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Bay Area hammered by loss of jobs: Lack of affordable housing strangles hiring

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Re: Bay Area hammered by loss of jobs: Lack of affordable housing strangles hiring

#621

Post by taysic »

hx87 wrote: post #539

If SF Bay Area cities can't be bothered to build enough housing, they should at least have the decency to tax the fuck out of business until they start moving out and housing prices regress to 3x the median rent. If you want the companies, you must take their employees. If you don't want their employees, you shouldn't have the companies.

They could just stop approving new office space. I've noticed a lot of the prices increases started around when Twitter moved to Civic Center and SOMA began to open up to tech startups. I think the number of jobs vastly increased.

Re: Bay Area hammered by loss of jobs: Lack of affordable housing strangles hiring

#622

Post by linkregister »

MystK wrote: post #596
5706906c06c wrote: post #49

38, two kids and a wife. Have been living in a 900SQ/FT apt, I don't know how much longer I can take this before rage quitting and relocating somewhere else (don't know where). The sad part, as a ethnic-minority, I have just found our community for my kids, etc. It would be really tragic if I have to tear my kids away from that. Don't get me wrong, my daily 30 minute commute on BART isn't the worst. The worst part is…

I was born and lived in the Silicon Valley all my life. I think you're over-exaggerating the issue. https://www.zillow.com/homedetails/1052-Montgomery-Ave-San-B... Here's a 1200 SQFT 4 bedroom home in San Bruno for only 700k. The fact is that you are looking at homes over your budget, especially if you haven't saved a sizable down payment. Yes it's worse than other areas, but there are a lot of opportunities for peop…

What a bargain!

How much should a household earn in order to afford that house? Assuming the $150k down payment.

Re: Bay Area hammered by loss of jobs: Lack of affordable housing strangles hiring

#623

Post by vadym909 »

Too many Chinese buyers, rich businessmen, corrupt bureaucrats, made money speculating on Beijing real estate and middle class speculators with children planning to study in the US have flooded the housing market from Vancouver, Seattle to SF Bay area. I guess they probably form at least 10-25% of buyers.

Just making overpriced metros ineligible for foreign buyers could ease the pricing pressure.

Re: Bay Area hammered by loss of jobs: Lack of affordable housing strangles hiring

#624

Post by linkregister »

beatpanda wrote: post #619
linkregister wrote: post #585

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I’m inclined to believe you. Can you share a source? Homeless populations move around the city in response to police, etc., so the total number can be completely opaque to the average city resident.

The headline on this article is misleading, but: "Just-released numbers from January’s homeless count, conducted every two years as a requirement to receive federal funds, show a very slight decrease. The drop is attributed to fewer families and youths among the homeless, while the number of single adults living on the street — the most visible — has risen." http://www.sfchronicle.com/politics/article/Despite-money-a…

That’s really hopeful, thanks!

Re: Bay Area hammered by loss of jobs: Lack of affordable housing strangles hiring

#626

Post by jaredklewis »

vadym909 wrote: post #623

Too many Chinese buyers, rich businessmen, corrupt bureaucrats, made money speculating on Beijing real estate and middle class speculators with children planning to study in the US have flooded the housing market from Vancouver, Seattle to SF Bay area. I guess they probably form at least 10-25% of buyers. Just making overpriced metros ineligible for foreign buyers could ease the pricing pressure.

When you sell stuff to foreign people that’s called exporting. Exports are good. They bring money from foreign countries to your country.

So SF could stop exporting with some sort of ban on foreign buyers. For what's it worth (not much), I think such a ban would have almost no effect, as unless the US bans all Chinese capital wholesale, all the same money can makes it way to SF real estate through less direct means.

Or we could fix our taxes and regulations. The current regime of taxes and regulations actively incentivize speculation, and penalize land use. We need tax revenue, might as well collect it in a way that discourages speculation.

Re: Bay Area hammered by loss of jobs: Lack of affordable housing strangles hiring

#627

Post by evancox10 »

AndrewBissell wrote: post #367
davidw wrote: post #59

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> where will they go Other tech hubs. Portland, Seattle - even little Bend has plenty of people from California who are attracted by the (for them) low housing prices. They, in turn, put pressure on housing prices for 'ordinary' people here. California's housing crisis has repercussions all up and down the west coast.

The runup in real estate prices is fundamentally driven by the huge amounts of money printing by the Fed earlier this decade. The Bay Area has just been the canary in the coal mine on this because the strong job growth and self-injurious housing policies caused the price pressures to show up earlier than elsewhere, but it will become an undeniably nationwide phenomenon soon enough. High real estate prices & rents are…

I'm not necessarily pro-big banks, but JP Morgan and GS were two of the banks LEAST in need of a bailout. GS was short MBS at the time, so your description is .

Re: Bay Area hammered by loss of jobs: Lack of affordable housing strangles hiring

#628

Post by closeparen »

lisper wrote: post #388
deepsun wrote: post #311

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you drive 30 minutes any direction from San Francisco, you will see plenty of vast empty fields covered with wild grasses. I don't argue that we should cover all the land available with houses, I like wild grass, but I just point out that if we really hadn't enough space -- we would have settled it already. I've never heard the now popular "Earth is overpopulated" rant from anyone who lives outside major metro. Go…

> I like wild grass And that is the problem. You're not the only one. Yes, if we turned the San Francisco Bay area into a clone of Manhattan or Hong Kong or Tokyo we could accommodate a lot more people. But a lot of people would not consider that a good outcome. People who like that kind of lifestyle can have it in any of the dozens of dense cities on the planet. The SFBay area is desirable precisely because it is no…

Vineyards and redwood trees are not found in suburban neighborhoods, and an apartment building next door does not threaten your yard. Nobody want to expand into nature areas, we want to build taller and denser where there are already buildings and transit stations.

Re: Bay Area hammered by loss of jobs: Lack of affordable housing strangles hiring

#629

Post by TuringNYC »

twobyfour wrote: post #593
TuringNYC wrote: post #229

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I sympathize with those in such positions who have family roots and dont wish to move out of the region. But the "good" think about such jobs are geographic freedom.

And in the meantime, where are SF businesses going to find people to DO those jobs, if everyone's priced out of the region?

Possible moves:

- Increase salary to livable wage for janitorial staff, etc

- Lobby for housing reform, progressive zoning policies

Re: Bay Area hammered by loss of jobs: Lack of affordable housing strangles hiring

#630

Post by closeparen »

akhilcacharya wrote: post #114
whack wrote: post #108

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In which of the above 3 categories would you put the Google/Facebook/Apple employees making 200-300k+ per year? I can't speak towards family living, but as a single person willing to live with roommates, you can find pretty nice places in the heart of Silicon Valley for ~$1000/month. Now add in compensation-packages well over 6 figures, brand-name companies for your resume, networking locally with other great enginee…

I'd consider living with non-family roommates to be in the "relative squalor" bucket if you're making $200k-300k a year.

Amen. After spending all day in an open office, it isn’t home unless I’m in control of the acoustic environment. Roommates ate my sanity very quickly during my internship - they were lovely people, but they had the right to watch TV and talk on the phone and they did. I ended up spending most of my evenings and weekends in random work conference rooms.
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