Costs of materials follow real estate prices therefore it's always beneficial to seek ways to build homes cheaper. Zoning and nimbyism, while contributing fact

Costs of materials follow real estate prices therefore it's always beneficial to seek ways to build homes cheaper. Zoning and nimbyism, while contributing factors, are not the root cause. It's the idea that real estate should be seen as an investment - it gained popularity in China in recent years, causing a lot of unnecessary construction and spilling over to the rest of the world. Fortunately(for us at leat) there are early signs that this scheme is collapsing: https://www.bloomberg.com/news/features/2022-08-03/china-real-estate-market-crisis-protests-may-spur-multi-billion-dollar-rescue https://www.bloomberg.com/news/features/2022-08-03/china-rea... Funnily enough in my neighbourhood (Eastern EU) there's already a: - Block of so-called "microapartments" - units too small to be legally considered housing. This one was started before the respective law was changed due to an explosion in such projects. - A project which took people's money in 2019 and then... never did anything. It's not even a hole in the ground - it's the previous building still scheduled to be demolished. Apparently the madness also spilled over outside of China.