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Austin’s surge of new housing construction drove down rents

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Re: Austin’s surge of new housing construction drove down rents

#401

Post by jmyeet »

wcfrobert wrote: post #169
rconti wrote: post #11

Meanwhile, California is also trying to build housing near transit, but Menlo Park wants to preserve the character of downtown by preserving dirty, cracked, flat, surface-level parking lots like it's 1950.

NIMBYism has never been about preserving neighborhood characteristic, or noise and traffic concerns. Menlo Park is not Big Sur. Sure, some concerns are reasonable and should be investigated, but most of the time they're bureaucratic distractions that's been weaponized by people who want to delay progress and protect their investment. For most Americans, A house is their primary savings account, retirement plan, and p…

Fundamentally as a society we need to stop treating housing as an investment. It is and should be a utility.

Suring property prices is a relatively new phenomenon (as in, post-WW2). The true origins of NIMBYism, at least in the US, is (you guessed it) racism. Long before segregation ended, and long after, there was economic segregation. Redlining [1], HOAs [2], the post-WW2 GI Bill [3], where highways were built [4][5], etc.

In fact this is a good rule of thumb: if you're ever confused why something is the way it is in the US, your first guess should pretty much always be "because racism".

[1]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Redlining

[2]: https://www.furman.edu/fu/placing-furman/what-are-racially-r...

[3]: https://www.history.com/articles/gi-bill-black-wwii-veterans...

[4]: https://www.npr.org/2021/04/07/984784455/a-brief-history-of-...

[5]: https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2017-07-09/robert-mo...

Re: Austin’s surge of new housing construction drove down rents

#402

Post by danavar »

wcfrobert wrote: post #169
rconti wrote: post #11

Meanwhile, California is also trying to build housing near transit, but Menlo Park wants to preserve the character of downtown by preserving dirty, cracked, flat, surface-level parking lots like it's 1950.

NIMBYism has never been about preserving neighborhood characteristic, or noise and traffic concerns. Menlo Park is not Big Sur. Sure, some concerns are reasonable and should be investigated, but most of the time they're bureaucratic distractions that's been weaponized by people who want to delay progress and protect their investment. For most Americans, A house is their primary savings account, retirement plan, and p…

>For most Americans, A house is their primary savings account

This is true for California, where people (foolishly) rely on their home value as their retirement plan, which further incentivizes NIMBYism.

But in places like Texas (and other areas with affordable housing), the house is just treated as something you pay off to have a low housing cost in retirement. And your investments are your retirement+savings account.

Re: Austin’s surge of new housing construction drove down rents

#403

Post by bobthepanda »

wolfi1 wrote: post #398
pclowes wrote: post #176

Its wild how the solution to housing costs is really just: Build more housing. Keep law and order. No it doesn’t need to be “affordable”. Yes rent control is a terrible idea. Just build more housing. Note: that the US already has plenty of housing and housing costs basically go up in areas of low crime relative to economic opportunity. If you build housing, but allow crime to rise, you have wasted everybody’s time.

Vienna built housing itself, with this housing it was possible to have cheap rents and keep rents from private investors down. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Housing_in_Vienna

It’s worth noting that a major confounding factor is that, unlike most cities with a housing crisis, Vienna is well below its population peak and so does not need to build nearly as much housing

Re: Austin’s surge of new housing construction drove down rents

#404

Post by greyface- »

triceratops wrote: post #336
tharmas wrote: post #321

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Investors add to demand for housing. This will help drive up prices. And no, builders will not necessarily increase supply if they can realise increased margin of profit due to increased demand. We see that with RAM manufacturers. RAM suppliers constrain supply to boost margins. Same with house builders. The difference is people can go without RAM but everyone needs a place to live.

> Investors add to demand for housing And here I thought people who want to live in houses add to demand for housing. Investors buy houses that people want to live in. If people don't want to live someplace, you won't see any investors there either.

1 house is built. Alice wants to own it to live in it. Bob wants to own it to rent it to Alice. 2 people want to own the house.

Re: Austin’s surge of new housing construction drove down rents

#405

Post by gtowey »

maxerickson wrote: post #71
gtowey wrote: post #63

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> As a homeowner, I want number to go up. Which is myopic. As a homeowner, I want cities to be livable and affordable for those who want or have to live there. I don't care if the value of my home changes one cent. It's honestly kind of useless, because it's not like I can sell the house and buy a nicer one. All the houses are more expensive so it's always going to be a lateral trade. It only helps if you sell and mo…

So you are saying you are a reactionary? Did you even try to read my entire comment?

I read it as presenting the reductionist side of the argument. Not saying that you personally believe it's good or right, only that it is what the majority of homeowners would think.

In that sense I agree with the current state of reality.

But what I am saying is that if we want to change that reality -- and it most certainly is possible to change -- it will take people rejecting the status quo. And there at least some of us who are already there.

Re: Austin’s surge of new housing construction drove down rents

#406

Post by idiotsecant »

pinkmuffinere wrote: post #376
estearum wrote: post #221

Earlier quoted context omitted.

New construction has already decelerated in Austin due to falling prices, which compresses already-near-zero margin on real estate development. So yes, it really is "just build more housing." The problem is: why would you build more housing as prices fall?

I'm confused by this objection, if you draw a stereotypical supply and demand curve, you can see how prices settle to an equilibrium point. Of course reality has more complications, but I think your objection is 95% answered by a supply and demand curve. You keep building houses when it is profitable. You stop when it is not. This naturally keeps everything in balance.

What do you do when that equilibrium point is hopelessly above what the average person can afford?

Re: Austin’s surge of new housing construction drove down rents

#409

Post by bluegatty »

jmyeet wrote: post #390
bluegatty wrote: post #378

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Rent control is one of the best ideas, and it may be a civilizational, foundational idea. Property ownership is at the very core of entrenched power, and the foundation of rent-seeking and wealth asymmetry. If you look at even the Monarchs of long past - it wasn't their 'titles' that made them powerful - it was the economic rent that came along with the land ownership. Even in more open market economies, property is…

Rent control is the wrong solution to the right problem (ie affordable housing). It creates all sorts of problems that wouldn't exist otherwise. For example, if you've been in a rent control house or apartment for 10+ years and are paying significantly less, what happens if you want to move? Or just need a bigger place? It's a huge impeediment to mobility and flexibility. Also, you have an adversarial relationship wi…

The problems that rent control creates are far smaller than the problems that exist without it.

To start - your 'very first example' is not even really 'a problem'.

'Without rent control' - you get kicked out of your abode every few years if your salary doesn't keep up with housing inflation. With rent control, you have the option of 'having a home; you decide when you want to leave (for the most part).

The answer to the 'second example', 'adversarial tenant/landlord' is that the theory doesn't line up with reality for the most part. Again - in most rent controlled areas this kind of stuff does not happen, especially if it's entrenched in the culture. It works well in a ton of housing markets like Quebec, Germany.

The primary concern about rent control limiting expansion ... just does not exist. It doesn't really impede new builds.

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