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A Postmortem of a Startup

buildwithtract.com

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Re: A Postmortem of a Startup

#91

Post by mattmanser »

matt-p wrote: post #67
froddd wrote: post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Reducing the problem to ‘people coming from overseas’ is an equally reductionist argument. There are properties going unused, for very many reasons. Second homes, holiday homes, etc. This also drives the price of properties up. This is one of the inputs to the problem. Planning permission laws is another input. The size and change of size of the people needing housing is another input.

reductionist in this case is not a bad thing. We need a major change to fix this situation and doing some little tweaks like increasing taxes on second homes or holiday homes does not actually fix this (we already tax those specific cases, with things like second home stamp duty or in some areas second home council tax). You have A - Demand (immigration of 1 Million per year) Or B - Supply (building only 120,000 hous…

The people have been saying pretty clearly for 20 years that they want A fixed.

But the politicians just ignore that for "growth" and keep granting 100,000+s of visas and then blame asylum seekers.

And then complain that there's mysteriously low productivity in the UK.

Re: A Postmortem of a Startup

#92

Post by gopher_space »

morsecodist wrote: post #12

This is interesting and they make some good observations but I can't help but think the deck was stacked against them because they are trying to come up with a technical/business solution to what is fundamentally a political problem.

The deck was stacked against them because nobody understood why the conversion process was so expensive or even there in the first place. It would have been easier to identify the handful of organizations that'd benefit from labeling this a political problem and embed themselves as vendors.

Their business model made sense for America, where sprawl is embraced.

Re: A Postmortem of a Startup

#93

Post by hinkley »

OccamsMirror wrote: post #16
morsecodist wrote: post #12

This is interesting and they make some good observations but I can't help but think the deck was stacked against them because they are trying to come up with a technical/business solution to what is fundamentally a political problem.

Yeah "founded to build software to fix Britain’s housing crisis." There was literally zero hope for success.

I know of an ISP that wrote a custom CRM/ERP solution in order to harass the less well behaved telecom company in town into doing their jobs when they said they would do them. So it would do things like send you a reminder to see if the approval or the hookup they promised you Wednesday was done so you could meet you customer’s expectation of having their Internet turned on by Friday.

That’s probably the best you can do. Make it obvious to everyone including the bureaucracy what their externalities are doing, and either nudge them to go faster or divest some responsibilities to someone else.

Re: A Postmortem of a Startup

#94

Post by hinkley »

mytailorisrich wrote: post #27
morsecodist wrote: post #12

This is interesting and they make some good observations but I can't help but think the deck was stacked against them because they are trying to come up with a technical/business solution to what is fundamentally a political problem.

Planning permission is partly a political issue, partly down to expertise. You need experience, you need to know the rules, you need to know the tricks, you need to know how to draft the application. You need to know the game. Indeed this is not something that is waiting for a technical solution. It's great that they tried, though. But it strikes me that they seem to be 20 something students (not meant disparagingly)…

My ex worked at a government contractor and they started paying the guy who wrote grant proposals more than the CEO because without grants they were fucked, and the grant writer was getting wistful for other horizons.

Talking to government is a highly compensated skill set. That’s all lobbyists are.

Re: A Postmortem of a Startup

#95

Post by trelane »

mytailorisrich wrote: post #27
morsecodist wrote: post #12

This is interesting and they make some good observations but I can't help but think the deck was stacked against them because they are trying to come up with a technical/business solution to what is fundamentally a political problem.

Planning permission is partly a political issue, partly down to expertise. You need experience, you need to know the rules, you need to know the tricks, you need to know how to draft the application. You need to know the game. Indeed this is not something that is waiting for a technical solution. It's great that they tried, though. But it strikes me that they seem to be 20 something students (not meant disparagingly)…

That is a lot of what to know.

I don't doubt that at least as important is who you know, and especially how well they know you.

Re: A Postmortem of a Startup

#97

Post by freeone3000 »

One of the key takeaways belies the entire premise: if you want to build a housing fix for the UK, build it in America?

After identifying a very real, pressing problem, they made a business to solve it. They were then more focused on building that business rather than fixing the actual problem. It seems like the takeaway is: don’t worry too much about the problems where you are, instead move to the US and write software.

Re: A Postmortem of a Startup

#98

Post by clpm4j »

If a government truly wanted to fix a housing "crisis", wouldn't a ban on any type of corporate entity from buying single-family homes be an efficient solution? E.g., LLC's can no longer purchase single-family homes. Only real, live human individuals can purchase single-family homes. They could also try to implement some type of ban on any single individual person from purchasing more than 1 (or choose a number) single-family home.

Re: A Postmortem of a Startup

#99

Post by mike_hearn »

trelane wrote: post #95
mytailorisrich wrote: post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Planning permission is partly a political issue, partly down to expertise. You need experience, you need to know the rules, you need to know the tricks, you need to know how to draft the application. You need to know the game. Indeed this is not something that is waiting for a technical solution. It's great that they tried, though. But it strikes me that they seem to be 20 something students (not meant disparagingly)…

That is a lot of what to know. I don't doubt that at least as important is who you know, and especially how well they know you.

They say that in the article where they talk about social technology and the importance of drinking in pubs.

Re: A Postmortem of a Startup

#100

Post by socalgal2 »

clpm4j wrote: post #98

If a government truly wanted to fix a housing "crisis", wouldn't a ban on any type of corporate entity from buying single-family homes be an efficient solution? E.g., LLC's can no longer purchase single-family homes. Only real, live human individuals can purchase single-family homes. They could also try to implement some type of ban on any single individual person from purchasing more than 1 (or choose a number) sing…

Why would that be a solution? What's the difference between the LLC that buys a bunch of homes and the LLC the builds bunch of homes. When the homes are done being built the LLC has morphed from an LLC that builds homes to an LLC that bought a bunch of homes.

The solution to me is to stop preventing people and companies from building homes.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cjWs7dqaWfY

Effectively, goverments and nimbyism prevent houses from being built. Even when some laws change to supposedly allow it other laws continue to prevent it. It's got nothing to do with LLCs buying existing houses, it's got to do with not enough houses period.

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