Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

San Francisco's Fog Over Growth

bloombergview.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

81–90 of 103 posts

Re: San Francisco's Fog Over Growth

#81

Post by ghaff »

danans wrote: post #71
ghaff wrote: post #57

Earlier quoted context omitted.

While there are reasonable arguments on both sides of the growth/zoning/etc. debate, I suspect that in the January 2016 economic climate in the Bay area, no reasonably imagined housing expansion would make more than the smallest dent in housing prices. Look at Manhattan. Yes, you can't build willy-nilly whatever you want but there's certainly plenty of high-rise residential construction and housing prices are still p…

> ...and housing prices are still pretty high in desirable areas. Isn't that kind of tautological? Prices are always relatively high in desirable areas, and the high relative prices are actually a contributing factor to their desirability. What's more eye-opening is that prices in desirable areas are so high relative to above-average incomes for the area.

"in desirable areas" basically referred to the fact that housing prices aren't necessarily particularly high in upper Manhattan. But they're pretty high where all the construction is taking place below 110th Street or whatever the appropriate dividing line is.

Re: San Francisco's Fog Over Growth

#82

Post by batbomb »

danans wrote: post #71
ghaff wrote: post #57

Earlier quoted context omitted.

While there are reasonable arguments on both sides of the growth/zoning/etc. debate, I suspect that in the January 2016 economic climate in the Bay area, no reasonably imagined housing expansion would make more than the smallest dent in housing prices. Look at Manhattan. Yes, you can't build willy-nilly whatever you want but there's certainly plenty of high-rise residential construction and housing prices are still p…

> ...and housing prices are still pretty high in desirable areas. Isn't that kind of tautological? Prices are always relatively high in desirable areas, and the high relative prices are actually a contributing factor to their desirability. What's more eye-opening is that prices in desirable areas are so high relative to above-average incomes for the area.

That's because you've defined area incomes to be incomes for that area, except San Francisco housing is a global market.

Re: San Francisco's Fog Over Growth

#83

Post by vonmoltke »

guelo wrote: post #51
pluckytree wrote: post #3

I agree that part of the motivation for people supporting zoning is to preserve or increase their property values. But I think that people that spend a huge chunk of change on a house should care about preserving the neighborhood they bought into. As an extreme case, without zoning, what if each home lot on your street were turned into a high rise residential or commercial building? I don’t think any homeowner expect…

The main problem is Prop13, in other states property taxes increase and drive people out as land increases in value. In California land owners are locked in forever. OTOH, somehow California ended up with the fastest growing economy in the country. Causation? Correlation? Who knows.

> OTOH, somehow California ended up with the fastest growing economy in the country.

Huh? California is decidedly middle-of-the-pack:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_U.S._states_by_economi...

Re: San Francisco's Fog Over Growth

#84

Post by millermp12 »

cgy1 wrote: post #78
wmil wrote: post #74

It's interesting that SF can be so pro-immigration on the national level, but so anti-immigration on the municipal level.

Because it's somehow become socially acceptable to hate on whites and Asians.

Not sure if it's race, the Left's refrain should be:

"You can Over Come, just don't Come Over Here."

Re: San Francisco's Fog Over Growth

#85

Post by kqr2 »

capkutay wrote: post #47
pluckytree wrote: post #3

I agree that part of the motivation for people supporting zoning is to preserve or increase their property values. But I think that people that spend a huge chunk of change on a house should care about preserving the neighborhood they bought into. As an extreme case, without zoning, what if each home lot on your street were turned into a high rise residential or commercial building? I don’t think any homeowner expect…

Zoning is important. The issue is that it is often abused and poorly thought out in San Francisco. For instance, Mission Bay [0] was a rail yard with no inhabitants sitting at the foot of San Francisco, just south of urban SoMa. It was a prime opportunity to make it a dense, metropolitan extension of the city with little voter backlash since there were no residents in the area. Not to mention, it is also the most acc…

Unfortunately there are many examples of this in SF. Over time, this leads to very poor land use. Other examples:

1) Balboa reservoir : people prefer to keep it as an empty parking lot

http://sf.curbed.com/archives/2015/05/08/at_balboa_reservoir...

2) Francisco Reservoir : although there is already a park nearby, they chose to turn this into another park

http://www.sfgate.com/bayarea/article/SF-s-Francisco-Reservo...

Current residents are unfortunately much more vocal than potential future residents or housing advocates.

Re: San Francisco's Fog Over Growth

#86

Post by trgn »

hibikir wrote: post #17
geebee wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's an excellent point. I live in an R1 neighborhood, but a buddy of mine lives in a SFH in an R2. He would technically be allowed to convert his SFH into two 3bd/2ba apartments, he could sell one of them, and profit so much that he would cover his entire mortgage with lots left over. While he'd still face permit challenges, this has been done (legally, with all required permits) on his block. However, this remain…

A big difficulty of building a new city in the US is that, in the age of the car, we'd not build anything dense enough to feel like a city. I live in a metro area that has a bit over a million people, but in no way does it feel anything like a European city, NY or SF. Without any pressure that makes land expensive, we build wide, single family houses on half-acres. Just look at the difference between SF and the rest…

True, the US is kind of a black hole for urbanity, but you'd be surprised how many hidden gems there are.

East coast obviously is not strained for fantastic cities. The South has fantastic places; Charleston, Savannah, New Orleans are rightfully world class (and surprisingly expensive, for a good reason). Ohio Valley cities are charmers in their own right, though urban renewal really did a number on them. Great weather too; sultry heat in summers, relatively mild winters.

Plus, the US can offer attractive urban experiences that you'd be hard pressed to find in European cities. Many streetcar suburbs offer that unique mix of spacious living and convenience within walking distance, where you're often surrounded by stupendously attractive architecture and lush mature greenery.

But you're right of course, the car has absolutely killed the American city, and in most places growth continues to be on the periphery. It's no wonder that SF is so popular, it's really something of a refuge. It's not as an inhuman place as NYC (gargh, what a dump, a city for machines), but it is also not the strip mall wasteland that's most of the US. It really hits that sweet spot IMO, wish I could afford it.

Re: San Francisco's Fog Over Growth

#87

Post by danans »

batbomb wrote: post #82
danans wrote: post #71

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> ...and housing prices are still pretty high in desirable areas. Isn't that kind of tautological? Prices are always relatively high in desirable areas, and the high relative prices are actually a contributing factor to their desirability. What's more eye-opening is that prices in desirable areas are so high relative to above-average incomes for the area.

That's because you've defined area incomes to be incomes for that area, except San Francisco housing is a global market.

Sure, it's long painted itself a global city after all, so it's not surprising that the housing market became globalized when it became a major center of economic growth.

Re: San Francisco's Fog Over Growth

#88

Post by danans »

ghaff wrote: post #81
danans wrote: post #71

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> ...and housing prices are still pretty high in desirable areas. Isn't that kind of tautological? Prices are always relatively high in desirable areas, and the high relative prices are actually a contributing factor to their desirability. What's more eye-opening is that prices in desirable areas are so high relative to above-average incomes for the area.

"in desirable areas" basically referred to the fact that housing prices aren't necessarily particularly high in upper Manhattan. But they're pretty high where all the construction is taking place below 110th Street or whatever the appropriate dividing line is.

So what you are saying is that there is an enough of an increase of demand attributable to desirability of particular areas (Manhattan below 110th) that new construction does little to bring down high prices.

But without that new construction, those seemingly high prices would be even higher than they are now, unless you assume that the increase in demand is itself a byproduct of the new construction.

Re: San Francisco's Fog Over Growth

#89

Post by guelo »

vonmoltke wrote: post #83
guelo wrote: post #51

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The main problem is Prop13, in other states property taxes increase and drive people out as land increases in value. In California land owners are locked in forever. OTOH, somehow California ended up with the fastest growing economy in the country. Causation? Correlation? Who knows.

> OTOH, somehow California ended up with the fastest growing economy in the country. Huh? California is decidedly middle-of-the-pack: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_U.S._states_by_economi...

Sorry, that was worded wrong. I meant that California ended up with San Francisco's economy.

Re: San Francisco's Fog Over Growth

#90

Post by ghaff »

danans wrote: post #88
ghaff wrote: post #81

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"in desirable areas" basically referred to the fact that housing prices aren't necessarily particularly high in upper Manhattan. But they're pretty high where all the construction is taking place below 110th Street or whatever the appropriate dividing line is.

So what you are saying is that there is an enough of an increase of demand attributable to desirability of particular areas (Manhattan below 110th) that new construction does little to bring down high prices. But without that new construction, those seemingly high prices would be even higher than they are now, unless you assume that the increase in demand is itself a byproduct of the new construction.

Or housing prices end up at some upper level past which the market won't support. The same sort of effect has been observed with traffic capacity. Add capacity and you get more traffic but, generally speaking, people won't sit in traffic for 6 hours per day.

Obviously there is a correlation between supply and demand but there can also be a demand increases to meet supply effect up to a certain level.

Post reply on HN