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In California, you can now sell your ADU

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Re: In California, you can now sell your ADU

#91

Post by Solvency »

game_the0ry wrote: post #33
billfor wrote: post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Lets keep overpopulating ad infinitum (because we are told that's the only way the economy grows) and see where we are in 100 years.

Its not the only way to grow. You can grow through productivity too. Problem is that corporate shareholders "hoarded" the productivity value that was created with stock buy-backs instead of raising wages.

I always hear this stock buybacks thing, it's become almost memefied. Is this really the culprit here because it sounds so reductionist.

Re: In California, you can now sell your ADU

#92

Post by Solvency »

Izikiel43 wrote: post #62

The problem with San Francisco, Seattle, and Vancouver (BC), and other cities with housing issues is simple, Americans seem to hate apartments, everyone wants houses, so most of the cities are zoned for SFH (Seattle and Vancouver for sure). If you built 10 floor buildings everywhere, with 2/3 bedroom apartments, even at 1 apartment per floor, housing stops being an issue in 5 years. However, go to Seattle, San Franci…

"Housing" might be a "solved issue" in "Asia" but that's absurdly reductionist. Quality of life is not solved. Breathing your neighbors vape and cigarette smoke is not solved. Hearing pounding bass through every adjacent wall is not solved. Lack of your own yard is not solved. There are thousands of human problems that arise in condensed compressed living.

Re: In California, you can now sell your ADU

#93

Post by game_the0ry »

Solvency wrote: post #91
game_the0ry wrote: post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Its not the only way to grow. You can grow through productivity too. Problem is that corporate shareholders "hoarded" the productivity value that was created with stock buy-backs instead of raising wages.

I always hear this stock buybacks thing, it's become almost memefied. Is this really the culprit here because it sounds so reductionist.

Since 2008, corporation buy back stock over investing in capex or raising wages. From my intuition, it is bc they were so scarred by the 2008-2010 GFC, that they have been anticipating another crash since, even though it was over 10 years ago.

Here are some instances of what CEOs do when they are flush with cash:

- A top Trump adviser’s startling response to CEOs not doing what he’d expect [1]

> "As Cohn sat comfortably onstage, a Journal editor asked the crowd to raise their hands if their company plans to invest more if the tax reform bill passes. Very few hands went up. Cohn looked surprised. “Why aren't the other hands up?” he said." [1]

> Make no mistake: The proportion of net income distributed to the shareholders of S&P 500 corporations is indeed high. From 2007 to 2016, the S&P 500 firms paid out $7 trillion to shareholders—$4.2 trillion through repurchases and $2.8 trillion through dividends—representing 96% of net income. Microsoft was one of the top cash distributors, paying out a total of $188 billion to shareholders. [2]

> In 2011, Senate Democrats, arguing against another repatriation tax holiday, issued a report asserting that the previous effort had actually cost the United States Treasury $3.3 billion, and that companies receiving the tax breaks had thereafter cut over 20,000 jobs." [3]

All of this signals pessimism in the upper ranks of corporate america.

Does this still sound reductionist?

[1] https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/wonk/wp/2017/11/14/why-a...

[2] https://hbr.org/2018/03/are-buybacks-really-shortchanging-in...

[3] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Repatriation_tax_holiday

Re: In California, you can now sell your ADU

#94

Post by bugglebeetle »

TheBlight wrote: post #70
bugglebeetle wrote: post #52

Earlier quoted context omitted.

…is what you say if you’re a real estate speculator trying to distract from root causes. Housing affordability and homelessness are directly correlated: > A large body of academic research has consistently found that homelessness in an area is driven by housing costs, whether expressed in terms of rents, rent-to-income ratios, price-to-income ratios, or home prices. Further, changes in rents precipitate changes in ra…

Housing is expensive in desirable places. These areas are also traditionally quite affluent and liberal -- because you need to be relatively rich to live there. As a result, they tend to be much more accommodating to the homeless and addiction. That doesn't mean housing prices in LA/SF/Miami/NYC are the reason homeless people gravitate there but it does explain a correlation.

These are just unsupported assertions unless you can disprove the wide body of research I linked to that demonstrates rates of homelessness and housing affordability are strongly correlated. Many “red” cities and states have higher rates of drug abuse, mental illness, and crime, but less homelessness. Why? Because housing is affordable in those places so people do drugs and have mental illness while sheltered. It’s honestly not that complicated. It seems like you’re trying to obfuscate these documented realities to suit your own narrative.

Re: In California, you can now sell your ADU

#95

Post by Izikiel43 »

Solvency wrote: post #92
Izikiel43 wrote: post #62

The problem with San Francisco, Seattle, and Vancouver (BC), and other cities with housing issues is simple, Americans seem to hate apartments, everyone wants houses, so most of the cities are zoned for SFH (Seattle and Vancouver for sure). If you built 10 floor buildings everywhere, with 2/3 bedroom apartments, even at 1 apartment per floor, housing stops being an issue in 5 years. However, go to Seattle, San Franci…

"Housing" might be a "solved issue" in "Asia" but that's absurdly reductionist. Quality of life is not solved. Breathing your neighbors vape and cigarette smoke is not solved. Hearing pounding bass through every adjacent wall is not solved. Lack of your own yard is not solved. There are thousands of human problems that arise in condensed compressed living.

And latin america, don't forget that.

This comment is literally the point I was trying to make, thank you very much, I couldn't ask for a more typical american answer.

If you want to live in a city, and not pay sky high rent, these are going to be some small issues you will have to work with. I say small, because the alternative is not having housing, or paying half of your salary in rent/mortgage.

The bass is solved, have the HOA or condo board apply fines for loud noises, which grow exponentially with each infraction.

Lack of your own yard? Go to a park, I lived in Vancouver in an apartment, and I had a ton of parks nearby, same in other cities I've lived in.

Having a house in a city is luxury, not a need, a home is a need, but that can be an apartment.

Re: In California, you can now sell your ADU

#96

Post by Izikiel43 »

JumpCrisscross wrote: post #87
Izikiel43 wrote: post #62

The problem with San Francisco, Seattle, and Vancouver (BC), and other cities with housing issues is simple, Americans seem to hate apartments, everyone wants houses, so most of the cities are zoned for SFH (Seattle and Vancouver for sure). If you built 10 floor buildings everywhere, with 2/3 bedroom apartments, even at 1 apartment per floor, housing stops being an issue in 5 years. However, go to Seattle, San Franci…

> Americans seem to hate apartments, everyone wants houses Tell that to every apartment building with a waiting list. The fetishization of single-family housing comes from planners, not the populace.

> The fetishization of single-family housing comes from planners

From what I read, the fetishization comes from already homeowners who want to have their cake (a house) and eat it too (making it an asset that appreciates). Since voting is non mandatory in USA, voters tend to skew old and/or homeowner, both of which like to maintain the status quo, hence favoring policies that keep it.

Re: In California, you can now sell your ADU

#97

Post by [deleted] »

Izikiel43 wrote: post #96
JumpCrisscross wrote: post #87

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Americans seem to hate apartments, everyone wants houses Tell that to every apartment building with a waiting list. The fetishization of single-family housing comes from planners, not the populace.

> The fetishization of single-family housing comes from planners From what I read, the fetishization comes from already homeowners who want to have their cake (a house) and eat it too (making it an asset that appreciates). Since voting is non mandatory in USA, voters tend to skew old and/or homeowner, both of which like to maintain the status quo, hence favoring policies that keep it.

[deleted]

Re: In California, you can now sell your ADU

#98

Post by dang »

onlyrealcuzzo wrote: post #6

> The legislation could be a major benefit to senior citizens on a fixed income who often can’t afford to move, whether because of high interest rates or capital gains taxes incurred by selling a long-time home. A group that is extremely small - and we pretend like every grandma in the world lived in a little cottage in Hollywood that's now worth $3m - and whatever would she do if she had to 1031 into rental properti…

Can you please make your substantive points without snark? We're trying for something else here.

This is in the site guidelines: https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html.

Re: In California, you can now sell your ADU

#99

Post by cheriot »

game_the0ry wrote: post #26
UncleOxidant wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What's the problem with being able to sell your ADU? Wouldn't this possibly incentivize more ADU building thus supplying more housing units to the market?

> What's the problem with being able to sell your ADU? There is nothin "wrong" or "right" about free market economics bc there is no concept of morality in free market economics. It is what it is. But it is the clearest of signals of what is going - US standard of living has peaked and is going down. > Wouldn't this possibly incentivize more ADU building thus supplying more housing units to the market? Is that trend…

> free market economics

> nor do I want to live in a community that has ADUs

Would you rather have a free market or a local land use committee to forbid ADUs?

Re: In California, you can now sell your ADU

#100

Post by cheriot »

billfor wrote: post #23
game_the0ry wrote: post #9

US standard of living is decreasing and will never come back. Many economic anomalies can be observed to prove this: inflation is just one. But I think the most dangerous anomaly has been real estate. In, what is ostensibly the most progressive, most prosperous state in the union, you can build a "mini house" (accessory dwelling unit) on your property and rent it out. The ideal target market would be my generation (m…

Lets keep overpopulating ad infinitum (because we are told that's the only way the economy grows) and see where we are in 100 years.

If people can't own a home do they cease to exist? Weird how "overpopulating" comes up when discussing homes for people that are here already, but not other issues like jobs or office construction.
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