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Employment, construction, and the cost of San Francisco apartments

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Re: Employment, construction, and the cost of San Francisco apartments

#51

Post by kafkaesq »

matt_wulfeck wrote: post #9

Building straight into the sky is easy. You'd be amazed at how earthquake-proof skyscrapers are with modern technology. You want a challenge? Build in a city where you're required to post notice any time you cut down a tree on your own property.

Build in a city where you're required to post notice any time you cut down a tree on your own property.

That's because you're talking about one of the most beautiful cities in the world (despite the attempts of some people to decry otherwise) and, as expressed through the will of its electorate, intends to stay that way. It's also a city that's keenly aware of ecosystem dynamics and environmental issues generally, and the effect of removing that removing certain kinds of trees (for example, trees of significant age, size, and/or foliage) -- particularly if they're close to the street -- can have on the neighborhood well beyond the tiny confines of your own property.

If you want to live in a city that couldn't begin to give a flying F* about trees, or anything else green, for most of its history -- and has the corresponding development footprint and visual character to show for it -- try moving to San Jose.

Re: Employment, construction, and the cost of San Francisco apartments

#52

Post by harryh »

timr wrote: post #48
harryh wrote: post #43

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> That's fine, but it doesn't change the fact that new construction doesn't help anyone but wealthy people in SF, today. If you build more luxury housing it lowers the price of luxury housing so that a marginally less rich person can move to that tier. That marginal move reduces the demand on the next lower tier of housing which should reduce the price at that level. And so on, and so on...

This was addressed by the source article. It happens a bit, but it isn't magic : one of the author's models found that for every 1% increase in housing, rents dropped by 1.7%. Lowering rents enough to make SF affordable for poor people requires construction on a scale that isn't just impractical -- it's economically impossible. No developer would choose to build into such a market with fixed construction costs at hun…

Indeed construction costs are far too high! Significant zoning changes are needed to make SF more affordable for large swaths of the economic spectrum. And even then, unfortunately, it will take time. Buildings don't go up overnight. The problems that SF is experiencing today are due to decades of mistakes.

Re: Employment, construction, and the cost of San Francisco apartments

#53

Post by davidw »

nerfhammer wrote: post #44
sampo wrote: post #35

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> New York City's population density is 56% higher than San Francisco's And even New York City is not really that dense: San Francisco: 18 000 people per mi2 New York City: 27 000 Barcelona: 41 000 Paris: 55 000 Only Manhattan (72 000 per mi2) is dense.

New York City is vast. Brooklyn alone is 40% larger than San Francisco.

If you're talking about outlying areas, the rest of the bay area is amazingly not dense given how expensive housing is.

Re: Employment, construction, and the cost of San Francisco apartments

#54

Post by ghaff »

ktRolster wrote: post #10

New housing doesn't even need to be right in San Francisco. Anywhere along the Peninsula, even Oakland would be good enough, as long as it's close enough to public transportation.

To a lot of people though, it does. And public transit is already stretched thin with a lot of problems. A second Transbay Tube is being discussed so you're not looking at anything soon.

Re: Employment, construction, and the cost of San Francisco apartments

#55

Post by x0x0 »

timr wrote: post #42
twinkletwinkle wrote: post #37

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A quick distinction, you have to build all of a skyscraper but you only get to sell part of it as condos. There are hallways, janitors' closets, fire stairways, etc etc.

Yes, this exactly. If you can get 70% efficiency in a skyscraper you're doing phenomenally well. Also, the cost of land isn't included in the $300/sq.ft. number (though that becomes a proportionately smaller concern for taller buildings, for obvious reasons), nor the costs of financing, insurance, maintenance, etc. But more to the point, these numbers set only the lower bound on what a unit will sell for. These numbe…

Hmm, [1] suggests 25% overhead for 30-40 stories.

Maintenance is largely irrelevant to the sales price, assuming the HOA/condo association fees aren't wildly out of line with others. Also, these should scale linearly or sub-linearly I'd think.

I still don't see an answer to why $300/ft2 (or hell, $500/ft2) construction costs are a problem when condos sell for $1k +- 50 ft2 in the north east chunk of sf. Even $500/0.70 = $714 / salable ft2. Which should make selling prices near $1k a damn attractive proposition.

The cost of land goes as

   (land cost / ft2) / ((1/0.7) x (stories - 1))
so even $5k/ft2 of land cost comes out to $103 per salable ft2 on a 35 story building.

[1] https://westnorth.com/2015/04/27/high-rises-land-efficient-b...

Re: Employment, construction, and the cost of San Francisco apartments

#56

Post by Camillo »

kafkaesq wrote: post #51
matt_wulfeck wrote: post #9

Building straight into the sky is easy. You'd be amazed at how earthquake-proof skyscrapers are with modern technology. You want a challenge? Build in a city where you're required to post notice any time you cut down a tree on your own property.

Build in a city where you're required to post notice any time you cut down a tree on your own property. That's because you're talking about one of the most beautiful cities in the world (despite the attempts of some people to decry otherwise) and, as expressed through the will of its electorate, intends to stay that way. It's also a city that's keenly aware of ecosystem dynamics and environmental issues generally, an…

The west side of the city (the Sunset and the Richmond) has little to recommend in terms of "visual character". It's also poorly connected to the rest of the city and has very poor walkability, save for the N corridor. They could just tear it all up and build mid-rises, if only they had better connections to stimulate demand.

Re: Employment, construction, and the cost of San Francisco apartments

#57

Post by rconti »

rayiner wrote: post #34
timr wrote: post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"Building straight into the sky is easy." Except, it isn't. Construction costs of taller buildings scale non-linearly with every additional story [1]. Building skyscrapers costs upwards of $300 per square foot, whereas single-family homes cost a fifth or a sixth of that. It's so much cheaper to build low-rises, in fact, that virtually no developers will take on a high-rise project unless the property is so expensive…

> Instead, they build class I-III in the Mission and SOMA. These buildings will always be "luxury" units, because at $300+/sq.ft. construction costs the economics don't pencil out otherwise. In the long run, that isn't true. A skyscraper has a useful life well in excess of 50 years. If you look at places like Chicago, you'll see that luxury high-rises get renovated 20-30 years in to become mid-range places. Of course…

To no one in particular, from TFA, w/r/t "luxury" housing:

"Surprisingly, given the anxiety over "luxury" apartments vs regular, non-luxurious ones, there does not appear to be any segmentation in the rental market in any year, even by unit size. In every year with more than a handful of listings, the total pool of prices is a smooth curve (except for the occasional taboo price: landlords were strangely reluctant to offer apartments for exactly $105), approximately lognormally distributed. The 95th percentile apartment always rents for about 2.2 times the price of the median apartment, and the 5th percentile apartment for about 1/2.2 of the price of the median apartment, but see below about variability in this. "

Re: Employment, construction, and the cost of San Francisco apartments

#58

Post by xfour »

kafkaesq wrote: post #51
matt_wulfeck wrote: post #9

Building straight into the sky is easy. You'd be amazed at how earthquake-proof skyscrapers are with modern technology. You want a challenge? Build in a city where you're required to post notice any time you cut down a tree on your own property.

Build in a city where you're required to post notice any time you cut down a tree on your own property. That's because you're talking about one of the most beautiful cities in the world (despite the attempts of some people to decry otherwise) and, as expressed through the will of its electorate, intends to stay that way. It's also a city that's keenly aware of ecosystem dynamics and environmental issues generally, an…

So true, San Jose, and the greater Silicon Valley have a huge problem with this. The ongoing fight over Coyote Valley is the flashpoint of the moment but mostly because it's the only open space left.

Re: Employment, construction, and the cost of San Francisco apartments

#59

Post by ecobiker »

kafkaesq wrote: post #51
matt_wulfeck wrote: post #9

Building straight into the sky is easy. You'd be amazed at how earthquake-proof skyscrapers are with modern technology. You want a challenge? Build in a city where you're required to post notice any time you cut down a tree on your own property.

Build in a city where you're required to post notice any time you cut down a tree on your own property. That's because you're talking about one of the most beautiful cities in the world (despite the attempts of some people to decry otherwise) and, as expressed through the will of its electorate, intends to stay that way. It's also a city that's keenly aware of ecosystem dynamics and environmental issues generally, an…

SF has far fewer trees than other cities. I agree that the city needs more trees but the city should plant them on sidewalks and other open spaces.

http://www.deeproot.com/blog/blog-entries/tree-cover-how-doe...

Re: Employment, construction, and the cost of San Francisco apartments

#60

Post by forrestthewoods »

matt_wulfeck wrote: post #9

Building straight into the sky is easy. You'd be amazed at how earthquake-proof skyscrapers are with modern technology. You want a challenge? Build in a city where you're required to post notice any time you cut down a tree on your own property.

It is worth mentioning that building into the sky is expensive. Easy sure. But expensive. Each floor is more expensive than the one below it.

I'm not sure what the premium is though. Anyone know? What's the added cost for an apartment building as you go up?

Seattle has a lot of 2+4 construction. Where it's 2 floor concrete and 4 floors wood. I believe the limit used to be 2+2 but they raised it. Cheaper construction costs but also cheaper quality. These plastic and cardboard buildings won't be standing in 100 years that's for sure. Or so I'm told.

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