> Overnight, their house is much more valuable because if they choose to, they can sell to a developer who can make MORE money by building more homes. And if th

> Overnight, their house is much more valuable because if they choose to, they can sell to a developer who can make MORE money by building more homes. And if they choose to keep their house as is, nobody is going to force them. In normal states -- people oppose up-zoning, because if their lot becomes more valuable, they instantly lose a lot of money. Sure, it's on-paper higher, but if they stay, that just means higher property taxes instantly (it's not uncommon for taxes to double or more after a few years of gentrification have occurred), along with higher cost of living (every other thing around them, like child care and restaurants and such will all get more expensive, to cover the higher rent and higher cost of living for those folks). And that's before getting to all the other minor annoying issues (extra noise, less infrastructure per person, income inequality, etc) And sure, in theory they could sell out. But how, for what? Sure, in California, you can always just assume there's a boring midwest/south place to escape to -- but for everyone already in the midwest/south, no such escape option exists. If those folks leave, they'll have to buy a new place somewhere else, and they're all expensive too. If your $50k house is now worth $500k on-paper, but every other place to live is now $800k and up, you can't afford to stay (property taxes + cost of living are eating your income) and you can't afford to leave (everywhere else is getting even more expensive, there's no where to 'sell out' to). And that's before getting to the fact that the average person literally can't move anywhere meaningfully different. (They have a job that forces them to stay in market, or are going to a specific university, or have kids, or have kids with divorced ex-spouses, or are caring for elderly parents, etc, etc) --- This is of course, just for normal/boring states. California has this "never charge people actual property taxes" law weirdness that complicates things.