Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

A look at Denver’s “Unlocking Housing Choices” plan

freerange.city

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

11–20 of 115 posts

Re: A look at Denver’s “Unlocking Housing Choices” plan

#11

Post by happytoexplain »

ecshafer wrote: post #7

Fixing housing is incredibly easy: 1. Remove Zoning / Deed Restrictions / Parking Minimums 2. Remove Red Tape (Environmental impact assessments, time cap approvals to a couple weeks, at cost fees) 3. Land Value Taxes Watch as Gentrification suddenly goes away and infill development occurs. These complicated schemes are unnecessary.

>Remove Zoning

>Remove Red Tape (Environmental impact assessments

I absolutely understand what prompts this desperation, but much like the desperation that prompted the election of Trump, it's very, very much more bad than it is good.

Re: A look at Denver’s “Unlocking Housing Choices” plan

#12

Post by hn_throwaway_99 »

pessimizer wrote: post #4

The premise is that the author is a libertarian, except that housing in the neighborhood they live in should be fixed at the price that they can afford, and that the character of the neighborhood from the point that they moved into it should be preserved. It's only real gentrification when upper-middle class YIMBYs get forced out.

Except that's not what the author argued, at all.

The author acknowledges that a lot of the gentrification is the result of zoning rules, and has only proposed what are primarily less restrictive zoning rules as a potential solution.

Re: A look at Denver’s “Unlocking Housing Choices” plan

#13

Post by hn_throwaway_99 »

djoldman wrote: post #8

A rare anti-Betteridge's law of headlines article. Yes, there are laws that, if passed, would stop or slow or even reverse the increasing price of real estate. Would they pass? Hard to say and probably not quickly. As has been repeated many times: it's in the financial interest of people who own property to increase their property's value by constraining supply via zoning/building codes, and they usually have a good…

> it's the same story all over the US.

At least some places are different:

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47433058

Re: A look at Denver’s “Unlocking Housing Choices” plan

#14

Post by cucumber3732842 »

happytoexplain wrote: post #11
ecshafer wrote: post #7

Fixing housing is incredibly easy: 1. Remove Zoning / Deed Restrictions / Parking Minimums 2. Remove Red Tape (Environmental impact assessments, time cap approvals to a couple weeks, at cost fees) 3. Land Value Taxes Watch as Gentrification suddenly goes away and infill development occurs. These complicated schemes are unnecessary.

>Remove Zoning >Remove Red Tape (Environmental impact assessments I absolutely understand what prompts this desperation, but much like the desperation that prompted the election of Trump, it's very, very much more bad than it is good.

Nope. I will f-ing yeet that baby along with the bathwater.

Every idiot (they're not even useful anymore FFS, look at the results) says this based on abstract assessments of individual rules and laws. But in practice the overall effect of the system is that all those environmental assessments and stormwater permits and all the other things aren't even speed bumps for big business interests with lawyers and engineers on staff. Those interests can construe any evil as compliant and do so at cost. The rules are unscalable cliffs to "normal" people and businesses who can't justify paying mid four to low five figures up front for projects that might not even generate that much value.

Re: A look at Denver’s “Unlocking Housing Choices” plan

#17

Post by Analemma_ »

cucumber3732842 wrote: post #10
JumpCrisscross wrote: post #3

> A developer could likely fit 3-4 nice cottage homes on that lot, sell them for $500-700k, and make a profit Denver takes 264 days to approve "multi-family or industrial projects with a valuation in excess of $1.5 million, such as a new apartment or office building, large additions" [1]. Construction loans in Colorado cost "8% to 13%" [2]. For a project with $1.5mm up-front costs, from land purchases to permit fees…

>particularly since Denver seems to categorise practically all impactful residential development as "major commercial." This isn't an accident. They know what they're doing. Every municipality tries to do this to the extent they think they can get away with it because it's an end run around your property right. There's all sorts of residential exemptions and precedents and case law and courts and politicians tend not…

It's absolutely vital to homeowners that no new housing be built, to keep Undesirables from moving in, but they need to do it in a way which leaves no blood on their hands so they can continue to have their In This House signs with no cognitive dissonance.

And this is how they get it: don't make it literally illegal to build housing, but make it economically impossible in practice. Then they can go "welp, nothing's getting built, I guess there's nothing we could've done", and as an added bonus they also get to say "looks like the free market can never fix our housing shortage!"

Re: A look at Denver’s “Unlocking Housing Choices” plan

#18

Post by rr808 »

thcipriani wrote: post #15

I'm down with killing restrictive zoning laws. But removing regulation has not historically been a great curb for the uber-wealthy.

Agreed, the biggest boom towns have been in the South where restrictions are low and profits high, leaving some really ugly suburbs.

Re: A look at Denver’s “Unlocking Housing Choices” plan

#20

Post by 9x39 »

hn_throwaway_99 wrote: post #12
pessimizer wrote: post #4

The premise is that the author is a libertarian, except that housing in the neighborhood they live in should be fixed at the price that they can afford, and that the character of the neighborhood from the point that they moved into it should be preserved. It's only real gentrification when upper-middle class YIMBYs get forced out.

Except that's not what the author argued, at all. The author acknowledges that a lot of the gentrification is the result of zoning rules, and has only proposed what are primarily less restrictive zoning rules as a potential solution.

Eh, let's take their word for it: >But I’d like to see new homes sold at prices I could conceivably afford.

Doesn't gentrification happen not from spontaneous combos of zoning rules but when someone with money wants to live somewhere, so they do? It's part of the golden rule: he with the gold makes all the rules, unless you can go asymmetric economic warfare and fire back with zoning & NIMBY laws.

Post reply on HN