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The anti-abundance critique on housing is wrong

derekthompson.org

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Re: The anti-abundance critique on housing is wrong

#211

Post by fn-mote »

WillPostForFood wrote: post #153
tptacek wrote: post #71

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm not making a value judgement. There are analysts and opinion writers I enjoy reading and get a lot of value from. But hosting a podcast interview with someone is basically the opposite of shoe-leather reporting. I guess if you did "stitch incoming" every couple minutes and cut to Fridman calling someone else to have conversations with other sources about whatever claim his primary guest just made, you'd be gettin…

You are touting "call up the authorities" and shitting sitting down and talking face to face with authorities, which reads like a value judgement.

> sitting down and talking face to face with authorities

I think the issue is the number of authorities. One isn’t enough.

Re: The anti-abundance critique on housing is wrong

#212

Post by quodlibetor »

tptacek wrote: post #170
quodlibetor wrote: post #167

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> a few tenths of a percentage point of NYC Feb 2024 (last year there's data, I think) was a record low and it was 1.4% empty, according to NYC[1]. But I don't really know the methodology, and according to other nyc gov data it's surprising, since we still haven't recovered our population from COVID[2]. The first statistic (housing pressure) is based on population growth, but the NYC population statistics suggest sti…

1.4% vacancy in a housing market is extraordinarily low . Remember: there is structurally always some material amount of vacancy, because people vacate housing units well before new people move into them. This, by the way, is a stat whose interpretation you can just look up. Real estate people use it as a benchmark.

Yeah I know it's among the lowest in the world, it's still an ~order of magnitude higher than a few tenths of a percent, which would be shocking for the reasons you mention.

My point though was just that I've seen arguments that these numbers can be manipulated, and the city's own data doesn't make sense by itself: either the 1.4% number is wrong or the slowly recovering population estimate is wrong. Especially considering the 60,000 housing units (representing 2% growth) created.

Re: The anti-abundance critique on housing is wrong

#213

Post by cocaclub »

crooked-v wrote: post #148
tptacek wrote: post #134

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I live in a very wealthy, extraordinarily progressive muni (almost certainly in the top 5 nationally), and my primary political project is zoning reform, and I assure you that left-NIMBYism is a thing, and that the "we should make blue state governments perform better and increase supply of things people want" thesis of "Abundance" (Thompson and Klein's book) is a bête noire among those leftists. The argument isn't t…

Here in extremely liberal Portland, there are a huge number of people who genuinely believe that 'greedy developers' are the cause of the nationwide housing shortage, having talked themselves into the nonsense belief that building fewer homes makes people more money.

Supply destruction to put a floor on prices is not an unknown phenomenon.

The effort to make it seem silly to think that there aren't enough houses because the industry whose job it is to build houses did not build enough houses is itself a little silly. Circumstantial as the evidence may be, it's logical to assume that they didn't because it was more profitable not to.

Re: The anti-abundance critique on housing is wrong

#214

Post by specialist »

tptacek wrote: post #160
deckar01 wrote: post #151

I find the term “anti-abundance left” odd. He wrote a book called “Abundance” laying out the case for deregulating zoning laws. Claiming global monopolies in aggregate seems more like a conspiracy theory. I thought the mainstream (left) opposition to deregulation was to subsidize affordable housing regardless of the cause.

Restating something I said upthread, but I think the right way to think about Thompson's rhetorical adversary here is "people on the political left who believe that antitrust is the high-order bit on housing affordability and that zoning reform shouldn't occur until after antitrust issues are addressed". He's arguing with people who are pushing back on legalizing housing density. He is not arguing broadly against the…

Paraphrasing: along with a dozen other pressing issues, anti-trust was out of scope for this book.

> He is not arguing broadly against the political left...

Yes and: NIMBY vs YIMBY is (mostly) olds vs youngs, rather than partisanship. Witness the coalition behind the Montana Miracle (recent pro-housing legislation).

So far. As you know, most positions eventually get coded as left or right, as needed, to defend the corptacracy.

Re: The anti-abundance critique on housing is wrong

#215

Post by appreciatorBus »

whatever1 wrote: post #179

Housing crisis is just a result of increasing income inequality and the resulting real estate investment craze. The population of America (real demand) did not suddenly double at any state/city. Rich have become so much richer that can afford bidding wars at unattainable prices. They can buy investment homes and be cashflow negative for decades in anticipation of the increased market bidding prices. Of course they op…

The population of a place doesn't have to double, or even change at all, for prices to go up. All that is necessary is for more people to want to live in a place. Those with the $ to satisfy that desire will outbid those who don't and you can easily double/triple/10x prices with no change in population.

Re: The anti-abundance critique on housing is wrong

#217

Post by cyberax »

Sigh. The whole housing narrative has been hopelessly taken off the rails by well-meaning but clueless urbanists.

And quite predictably, once the poisoned fruits of their labors start to bloom, it's always the fault of capitalism. Or maybe foreign investors and private equity.

Re: The anti-abundance critique on housing is wrong

#218

Post by ch4s3 »

quodlibetor wrote: post #167
ch4s3 wrote: post #126

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Empty properties barely exist as a percentage of total housing supply in high cost of living areas in the US. You’re looking at no more than a few tenths of of a percentage point of NYC’s more than 4 million units.

> a few tenths of a percentage point of NYC Feb 2024 (last year there's data, I think) was a record low and it was 1.4% empty, according to NYC[1]. But I don't really know the methodology, and according to other nyc gov data it's surprising, since we still haven't recovered our population from COVID[2]. The first statistic (housing pressure) is based on population growth, but the NYC population statistics suggest sti…

Vacancy doesn’t mean units held empty as either a parking place for cash or held off the market. Vacancy happens when you’re painting and repairing between rentals. Vacancy happens when there’s a renovation. Things like that are normal and not nefarious. Have 1.4% vacancy rate means there is essentially no usable housing for rent.

I was talking about the myth that there are tons of apartments held by rich people who don’t use them for anything.

Re: The anti-abundance critique on housing is wrong

#219

Post by ch4s3 »

quodlibetor wrote: post #212
tptacek wrote: post #170

Earlier quoted context omitted.

1.4% vacancy in a housing market is extraordinarily low . Remember: there is structurally always some material amount of vacancy, because people vacate housing units well before new people move into them. This, by the way, is a stat whose interpretation you can just look up. Real estate people use it as a benchmark.

Yeah I know it's among the lowest in the world, it's still an ~order of magnitude higher than a few tenths of a percent, which would be shocking for the reasons you mention. My point though was just that I've seen arguments that these numbers can be manipulated, and the city's own data doesn't make sense by itself: either the 1.4% number is wrong or the slowly recovering population estimate is wrong. Especially consi…

I was replying to this claim

> They leave it empty (that actually happens a lot, especially with foreign investors

Not talking about rental vacancy.

Re: The anti-abundance critique on housing is wrong

#220

Post by proggy »

bullfightonmars wrote: post #23
tiahura wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why don't they build $10,000 Ford Rangers anymore?

The same reason housing isn't being built, it was regulated out of existence.

This is the real answer, not the pat “no one builds new used cars” nonsense. It is entirely possible to build new, no-frills apartments that are 100% habitable and to code. But because of all the regulatory boxes one needs to check — namely all the fees spent, and time spent waiting for seemingly endless approvals — it is simply not possible to rent out bottom-dollar builds at a low market rate. The same logic applies for single family homes sold for purchase. The startup costs are just too damn high.
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