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How Much Housing Will Be Built?

ternercenter2.berkeley.edu

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Re: How Much Housing Will Be Built?

#31

Post by cbr » 

    Properties included in the model have total development
    potential, measured by FAR and residential units, of 20%
    or less of the maximum allowed under local zoning law. 
    All properties above this level are considered "built 
    out" and do not factor in to the maximum potential units
    number.
FAR is "floor area ratio" and controls how many square feet of building you can have on a given lot. I'd love to have a slider for this, since increasing the allowable FAR is a good way to make more efficient use of limited land.

(For example, zoning where I live sets a maximum FAR of 0.75, but most properties are over that limit and grandfathered in, averaging more like 0.90. Allowing people to build to 0.90 instead of 0.75 would not substantially change the feel of the area, and would make a lot more units available.)

Re: How Much Housing Will Be Built?

#32

Post by lmm »

mickrussom wrote: post #18

The bay area. The best, brightest, smartest, pedigreed, hardest working most motivated people on earth. And we cant solve the simplest problems in the Maslow's hierarchy. American Indians solved the housing problems with Teepees and Wigwams - so much for being "smart." There was an article recently where a google employee was living in a 24 ft truck in the google parking lot. This Bay Area mess is a self inflicted jo…

Is a teepee or wigwam really so much nicer than a 24 ft truck?

Re: How Much Housing Will Be Built?

#33

Post by spiffage »

AnthonyMouse wrote: post #10
kartan wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Build enough market rate housing that the price falls to what low income people can afford and you don't need any low income housing. There are other kind of problems like buy-to-leave ( http://www.designingbuildings.co.uk/wiki/Buy_to_leave ). In that scenario the amount of housing to build to get to a point that it is affordable is a lot higher than it should be. > subsidizing construction If you mean state owned…

> There are other kind of problems like buy-to-leave ( http://www.designingbuildings.co.uk/wiki/Buy_to_leave ). In that scenario the amount of housing to build to get to a point that it is affordable is a lot higher than it should be. Not if you publicly announce your intentions ahead of time. Then people have no incentive to do that because the expectation will be for housing prices to decline and the investment to…

Subsidies would be mostly unnecessary. Merely allowing the housing to get built would be a gigantic improvement.

Re: How Much Housing Will Be Built?

#34

Post by ZanyProgrammer »

pjc50 wrote: post #25
mickrussom wrote: post #18

The bay area. The best, brightest, smartest, pedigreed, hardest working most motivated people on earth. And we cant solve the simplest problems in the Maslow's hierarchy. American Indians solved the housing problems with Teepees and Wigwams - so much for being "smart." There was an article recently where a google employee was living in a 24 ft truck in the google parking lot. This Bay Area mess is a self inflicted jo…

"What do you mean 'we', white man?" The problem is there's no solidarity with the newcomers, and a strong desire by incumbents to keep the place the same and not turn it into skyscraper-filled Guangzhou. For a lot of people not building housing is an important priority in their life that they will fight for. Not to mention the question of money. You might equally ask why the tech industry feels the need to be stuck s…

If you're so worried about earthquakes, you're more than welcome to leave the Bay yourself. And I love how you equate building more housing to lifeless Chinese skyscrapers.

Re: How Much Housing Will Be Built?

#36

Post by LionessLover »

ZanyProgrammer wrote: post #34
pjc50 wrote: post #25

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"What do you mean 'we', white man?" The problem is there's no solidarity with the newcomers, and a strong desire by incumbents to keep the place the same and not turn it into skyscraper-filled Guangzhou. For a lot of people not building housing is an important priority in their life that they will fight for. Not to mention the question of money. You might equally ask why the tech industry feels the need to be stuck s…

If you're so worried about earthquakes, you're more than welcome to leave the Bay yourself. And I love how you equate building more housing to lifeless Chinese skyscrapers.

> If you're so worried about earthquakes, you're more than welcome to leave the Bay yourself.

What an inane response.

Re: How Much Housing Will Be Built?

#37

Post by LionessLover »

lmm wrote: post #32
mickrussom wrote: post #18

The bay area. The best, brightest, smartest, pedigreed, hardest working most motivated people on earth. And we cant solve the simplest problems in the Maslow's hierarchy. American Indians solved the housing problems with Teepees and Wigwams - so much for being "smart." There was an article recently where a google employee was living in a 24 ft truck in the google parking lot. This Bay Area mess is a self inflicted jo…

Is a teepee or wigwam really so much nicer than a 24 ft truck?

The tents of the Arabian rulers that they used when traveling were very luxurious. So it very much depends - the variety in the comforts of (and inside) such structures is as big as in houses. Trucks are usually more limited in the layout and in space, but of course there are multi-million dollar "rolling homes" trucks too.

Without having seen the concrete truck, I think I would still always prefer this tent: http://cocoweddingvenues.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/2013/12/ar...

Re: How Much Housing Will Be Built?

#38

Post by mathattack »

AnthonyMouse wrote: post #3
raldi wrote: post #2

If you click the link and, leaving all the rest of the defaults alone, drop the required affordable housing percentage from 10% to 0%, you lose about 4,000 affordable units but gain 6,000 market-rate ones. So, would this change increase or decrease displacement? Well, another recent Berkeley study concluded that a new market-rate apartment has about half the displacement-fighting impact of a below-market-rate apartme…

The entire concept of low income housing is a scam to keep market rate prices high. Build enough market rate housing that the price falls to what low income people can afford and you don't need any low income housing. If the government spent the money it spends subsidizing rents on subsidizing construction then the problem would be solved.

The dangerous problem is that it isn't the government who subsidizes rents, it's everyone else. If the subsidy were visible (the government writing a check to landlords) people would raise hell. Instead it's a hidden subsidy. The housing costs and rents of everyone goes up (including low-income income people) except for the lucky few who win the subsidized housing lottery.

The intent of low income housing is laudable, but the execution causes more problems than it solves.

Re: How Much Housing Will Be Built?

#39

Post by [deleted] »

LionessLover wrote: post #36
ZanyProgrammer wrote: post #34

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you're so worried about earthquakes, you're more than welcome to leave the Bay yourself. And I love how you equate building more housing to lifeless Chinese skyscrapers.

> If you're so worried about earthquakes, you're more than welcome to leave the Bay yourself. What an inane response.

[deleted]

Re: How Much Housing Will Be Built?

#40

Post by norea-armozel »

I think the housing troubles could easily be fixed if those jobs which can easily be moved over to telecommuting were done so over time. Like honestly, how many devs and QA staff have to physically be in the same place throughout the work week? I'd understand if we're talking a firm that built physical prototypes for products but a website/service is easily accessible from the high rise office as it is from home office. At some point, software development is going to have to suck it up and be 100% remote for day-to-day concerns (excluding certain meetings with clients and the like).
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