California affordable housing is more expensive than luxury housing • Hacker News Board

Re: California affordable housing is more expensive than luxury housing

#211

Post by masonic » Sat, May 23, 2020, 2:58 AM UTC

ip26 wrote: post #203

lotsofpulp wrote: post #186

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>you're getting a much newer & better condition house at that ratio compared to California real estate You can renovate and get a newer and better condition house. You can't get SoCal weather and natural features at any price. Hence the high prices.

The sad part is because it's so competitive it seems like no one has any money left over to renovate, which has the rather perverse outcome of the nicest locations in the world to live, having the worst houses to live in.

If you have money for luxuries, you have money to renovate.

After my neighbors moved out, they had the kitchen and bathrooms gutted and redone.

After the new buyers took over, they gutted it all again and threw out brand new appliances and cabinetry.

Re: California affordable housing is more expensive than luxury housing

#212

Post by masonic » Sat, May 23, 2020, 3:09 AM UTC

Gibbon1 wrote: post #179

subsubzero wrote: post #17

What can't be discounted besides the usual suspects of bad zoning, high cost of land etc. is construction costs. Basically an area gets so expensive that it prices out construction workers and their families. This is being seen in the bay area now as a typical single family home goes for over 1M in the pennisula/SF/South Bay area. Go farther out to the east bay, far south bay(gilroy etc) and prices are still 700/800k…

I can ask my friend again who worked on public housing projects ten years ago. But one thing I remember her saying is California is really leery of shoddy construction and the resulting blight. And blighted low income housing is a big big political problem. So low income housing has to be built to take a lot of abuse. Which of course $$$.

Shoddy construction is more rampant than ever.

The Silvery Towers development[0] in downtown San Jose was busted for importing a bunch of undocumented construction workers and keeping them locked up in Hayward after hours. It didn't get any real law enforcement attention until one was killed.

Hang out at any Home Depot or Lowe's weekday mornings, and you'll see contractor after contractor picking up day laborers with no protection, no Workers Comp, no insurance, no nothing.

And after that Berkeley balcony collapsed from shoddy construction and killed a bunch of Irish kids, not one worker who did the job could be interviewed or identified.

I wouldn't buy a home built in the last 25 years in CA unless I personally knew the contractor.

[0] https://www.mercurynews.com/2018/08/16/silvery-towers-projec...

Re: California affordable housing is more expensive than luxury housing

#213

Post by harambaebae69 » Sun, May 24, 2020, 3:02 PM UTC

instaheat wrote: post #193

zozbot234 wrote: post #54

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Motorbike noise is quite real. Hopefully electric motorbikes will grow more common over time and cut down on this widespread nuisance.

Just a thought, but several of my motorbike-owning friends tell me the noise generated from the bike reminds those in larger vehicles of their presence.

"loud pipes save lives"

I don't necessarily agree with it, but that's the common refrain yes.