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Priced out of Paris

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Re: Priced out of Paris

#51

Post by 6d0debc071 »

kiba wrote: post #9
datr wrote: post #5

I don't want to undermine this piece too much as I think it is an important issue and what I'm about to say doesn't address all of the details. But I also believe it's an issue that will be partially solved by automated cars. As soon as it becomes palatable to live further from the city and commute; and, to a lesser extent, free up space from car parks, this problem will be dramatically reduced.

Regardless of autonomous cars, proximity and density will always be a decisive feature of cities, which is what allows humanity to thrive and innovate. The fact that only the rich people can afford to live in the center of the city is a problem, because it becomes harder to aggregate human ingenuity and innovation. In fact, I believe autonomous cars will increases a city's ability to network, because it increases peo…

> Regardless of autonomous cars, proximity and density will always be a decisive feature of cities, which is what allows humanity to thrive and innovate.

Population density is correlated with increased rates of mental illness.

Re: Priced out of Paris

#52

Post by andyking »

njs12345 wrote: post #43
andyking wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Even if my pay was doubled, I wouldn't be able to afford to live in or near London. However, I can afford a comfortable lifestyle in rural Yorkshire (house, car, holidays, internet access, good food, days out etc etc) on a modest pay packet. The rent for my 17th century cottage with garden in a Yorkshire village wouldn't get me a room in a shared house in an undesirable part of London. I don't understand the pull of…

If you don't mind me asking, how much do you earn? If you're on the median UK national income and you double it you'd very easily be able to live in a nice place in London. Your lifestyle would of course be very different, but not necessarily worse (I'd rather take good public transport than drive, for instance). Housing is the only thing that's objectively worse, unless you have kids, that is..

I work for a non-profit organisation and I'm considerably below the median income. There are jobs going, doing what I do for wages that are quite a bit higher - but they're all in London. An absolutely ideal job came up last week, but it's in Southwark. I just couldn't do it... so I stay here, where I'm reasonably settled and happy.

Re: Priced out of Paris

#53

Post by mathattack »

stevoski wrote: post #4

The article talks a lot about cities now being the domain only of "one-percenters" and "global elite". This is demonstrably false. Consider the UK. UK's population: 62 million London population: 8 million 13% of the UK's population, therefore, resides in London. To say that only the "1%" can afford London is clearly not the case. In France's case, 15% of the population live in Paris. Perhaps we can't all live in Lond…

It's the 1% that can afford to move in. That's what's skewing the article. In Manhattan, there are very few buyers who make less than $400k/year as a couple. That's about the cutoff for the 1%.

This doom and gloom in the article is neither new, nor entirely accurate. The popular consensus (I wish I had the link handy!) in NYC is financial services employment rises and falls 1 to 1 with artistic employment. The causality is probably reversed though. The growth of one helps the other. Gentrification is nothing new.

Re: Priced out of Paris

#54

Post by philh »

andyking wrote: post #24
stevoski wrote: post #4

The article talks a lot about cities now being the domain only of "one-percenters" and "global elite". This is demonstrably false. Consider the UK. UK's population: 62 million London population: 8 million 13% of the UK's population, therefore, resides in London. To say that only the "1%" can afford London is clearly not the case. In France's case, 15% of the population live in Paris. Perhaps we can't all live in Lond…

Even if my pay was doubled, I wouldn't be able to afford to live in or near London. However, I can afford a comfortable lifestyle in rural Yorkshire (house, car, holidays, internet access, good food, days out etc etc) on a modest pay packet. The rent for my 17th century cottage with garden in a Yorkshire village wouldn't get me a room in a shared house in an undesirable part of London. I don't understand the pull of…

> The rent for my 17th century cottage with garden in a Yorkshire village wouldn't get me a room in a shared house in an undesirable part of London.

Maybe I'm only confused because I've never lived in a village, but... You're paying significantly less than £700 pcm (including bills and council tax) for that?

Re: Priced out of Paris

#55

Post by othello »

kiba wrote: post #3

Why is Paris really expensive? Constricted supply and high demand. Why is the supply constricted? Because Paris refuse to build anything in the center. That's because the center is a historical preservation district writ large. If you build anything modern, it would "ruin" the image of Paris. So, Paris would need to change its policy and start demolishing old buildings, and build higher density buildings. Certainly,…

Actually two of the 20 districts of inner Paris (the "arrondissements"), which you describe as a "historical preservation district writ large", are more densely populated than any districts in any Western city - except for Manhattan Community Board 8 and 2 districts in Spain [1].

The 11th and the 20th arrondissement both house more than 40,000 people per km2 (104,000 per sq mile), which is denser than any district of Tokyo by the way. If that's not dense, I don't know what is.

Incidentally, the 11th is not cheap in any way: buying a flat there will set you back 9000 to 9500€ per sqm ($1200 to $1270 per sqft) [2].

[1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_city_districts_by_popul...

[2] http://parispropertygroup.com/blog/2012/real-estate-prices-p...

Re: Priced out of Paris

#56

Post by JPKab »

My cousin is a .01%-er. My father's brother, due to a position of political power he held in the late 1970's, met and married a woman who is an heir to an American old-money family. (if i were to name them, you would know. If you listen to NPR for more than an hour, you will hear their name mentioned as a donor)

The contrast is insane, since my entire family is Appalachian coal mining stock. She NEVER visits, so the only time I see her is by visiting her at one of the many properties she has in the various 'global elite' cities.

She has an apartment which takes up 3 entire floors of a building which overlooks the East River in Manhattan (in the "50's" of the street numbers, but I won't name the street for anonymity purposes). She is almost never there, perhaps once a year. She has an equally large aparment in London. She has a mansion in Greenwich, Connetticutt. She rents out none of these properties. They are all left vacant for her to use at a whim. She isn't very educated (despite the efforts of her mother, her friends and her see little use in education. They have everything already.) and once had a major cocaine problem, along with half of her friends. I've met most of them, and attended parties at THEIR vacant-most-of-the-year apartments too.

I love my cousin, but she and her friends are parasites, sucking off of economic rent, delegating the management of their huge hoards of capital to investment bankers in their social circles. They produce nothing, but buy huge amounts of property on a whim wherever is "hip" and then leave it artfully furnished, beautiful, and vacant 11.5 months out of the year.

Re: Priced out of Paris

#57

Post by imgabe »

bru wrote: post #12
kiba wrote: post #3

Why is Paris really expensive? Constricted supply and high demand. Why is the supply constricted? Because Paris refuse to build anything in the center. That's because the center is a historical preservation district writ large. If you build anything modern, it would "ruin" the image of Paris. So, Paris would need to change its policy and start demolishing old buildings, and build higher density buildings. Certainly,…

According to Wikipedia[1], Paris is the 34th densest city in the world. 5 French cities are denser, and all of them are Paris' suburbs. Only 3 non-French European cities are denser than Paris. Your comment lacks foundations. 1: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_cities_proper_by_popula...

This is a non-sequitor. How dense it is relative to other cities is irrelevant with regard to whether it's dense enough to meet the demand for housing in the city.

Re: Priced out of Paris

#58

Post by EwanG »

rdouble wrote: post #46
twic wrote: post #41

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Nitpick: the City of London does not have neighborhoods of empty luxury apartment developments, because the City of London is the one square mile of the city where the financial industry lives. It's equivalent to the Financial District in New York. The only significant chunk of residential building is the Barbican, which is not empty, just awful. The name of the city as a whole is simply London. You could even call i…

I actually know the difference between City of London and London because I watched that one clever Youtube video explaining it. However, I don't really have the details internalized as I've not been to London. To explain what I meant, I was thinking of this article that I read about One Hyde Park: http://www.vanityfair.com/society/2013/04/mysterious-residen... I had merged this info in my head with another link that…

I wonder if there is a need here for a Luxury AirBnB so that folks who aren't millionaires could spend time in these places that are otherwise going empty. Seems like space could be offered for less than normal rent since anything above $0 would be a gain as long as there was a decent screening process.

Re: Priced out of Paris

#59

Post by rdouble »

EwanG wrote: post #58
rdouble wrote: post #46

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I actually know the difference between City of London and London because I watched that one clever Youtube video explaining it. However, I don't really have the details internalized as I've not been to London. To explain what I meant, I was thinking of this article that I read about One Hyde Park: http://www.vanityfair.com/society/2013/04/mysterious-residen... I had merged this info in my head with another link that…

I wonder if there is a need here for a Luxury AirBnB so that folks who aren't millionaires could spend time in these places that are otherwise going empty. Seems like space could be offered for less than normal rent since anything above $0 would be a gain as long as there was a decent screening process.

The problem from an urban community building perspective is that the owners of the properties are so rich they don't care if the property is used.

It's actually illegal to rent out a pied a terre in Paris.

Re: Priced out of Paris

#60

Post by drakeandrews »

philh wrote: post #54
andyking wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Even if my pay was doubled, I wouldn't be able to afford to live in or near London. However, I can afford a comfortable lifestyle in rural Yorkshire (house, car, holidays, internet access, good food, days out etc etc) on a modest pay packet. The rent for my 17th century cottage with garden in a Yorkshire village wouldn't get me a room in a shared house in an undesirable part of London. I don't understand the pull of…

> The rent for my 17th century cottage with garden in a Yorkshire village wouldn't get me a room in a shared house in an undesirable part of London. Maybe I'm only confused because I've never lived in a village, but... You're paying significantly less than £700 pcm (including bills and council tax) for that?

I rent a two bed flat with two other people in a nice part of Zone 3, paying ~£500pcm for rent and council tax (together we're paying about ~£1300pcm total).

I could quite happily rent a two bedroom cottage in the lake district and pay all my bills out of that £500.

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