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Paying for Dirt: Where Have Home Values Detached from Construction Costs?

buildzoom.com

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Re: Paying for Dirt: Where Have Home Values Detached from Construction Costs?

#81

Post by carradjm »

clairity wrote: post #33

i once managed the product that calculated the cost basis for your property tax bill in most US counties & states (and some international jurisdictions), and it was common knowledge there that home prices were disconnected from construction costs. construction cost relative to home prices is interesting to a company like buildzoom because they're in the construction business (and finding the coming construction booms…

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Georgism.

Don't mean to boil down your entire well-written post to a single point, but I maintain that Georgism is the only sensible solution to this problem.

Re: Paying for Dirt: Where Have Home Values Detached from Construction Costs?

#82

Post by lostmsu »

rayiner wrote: post #10
lostmsu wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Where did you move to? I'm looking for a good area like this with the biggest requirement of having fiber or otherwise just a very good 250Mbps+ service.

If you can telecommute a lot, I recommend Maryland b/w D.C. and Annapolis. You can get a 4BR house for what a 1BR apartment costs in D.C., you can be at a farm in 20 minutes in one direction and a downtown bar in 10 minutes in the other, and I've got two different fiber providers available (I'm getting 2-gig installed soon). Unfortunately, the tech scene in the DMV area seems to be mostly in northern Virginia, which…

Care to share a couple of zips?

Re: Paying for Dirt: Where Have Home Values Detached from Construction Costs?

#83

Post by frgtpsswrdlame »

TheSpiceIsLife wrote: post #36
kevinburke wrote: post #17

Would like to say: If you would like to reverse these trends, or live in the SFBA and would like to be able to afford a home or condo without needing to commute from Stockton or hit the startup lottery, please pay attention to your local City Council and their zoning/land use decisions. Local decisions frequently don't get that many comments; your voice makes a difference. - Brisbane may approve 4400 units of housing…

Will building more units / appartments/ houses bring the price down? Have other cities seen home prices move toward affordability when more housing has been built? I'm not saying it isn't a good idea, just that the logic seems flawed.

For a more skeptical viewpoint: http://stumblingandmumbling.typepad.com/stumbling_and_mumbli...

Re: Paying for Dirt: Where Have Home Values Detached from Construction Costs?

#84

Post by kevinburke »

ACow_Adonis wrote: post #54
rspeer wrote: post #37

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm not up on the sources, but a moderately pro-development candidate for Cambridge City Council has often quoted a statistic saying that there are only two ways to bring down house prices: 1. Make the city suck 2. Get the housing vacancy rate to 5.5% And of course he says this to encourage everyone to work toward #2, and the way to do that without displacing anyone is to build new housing. I don't really understand…

I don't see many people mentioning a proportional value-based land tax, which would probably be about the first thing a traditional economist would recommend? Brings down prices, hurts land-banking, increases density, generates revenue for infrastructure, captures public benefit from value increase, etc...

Prop 13 is pretty well baked into the state’s politics and any reform would have to start there. Most likely reforms are letting a home’s taxable value increase by more than 1% a year, especially if you are under 65.

Re: Paying for Dirt: Where Have Home Values Detached from Construction Costs?

#85

Post by kevinburke »

frgtpsswrdlame wrote: post #83
TheSpiceIsLife wrote: post #36

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Will building more units / appartments/ houses bring the price down? Have other cities seen home prices move toward affordability when more housing has been built? I'm not saying it isn't a good idea, just that the logic seems flawed.

For a more skeptical viewpoint: http://stumblingandmumbling.typepad.com/stumbling_and_mumbli...

I guess SF’s recent experience, where years of rent and owner move-in eviction increases ended the same year we built a record number of housing units, belies this.

Sure we may run into other problems, but right now a third of California renters are paying more than half their salary in rent. I’d take my chances with a lot of other crises to help with that one.

Re: Paying for Dirt: Where Have Home Values Detached from Construction Costs?

#86

Post by shostack »

kevinburke wrote: post #84
ACow_Adonis wrote: post #54

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't see many people mentioning a proportional value-based land tax, which would probably be about the first thing a traditional economist would recommend? Brings down prices, hurts land-banking, increases density, generates revenue for infrastructure, captures public benefit from value increase, etc...

Prop 13 is pretty well baked into the state’s politics and any reform would have to start there. Most likely reforms are letting a home’s taxable value increase by more than 1% a year, especially if you are under 65.

I still don't get why younger generations should shoulder the burden of the mistake that was Prop 13. Start by jacking it up on those who have benefitted and profited the most.

Re: Paying for Dirt: Where Have Home Values Detached from Construction Costs?

#87

Post by jmcqk6 »

Simon_says wrote: post #35
matt_wulfeck wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

We’ll see how long Washington can maintain its income-tax free environment [1]. 1. https://www.seattletimes.com/seattle-news/politics/seattle-c...

> “Whoever goes against this is openly causing suffering,” she said. This quote really stands out to me. Is this demonization of opposing viewpoints a new thing, or am I just noticing it more in the last two years?

I think that this is probably a logical extension of the underlying logic.

Sales taxes are inherently harder on people with less money than people with more money. That's demonstrable just based on simple math.

Any argument for sales taxes over income taxes that doesn't recognize that fundamental mathematical truth is not being intellectually honest (or doesn't know the topic very well).

Re: Paying for Dirt: Where Have Home Values Detached from Construction Costs?

#88

Post by frgtpsswrdlame »

kevinburke wrote: post #85
frgtpsswrdlame wrote: post #83

Earlier quoted context omitted.

For a more skeptical viewpoint: http://stumblingandmumbling.typepad.com/stumbling_and_mumbli...

I guess SF’s recent experience, where years of rent and owner move-in eviction increases ended the same year we built a record number of housing units, belies this. Sure we may run into other problems, but right now a third of California renters are paying more than half their salary in rent. I’d take my chances with a lot of other crises to help with that one.

>I guess SF’s recent experience, where years of rent and owner move-in eviction increases ended the same year we built a record number of housing units, belies this.

Care to link me? I'm interested in this.

But mainly I agree with the article that increasing building is only a long-term solution, to fix the ridiculous prices of housing in the short-term different measures are needed - there's just no way to build enough housing in the short term.

Re: Paying for Dirt: Where Have Home Values Detached from Construction Costs?

#89

Post by boardwaalk »

nowarninglabel wrote: post #45
wheresmyusern wrote: post #32

hey, i'm looking to buy a small plot of land and build a house on it in the next few years. my goal is to be able to have land and a house of my own without taking a loan, or a very big one at least. ive been looking at land in northern california and there seems to be a lot of promising deals. lake county california seems to be a pretty good spot. if anyone has experience with buying land to settle on, in northern c…

Check out the book "County Property: Dirt Cheap". It has some good tips. Note Lake County is high in fire danger, so depending on where you buy you'll want to take that into account for insurance cost or building style. Neighbors are also pretty critical to whether or not you'll be happy with this dream of yours.

This is a pretty old book, being >20 years old. I wonder if anyone knows of a good book that takes into account searching via the internet.

Re: Paying for Dirt: Where Have Home Values Detached from Construction Costs?

#90

Post by kevinburke »

shostack wrote: post #86
kevinburke wrote: post #84

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Prop 13 is pretty well baked into the state’s politics and any reform would have to start there. Most likely reforms are letting a home’s taxable value increase by more than 1% a year, especially if you are under 65.

I still don't get why younger generations should shoulder the burden of the mistake that was Prop 13. Start by jacking it up on those who have benefitted and profited the most.

“Should” and “will” are different things entirely. Also, homeowners vote more often than renters, which is sad.
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