San Francisco braces for commercial real estate crash • Hacker News Board

Re: San Francisco braces for commercial real estate crash

#381

Post by filoleg » Tue, Sep 06, 2022, 7:21 PM UTC

malnourish wrote: post #174

gfodor wrote: post #154

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You think drug use doesn't lead to crime?

What crimes will drug users commit if drugs are legally available like alcohol?

The same ones they are committing now? I don't think anyone in this thread is saying that they are upset with those people just because they do illegal drugs, thus making them criminals just by the virtue of doing those drugs. It's all the other non-drug criminal stuff that they do (presumably under influence, but not necessarily) that people are upset about.

No one is a criminal in my eyes for just doing whatever drugs they do. You are, however, a criminal if you run around chasing people on the streets with an axe, screaming at them, and then steal a car[0] (I am aware that this is Seattle, not SF, but the point still stands).

And I honestly don't think that officially legalizing fentanyl or meth or whatever else they were on would have helped, especially since drug consumption crimes are de-facto non-enforced in Seattle (which imo is not a bad thing at all, I am totally fine with consumption not being a crime).

0. https://komonews.com/news/local/axe-wielding-man-apparently-...

Re: San Francisco braces for commercial real estate crash

#382

Post by mechanical_bear » Tue, Sep 06, 2022, 7:22 PM UTC

mbfg wrote: post #257

buscoquadnary wrote: post #212

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> According to the data, crime in SF is lower that it was a few years ago: https://www.city-data.com/crime/crime-San-Francisco-Californ ... Every time I see something like this I will point out that during the anti-police movement that happened a while back, many police started reducing their activity either because they were told to, because prosecutes would refuse to prosecute, or because they didn't want to be the…

do you have statistics/links for this "crime not being lower, only reporting is lower" claim?

That isn’t easily shown in official studies as it only makes them look bad. Do this for me; in the middle of the day, go park your car with some boxes in the back near embarcadero, go to lunch, come back to broken windows and call the police. No one will come to take your report, then let me know what you think.

Re: San Francisco braces for commercial real estate crash

#383

Post by fakethenews2022 » Tue, Sep 06, 2022, 7:22 PM UTC

LatteLazy wrote: post #294

darth_avocado wrote: post #127

The city officials are asleep at the wheel. Blame it on remote work and pandemic as much as you want, but the reality is that the city was in decline even before that. It is too expensive to live in the city. It is too expensive to commute to the city. It is too expensive to feed yourself in the city. Crime is rampant. Drug use and filth is everywhere. Most importantly city has been hostile to tech and business owner…

Cities need social services to work, because of the density of people. It is a problem when my neighbour is crazy and screams for 18h a day when we live on top of each other in a city. It isn't when we live in the middle of no where and are separated by 50miles. Only America is specifically designed to prevent any sort of social services, because people have the freedom to come into town to use those services and the…

Cities already make visitors pay. First there is usually a higher sales tax. Furthermore, many cities have additional taxes on lodging and entertainment. These taxes are quite substantial.

Furthermore look at decaying cities in the 70s. The cities weren't subsidizing surrounding areas by providing services. Instead, many businesses and services straight moved out of cities to surrounding areas. So did many people.

It was only in the 90s when cities became hip again and services sprang back up in cities.

According to your notion, surrounding areas were subsidizing cities in the 70s.

Re: San Francisco braces for commercial real estate crash

#384

Post by bombcar » Tue, Sep 06, 2022, 7:22 PM UTC

hattmall wrote: post #229

gofreddygo wrote: post #179

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In The city You're screwed when you rent a home or office. You're screwed when you own a home. You're screwed when you eat. You're screwed when you drink. You're screwed when you commute. You're screwed when you walk the streets. You're screwed when you (pay) park your car on the street. homeless? neglected commuters? neglected business owners? neglected public workers? neglected tourists? neglected I just don't know…

Who is doing all the screwing??

No post body was provided.

Re: San Francisco braces for commercial real estate crash

#385

Post by mechanical_bear » Tue, Sep 06, 2022, 7:23 PM UTC

inferiorhuman wrote: post #281

bluedino wrote: post #260

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Or if you call the police, they just never show up, or when they do, tell you not even bother filing a report. Citizen: Someone stole my backpack and laptop out of my car! Police: And?

So file a report online. https://www.sanfranciscopolice.org/get-service/police-report... https://www.oaklandca.gov/services/report-a-crime-online https://www.sjpd.org/reporting-crime/report-crimes-online

And have nothing come of that? Been there, done that. They do not give a shit.

Re: San Francisco braces for commercial real estate crash

#386

Post by GekkePrutser » Tue, Sep 06, 2022, 7:23 PM UTC

nemothekid wrote: post #346

happyopossum wrote: post #274

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> In an ideal world house prices would increase 1:1 with wage growth from an affordable baseline. There's only one way to do that - a command economy, with all housing owned and doled out by the government. That just doesn't work, anywhere, ever. You have to work very hard to ignore the fact that some places are more desirable than others to live in, and sometimes those desirable places change. Also, different people…

> That just doesn't work, anywhere, ever. Except for Vienna.

Yes Vienna does an amazing job but nobody in other cities seems to notice :(

Re: San Francisco braces for commercial real estate crash

#387

Post by ItsMonkk » Tue, Sep 06, 2022, 7:23 PM UTC

happyopossum wrote: post #274

scarby2 wrote: post #223

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Housing can be affordable while going up in nominal terms. Housing cannot be affordable if it goes up in real terms though. In an ideal world house prices would increase 1:1 with wage growth from an affordable baseline. There are 2 ways to fix it: either crash the market or introduce policies which will cause either stagnation or below inflation growth in housing prices for at least 20 or 30 years.

> In an ideal world house prices would increase 1:1 with wage growth from an affordable baseline. There's only one way to do that - a command economy, with all housing owned and doled out by the government. That just doesn't work, anywhere, ever. You have to work very hard to ignore the fact that some places are more desirable than others to live in, and sometimes those desirable places change. Also, different people…

> and doled out by the government

Not necessary. A land value tax provides a market-based solution to this problem.

Re: San Francisco braces for commercial real estate crash

#388

Post by bombcar » Tue, Sep 06, 2022, 7:24 PM UTC

onlyrealcuzzo wrote: post #288

CuriouslyC wrote: post #196

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Drug prohibition clearly leads to crime. Drug users would rather use drugs than commit crimes, but paying for a drug habit when drugs are expensive and you have a hard time holding down a 9-5 job (usually due to mental illness) forces people to do things they don't want to do. Ending prohibition and diverting some resources from police to mental health and preventative services is just a sensible thing to do.

> but paying for a drug habit when drugs are expensive and you have a hard time holding down a 9-5 job (usually due to mental illness) I would imagine mental illness would be a bigger barrier to handling a 9-5 job than drug use. IIUC, the majority of people that drink alcohol and smoke weed daily work 9-5 just fine. Is the same true for the majority of people that have mental illness? What are we even considering men…

Nobody wants to talk about it but we really need to decriminalize hiring druggies.

Drug addicts can work quite well in the trades (drywall hangers are famous for being meth-heads in some areas) but once "enforcement" starts cracking down on hiring them, they can't find work.

Re: San Francisco braces for commercial real estate crash

#389

Post by jfghi » Tue, Sep 06, 2022, 7:24 PM UTC

JamesBarney wrote: post #367

jfghi wrote: post #201

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I agree that nimbyism is harmful, however I also think that the organizations owning large portfolios of properties can generally find a way to maintain scarcity levels in the presence of additional construction.

How? If you own 10% of the rental units in San Francisco, how do you enforce scarcity except by trying to prevent construction?

I’d claim that if a person owns 10 percent they can afford to fill 9 percent of those and push up prices such that it becomes a net gain. It seems as though housing is priced on the edges of supply and demand and that a slight excess of either can shift prices for the future units being bought or rented.

I once spoke with a general manager of a large hotel that explained to me how certain levels of vacancy were targeted for this reason. I feel as though the methodology would be somewhat analogous.

Further, there is statistical modeling for sale that indicates what can be afforded in geographic locations. I’d claim that additional housing would be priced to what’s affordable rather than attempting to outbid the lowest listing as housing is a price-inelastic good.

Re: San Francisco braces for commercial real estate crash

#390

Post by Dig1t » Tue, Sep 06, 2022, 7:25 PM UTC

mullen wrote: post #329

cpursley wrote: post #191

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Money goes to where it's treated best and people vote with their feet. I know people thumb their nose on the state, but Florida is open for business. But the real secret is Puerto Rico and their incredible tax incentives for software companies.

Florida could be a real option vs SF but not with Fascists in charge.

Do you consider all people who are politically conservative to be fascist or just Trump supporters?