you. Gave birth to a child with an expensive genetic disorder? The baby needs to die so you can keep being a productive member of society. Etc. I don't think that works so well, personally. Our current system does a poor job of helping people find their way back to a middle class life once things go wrong somewhere and, so far, no one is quite yet proposing the death penalty for such problems. Which means people barred from having minimal housing become an increasing drag on the system because they have no immediate way out of their predicament. That's not intended as hyperbole: The average life expectancy in the homeless population is estimated between 42 and 52 years, compared to 78 years in the general population. https://www.nationalhomeless.org/factsheets/health.html https://www.nationalhomeless.org/factsheets/health.html Our housing policies are killing people, just more slowly and with more plausible deniability than putting a bullet through their brain. And some do get murdered simply for being homeless. Four homeless individuals were murdered in their sleep in New York recently and three years ago someone was setting tents on fire in San Diego. https://www.reuters.com/article/us-new-york-crime/man-accused-in-fatal-beatings-of-four-homeless-people-in-new-yorks-chinatown-idUSKCN1WK0CR https://www.reuters.com/article/us-new-york-crime/man-accuse... https://www.foxnews.com/us/san-diego-police-looking-for-person-of-interest-in-string-of-homeless-murders https://www.foxnews.com/us/san-diego-police-looking-for-pers...

asah 7y ago

um, natural light and two means of egress in a fire? (which severely limits density) Also, plumbing incl waste, trash service, etc.

rohit2412 7y ago
We very well know that is not what costs money. Houses with everything you can suggest cost 200k$ in rural areas, but cost 2 million in metropolitan. Rent just follows the price.

DoreenMichele 7y ago

We've torn down more than a million SROs. SROs would be the closest thing to just giving people a room. They typically have shared bathroom facilities down the hall, a shared kitchen and the ability and permission to use a microwave, hot plate or similar to cook within the room. They typically have their own sink. They may have a private bath of their own in some cases, but generally have no kitchen. If you add a kitchen, it's now a studio apartment. I suspect the organizations promoting the concept of Missing Middle housing aren't for bringing back SROs. One site used to describe "residential above commercial" as fitting the definition of Missing Middle housing, but they seem to have changed it to "live-work." This excludes the idea of small units, like SROs, above a rental office or other commercial space in a downtown area. Maybe they did that to intentionally exclude SROs or maybe they aren't aware the change has this impact. Regardless of the logic, it suggests they aren't including SROs in their agenda. Reintroducing SROs and boarding houses would be one way to provide genuinely affordable spaces for small households, such as single individuals, childless couples and single parents. I think we could even improve on what typically gets provided in our remaining SROs which tend to be in old buildings. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Single_room_occupancy https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Single_room_occupancy

maxsilver 7y ago
> I suspect the organizations promoting the concept of Missing Middle housing aren't for bringing back SROs. Because they're a bad idea, that had terrible consequences, and most reasonable people have vowed never to repeat that mistake. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tenement https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tenement It's not like building real housing costs that much more. Trying to downgrade housing to make it cheaper is by scrimping 50sqft here, or a bathroom over there, is like the textbook definition of "penny wise, pound foolish". --- Housing is expensive because land is monopolized, hyper-overinvested, and carries zero risk because of government-guaranteed bailouts. Housing in cities is expensive for the same reasons, plus the inherently higher costs of higher density in construction. Housing is not expensive because an apartment is required to have running water, a functional toilet, and enough floorspace for a mattress. That's just simply not the issue.
- DoreenMichele 7y ago
  That argument boils down to "I'd rather let poor people be homeless than allow less than middle class housing to exist at all." I spent nearly six years homeless. I got off the street by moving into an SRO. An SRO with access to electricity, heat, bathroom facilities etc beats the hell out of living in a tent, peeing in the bushes and living in fear of being rounded up by the police for being too poor for my existence to be legal. I'm working on resolving my personal problems and raising my income. I still struggle to make ends meet every single month. I'm not a drug addict and I don't have a mental health diagnosis. I do have two special needs sons who still live with me and I'm medically handicapped. If you really want to outlaw poverty, you basically need to start applying the death sentence to anyone who has intractable personal problems, no matter the cause. Beat up by your husband and no place else to go but a shelter? Oh, death penalty for you. Gave birth to a child with an expensive genetic disorder? The baby needs to die so you can keep being a productive member of society. Etc. I don't think that works so well, personally. Our current system does a poor job of helping people find their way back to a middle class life once things go wrong somewhere and, so far, no one is quite yet proposing the death penalty for such problems. Which means people barred from having minimal housing become an increasing drag on the system because they have no immediate way out of their predicament. That's not intended as hyperbole: The average life expectancy in the homeless population is estimated between 42 and 52 years, compared to 78 years in the general population. https://www.nationalhomeless.org/factsheets/health.html https://www.nationalhomeless.org/factsheets/health.html Our housing policies are killing people, just more slowly and with more plausible deniability than putting a bullet through their brain. And some do get murdered simply for being homeless. Four homeless individuals were murdered in their sleep in New York recently and three years ago someone was setting tents on fire in San Diego. https://www.reuters.com/article/us-new-york-crime/man-accused-in-fatal-beatings-of-four-homeless-people-in-new-yorks-chinatown-idUSKCN1WK0CR https://www.reuters.com/article/us-new-york-crime/man-accuse... https://www.foxnews.com/us/san-diego-police-looking-for-person-of-interest-in-string-of-homeless-murders https://www.foxnews.com/us/san-diego-police-looking-for-pers...