3 ms·

It would absolutely not help with housing costs. What do you think will happen, all the sudden because some new building can be jammed into the space where a st

by wahsd 11y ago

It would absolutely not help with housing costs. What do you think will happen, all the sudden because some new building can be jammed into the space where a street used to be the prices will somehow come down? That never happens. In the bubbles that were insulated from the recession all kinds of condos and apartment building were built, none of which were ever cheaper or pushed the price down. That's simply not how it works. Until you can somehow trigger a massive spurt of apartment and condo construction that creates a glut for a sustained period, you will NEVER have anything that is even remotely close to "help with housing costs". Any new building will always ask at the very least a little more than a comparable older building. Am I wrong? I don't know, look at the dense cities. Paris, NYC, London, etc. are any of those the expected cheap meccas you would have predicted? Look at Austin, TX the more is built the more people are attracted and the more people drive into town and drive every single price up up up. Humans are kind of stupid and make nothing even remotely close to rational decisions that economics would like you to believe we make, otherwise the market would function and companies would not be starting in cities, people would not be moving to cities. Hell, we wouldn't really be co-locating in offices in specific cities and limiting our talent pool by geographic location.

marssaxman 11y ago
It is true that housing prices are sticky, because property owners are generally content to simply wait until prices rise rather than selling. There's little you can do to push housing prices down once they've risen, though you can get the same effect through inflation and through economic growth causing salaries to rise. What you can do, however, is help create and sustain conditions where prices don't rise, thus giving inflation a chance to do its work while property owners hold and wait. You do this by upzoning, which makes formerly unattractive properties become possibilities for profitable development, and by loosening restrictions on the kinds of properties that may be developed. (Dropping parking minimums, FAR limits, setback requirements, etc.) When new houses are popping up all over the place, owners of older houses will have difficulty competing if they raise prices, so prices of existing buildings will tend to stagnate. This is about as close as you can get to dropping housing costs.

by wahsd 11y ago

marssaxman 11y ago

It is true that housing prices are sticky, because property owners are generally content to simply wait until prices rise rather than selling. There's little you can do to push housing prices down once they've risen, though you can get the same effect through inflation and through economic growth causing salaries to rise. What you can do, however, is help create and sustain conditions where prices don't rise, thus giving inflation a chance to do its work while property owners hold and wait. You do this by upzoning, which makes formerly unattractive properties become possibilities for profitable development, and by loosening restrictions on the kinds of properties that may be developed. (Dropping parking minimums, FAR limits, setback requirements, etc.) When new houses are popping up all over the place, owners of older houses will have difficulty competing if they raise prices, so prices of existing buildings will tend to stagnate. This is about as close as you can get to dropping housing costs.