Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Facing housing crisis, L.A. voters back duplexes in single-family neighborhoods

latimes.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

251–260 of 403 posts

Re: Facing housing crisis, L.A. voters back duplexes in single-family neighborhoods

#251

Post by bluGill »

nouveaux wrote: post #52
_fat_santa wrote: post #5

As soon as you look at the zoning of LA, the housing problem there becomes clear as day, even for someone who doesn't visit very often. I don't know what you would call this system but LA's problem is that the folks that have the power to fix housing have zero interest in doing because it would hurt their self interest. Housing is only a "problem" if you haven't bought a house yet, once you purchase a house, all the…

Why is this a LA/California problem? New York City and all major cities have had high price housing that benefits owners for decades. What steps have Paris, Tokyo, Hong Kong, Seoul, Shanghai, etc done to take their housing prices down to their national average?

NYC has high prices, but they are not nearly as high. NYC is not perfect, but it is a lot easier to build there, and thus housing is much cheaper. Housing in the middle of dense cities will always be expensive because it is a desirable place to live, but as you get out NYC starts to get affordable faster than in CA.

Re: Facing housing crisis, L.A. voters back duplexes in single-family neighborhoods

#252

Post by denimnerd42 »

autarch wrote: post #84

(Stealing this argument from a friend who I discussed something similar with ...) It's hard to see how allowing duplexes will do _anything_ to address housing issues. We have a similar law here in Minneapolis which allows triplexes on any property. But what are the economics of this? Surely there's not a lot of vacant land in LA or Mpls just waiting for a new plex to be built. Instead, all the plots are already occup…

nah. you'd do a 3 story and get 3.5kft out of it per unit. would cost around a million for the 2units with today's material prices. rent it for 6000-8000/mo. affordable housing never starts with new built unless there are major incentives.

Re: Facing housing crisis, L.A. voters back duplexes in single-family neighborhoods

#253

Post by KittenInABox »

ghaff wrote: post #175
SmellTheGlove wrote: post #131

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I can tell you that when we were moving from SF to Seattle this past year, we were getting _crushed_ on any house that was sitting on an upzoned lot. Seattle's done a decent job of upzoning parts of neighborhoods around transit corridors, and we were looking at houses on those lots because I believe in the upside as you do. Well, so do others, and they have _cash_ to buy it - we did not! We're now in a SFH in a mostl…

People complain about parking requirements but, in most US cities (and indeed in a great deal of the world) most households have cars. If I lived in Seattle, even if I didn't need one day to day for work/errands/etc., I'd certainly own one for going out to the mountains and so forth on the weekends.

Forgive me, since I don't own a car:

Wouldn't it be cheaper to rent a car if you're only going to use it once a week or so? I mean, with the payment itself, plus insurance, plus gas, regular maintenance, is it worth the price?

Re: Facing housing crisis, L.A. voters back duplexes in single-family neighborhoods

#254

Post by ryandrake »

duped wrote: post #138
ihaveajob wrote: post #109

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The thing I don't get is why many SFH owners don't see the benefit of upzoning their lot: Overnight, their house is much more valuable because if they choose to, they can sell to a developer who can make MORE money by building more homes. And if they choose to keep their house as is, nobody is going to force them. In the end, it boils down to cars, though. Many people see the free parking space in front of their hous…

Some people aren't solely motivated by the rise in their property. Evidence already suggests doing nothing increases it plenty. On the other hand, some folks just don't like living in higher density neighborhoods. I can empathize with someone that bought a single family home decades ago, probably can't afford to buy a new one today even after selling it, and doesn't want to see their quiet neighborhood turn into a bu…

Exactly. I'm an evil SFH owner. I don't give a single shit about how much it is worth, because I'm not a house flipper and I plan to live in this home for decades. I deliberately moved to this home, away from higher-density housing, primarily to get away from high population density and for the other various benefits of living in a SFH neighborhood. Some people like living in higher-density neighborhoods, and they should have a place to live that they like, too. There is not One True Correct style of home for everyone.

Re: Facing housing crisis, L.A. voters back duplexes in single-family neighborhoods

#255

Post by mrkstu »

usrusr wrote: post #207
danans wrote: post #60

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> This is a small step in the right direction but California has really dug themselves into a hole here. California needs whole apartment blocks, not just duplexes, but apartments is something that is likely to never happen because of the above issue where no one will vote against their self interest Incremental upzoning is what will get us there. So changing single family zoning to duplex zoning like what this does,…

Sorry for being so ignorant about particularities of American zoning (I hardly know more than what you pick up playing the original Sim City): could it be easier to shift commercial to high density residential? Of course the general threat to owners would still be there, "if we solve the housing crisis my Prophet might stop appreciating like mad". But that's true for any approach short of an October 1917 reenactment.…

This is definitely a major part of the solution. Places like The Domain[0] in Austin should be a model for mixed use development.

https://www.galleryatdomain.com/gallery-at-domain-austin-tex...

Re: Facing housing crisis, L.A. voters back duplexes in single-family neighborhoods

#256

Post by subsubzero »

Dylan16807 wrote: post #177
subsubzero wrote: post #130

What is the end solution to this housing crisis? The solutions will all hurt existing homeowners or multi-homeowners and are not likely to be implemented. The duplex in a single family lot is not going to move the needle on this crisis much, as building 2 houses on a existing lot will require a teardown of the original structure, then a buildup of the new duplex, all very costly. It will run at least $500K+ and I don…

> #2. Repeal CA prop. 13, all housing should be taxed at current market value. (exclusions for older retirees and the disabled) Why the exclusions? Is there a reason to give extra help for the disabled to own homes (and, implicitly, not help disabled renters a similar amount)? Older retirees could sell off a third of their house's value and cover property taxes for something like 20 years.

Trying not to throw the older/helpless out into the street. Its no fault of theirs that the house they own increased from $40k to $3M(know 2 elderly people in this exact situation) and they would now incur a gigantic tax bill(if prop-13 was repealed). They could sell but would most likely be forced to move out of the area and away from all family/community and would be devastating to a person of advanced age or who was disabled.

Also the thinking would be "oh they will have so much money!", #1 the majority of the windfall would be taxed at max tax rate, and #2 I imagine people preying on these forced out older "millionaires" ie. family members and con artists.

Re: Facing housing crisis, L.A. voters back duplexes in single-family neighborhoods

#257

Post by foofoo4u »

IIAOPSW wrote: post #114
_fat_santa wrote: post #5

As soon as you look at the zoning of LA, the housing problem there becomes clear as day, even for someone who doesn't visit very often. I don't know what you would call this system but LA's problem is that the folks that have the power to fix housing have zero interest in doing because it would hurt their self interest. Housing is only a "problem" if you haven't bought a house yet, once you purchase a house, all the…

>LA's problem is that the folks that have the power to fix housing have zero interest in doing because it would hurt their self interest. Housing is only a "problem" if you haven't bought a house yet, once you purchase a house, all the issues with housing there all of a sudden become benefits. I have an expression for this. "Solving the problem is only half the problem." Everyone knows how to fix the housing problem…

I have never heard this quote before, but I like it. It's a good point. So how about this to help lead the discussion. We, the HackerNews community, seem to have a general consensus that increasing supply is the best way to lower prices. Rather straight forward, really. But the reason why housing is currently limited is due to a conflict of interests; existing property owners want to stifle supply. And they have more political power than non-property owners in the state. So perhaps we can discuss ingenious policy ideas that would help feed their own self interests, but result in increased supply? The following article references how other countries were able to accomplish such a feat [How to turn NIMBYs into YIMBYs](https://www.economist.com/finance-and-economics/2021/09/11/h...)

Re: Facing housing crisis, L.A. voters back duplexes in single-family neighborhoods

#258

Post by maxsilver »

ihaveajob wrote: post #109
_fat_santa wrote: post #5

As soon as you look at the zoning of LA, the housing problem there becomes clear as day, even for someone who doesn't visit very often. I don't know what you would call this system but LA's problem is that the folks that have the power to fix housing have zero interest in doing because it would hurt their self interest. Housing is only a "problem" if you haven't bought a house yet, once you purchase a house, all the…

The thing I don't get is why many SFH owners don't see the benefit of upzoning their lot: Overnight, their house is much more valuable because if they choose to, they can sell to a developer who can make MORE money by building more homes. And if they choose to keep their house as is, nobody is going to force them. In the end, it boils down to cars, though. Many people see the free parking space in front of their hous…

> Overnight, their house is much more valuable because if they choose to, they can sell to a developer who can make MORE money by building more homes. And if they choose to keep their house as is, nobody is going to force them.

In normal states -- people oppose up-zoning, because if their lot becomes more valuable, they instantly lose a lot of money. Sure, it's on-paper higher, but if they stay, that just means higher property taxes instantly (it's not uncommon for taxes to double or more after a few years of gentrification have occurred), along with higher cost of living (every other thing around them, like child care and restaurants and such will all get more expensive, to cover the higher rent and higher cost of living for those folks). And that's before getting to all the other minor annoying issues (extra noise, less infrastructure per person, income inequality, etc)

And sure, in theory they could sell out. But how, for what? Sure, in California, you can always just assume there's a boring midwest/south place to escape to -- but for everyone already in the midwest/south, no such escape option exists. If those folks leave, they'll have to buy a new place somewhere else, and they're all expensive too. If your $50k house is now worth $500k on-paper, but every other place to live is now $800k and up, you can't afford to stay (property taxes + cost of living are eating your income) and you can't afford to leave (everywhere else is getting even more expensive, there's no where to 'sell out' to). And that's before getting to the fact that the average person literally can't move anywhere meaningfully different. (They have a job that forces them to stay in market, or are going to a specific university, or have kids, or have kids with divorced ex-spouses, or are caring for elderly parents, etc, etc)

---

This is of course, just for normal/boring states. California has this "never charge people actual property taxes" law weirdness that complicates things.

Re: Facing housing crisis, L.A. voters back duplexes in single-family neighborhoods

#259

Post by ghaff »

KittenInABox wrote: post #253
ghaff wrote: post #175

Earlier quoted context omitted.

People complain about parking requirements but, in most US cities (and indeed in a great deal of the world) most households have cars. If I lived in Seattle, even if I didn't need one day to day for work/errands/etc., I'd certainly own one for going out to the mountains and so forth on the weekends.

Forgive me, since I don't own a car: Wouldn't it be cheaper to rent a car if you're only going to use it once a week or so? I mean, with the payment itself, plus insurance, plus gas, regular maintenance, is it worth the price?

It would probably be cheaper but less convenient. I was in a ski house once with people who lived in Manhattan (carless) and every weekend they came up there was lots of planning and overhead associated with the rental car.

Manhattan is obviously extreme but most people who can afford to do sso would rather just have a car they can jump into when they want to.

Re: Facing housing crisis, L.A. voters back duplexes in single-family neighborhoods

#260

Post by thewebcount »

LA resident here. There are a number of problems with housing in LA. This will help a little, but more will need to be done.

However, it should be noted that duplexes in single-family neighborhoods are not new. There are plenty of them here. I'm over in Westchester, and our neighborhood has dozens of 2 and 4-plexes. I've never heard a single-family homeowner here complain about it. My brother used to live in a duplex down in Redondo, as well.

They've also built about 4 or 5 low-rise apartment complexes within 1 mile of my house in the last 3-4 years. Again, I haven't heard any complaints from homeowners. (And as one myself, I have no complaints.)

People like to say the problem is that we don't have enough housing. While that's part of the problem, the bigger problem is that we have plenty of housing that nobody wants. A few years ago, the LA Times ran an article about how there were several large luxury apartment complexes built downtown that nobody wanted to move into. The problem is less that housing isn't being built and more that it's only being built for the high end, and the people at the high end have better options.

Honestly, I'm not sure whether a duplex is that much more affordable than a house. Maybe your recently minted Googlers and such will move into them, but the much larger pool of people who work in the area and don't get paid those salaries still won't have anyplace affordable to live. Hopefully this is just the first step.

Post reply on HN