San Francisco has nearly five empty homes per homeless resident • Hacker News Board

Re: San Francisco has nearly five empty homes per homeless resident

#51

Post by s0rce » Thu, Jan 09, 2020, 5:07 PM UTC

lacker wrote: post #38

How do they tell if a home is vacant? Mail and computer-assisted telephone and personal-visit interviews. All group quarters responses are obtained by personal visit interview. Okay, so if you don't answer spam calls, or you aren't home when some random person knocks on your door, your house might be considered to be vacant. This data seems pretty worthless.

That seems like an extremely obvious shortcoming of this survey methodology. I'm willing to give the authors the benefit of the doubt and assume they aren't completely incompetent and that they've attempted to account for this occurrence.

Re: San Francisco has nearly five empty homes per homeless resident

#52

Post by rayiner » Thu, Jan 09, 2020, 5:07 PM UTC

ahelwer wrote: post #14

You can't build yourself out of the housing crisis when the problem is one of distribution, not one of supply. The idea that housing should be treated as an investment is, itself , the problem. How can you want housing to be affordable while also wanting housing to gain in value, i.e. increase in cost? These are completely contradictory aims. Zoom out for a second and consider how wild it is that we turned a life nec…

The premise isn’t that housing is treated as an investment. The premise is that housing is personal property. (Just like bread, etc., and many other things necessary for life.)

It’s cities that are turning housing into an investment through laws turning it into a scarce resource. (Not just laws against building, but laws against short term rentals, boarding houses, tenements, etc.). It’s unsurprising that homelessness is actually decreasing in the US as a whole, whole increasing in wealthy cities: https://www.economist.com/united-states/2019/10/19/homelessn....

But this is mostly a San Francisco and New York problem. In 2015, about 10,000 people in San Francisco experienced homelessness at any time in the past year. That’s 112 per 10,000 people. (This is a different, and better, measure than the “homeless on a given night” instantaneous measure.) That same figure in Iowa is about 9 per 10,000. The national average is around 20-25 per 10,000.

Re: San Francisco has nearly five empty homes per homeless resident

#53

Post by GrayTextIsTruth » Thu, Jan 09, 2020, 5:07 PM UTC

damnyou wrote: post #23

rb808 wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

At least an American billionaire pays some American taxes. If a foreign speculator makes a lot of money they aren't even paying any income or capital gains taxes here.

American billionaires dont pay much taxes either. The solution to this is to fix the tax code, not retreat further into nationalism.

>not retreat further into nationalism

God forbid we feel any natural affinity towards our fellow countrymen. Any alternative is so artificial and forced.

Re: San Francisco has nearly five empty homes per homeless resident

#54

Post by hello_moto » Thu, Jan 09, 2020, 5:08 PM UTC

asdfadsfgfdda wrote: post #22

rb808 wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

At least an American billionaire pays some American taxes. If a foreign speculator makes a lot of money they aren't even paying any income or capital gains taxes here.

They are still paying plenty in property tax. From the city's perspective, you couldn't ask for a better resident. Somebody who pays full property tax and consumes almost no services (schools, police, etc).

They drive artificial demands which increases the overall price.

At the end of the day, it's not good for the local residents.

It's not as simple as "they're not here thus they're not consuming any services". The resulting effect of sky-high property cost ripples to everything else below it (jobs, transportation, etc).

Re: San Francisco has nearly five empty homes per homeless resident

#55

Post by s0rce » Thu, Jan 09, 2020, 5:08 PM UTC

martin_bech wrote: post #27

In Denmark this would be impossible as we have “bopælspligt”. It means if you buy a home or apartment in an area like this, you are required by law to live in it.

Not free enough for America, maybe? Also, most of the politically active residents own homes here that they are counting on to continue dramatically appreciating in value, having investors buy up new property supports this goal.

Re: San Francisco has nearly five empty homes per homeless resident

#56

Post by waynecochran » Thu, Jan 09, 2020, 5:09 PM UTC

damnyou wrote: post #34

GrayTextIsTruth wrote: post #30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There’s a lot of money in real estate. It’s better staying in the country than going to Chinese firms. If it makes no difference to you, why not favor your own country?

Because I am a committed internationalist and believe that national borders are the greatest moral atrocity that exists today.

Kim Jon-Un will downvote you.

Re: San Francisco has nearly five empty homes per homeless resident

#57

Post by metalliqaz » Thu, Jan 09, 2020, 5:09 PM UTC

lacker wrote: post #38

How do they tell if a home is vacant? Mail and computer-assisted telephone and personal-visit interviews. All group quarters responses are obtained by personal visit interview. Okay, so if you don't answer spam calls, or you aren't home when some random person knocks on your door, your house might be considered to be vacant. This data seems pretty worthless.

are you sure you're interpreting that correctly? I think they don't count a no-answer in the data. More like someone answers and then provides responses about their own home and their neighbors. I know exactly which homes are occupied in my neighborhood, so I could accurately answer for them if someone asked me.

Re: San Francisco has nearly five empty homes per homeless resident

#58

Post by vonmoltke » Thu, Jan 09, 2020, 5:10 PM UTC

api wrote: post #43

biznickman wrote: post #4

When I lived in San Francisco, the newly built condo building across from me was fully empty (but fully sold) for all the years I lived there. This is a tower in SOMA. There was only one apartment which appeared to be a corporate one that was occasionally utilized. The rise of foreign money parking money in real estate has screwed things up on a global level. San Francisco has felt the brunt of this due to their insa…

A few starter ideas: (1) Repealing prop-13 is probably a non-starter but we could probably get away with repealing it for non-owner-occupied homes. Prop-13 was meant to prevent people from being driven from their homes by property tax increases, not to protect speculators from being taxed. (2) Levy a substantial additional property tax on residential properties that are not currently occupied by either the owner or a…

> (1) Repealing prop-13 is probably a non-starter but we could probably get away with repealing it for non-residents. Prop-13 was meant to prevent people from being driven from their homes by property tax increases, not to protect speculators from being taxed.

I have never lived in California, and Prop 13 passed before I was born anyway, so I don't know much about the political backstory. That said, if this was the purpose that got it passed, why is the exemption so broad? How does capping Safeway's property taxes keep people from being driven out of their homes?

Re: San Francisco has nearly five empty homes per homeless resident

#59

Post by macinjosh » Thu, Jan 09, 2020, 5:10 PM UTC

Offer property tax incentives to real estate owners who have empty homes if they lease them to tenants that have issues with housing stability at rates they can realistically afford.

The owner gets tax benefits. People in need get a home to live in. The city has fewer homeless. All lease income could go towards upkeep.

Re: San Francisco has nearly five empty homes per homeless resident

#60

Post by mschuster91 » Thu, Jan 09, 2020, 5:10 PM UTC

biznickman wrote: post #4

When I lived in San Francisco, the newly built condo building across from me was fully empty (but fully sold) for all the years I lived there. This is a tower in SOMA. There was only one apartment which appeared to be a corporate one that was occasionally utilized. The rise of foreign money parking money in real estate has screwed things up on a global level. San Francisco has felt the brunt of this due to their insa…

There is an easy solution preventing empty homes in markets with a high rate of vacant homes combined with a high rate of involuntary homeless: a tax of 40% of the value as recorded at deed transfer per year of emptiness. Exceptions only given in case of reasonable vacancy (e.g. due to construction works or damages).

If the property ends up vacant for 2 years, government appoints random renters - for a maximum rent no higher than the rate the lowest 10% city-wide is. No possibility of eviction for ten years, except for willful/grossly negligent damage to property or unfit conduct (e.g. disturbing the peace, running drug dens or harassment of other renters). If an owner intentionally does not repair damages to claim the tax exception, government is authorized to do the repairs themselves and recoup costs from the owner.

That should be proper incentive for developers to build housing that is actually wanted and for speculation owners to rent out homes and to keep them intact/rentable.

Edit: for the downvoters, please explain why. This is a system that is the law in Berlin, only with a drastically higher tax rate and lower minimum rent.