Average Rent in San Francisco Has Dropped $1k This Year • Hacker News Board

Re: Average Rent in San Francisco Has Dropped $1k This Year

#411

Post by finikytou » Mon, Dec 28, 2020, 8:09 PM UTC

wjossey wrote: post #372

finikytou wrote: post #365

Earlier quoted context omitted.

so considering the covid and the fact that it will be hard to get rented ... OP made a mistake?

Not necessarily. I’ve lived in three rentals in LA over the past five years and each one had a clause that allowed me to break my lease in exchange for two months rent. Not saying the OP had that clause, but I’ve never had to ask for it and it’s been baked into the lease. I know my current landlord is going to be excited about me leaving in a month, as rent had gone up about $1,300 a month in this area over the last…

I see. I am in NYC and read my lease break to see if I could brake it. Im from europe and this clause looks like illegal in my country but I guess USA is on a whole other level... If I move I could end up paying 1200$+ double rent for months...

"In the event the lease is broken during the middle of the term, and the applicant did not pay a year up front due at lease signing, the lease break fee is $1,200.00 made payable to the Shareholder. The penalty fee is charged by the coop board to the Shareholder due to the lease break. Lessees are immediately relieved of his or her contractual obligations to the Shareholder & coop upon successful take over by the next Lessee(s) identified by the broker, and is board approved for move in."

Re: Average Rent in San Francisco Has Dropped $1k This Year

#412

Post by Kalium » Mon, Dec 28, 2020, 8:09 PM UTC

random314 wrote: post #408

pound wrote: post #384

Earlier quoted context omitted.

not enough housing to meet demand means raising property values, which is beneficial for property owners without having to pay more taxes

Are you in favor of a wealth tax in general, or only property taxes?

Wealth taxes in general are challenging to execute. Property taxes are much easier, as well as deal with the extra issues brought on by land ownership that cash-equivalent wealth does not.

Re: Average Rent in San Francisco Has Dropped $1k This Year

#413

Post by kansface » Mon, Dec 28, 2020, 8:11 PM UTC

chrisseaton wrote: post #281

wil421 wrote: post #257

Earlier quoted context omitted.

We do not frame our houses with stones in the US. It’s not cardboard it’s OSB[1] (Oriented Strand Board). The US and Canada make most of it. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oriented_strand_board

Why don't they use reinforced concrete since they're in an earthquake and fire zone? This wood seems so temporary.

The numbers don't pan out until for buildings with fewer than 5 floors or so. I don't know the street, but this will almost certainly be a 3 story house, max.

Re: Average Rent in San Francisco Has Dropped $1k This Year

#414

Post by nradov » Mon, Dec 28, 2020, 8:19 PM UTC

ProblemFactory wrote: post #159

oblio wrote: post #124

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think the point is: what if they don't sell it, at all? Kids move out of the house, parents retire at 65 and live to 85+. That's 20 years, a whole generation.

If the developer can get permission to build 3-5 story apartments on the lot, then their land suddenly becomes way more valuable than the single home ever was. Most retirees will gladly sell and live in luxury elsewhere. If a few don't, it won't make a difference.

Many single family home owners will strenuously object to having a developer build a 5 storey apartment building next door because they don't want additional noise, traffic, and people looking down into their private back yard. It directly impacts their quality of life.

Re: Average Rent in San Francisco Has Dropped $1k This Year

#415

Post by abalone » Mon, Dec 28, 2020, 8:23 PM UTC

SllX wrote: post #162

TheOtherHobbes wrote: post #137

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But property supply itself is a constrained effect of politics and the relative power of various social groups, not a unique and independent primary cause. If landlords can make a killing by constraining supply politically, they will. So the primary cause is the incentive system and the political environment which makes it possible for them to do that. It's all about how the reward functions are designed. So of cours…

Political factors can also inform supply, it doesn’t change the fundamental calculus of supply and demand, merely shapes the supply. If you have a bunch of left wing groups who are anti-development fighting to keep supply constrained even while complaining the rent is too damn high and the character of the City is changing and yadda yadda yadda, who are you[1], as a landlord, to take the wind out of their sails when…

This is just wildly incorrect. Landlords are very strongly opposed to left wing groups in SF, based on political funding. Landlords are the number one target of progressive legislation. The most left wing supervisor is literally a tenants rights attorney who ran on protecting rent control and wrote the law banning evictions.

Re: Average Rent in San Francisco Has Dropped $1k This Year

#416

Post by grendix » Mon, Dec 28, 2020, 8:26 PM UTC

SpicyLemonZest wrote: post #43

ashtonkem wrote: post #30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I’m not sure why, but a surprising number of people seem to have convinced themselves that supply and demand doesn’t apply to housing.

I think most people doubt supply and demand to some degree. How often have you seen someone argue we should secure the supply of food to disaster zones by repealing price gouging laws? Rent control is popular because many people believe, wrongly but wholeheartedly, that landlords are just price gougers and everyone could get cheap adequate housing if they weren’t manipulating it.

Rent control is popular with renters because the rent is too damn high. You can figure that one out without assigning motives to people you've never met.

Re: Average Rent in San Francisco Has Dropped $1k This Year

#417

Post by HeadsUpHigh » Mon, Dec 28, 2020, 8:27 PM UTC

SllX wrote: post #3

> the weighted average asking rent for an apartment in the city, which currently measures around 2.3 bedrooms when counting a studio as having one, has dropped to $3,100 a month. Still too high. Was checking into apartment prices earlier in the year and it is amazing the number of landlords that will try and sell you on a “kitchen” that is a mini-fridge, tiny sink, microwave and a hot plate whilst still charging you…

For comparison I was paying €330 for a brand new 35 sqft apartment with 2 separate rooms, a small balcony, amazing heat and noise insulation, 5 minutes from a bus stop and ample parking, all in a nice area without very dense buildings. And this was considered expensive. The reduced price here is still x10...

Re: Average Rent in San Francisco Has Dropped $1k This Year

#418

Post by randomdata » Mon, Dec 28, 2020, 8:29 PM UTC

inglor_cz wrote: post #399

randomdata wrote: post #389

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There is a lot more to a standard kitchen than appliances. Like walls, floors, counters, etc. None of that comes free, or even cheap.

Well, every room tends to have walls and floors. Unless the talk is about some big ass mansion, I cannot imagine spending 60 000 USD on a kitchen, the very price of the materiel used does not add up to even tenth of that value even if you choose mid-range stuff. You can have a nice 300 x 60 cm wooden counter for like 200 USD.

> Well, every room tends to have walls and floors.

And every room would be equally judged against its economic value. It could very well be that having an maintaining your TV room is more expensive than going to the movie theatre as well. If you were designing a domicile based purely on optimizing cost, as posed earlier, it is very likely that it wouldn't be anything more than a small bedroom, with everything else more cost effectively provided by outside third-parties at scale.

But there is, of course, more to life than numbers. A small bedroom and nothing more does not seem like an overly desirable place to live. Being able to watch TV at home is nice. Being able to cook at home is enjoyable. However, the topic is what it is and as a result those factors don't matter for the purposes of this particular discussion.

Re: Average Rent in San Francisco Has Dropped $1k This Year

#419

Post by lumost » Mon, Dec 28, 2020, 8:30 PM UTC

gen220 wrote: post #340

lumost wrote: post #301

Earlier quoted context omitted.

CT went this way as well, eventually the businesses look to follow residents - particularly younger residents who can't afford the inflated rent or down payments.

Can you expand on this? Did CT follow Oakland, where SF is NYC? Or if CT is SF, where is the corresponding Oakland? I live in NYC, and my view of CT is that its modern identity is dominated by being a suburb to NYC, with a handful of big and old businesses in the big cities to keep domestic economy afloat. The places in my mind that don't fit this model are all east of New Haven, at which point CT starts to be "Coast…

During the suburban expansion of the last century many southern CT towns allowed in businesses but declined to expand housing and transit availability. This combined with strong NIMBYism drove up housing prices in southern CT.

A good modern analogue of southern CT from the 70s-90s would be the valley in the bay area e.g. Palo Alto, Mountain View etc.

Re: Average Rent in San Francisco Has Dropped $1k This Year

#420

Post by zapita » Mon, Dec 28, 2020, 8:39 PM UTC

fortran77 wrote: post #405

zapita wrote: post #403

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> But if it weren't for Prop 13, my home and my business would have been forced out by people moving in and paying too much money for homes next door to me. Prop 13 does not solve this problem. It merely shields historical homeowners from it, while amplifying it for everyone else. Many people and businesses were forced out by speculation because of prop 13, but you and a small group of people were exempted so you don…

How dare you say "I don't care." Who are you to speculate about what I think about?

Perhaps you simply were not aware of the fact that prop 13 contributes to the displacement of people and businesses you claim to care about. I that case, it is now up to you to act on this newly acquired information and revisit your support of prop 13. The choice is yours.