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To meet demand, US needs 4.3M more apartments by 2035

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Re: To meet demand, US needs 4.3M more apartments by 2035

#131

Post by RhysU »

RhysU wrote: post #120
kelseyfrog wrote: post #99

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You seem to be focused on navigating the effects of the current system by relocating people. I'm not sure where you got this from. I'm interested in modifying the system which allows for such outcomes, not managing the outcomes themselves. Please take a systems-level approach that seeks root-cause adjustment and not simply an amelioration of symptoms.

To be perfectly awful, 552K homeless out of 335M people is about 1.6% of the US population. Even high-functioning and privileged individuals seldom have their shit together 98% of the time. I can't go 5 days without doing something chillingly stupid. It is frankly astounding that we achieve better than 98% on any homelessness metric. A long forgotten ancestral memory says: there but for the grace of God go I. Root ca…

I botched that division, off by a factor of 10.

Re: To meet demand, US needs 4.3M more apartments by 2035

#132

Post by sp527 »

TulliusCicero wrote: post #128
sp527 wrote: post #123

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Using rising home values as a retirement account is essentially just a pyramid scheme. Paying down a mortgage builds equity in the home. It's because homes are relatively illiquid and most people choose to own instead of rent that housing works rather well as a de facto retirement account. I see no issue with that personally. > Like, just think about how this has to work. It only functions if home values drasticall…

> Paying down a mortgage builds equity in the home. It's because homes are relatively illiquid and most people choose to own instead of rent that housing works rather well as a de facto retirement account. I see no issue with that personally. Irrelevant. Mere equity in a home with a flat value is essentially unaffected by lowered property values overall: you'll not be forced to 'save' as much, but the point of saving…

> Mere equity in a home with a flat value is essentially unaffected by lowered property values overall: you'll not be forced to 'save' as much, but the point of saving was to not have a mortgage payment anymore. If you don't need to 'save' as much to reach the same outcome, if anything that's a net good.

Some of this is hilariously false and the rest is incoherent. There is simply no way to argue that lowered property values won't result in a net destruction of wealth for people holding mortgages or paid off homes.

> Your data is out of date. It used to hover around 200k current dollars on average, but now it's far higher. The increasingly terrible zoning and other building regulations finally caught up to us: https://dqydj.com/historical-home-prices/

You can't measure from a point of extreme dislocation. We're clearly off trend at present and there's no reason to believe it won't revert, as is being widely discussed right now. Somewhat obviously, monthly mortgage payment inflation cannot greatly exceed wage inflation, on average.

> No, it's just luck compounded by regulations that favor handing out wealth to the elderly over the keeping costs reasonable for younger people.

You're still thinking about extreme markets. And in those markets regulation is only part of the answer. The truly salient determinant of prices is how quickly demand for housing in a region increases, which is fundamentally unpredictable.

Re: To meet demand, US needs 4.3M more apartments by 2035

#133

Post by TulliusCicero »

sp527 wrote: post #132
TulliusCicero wrote: post #128

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Paying down a mortgage builds equity in the home. It's because homes are relatively illiquid and most people choose to own instead of rent that housing works rather well as a de facto retirement account. I see no issue with that personally. Irrelevant. Mere equity in a home with a flat value is essentially unaffected by lowered property values overall: you'll not be forced to 'save' as much, but the point of saving…

> Mere equity in a home with a flat value is essentially unaffected by lowered property values overall: you'll not be forced to 'save' as much, but the point of saving was to not have a mortgage payment anymore. If you don't need to 'save' as much to reach the same outcome, if anything that's a net good. Some of this is hilariously false and the rest is incoherent. There is simply no way to argue that lowered propert…

> There is simply no way to argue that lowered property values won't result in a net destruction of wealth for people holding mortgages or paid off homes.

For people with existing home equity, sure. But how much does that actually benefit them? You can only actually make use of that money in a meaningful way if you either get a mortgage again, or if you leave and go somewhere cheaper (if it's more expensive than your current area, the current situation makes you even more screwed compared to the hypothetical).

Anyway, I was talking about the eventual steady state of the system: as a general principle, low home values would not destroy wealth, any more than reverting back to sane car prices will "destroy the wealth" of car ownership.

> We're clearly off trend at present and there's no reason to believe it won't revert

It might revert, yes, but unlike the insane housing bubble before, the current situation doesn't appear to be caused by financial shenanigans. There's just a lot of demand chasing not many houses. And if it does revert, it'll almost certainly be because of long-term changes in demand or supply. For demand, that would mean a long period of stagnation or recession.

> You're still thinking about extreme markets.

And what we're seeing is that increasingly, even markets that we didn't think of as "hot" are getting expensive. Random places look increasingly like the bay area I grew up in in the 90's, when it was already quite expensive, but not insanely so like now.

Re: To meet demand, US needs 4.3M more apartments by 2035

#135

Post by pandaman »

kredd wrote: post #10
kvetching wrote: post #9

Apartments are terrible for people. Why not talk about needs for homes? Why can't America make small 2 bedroom homes anymore as seen in 1950s suburbs. It's either a mansion or an apartment now for new housing.

I am genuinely curious, why are they terrible for people? Grew up in one, and currently living in one as well (mind you, by choice), and know multiple families (with kids) living a relatively happy life in apartments.

I am not sure if they are terrible for all the people but for me the noise is a huge deal: always had been sleep-deprived when I lived in apartments. On top of that there are tons of tiny things that combine together into miserable conditions: the bare minimum appliances (many apartments don't have even a washer/dryer and ones that have usually come with an electric dryer), pest infestations, mold, tobacco/weed smoke and other smells from neighbors in shared ventilation/windows, slow maintenance, elevated crime activity (an apartment complex parking is a big juicy target for any enterprising thief, as is its mailroom), your deliveries going to your neighbors and their deliveries to you (at any time of night too) etc. etc.

Re: To meet demand, US needs 4.3M more apartments by 2035

#136

Post by rewq4321 »

rewq4321 wrote: post #106
kelseyfrog wrote: post #99

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You seem to be focused on navigating the effects of the current system by relocating people. I'm not sure where you got this from. I'm interested in modifying the system which allows for such outcomes, not managing the outcomes themselves. Please take a systems-level approach that seeks root-cause adjustment and not simply an amelioration of symptoms.

The root cause is primarily housing policy. Let developers build many apartments, and let them build small apartments. Zoning laws that make it a years-long process to just get a permit, or that force developers to build apartments with minimum square footage, or prevent large families living in a "small" apartment - these are all luxury laws forced upon poor people so that rich people can be more comfortable. I coun…

*make their neighbourhood more accessible to those who are not well-off
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