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San Diego rents declined following surge in supply

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Re: San Diego rents declined following surge in supply

#81

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I've been told repeatedly by people who have a vested interest in maintaining high housing prices that supply and demand don't work at all, ever, for any reason, and high prices are no reason to build more housing. How do I reconcile these facts?!?

If the alleged people actually said this, and they wanted to "maintain high prices", then why would they oppose more building? If they believed "supply and demand don't work at all", then more supply wouldn't hurt their goal of maintaining high prices.

[deleted]

Re: San Diego rents declined following surge in supply

#82

What is this country's allergy with public housing? Not pursuing that feels like jumping in water with our hands tied behind our backs

Is there a current best practice for public housing? I remember a project here in South Australia that integrated some apartments for low-income or homelessness-risk tenants, amongst other tenancies. Idea being that it made for a melting pot rather than risk of only slum or only premium housing. But I don't think it was done at any real scale.

Re: San Diego rents declined following surge in supply

#83
post #59

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I've been told repeatedly by people who have a vested interest in maintaining high housing prices that supply and demand don't work at all, ever, for any reason, and high prices are no reason to build more housing. How do I reconcile these facts?!?

If demand for cars skyrockets then you (eventually) get more cars at the same price coz the manufacturer can just make more. If everybody wants to buy up land because "god isnt making it any more" you get less land at an even higher price which makes it even more attractive as a store in value. So no, supply and demand doesnt really work for land the way it works for everything else. Land needs to be taxed a lot to c…

Land != Housing.

Re: San Diego rents declined following surge in supply

#84
post #49
post #21

But what about the desirability of San Diego? Was the decrease in rent only because of the increase in supply, or is there also lower demand?

The majority of the "more housing = cheaper rent" success stories crowed about on the internet correspond with net population exodus. Austin, Minneapolis, now San Diego. Edit: I think we should build several million more units of housing in the US. I'm salty because all the new housing I've seen is ugly shitboxes owned by national property firms that make everywhere feel like nowhere.

Do you have a source for the claim that the population of Austin has decreased recently?

Re: San Diego rents declined following surge in supply

#85
post #21

But what about the desirability of San Diego? Was the decrease in rent only because of the increase in supply, or is there also lower demand?

Right. What the reporter calls a "surge in supply" is an increase in "active listings", which doesn't differentiate from listings due to new construction vs listings due to people leaving.

Also, I could not find the "active listings" data in Zumper's report[1]. And then I noticed the chart with the active listing data says it was made by Brenden Tuccinardi/KPBS, so this was done by a reporter, not a Zumper data analyst. It's a bit fishy.

[1] https://www.zumper.com/rent-research/national-rent-report

Re: San Diego rents declined following surge in supply

#86

Incredible. So what you're saying is... we should just build more housing? Who would have thought that was the answer?

I've been told repeatedly by people who have a vested interest in maintaining high housing prices that supply and demand don't work at all, ever, for any reason, and high prices are no reason to build more housing. How do I reconcile these facts?!?

Easily.

Many of those people have a correct observation in that new construction is just luxury housing, which is obviously unaffordable for people struggling with rent.

What they fail to miss is that for every luxury unit that's built and is occupied, some well-off person moved into it... And out of a shitty, cheap unit that's now on the market.

Re: San Diego rents declined following surge in supply

#87

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If the alleged people actually said this, and they wanted to "maintain high prices", then why would they oppose more building? If they believed "supply and demand don't work at all", then more supply wouldn't hurt their goal of maintaining high prices.

For the same reason that NIMBYs care so much about urban trees or spotted owls. They don't actually give a shit about them, they just are willing to say or do anything to sabotage the process of increasing housing supply.

I'm as big a YIMBY as you'll find, and urban trees are really important to making a city a nice place to live. There's no contradiction to those positions - just, you know, build more housing and plant more trees. (Spotted owls, of course, have nothing to do with urbanism, so I don't know how they got dragged in here.)

Re: San Diego rents declined following surge in supply

#88
post #71

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Zoning that reduces buildable footprint and/or height artificially increases demand for land. If the only way to build a home is to buy a 9000 sqft lot, then my demand for land is 9000 sqft. If you can build 18 homes on that same lot, my demand for land is 450 sqft. Land definitely needs to be taxed, but not without the zoning changes first to allow more to be built on less.

Zoning is the hobby horse of property developers. They're endlessly frustrated by the way zoning prevents them from building the most profitable construction - no matter whether there is a good or a bad reason for it (sometimes it's good sometimes it's not). This inspires a lobbying and public outreach effort to try and convince people that relaxing zoning rules will fix everything . As with many corporate lobbied fo…

TFA shows that it was zoning changes that allowed the influx of housing and lower prices. You can find similar articles across the country everywhere that has had significant relaxation of zoning restrictions, like in Minneapolis, Austin, and Seattle (just off the top of my head). This includes places where building code and permitting processes have gotten more arduous while the zoning was relaxed.

I don't care if it is a panacea or not...If you want to convince me that restrictive zoning is not the most significant cause of our housing affordability crisis, you'd have to find some better proof than "developers like upzoning and developers are bad people".

Re: San Diego rents declined following surge in supply

#89
post #76

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Being a homeowner, you get a title to your lot, not your entire neighborhood. You have no legal claim on your neighbor's home. If you want a legal claim on your neighbor's home, join an HOA. Or just buy it.

You do. It's called zoning.

It's a beautiful state of affairs when owners of property can collude for their interests with almost no restrictions, but worker unions are almost entirely defanged.

Re: San Diego rents declined following surge in supply

#90
post #76

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Being a homeowner, you get a title to your lot, not your entire neighborhood. You have no legal claim on your neighbor's home. If you want a legal claim on your neighbor's home, join an HOA. Or just buy it.

You do. It's called zoning.

I'd be willing to bet you every last dollar on the planet that if you read your deed, you will find zero claims to any particular zoning. Zoning is not a transferable property right. It can be changed for any reason at any time.
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