Household size and the housing stock

> It is a competitive market given the number of independent landlords and given their inability to coordinate in order to effect collusion.

Oops, they did collude. https://www.ftc.gov/business-guidance/blog/2024/03/price-fix...

> rents actually decreased.

This link says rent inflation decreased, which just means inflation was lower. This is also just a graph and some numbers, so I'm not really sure why you linked it. It doesn't explain anything by itself.

> which is that it leads to more housing starts which addresses the shortage issue

We had 15 years of the cheapest money in the history of modern economics, why do we still have a shortage?

Most differentials are much smaller. "Cheap" places are no longer very much cheaper.

Cost of living changes are no longer extreme enough to offset the loss of a wage earner.

> Do the mega corp leaders not see the social and business value in opening offices in smaller cities?

Um, no?

The difference between opening an office in San Jose and one in Pittsburgh is quite large, for example. Your connectivity due to air travel is much worse. Your personal networking is much worse. etc.

It was the former CTO of Modcloth who talked about how having the programmers in Pittsburgh was great but that they needed to park the executives in the Bay Area.

It's still an international airport, even if the schedule isn't as robust. The emphasis on in-person personal networking, and personal networking in general, is atrocious. Personal networking and the requirement to so it in person is a huge factor in many biases and discrimination. It's only going to get worse as the group-think and physical concentration increases while the job market gets worse.

Also, 25% is a big difference. I think we have to compare the commutable areas as well. Some places like NYC and SF do not have much cheaper areas in a reasonable commute. Other areas can have much cheaper areas in a reasonable commute. Many costs are largely the same due to the national brands - cars, electronics, appliances, etc. But things like housing can be massively different. An apartment in a commutable suburb can be close to 50% of what it is downtown in many cities. It's no secret that the salaries and property costs are extremely above average in the bay area.

1. Price varies based on desirability of a location.

2. Desirability varies based on many factors, including proximity to a city center or major business concerns, cost of living, crime rate, etc.

3. To optimize desirability until there is more desirable space than those who desire it would require optimizing the variables that contribute to desirability.

4. The potential result is desirable, ie proximity to jobs or cultural center, low crime, low cost of living, etc. A number of variables contribute to each of these, and those would require optimization as well.

4a. There will be a point of diminishing returns, where builders will exit a market when there are not enough buyers at high enough prices to make a profit. As soon as there is a hint of profit, the vultures will appear.

5. In order to prevent real estate speculation, we could impose a few laws: first, make lending at a profit illegal for all non productive enterprises; second, levy a land value tax that hurts enough that it makes owning non productive commercial property untenable to own; third, allow only individuals to own residential real estate, ie, eliminate the rental market entirely and levy use taxes for vacant homes (your real estate must be your home of record and must be your residence for some minimum percentage of time every year).

This would destroy the real estate market entirely, and I don't think that would be a bad thing.

The economy is in shambles if homes can’t be built for different income groups. The villain here is the govt that eats up the taxes and imposes more and doesn’t provide basic quality of life. Wealth redistribution is not the solution. Wealth management is the answer. America fails miserably.

Basically..if a country as large as America is wanting dense housing and smaller homes, it means it’s becoming poorer.

For the rest of world..who are resource constrained or resource poor or economically weak…America is laughing stock.

It’s like the world’s richest person has a poverty fetish to fit in.

The only true wealth in this world is land. And the govt has made if so none can truly own it. And there you have it.

The gaslighting is real. Land owning farmers are the richest people in the world. By offering them subsidies, they have become debtors. Land rich and cash poor. The ultimate goal is land grab by institutional investors until very few elite will own all the land…and its resources.