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It's a problem all over in many big cities. Toronto is experiencing the same issues. Small businesses are being pushed out. You have a Deli or a Coffee shop tha

It's a problem all over in many big cities. Toronto is experiencing the same issues. Small businesses are being pushed out. You have a Deli or a Coffee shop that has been there for decades close and some kind of Boutique shop move in since they can afford the 5-10k a month in rent. The trend now is for small shopping plazas or outdoor malls being sold off to developers to build Condo complexes. Complete neighborhoods have no shopping anymore forcing residents to drive instead of walk to get groceries or enjoy a stroll. It doesn't help that these cash strapped cities (Toronto) just rubber stamp any new development since the tax haul will be several times what they got for what was there. A 20 story Condo brings in a lot more revenue then a parking lot and strip mall. I won't even start about all the green space they are selling off to developers. It's out of control.

epistasis 7y ago
I don't know Toronto, but your description is the exact opposite of what is happening in San Francisco. All residential development has been frozen. There are a few small areas where very modest amount of housing has been built, but even there it has been with an abundance of retail, that takes a long time to find retail tenants. And because most of the city is blocked from any development; and only small areas get what look like massive changes, it take many years to adapt. The entire western side of SF is basically unchanged in the 20 years I've been in the area, and the age of the buildings say that it's been unchanged for decades more.
- Areading314 7y ago
  North beach, Russian hill, marina, cow hollow, telegraph hill are all basically unchanged too.
  - notyourwork 7y ago
    Mission bay and soma are the two places where residential is being built but it’s all expensive high rise esque units that middle income can not afford.
    - epistasis 7y ago
      When you limit building, the most expensive forms of building get built first, and existing buildings go to those who can pay the most. The only other way to deal with the mismatch of shortages is to have waiting lists or lotteries. Both of those are used for subsidized housing in SF, and the lotteries are ridiculously lopsided, to a tragically comic degree. The only people who benefit from the shortage are landowners, and boy do they take it in.
    - GhettoChild 7y ago
      I have never understood the mindset that new housing has to be cheap or "affordable" to middle income people. New things whether it be a car or a home is always going to be more expensive and it being in the bay increases that immensely. I grew up in the bay and now live elsewhere because the price of living in the bay became unjustifiable to me. I don't see why so many people feel that they are entitled to live in a place that they do not own and feel its the role of the gov't to ensure that they have a place to live.
      - epistasis 7y ago
        I'm glad that you escaped before the economic system got as messed up as it currently is, but there's a lot wrong with your point of view on this. Those of us who live here do not exist as islands. We all participate in a rich economic web that requires exchanging services with lots of people. Teachers, bus drivers, delivery people, shop keepers, mechanics, plumbers, police officers... it takes a lot of people to run a society. Typically the "not everybody has to be able to afford to live here" mindset has worked only when there is a wealthy exclusive enclave that tries to keep out poorer people and races they don't like, but when that community can still draw workers from more affordable places nearby. The Bay Area has taken that "these people we depend upon for our lifestyle don't deserve to live here" attitude and applied it a region so large that people can no longer commute in. It leads to extremely dysfunctional societies.
- bryanlarsen 7y ago
  Toronto's problems are very different from San Francisco's. Toronto currently has more cranes in the sky than New York City, Los Angeles, Seattle and Boston combined. 1: https://www.blogto.com/real-estate-toronto/2019/07/toronto-construction-cranes/ https://www.blogto.com/real-estate-toronto/2019/07/toronto-c... So there's lots of construction, but prices and rents keep going up. But there are signs of it softening a little. https://www.thestar.com/news/gta/2019/07/12/apartment-vacancy-rate-hits-four-year-high-in-the-gta-as-condo-rents-soften-in-downtown-toronto.html https://www.thestar.com/news/gta/2019/07/12/apartment-vacanc...
  - tigershark 7y ago
    Maybe I’m missing something but 120 buildings doesn’t seem a lot. Also only 27 new buildings in the whole New York seems wrong by at least an order of magnitude. What am I missing with this crane index?
  - 1stcity3rdcoast 7y ago
    It may seem like a lot of cranes and a lot of construction, but like tigershark notes below, on a relative basis it’s not even close to the amount of construction needed to meet demand (and thereby induce lower prices). Today’s building boom is a pittance relative to population.
Finnucane 7y ago
New York, Boston, most expensive urban areas are experiencing some version of this. Landlords with commercial space either want a bank or some other national chain that afford an expensive long-term lease, or they're willing to let the space sit empty because it's just a safe-deposit box for some investor's cash--the appreciation of property value is worth more than the rent.
- dsfyu404ed 7y ago
  Boston is kind of a funny case because Boston itself is decently good about letting development happen so long as said development isn't politically incorrect (relative to local politics/beliefs) or can't be construed by the pearl clutchers as being unsafe, bad for the children or bad for some protected class. Yes I know you can drive a container ship through those exceptions but it's pretty darn pro-building as far as Eastern MA goes. By contrast everywhere around Boston is zoned and run like SF. This has the side effect of creating rising real estate prices, rent, etc. in Boston proper even though Boston is mostly sort of doing things right (with regard to zoning) because land is limited and Boston may as well be an island because it's the only place development can happen.
  - Finnucane 7y ago
    Really? I live near Kendall Square in Cambridge and there's been a massive mount of development there. It's been a nonstop construction zone for a decade, with no end in sight.
    - eli_gottlieb 7y ago
      Kendall is one of the only places outside Boston proper. Large parts of Cambridge and Somerville are basically zoned as leafy commuter suburbs with New England small-town charm.
nordsieck 7y ago
> It doesn't help that these cash strapped cities (Toronto) just rubber stamp any new development since the tax haul will be several times what they got for what was there. The problem is not too much building, but not enough. The only real solution to the real estate problems in expensive cities is to get enough new building that real estate values tank. I could fix the SF real estate market in 10 seconds (although it would take maybe 10-20 years for developers to enact the change). 1. Minimum residential zoning is 15 story multi-family (subject to engineering limitations) 2. Axe rent control 3. No requirement to conform to the character of the neighborhood This would make lots of people very unhappy. People wouldn't like it that huge buildings are going up next to their 1 story house. People wouldn't like it that their real estate values will tank my 80-90%. That's a big part of the reason why there will never be a fix. But that level of change is what's necessary to fix the problems the city has.
- zozbot234 7y ago
  That would definitely create a lot of value ("fixing the problems"), but it needs not tank real estate values at all - Manhattan NYC does not have "cheap" real estate. What helps people looking for "cheap" RE is that this gives them more options in terms of moving to surrounding communities, since these would be incented to develop and densify in turn.
  - nordsieck 7y ago
    > That would definitely create a lot of value ("fixing the problems"), but it needs not tank real estate values at all The most basic, fundamental laws of economics are the relations between supply, demand and price. If you keep demand relatively constant and dramatically increase supply, price will fall. Indeed, because of the close substitutability of owing and renting, the only way to get rents lower is to also decrease property values.
    - zozbot234 7y ago
      Why do you assume that demand would remain constant despite a large increase in density? More density tends to mean more amenities and more services like mass transit, hence raising demand.

epistasis 7y ago

I don't know Toronto, but your description is the exact opposite of what is happening in San Francisco. All residential development has been frozen. There are a few small areas where very modest amount of housing has been built, but even there it has been with an abundance of retail, that takes a long time to find retail tenants. And because most of the city is blocked from any development; and only small areas get what look like massive changes, it take many years to adapt. The entire western side of SF is basically unchanged in the 20 years I've been in the area, and the age of the buildings say that it's been unchanged for decades more.

Areading314 7y ago
North beach, Russian hill, marina, cow hollow, telegraph hill are all basically unchanged too.
- notyourwork 7y ago
  Mission bay and soma are the two places where residential is being built but it’s all expensive high rise esque units that middle income can not afford.
  - epistasis 7y ago
    When you limit building, the most expensive forms of building get built first, and existing buildings go to those who can pay the most. The only other way to deal with the mismatch of shortages is to have waiting lists or lotteries. Both of those are used for subsidized housing in SF, and the lotteries are ridiculously lopsided, to a tragically comic degree. The only people who benefit from the shortage are landowners, and boy do they take it in.
  - GhettoChild 7y ago
    I have never understood the mindset that new housing has to be cheap or "affordable" to middle income people. New things whether it be a car or a home is always going to be more expensive and it being in the bay increases that immensely. I grew up in the bay and now live elsewhere because the price of living in the bay became unjustifiable to me. I don't see why so many people feel that they are entitled to live in a place that they do not own and feel its the role of the gov't to ensure that they have a place to live.
    - epistasis 7y ago
      I'm glad that you escaped before the economic system got as messed up as it currently is, but there's a lot wrong with your point of view on this. Those of us who live here do not exist as islands. We all participate in a rich economic web that requires exchanging services with lots of people. Teachers, bus drivers, delivery people, shop keepers, mechanics, plumbers, police officers... it takes a lot of people to run a society. Typically the "not everybody has to be able to afford to live here" mindset has worked only when there is a wealthy exclusive enclave that tries to keep out poorer people and races they don't like, but when that community can still draw workers from more affordable places nearby. The Bay Area has taken that "these people we depend upon for our lifestyle don't deserve to live here" attitude and applied it a region so large that people can no longer commute in. It leads to extremely dysfunctional societies.
bryanlarsen 7y ago
Toronto's problems are very different from San Francisco's. Toronto currently has more cranes in the sky than New York City, Los Angeles, Seattle and Boston combined. 1: https://www.blogto.com/real-estate-toronto/2019/07/toronto-construction-cranes/ https://www.blogto.com/real-estate-toronto/2019/07/toronto-c... So there's lots of construction, but prices and rents keep going up. But there are signs of it softening a little. https://www.thestar.com/news/gta/2019/07/12/apartment-vacancy-rate-hits-four-year-high-in-the-gta-as-condo-rents-soften-in-downtown-toronto.html https://www.thestar.com/news/gta/2019/07/12/apartment-vacanc...
- tigershark 7y ago
  Maybe I’m missing something but 120 buildings doesn’t seem a lot. Also only 27 new buildings in the whole New York seems wrong by at least an order of magnitude. What am I missing with this crane index?
- 1stcity3rdcoast 7y ago
  It may seem like a lot of cranes and a lot of construction, but like tigershark notes below, on a relative basis it’s not even close to the amount of construction needed to meet demand (and thereby induce lower prices). Today’s building boom is a pittance relative to population.

Finnucane 7y ago

New York, Boston, most expensive urban areas are experiencing some version of this. Landlords with commercial space either want a bank or some other national chain that afford an expensive long-term lease, or they're willing to let the space sit empty because it's just a safe-deposit box for some investor's cash--the appreciation of property value is worth more than the rent.

dsfyu404ed 7y ago
Boston is kind of a funny case because Boston itself is decently good about letting development happen so long as said development isn't politically incorrect (relative to local politics/beliefs) or can't be construed by the pearl clutchers as being unsafe, bad for the children or bad for some protected class. Yes I know you can drive a container ship through those exceptions but it's pretty darn pro-building as far as Eastern MA goes. By contrast everywhere around Boston is zoned and run like SF. This has the side effect of creating rising real estate prices, rent, etc. in Boston proper even though Boston is mostly sort of doing things right (with regard to zoning) because land is limited and Boston may as well be an island because it's the only place development can happen.
- Finnucane 7y ago
  Really? I live near Kendall Square in Cambridge and there's been a massive mount of development there. It's been a nonstop construction zone for a decade, with no end in sight.
  - eli_gottlieb 7y ago
    Kendall is one of the only places outside Boston proper. Large parts of Cambridge and Somerville are basically zoned as leafy commuter suburbs with New England small-town charm.

nordsieck 7y ago

> It doesn't help that these cash strapped cities (Toronto) just rubber stamp any new development since the tax haul will be several times what they got for what was there. The problem is not too much building, but not enough. The only real solution to the real estate problems in expensive cities is to get enough new building that real estate values tank. I could fix the SF real estate market in 10 seconds (although it would take maybe 10-20 years for developers to enact the change). 1. Minimum residential zoning is 15 story multi-family (subject to engineering limitations) 2. Axe rent control 3. No requirement to conform to the character of the neighborhood This would make lots of people very unhappy. People wouldn't like it that huge buildings are going up next to their 1 story house. People wouldn't like it that their real estate values will tank my 80-90%. That's a big part of the reason why there will never be a fix. But that level of change is what's necessary to fix the problems the city has.

zozbot234 7y ago
That would definitely create a lot of value ("fixing the problems"), but it needs not tank real estate values at all - Manhattan NYC does not have "cheap" real estate. What helps people looking for "cheap" RE is that this gives them more options in terms of moving to surrounding communities, since these would be incented to develop and densify in turn.
- nordsieck 7y ago
  > That would definitely create a lot of value ("fixing the problems"), but it needs not tank real estate values at all The most basic, fundamental laws of economics are the relations between supply, demand and price. If you keep demand relatively constant and dramatically increase supply, price will fall. Indeed, because of the close substitutability of owing and renting, the only way to get rents lower is to also decrease property values.
  - zozbot234 7y ago
    Why do you assume that demand would remain constant despite a large increase in density? More density tends to mean more amenities and more services like mass transit, hence raising demand.