4 ms·
Have you had many conversations on the topic with the typical person on the street? I have (among other things, I’ve collected signatures for ballot measures),
by raldi 3y ago
Have you had many conversations on the topic with the typical person on the street? I have (among other things, I’ve collected signatures for ballot measures), and I think about as many people think high housing prices are caused by allowing new development as restricting it.
- anovikov 3y agoHow can someone think that? How can increase of supply increase prices? What's the logic behind that perception?
- raldi 3y agoThey mistake correlation (new buildings going up as housing prices increase) and causation.
- AlanSE 3y agoAlso, builders want to build high-margin houses, not low-margin houses. Also, high-margin housing gets advertised, low-margin housing does not.
- Aunche 3y agoPeople see newly constructed "luxury" housing. They also see techies that can outbid them on rent. They mix up cause and effect and assume that it's the luxury housing that's bringing in all the techies rather than vice versa.
- bitsage 3y agoDevelopment can sometimes increase demand for previously blighted urban areas. A few years ago, I used to live in expensive re-purposed lofts in an area of Boston metro which was in disrepair in the 90s. There’s a similar story for Bushwick and Williamsburg in NYC. However, by the time an area has become popular, restricting development will only hurt rent affordability. I guess some would like to prevent their neighborhoods from becoming popular in the first place though.
- s1artibartfast 3y agoThe logic basically comes down to concepts of induced demand, demographic shift, and gentrification. A community can improve on average while some people see less of that benefit.
- AlanSE 3y agoThey see new builds hitting the market and look at the (aspirational) price put there by the builder. It's a borderline conspiracy that Zillow lists certain high-end new developments for a year (before they're built) which pollutes the "for sale" housing inventory. Whereas the "recently sold" is the best metric of how things actually are, the search options don't allow you to get an accurate market sense from these. After all, the app's purpose is not to give you an accurate sense of the market.
- hgsgm 3y agohttps://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gentrification https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gentrification
- artsytrashcan 3y ago"New development" covers a wide range of development types. Most of the types that are "allowed" to be developed - per regulation, public investment, what does and doesn't trigger the NIMBY predatory instinct - are types that raise "market rates" like low-density SFH and luxury condos.* The government could "radically incentivize" developers to build high-density housing with basic finishes and fewer amenities, to be sold or rented at affordable rates, but that bumps up against https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=36632171's https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=36632171's impeccably correct observation: prices are high because the people who own the housing stock want them to be high. Inventory influences a fraction of the cost. *(That is, however far you're convinced that there even is a market; for rent, thanks to "discounts" that allow property owners to avoid actually advertising lower rates, supply and demand don't exist, only the imperative to raise rates annually.)