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Zoom towns and the new housing market for the two Americas

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Re: Zoom towns and the new housing market for the two Americas

#171

Post by anon9001 »

wtracy wrote: post #140
shajznnckfke wrote: post #126

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you’re used to receiving BigCo pay and bought a mansion in a remote vacation hotspot, you could be in for a rude awakening if you find other remote jobs pay half as much and your employer knows that and stops giving you refreshes.

This. The FAANG crowd is used to pulling down $100k-$150k. Developer jobs that are advertised as remote from day one tend to be closer to $50k-$70k. (These numbers are based on a combination of rumors and job board postings, so no, I don't have a source to cite.)

I work for a big company you've heard of as a developer. I'm fully remote since pre-pandemic and plan to stay fully remote indefinitely.

If you're a good developer with experience, it doesn't really matter where you are. I actually get paid more total comp than I would in SF, my cost of living is lower, and my tax situation is much better.

Re: Zoom towns and the new housing market for the two Americas

#172

Post by reducesuffering »

asdff wrote: post #164
SpicyLemonZest wrote: post #55

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Housing density is definitely a problem outside of the United States. Many countries handle it in much the same way, while others handle it by shoving their working class into what's basically a human rights violation. I've seen discussions of Singapore's good housing policy, for example, that fail to mention the worker dormitories with 10 or 20 people per room. I certainly wouldn't claim the US has good housing poli…

Have you seen how the working class lives in the U.S.? It's honestly not much different than a developing country. Multiple families in a tiny apartment is common in places like LA. People hold full time jobs while going back home to a tent on the sidewalk. Tenement conditions are very real in the U.S., and invisible for the most part by anyone fortunate enough not to live in them.

LA doesn’t represent the entire U.S. Most of the US, especially outside of the west coast and NYC, has plenty of housing. US median income is 64k and median home price is 310k. Most of those are 1500+ sqft SFH easily afforded by the working class.

Re: Zoom towns and the new housing market for the two Americas

#173

Post by pbourke »

epistasis wrote: post #144
pbourke wrote: post #75

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> We need to be building massive amounts of housing in city centers to let as many people live in them that would like to. All else being equal, Americans will choose to live in a detached house on a 1/2 acre lot with an SUV or pickup in the driveway.

This is simply untrue. Some people will, but this sort of “everybody who doesn’t want what I want is lying to themselves” is elitism that destroys people’s chances to live th way they prefer. The higher cost of living in cities is pretty strong evidence that city living is under supplied compared to suburban living.

How is it untrue?

The proportion of Americans living in urban counties (31%) has not changed in 20 years. The proportion living in suburban counties has increased slightly (53% to 55%) [1]

The proportion of new vehicle sales that are SUVs or pickups has been steadily climbing for over 30 years [2]

> The higher cost of living in cities is pretty strong evidence that city living is under supplied compared to suburban living.

Is that true for all cities or just a few large ones? I don’t see how you can conclude that. The narrower conclusion is that demand for city housing exceeds supply in a few key markets.

> this sort of “everybody who doesn’t want what I want is lying to themselves” is elitism that destroys people’s chances to live th way they prefer.

You have apparently without irony proved my point.

My broader point is that rather than force people to do things that they apparently don’t want to do (move to dense housing, ditch or downsize their vehicles) we should seek ways to invest in the efficiency of our existing housing stock, and provide incentives to improve the efficiency of new vehicles. A carbon tax also looks like a promising approach.

[1] https://www.pewsocialtrends.org/2018/05/22/demographic-and-e...

[2] https://www.epa.gov/automotive-trends/highlights-automotive-...

Re: Zoom towns and the new housing market for the two Americas

#174

Post by jessaustin »

epistasis wrote: post #43
alextheparrot wrote: post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Come on now, Truckee is half second homes - the resource intensiveness is based on gluttony not existence of housing.

A 2000 sq ft home in Truckee, be it a second home or a primary home, is going to require far more roads, more vehicle miles travelled, require cutting down far more trees, more heating and cooling, more water and waste water infrastructure than a 2000 sq ft apartment in a city. That not to say that we should ban all Truckee homes on long roads like we ban apartments in cities, but we should definitely legalize apartm…

Yeah, there's no way the public should spend anything trying to save the house pictured in TFA. The owner who can afford that house can certainly afford to cut some trees. The trees weren't cut, so the house must not be very valuable to anyone.

https://www.readyforwildfire.org/prepare-for-wildfire/get-re...

Re: Zoom towns and the new housing market for the two Americas

#175

Post by jessaustin »

swimfar wrote: post #130
refurb wrote: post #114

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I would be shocked if one could find a liveable single family home in Palo Alto or Mountain View for $1.5M. Last I looked empty lots went for that much.

By home, do you mean house? Sub-million dollar homes show up all the time in Mountain View, even before Covid. Thinking anything less than a house is unlivable for a family is not the norm in most other parts of the world.

By home-not-a-house, do you mean an apartment? Duplex? Tent?

Re: Zoom towns and the new housing market for the two Americas

#176

Post by profile53 »

deanCommie wrote: post #151
war1025 wrote: post #134

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> A town of 100K people I know it doesn't really mean anything, but it always just seems peculiar to me when people refer to places with tens or hundreds of thousands of residents as "towns" I guess mainly because the general consensus is that a "town" is smaller than a "city". The "town" I grew up in had about 3k residents. To us, the place a half hour away with the big box stores where we'd do our shopping was the…

It all depends on what you're used to. I was born in a City of 6 million people. I then moved to a City of 2 million people. It feels small by comparison. To me a "city" is a place with an opera house, multiple museums, multiple options for every type of good international cuisines, shops open in the evening, and a transit system beyond bus (tram, or metro/subway). I lived for a couple of years in a place that was th…

It’s interesting how different everyone’s perspective is on this — it hadn’t crossed my mind before.

My parents grew up in a town of one thousand people. There was a small bakery in the town and we had a leg up on all the other towns because we had a post office. If I ever misbehaved and did something I wasn’t supposed to, my parents knew before I even made it home because all of the residents knew each other and could call my parents to tell on me.

Anything smaller than that was a village.

Later, I moved to a city of about 300,000 people. There were multiple big box stores and, as you said, shops and restaurants open late into the night. That city was surrounded by suburbia. That was a big city in my eyes.

Now, I live in a city of about 50,000 people and I guess that’s what a normal city looks like in my eyes. It has a few restaurants, a few somewhat culturally distinct areas, and a college and university.

When I visited New York City, I would have characterized it as a metropolis, not just another city.

Going back, I think the defining characteristic for a city is that it’s large enough not to keep everything in your head. You don’t know everyone or everything in the city anymore, so you’re forced to make subdivisions. It’s not “the bakery next to the Jones’s up the street” but instead it’s downtown/uptown/Westside/Eastside.

Re: Zoom towns and the new housing market for the two Americas

#177

Post by shajznnckfke »

anon9001 wrote: post #171
wtracy wrote: post #140

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This. The FAANG crowd is used to pulling down $100k-$150k. Developer jobs that are advertised as remote from day one tend to be closer to $50k-$70k. (These numbers are based on a combination of rumors and job board postings, so no, I don't have a source to cite.)

I work for a big company you've heard of as a developer. I'm fully remote since pre-pandemic and plan to stay fully remote indefinitely. If you're a good developer with experience, it doesn't really matter where you are. I actually get paid more total comp than I would in SF, my cost of living is lower, and my tax situation is much better.

This is interesting, they pay you extra to not live in SF?

Re: Zoom towns and the new housing market for the two Americas

#178

Post by sudosteph »

stonogo wrote: post #133
sudosteph wrote: post #119

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Lots of cities in the southeast are still undervalued IMO. I'm a North Carolinian, and there's been no shortage of northern transplants over the years. Charlotte and Raleigh have grown like crazy, and show no sign of stopping. Tons of young people moving here despite the well-deserved reputation of this area being pretty boring. I guess boring is a plus these days. West coasters largely haven't caught on, but I don't…

I moved west to avoid the bizarre laws that are common in the south -- weird restrictions on arbitrary divisions of product, state constitutional amendments banning gay marriage, laws demanding that schools teach creationism, and so forth. When I lived in Fayetteville, you could buy beer at a grocery store, but liquor was only for sale by the state government. I bought a house once that required a lot of legal fees a…

Fayetteville is just awful - would never recommend that place to anyone.

I moved west for a while too. Eventually moved back to NC though. Most quirks that came from being in the south just didn't outweigh the positives in my case. ABC stores are weird, but the selection and prices are usually decent at least. I certainly never experienced anyone teaching creationism in Charlotte-Meck schools. Racial covenants are also something I've never had a friend or family member experience in Charlotte - though maybe it's because I'm from North Charlotte so most of the homes there are new construction or considered gentrified. I have read about racial covenants and redlining every where though - and Seattle certainly felt far more segregated than Charlotte and Raleigh did in that regard.

I will concede though - that gay marriage amendment that passed a few years back, was extremely disheartening and certainly did play a role in my temporary abandonment of my home state. Notably, all the big cities and every area that had a university voted against it. But still, I was aghast that the bill passed at all. I'm very glad that SCOTUS stepped in and that's not an issue any more.

It's not for everyone, and I'd even say that Fayetteville is not for anyone... but there are real reasons the metropolitan areas have grown like crazy. Charlotte and Raleigh now have something like 60% of residents being people who were not born in NC. It's probably just weather, house prices and jobs - but if somebody just wanted to live somewhere affordable that was going to go up in value - you could probably do a lot worse.

Re: Zoom towns and the new housing market for the two Americas

#179

Post by closeparen »

ghaff wrote: post #32
ssequeira wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What are some examples of Bay Area towns? It seems like everyone in my friend circle in tech lives in San Francisco and puts up (or used to) with the long commute.

Quite a few of the towns in the South Bay have walkable cores: Mountain View, Palo Alto, San Mateo... You also have smaller cities all over the country. Now, you get into truly small towns in places like New England and there really isn't a lot in the town center and it's unlikely you'll be living walking distance from it.

Suburbs, particularly old growth / inner ring suburbs, often have walkable cores and even rail connections to the city. They are not all the postwar Levittown kind.

“Town” as distinct from “suburb” usually implies standing alone, being surrounded by farmland and not particularly connected to the nearest metro area.

Re: Zoom towns and the new housing market for the two Americas

#180

Post by deanCommie »

profile53 wrote: post #176
deanCommie wrote: post #151

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It all depends on what you're used to. I was born in a City of 6 million people. I then moved to a City of 2 million people. It feels small by comparison. To me a "city" is a place with an opera house, multiple museums, multiple options for every type of good international cuisines, shops open in the evening, and a transit system beyond bus (tram, or metro/subway). I lived for a couple of years in a place that was th…

It’s interesting how different everyone’s perspective is on this — it hadn’t crossed my mind before. My parents grew up in a town of one thousand people. There was a small bakery in the town and we had a leg up on all the other towns because we had a post office . If I ever misbehaved and did something I wasn’t supposed to, my parents knew before I even made it home because all of the residents knew each other and co…

That makes sense too!

I think by most people's definitions yours is closer to the standard. My wife did not grow up in the 6MM city like I did but towns of 70,000, 500,000, and 3,000 respectively, and she thinks my "It's not a city unless it's over 1MM people" take is the highpoint of douchey elitist snobbery.

I think that "keep everything in your head" is a reasonable cutting off point. Despite me scoffing at that "only 3 ramen restaurants" city I lived in, it's not like i know and have been to every restaurant in the place. A town you probably would be able to go to each one if you wanted to after a year.

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