Will real estate ever be normal again?

If you can pay a mortgage most likely you can pay a rent, and it's going to be way cheaper if you factor everything in. And in both cases you can be evicted if you don't pay anyway.

Sure, you can win from that. But, in % terms, you win less than people already richer than you. Inequality is only increasing.

Your statement above seems quite incorrect. I was thinking that most people in the U.S. can't build an accessory dwelling unit in their backyard for their grandmother. Most people in the U.S. can't build a 400 square foot house on their land. Most people can't convert their house into a duplex or a triplex. Most people can't run a low traffic specialty retail or service business out of their house. None of these are safety issues.

You mentioned variances, which can be requested for things like the above. But that's my main point, why should these things require variances? "taking into consideration everyone's local concerns" as you mentioned. Processes like this take away people's freedom to modify their house like in the above examples, without good reason.

This is what I was referring to. Why should the approval of other people be required to make the above modifications to a property you own?

Maybe this is the main thing that we disagree on. It seems like micromanaging to me.

I still don't think you get where I'm coming from when I mentioned Japan. I'm not in favor of developers, and I don't think my ideas lead to that. Did you look into how the Japanese do zoning? I'm guessing you didn't, because all you said to me was "If you like Japan, go there." That just seems reactionary. Japanese homeowners could make all of the modifications I mentioned above without needing permission. It's a good system. Has it's advantages. I think that sometimes people are afraid of change.

Some of the stuff you typed in your two replies was interesting, but doesn't seem to narrow down what we are discussing. I don't think the dictionary definitions helped.

> Until then, stop being so entitled and stop the clueless rhetoric.

We both feel passionate about this stuff. It's easy to go off the rails. Doesn't look good, though.

First is scale. Very few one-off items will have a big effect. But when nearly everyone does it, it entirely changes the loads on the infrastructure, character of the community, etc.

Adding 2x-3x the residents to existing plots will add similar loads to the roads, water, sewage, and services infrastructure. These boil down to very real costs, and if not properly managed, including raising taxes as it happens, will seriously degrade the town. Limiting this is not micromanaging, it is managing.

The other is the direct effect on the neighbors. This happened with my grandparent's house, a one floor ranch built in the ~1950s overlooks the Hudson river north of NYC. Someone bought it and wanted to turn it into a 2-story. There is another large house further up the ridge overlooking the roof, the river, and the hills beyond. This change would have destroyed their view of the river and hills to the west. Despite the new owner's significant funds and lobbying, the request was denied and it was sold on.

I think this is an excellent result. The owner of my GP's house would have imposed a massive external loss on the neighbor.

Sure, there are some neighbors who are absolute asses and will deny everything for spite, and that can be as annoying as micromanaging. At the same time, I do not consider it to be my right to do whatever TF I want, and the hell with how it affects my neighbor - and in particular, I want the same treatment - golden rule.

The problem is that developers DO work by the different golden rule - he who has the gold makes the rules. They are basically growth hackers (and not in a good way). Any hole in the rules they WILL attempt to exploit in order extract maximum profit from a plot of land.

The developer off my back lot line? He's not big, he's a guy from another state who builds additions, and thinks this massive development, with which he has zero experience will be his big retirement payday. Considering the environment and geography issues, I think he is stupid money and that serious developers passed on the lot. But that doesn't stop every random builder with dreams.

So, as soon as you allow general conversion from single to duplex/triplex, that is guaranteed what you will get within a few years. Sure, some of it will be people just building a second unit for their family to live on the same plot. But most of it will be builders buying up lots that can then be built out. And they will do it in the way that makes them the most profit, usually short-term - this means regard for the neighbors is zero beyond what is required and enforced.

So, while these ideas sound wonderful and egalitarian, the reality is that being more loose about it inevitably leads directly do developer abuses and destruction of what has been created.

There may be solutions to this, but if it was easy, it would have already been done.