Why don't you move to a cheaper place/smaller city? I don't understand why there are some many homeless people in big cities (i.e NYC). If people would just move to cheaper areas/cities the whole issue of housing would be fixed.
Yes remote might fix that, eventually. But I strongly doubt that, especially as humans are social animals.[1]
However The UK is a more extreme version of this. People move to london because it has the most concentration of high paying jobs, and as a side effect culture (what that is I leave up to you. I don't just mean music, cinema and posh people shit.)
Now, I could move back to bumblefuck rural england, but I would have to exchange an underserved IT job market, with a median wage of >£60k to a once/two company town with a median wage of £38k. Combine that with houses only being 30% cheaper, and higher transport costs, no nurseries or comprehensive child care, the countryside can be a real pain in the tits.
Costs are higher in the countryside, as there are less public amenities.
So no, people can't just move, otherwise they would have done already.
[1] there are two classes of remote "influencers" the first ones seem to be happy working alone, permanently. The second appears to be the ones that are "jet setting" where they work in a new country every other month. Both of these groups represent a tiny minority. I strongly doubt that we should be optimising for these two noisy classes of people. I suspect, and me, my team and wider company data backs this us (even though its shallow evidence) that they more popular route is hybrid.
This is simply not true. There are a record number of job openings. I would go on to say that there has never been a time in history where finding a job was this easy.
"The number of job openings was little changed at 10.4 million on the last business day of September, the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics reported today"
So instead of optimizing for efficient allocation of labor and capital, we should instead optimize for the short-term benefit of the landed gentry class?
Seems like a likely path to either economic ruin or political revolution. Probably both.
Since you don't seem like you're be sympathetic to an ethical argument, here's some real-politik: "fuck the poors" works well enough when the poor are actually poor. Less well when the people being systematically fucked over have significant social esteem, education, and economic means. See: the American Revolution.
I don't see an ethical argument going against what I said in the parent comment.
Here's a non-hypothetical scenario: Boeing lays off thousands of mechanical engineers in Greater Seattle Area. What do you suppose the local government has to do exactly to find jobs in mechanical engineering for them? What does it have to do with ethics?
That's true, but it is also true, that this is (at least partially) a self-imposed problem. Many people are giggling when they hear about a liberal arts graduate who struggles to find a descent job, but they never think the same might apply to their profession too.
So you're saying that instead of optimizing for the job I am qualified for and have experience of, I should move to somewhere where the labour market is more subdued, and move to an industry where I have no experience?
Basically, yes. Local (and global) market only has so many positions for a specific profession. If there are more qualified people, than positions, you are out of luck and might need to do exactly what you described.
You are correct that there are a record number of jobs.
However, the person you are responding is talking about the economic situation in the UK. I'm pretty sure those links to the Fed reports do not characterize the economic situation in the UK, because that's not their purview.
The housing and job situation in the UK is much more difficult than the US.
Considering there is no regional specific trends and the highest % of jobs are actually in white collar jobs (pro services, healthcare, etc.), I think its fair to assume this data represents the whole of the US...no matter where you live.
You should re-read my comment - I was inferring this was the case (to your point) based on the regional numbers. It's not perfect but it's indicative. I didn't have the time to dig into more data.
> If there were 10,000,000 jobs in NYC and 1 job in Kansas or 10,000,000 jobs in Kansas and one in NYC, the graphs would look the same.
These numbers are irrelevant anyway because they're always going to be correlated in some way to local population (thus per capita is important here)
You should also check housing prices in states like Kansas, they're all through the roof - https://www.zillow.com/ks/home-values/ - in other words people aren't magically leaving these places for major metros (people follow jobs).
Anyway took some digging but here is some data that explains it better:
For example - Ohio has 231k openings compared to NY's 345k with a fraction of the overall population.
So, no, leaving a major metro doesn't mean there "aren't any jobs". Quite the opposite actually. This has been talked about endless in media for the last 12 months, so it's no surprise the data supports it.
I guess you missed the 13.6% delta increase in the last year...I meant through the roof relative to previous years. Not sure how you interpreted that any differently given the context...
So your statement was about 2nd order price growth vs the first order prices themselves? You literally said “the prices were through the roof”, not the growth. Yes something that is really cheap can experience rapid price growth and still be relatively cheap.
> You literally said “the prices were through the roof”, not the growth.
Maybe english is not your first language but when something is "through the roof" it means it raises at a very rapid rate. In other words, speaking to the velocity, not the overall speed.
> Yes something that is really cheap can experience rapid price growth and still be relatively cheap.
You're being overly pedantic about this for no reason. Put this into the context of the discussion. Yes, moving from San Francisco, CA to Wichita, KS will mean your cost of living will drastically decrease. The discussion is about whether there are jobs in Wichita. People will naturally migrate where jobs are and a rapid growth in housing costs (i.e. demand outpaces supply) means people are staying where the jobs are.
Again this has been all talked about in the daily news cycle. Covid has allowed a significant portion of the population to virtually live wherever they want. Thus people are moving from large cities and suburbs to more rural locations. Thus jobs are opening up in these areas (think Wichita) because both remote workers are moving there and then local markets that can't be remote (think retail) will grow as a result.
> Maybe english is not your first language but when something is "through the roof" it means it raises at a very rapid rate.
English is my first language, but I get your meaning now. It wasn't that Kansas property was expensive, just that it went from very very cheap to just very cheap very quickly.
Fair. But "cheap" is relative. Most people who don't work in tech that would from <insert big city here> to <insert small city here> are going to get wages relative to their living cost. So "very cheap" isn't really a thing anymore.
No but see my link above, a large plurality of jobs are professional services and healthcare, which if you read any "these jobs pay the highest" article it's usually those two sectors.
There is another factor when it comes to moving: people don't necessarily want to move away from their families and friends. It's becoming increasingly common for families to be spread apart which is really a shame because it makes having children way more difficult (your parents will often gladly give you free "childcare" and it will make them happier too). I also suspect mental health problems are more prevalent in people who don't really have a "home". I've met so many people highly educated people in tech and academia who are essentially vagrants and they are often deeply unhappy at not being able to maintain relationships.
The centralisation of computer related jobs in the UK is sad. I had to move to Cambridge as it seems to be the only option that wasn't too far away and wasn't London. House prices are ridiculously inflated here and you don't even really get anything for your money. All the "culture" here is posh people shit (ie. only for Cambridge University people) or just regular stuff for the plebs that you can find anywhere. I'd have much rather moved somewhere like Bristol, but there just doesn't seem to be enough work there any more.
Right, but I personally don’t see a scenario where living on the street doesn’t trump every single one of those other factors.
In other words, anything that involves me living on the street is a complete non-starter, regardless of how compelling the other factors are.
I get that some people really don’t have the option to just move somewhere cheaper. But if that’s at all a possibility, it seems like that should be a no brainier
There has to be a place to live on the other end. That place has to be affordable and safe. There have to have enough funds for the entire family to move. The funds have to last until all of the jobs that pay enough are secured (in our case 3-4).
The funds may also need to last long enough for the wage earners' business to be reestablished or can find an employer who's hiring portal doesn't auto-discard 20 year job gaps (that portal may not exist).
All this assumes earning family members don't have even the most minor of criminal records. It also assumes family members don't have zero credit (which bar most rentals and many employers) after years of frugal living to save up those funds. God help anyone with medical debt.
Just one of these factors can lead to family homelessness, in some city far away from their support systems.
I think there's definite limits to that. Like you can't expect to forever stay in Amsterdam center because you happen to live there now. Loads of others want your place and can contribute more. But it's not always the case. For example the outskirts of said city are deliberately underdeveloped because the zoning designation says so which is entirely a political choice to expel the poor.
I don't think it's fair to put the onus on individual people to move everytime they're priced out of a market, especially a market that has been heavily manipulated to benefit the few via lower interest rates and poor zoning laws.
You could see this housing crisis coming from years out and the government did nothing but maintain low rates, block multi-unit zoning changes, and allow the wealthy and foreign investors to buy up housing.
My view is one shaped by a family of immigrants. In the end life isn't about right or wrong or morals or ethics. It just is. Much of it is out of an individuals control and never was or will be. All you can do is control how YOU react to those factors. You can complain about them and get ground into powder, or you can adjust to make your own life better.
The threshold for a crisis isn't 50%. For example, our current shortage of housing is 4M-7M homes. That small percentage belays the story of millions of families who are not finding a home.
That said, we've past our historical high of owner-occupied homes. That trend is downward.
As ever, ~0 rentals are owned by the inhabitant. What changed there is that individual-owned rental properties are no longer the norm.
The curse of mobility I guess: people can move in if they want, bid up prices, which can force out those who were there before. The only solutions are to either eliminate/reduce mobility or move housing out from market influences.
Yes, it is sucky to not be able to live where you like, but the attitude seems odd.
Why do you feel entitled to live at any particular location (that was not actually inherited)?
I've never felt it was my "right" to be able to afford any particular location and/or living standard at that location, and always noticed that it was a trade-off between costs, location, commute/travel times. Same whether it is in a resort town vs out in the styx, or in a major city downtown vs the suburbs/exurbs.
As long as I can remember, it's been that way - the workers in the fancy town couldn't afford to live there, unless a big crew got together to rent a house in town. Or, you were looking for a rent-controlled apt or sublet.
Just because you or I have done no wrong, does not mean that we are entitled to do what we want, where we want, when we want.
"... You can't always get what you want / But if you try sometime you just might find / You just might find / That you get what you need "
> Why do you feel entitled to live at any particular location (that was not actually inherited)?
For me, it's less about my own life, and more about how terrible the world is when people get pushed out of their homes.
Most people need stability to have a good life. They do better when they understand their neighborhood. Their kids do better when they can go to the same school system until they are 18. Plus, the employment market is really uneven, so being booted out of a location with good jobs can be a disaster for a family. On top of this, moving is costly by itself, so the cost of moving every year is another tax on those who are struggling.
The argument of "you shouldn't feel entitled to this" just sucks. A better lens is "Do our housing policies help or hurt leading a good life." We're not talking about who deserves the latest fancy SUV, but about whether our housing situation screws up many people's lives.
>>People wouldn't be priced out of their communities if there was more supply of housing
Many of the communities you find attractive would not exist at that level of attractiveness if the supply were massively increased by abandoning zoning.
People live in communities and make their sets of zoning regs to design, build, and maintain the quality of life that makes that community exist, and pay significant-to-massive extra taxes over the course of decades to build that quality of life, which makes the community attractive.
Other communities see development and lower individual tax loads as attractive, and build at higher densities.
Simply saying that 'zoning restricts supply and is thus unfair because I want in' is over-simplistic and, to be blunt, greedy and entitled.
While I don't know what sort of towns you are talking about, the ones that I'm familiar with would see massive environmental destruction if built as you seem to want, since the spacing and open space was specifically created to maintain a healthy ecosystem in which to live. Declaring it is merely about "uniformity and property values" seems like very shallow self-centered thinking.
I have absolutely no problem with people voting for zoning policies that decrease the supply of housing. I have a major problem with incentive structures that are setup such that the people that own houses in that environment become wealthy through no effort of their own.
George figured this out 100 years ago[0]. Implement the Land Value Tax. Go ahead and restrict supply, that's your right. But it's going to cost you in taxes.
>> I have a major problem with incentive structures that are setup such that the people that own houses in that environment become wealthy through no effort of their own.
This is simply wrong.
People are not becoming wealthy with no effort.
If they collectively vote in the zoning conditions that restrict supply, they are ALSO creating a situation where they MUST pay more in taxes to maintain those conditions. Everything becomes more expensive, and is amortized over fewer people.
The residents literally pay every month for those upgrades in higher taxes, longer commutes, higher maintenance costs on larger houses and yards, etc.
In real time, those investments pay off in higher quality of living (which is what you want to access for lower cost).
Over time, those investments MAY, but do not always, result in larger increases in value. I can tell you that values in my town has barely increased in 15+ years, whereas nearby towns have increased 30-100%, and our town has probably the most restrictions.
People are NOT doing this to become wealthy without work. They are doing it for their and their families' quality of life. Sure, there are a few that are flipping houses as a side gig, but the majority of people living in any area I've seen are there building a life and INVESTING in quality of life.
Why do you think communities shouldn't change? If the population growth rate is 1.8%, why should a city be able to decide that 0% growth is completely acceptable?
Would you be willing to pay an uncapped land-value tax on your nicer area? A lot of people are vehemently opposed to paying the full externalities of their choices.
I do not think communities shouldn't change - they do change and grow all the time. Have you ever been to a town meeting?
>>Would you be willing to pay an uncapped land-value tax on your nicer area?
Of course —WE ALREADY DO—, as pointed out above, everyone already pays much higher taxes - based on land and building value, uncapped - to maintain the environment. (Please do try to keep up and have a clue what you are talking about.)
Those changes are fine and should be decided by those affected, not some set of interlopers who just want to basically steal the value that has been created and maintained over decades or centuries.
The externality here is yours - if you want to come in and destroy the value that has been created and maintained, are you willing to pay the costs of that - both the costs of decreasing the value in place, and the excess costs paid to maintain the value- i.e., pay the delta in taxes as if the town had had the higher population the whole time?
> Those changes are fine and should be decided by those affected, not some set of interlopers
Those "interlopers" are people's sons and daughters who want to live where they grew up, growing families that need more space, the retired on a fixed income, the working poor struggling to stay housed, those who spend hours commuting, etc. All of these people are your neighbors, not the enemy.
> who just want to basically steal the value that has been created and maintained over decades or centuries.
That depends on your definition of "value". Do you mean the well-being of everyone in the community? or the market price of your house?
For many people jobs, amenities, and culture make for desirable neighborhoods. Single family single use zoning doesn't contribute to any of that.
I notice that your example start with actual locals growing out of a locale to people who have nothing to do with the locale.
Whether someone is enemy or friend all depends on attitude. Are you trying to work with and build upon what the previous generations have built, or are you trying to merely appropriate it because you don't like the price of single-family zoning?
>>That depends on your definition of "value". Do you mean the well-being of everyone in the community? or the market price of your house?
The market price of the house has little to do with it (and could plausibly increase w/more building by inducing local demand). For me, and everyone I know, market value is not motivating.
What IS motivating is threats to the CHARACTER and ENVIRONMENT of the locale - especially the environment - open land, walking trails, actual wildlife and an ecosystem hosting endangered species, butterflies, birds, etc..
THIS is real value to the people who choose to live here.
And in fact, the property values are not that great, and certainly have not increased like other areas.
So, NO, property values are NOT even close to the top priority of me or anyone I know in this or any other such town I lived in. Yet, in your limited understanding of the issues, property values are all you see.
>>the retired on a fixed income, the working poor struggling to stay housed,
ihe town I currently live in and surrounding towns have all approved some senior and low-income housing developments (and denied other damaging proposals).
>>those who spend hours commuting, etc.
Yes, from here commuting is hours to the city center; about 45min in an off time, but nearly two hours at commute time. So, building more here will just create more massive commuting issues. In fact, an MIT study in the area found that it was only the addition of about 250 commuters in an area of three adjacent towns that caused the commuting traffic to go from doable to regularly 'gelling' into intolerable jams — literally just over 100 extra units now regularly extra choked traffic in the whole region.
>>For many people jobs, amenities, and culture make for desirable neighborhoods. Single family single use zoning doesn't contribute to any of that.
Fine, so find an area that doesn't have single-family zoning and build that up for more jobs, amenities and culture.
Do not presume that you have some right to come and literally trash the place because the population density and pricing is not to your liking.
That is no different than some developer saying that he should be able to put up a condo development, strip mall, and office zone in a National Park because he thinks it has too low a population density.
Your note above contains a lot of assumptions about what I think, and vitriol, words like steal, destroy, trash, etc. This seems to be something that you are emotional about.
Lots of people think it's immoral for neighbors to be able to micromanage the living spaces of other neighbors outside of basic safety issues. I'm not sure how you'd defend imposing your will on other people just because you can at any given moment. Who are you to hijack the decades and centuries that goes into a city, like you mentioned, and freeze it in time for your convenience, at the expense of others who were born into the same society you were. We're all here together, you can't morally just marginalize people you're afraid of.
I stand by my original statement that I think it's wrong for you to characterize everyone who doesn't agree with the way zoning has evolved in this country over the last 100 years as an interloper. We live in a democracy. These are fellow citizens, people who are just as important as you and me.
I'm not in favor of big developers or corporations or profits. I don't want to build a high rise or a factory next to your house. I am in favor of lots more real neighborhoods, as opposed to suburban developer big-box retail car centric sprawl. I am opposed to single use zoning.
If I had a magic wand I think that the way the Japanese do zoning is much better than the way it has evolved in the U.S. [0].
>>Lots of people think it's immoral for neighbors to be able to micromanage the living spaces of other neighbors outside of basic safety issues. I'm not sure how you'd defend imposing your will on other people just because you can at any given moment.
No one is micromanaging the living spaces of other neighbors. As you say, it's a democracy.
I have lived in towns that had zoning, and voted it out. Some years later, there were meetings where people were asking "If we had zoning, this siht would not have happened, would it?", but they did decide to create zoning, then abolish it, then reinstate it.
It is simply false to imply that I have some micromanaging power over my neighbor, beyond the democratically agreed rules that require them to apply for variances to the zoning rules, and allow abutters to submit comments on those variance requests, which must also be considered.
In Switzerland, you will drive around and see poles standing on land. These are marking the corners of a proposed new building and must be erected for months before a hearing on the building, so everyone can comment and post objections, requests for adjustments, etc. before permission is granted to build.
This is not some kind of unfair micromanagement, it is taking into consideration everyone's local concerns before making a decision.
Zoning does not exist as you imaging because of petty concerns over property value and fear of unknown people. It exists because too many people will build things that negatively affect their neighbors, and are democratically introduced. I get to vote on them in my town, and you in yours. I don't get to vote in your town, and you don't get to vote in mine, any more than I get to vote in Switzerland, or some Swiss guy gets to vote here.
> No one is micromanaging the living spaces of other neighbors.
Your statement above seems quite incorrect. I was thinking that most people in the U.S. can't build an accessory dwelling unit in their backyard for their grandmother. Most people in the U.S. can't build a 400 square foot house on their land. Most people can't convert their house into a duplex or a triplex. Most people can't run a low traffic specialty retail or service business out of their house. None of these are safety issues.
You mentioned variances, which can be requested for things like the above. But that's my main point, why should these things require variances? "taking into consideration everyone's local concerns" as you mentioned. Processes like this take away people's freedom to modify their house like in the above examples, without good reason.
This is what I was referring to. Why should the approval of other people be required to make the above modifications to a property you own?
Maybe this is the main thing that we disagree on. It seems like micromanaging to me.
I still don't think you get where I'm coming from when I mentioned Japan. I'm not in favor of developers, and I don't think my ideas lead to that. Did you look into how the Japanese do zoning? I'm guessing you didn't, because all you said to me was "If you like Japan, go there." That just seems reactionary. Japanese homeowners could make all of the modifications I mentioned above without needing permission. It's a good system. Has it's advantages. I think that sometimes people are afraid of change.
Some of the stuff you typed in your two replies was interesting, but doesn't seem to narrow down what we are discussing. I don't think the dictionary definitions helped.
There are several reasons that zoning and variances work.
First is scale. Very few one-off items will have a big effect. But when nearly everyone does it, it entirely changes the loads on the infrastructure, character of the community, etc.
Adding 2x-3x the residents to existing plots will add similar loads to the roads, water, sewage, and services infrastructure. These boil down to very real costs, and if not properly managed, including raising taxes as it happens, will seriously degrade the town. Limiting this is not micromanaging, it is managing.
The other is the direct effect on the neighbors. This happened with my grandparent's house, a one floor ranch built in the ~1950s overlooks the Hudson river north of NYC. Someone bought it and wanted to turn it into a 2-story. There is another large house further up the ridge overlooking the roof, the river, and the hills beyond. This change would have destroyed their view of the river and hills to the west. Despite the new owner's significant funds and lobbying, the request was denied and it was sold on.
I think this is an excellent result. The owner of my GP's house would have imposed a massive external loss on the neighbor.
Sure, there are some neighbors who are absolute asses and will deny everything for spite, and that can be as annoying as micromanaging. At the same time, I do not consider it to be my right to do whatever TF I want, and the hell with how it affects my neighbor - and in particular, I want the same treatment - golden rule.
The problem is that developers DO work by the different golden rule - he who has the gold makes the rules. They are basically growth hackers (and not in a good way). Any hole in the rules they WILL attempt to exploit in order extract maximum profit from a plot of land.
The developer off my back lot line? He's not big, he's a guy from another state who builds additions, and thinks this massive development, with which he has zero experience will be his big retirement payday. Considering the environment and geography issues, I think he is stupid money and that serious developers passed on the lot. But that doesn't stop every random builder with dreams.
So, as soon as you allow general conversion from single to duplex/triplex, that is guaranteed what you will get within a few years. Sure, some of it will be people just building a second unit for their family to live on the same plot. But most of it will be builders buying up lots that can then be built out. And they will do it in the way that makes them the most profit, usually short-term - this means regard for the neighbors is zero beyond what is required and enforced.
So, while these ideas sound wonderful and egalitarian, the reality is that being more loose about it inevitably leads directly do developer abuses and destruction of what has been created.
There may be solutions to this, but if it was easy, it would have already been done.
iIn general I think we have in common a dislike of developers. I'll talk more about that below, and also why I don't like the current system. I do believe we could make changes for the better.
> Adding 2x-3x the residents to existing plots will add similar loads to the roads, water, sewage, and services infrastructure.
Dense city neighborhoods, even poor ones, are increasingly subsidizing less dense areas because there are not enough taxpayers per mile of infrastructure in the less dense suburbs [0]. Due to sprawl there are more roads, sewers, etc, and not nearly as many people per mile to maintain them. Suburbs built in the 70s will be facing maintenance costs soon that many of them can't afford. Transfer payments already happen through county, state and federal budgets [1]. Another reason to say that every taxpayer has a stake in zoning, not just homeowners.
Plus there's a lot of upzoning that is already happening, and infrastructure hasn't been a deal breaker. Tacoma is replacing single family with low-scale residential allowing up to three units [2], and they are not the only city doing this. Others are allowing accessory dwelling units on any property if setbacks allow. In fact California just passed a law that will require that all cities in the state to allow up to four housing units in place of single-family homes, and the ability to split single-family lots [3].
> These boil down to very real costs, and if not properly managed, including raising taxes as it happens.
Before the pandemic the trend of people wanting to live in cities was pushing a lot of poor folks into some suburbs, and you could see things deteriorating over the years in these areas with the poorer tax base, negative feedback loops making things worse. I've seen areas with lots of abandoned strip malls. I've also seen subdivisions overloaded with cars on the street, in driveways, and on lawns because the neighborhoods weren't designed for three or four or more commuters per house, but everyone needs a car to get anywhere. Some are saying that eventually many suburbs will be like this, populated by the poor, the ghettos of the future, extended families and groups of friends sharing large houses, subdivisions and suburbs going broke, people with money fleeing to other more interesting and better maintained places.
> my grandparent's house, a one floor ranch built in the ~1950s overlooks the Hudson river north of NYC. Someone bought it and wanted to turn it into a 2-story. There is another large house further up the ridge overlooking the roof, the river, and the hills beyond. This change would have destroyed their view of the river and hills to the west. Despite the new owner's significant funds and lobbying, the request was denied and it was sold on.
It seems more fair to have consistent rules, like two stories allowed, certain setbacks, etc. than to allow neighbors to arbitrarily decide these things. I don't even understand how that is constitutional, the law and due process in this case being "lets see what your neighbors happen to think today". There should be the same rules for everyone.
Maybe the people who want a view should buy the lot in front of them, if they want it that bad. That's why a water front lot costs much more than water view. Or build their own second floor, or rooftop porch, etc. They had the benefit of the view for a while even thought they didn't own it. It wasn't taken from them. They are not entitled to this. It was never theirs to begin with. They knew there was a house in front of them that could build another floor.
> I think this is an excellent result. The owner of my GP's house would have imposed a massive external loss on the neighbor.
And now the neighbor has imposed a massive external loss on the owner of your GP's house, the loss of a second floor that other people are allowed, for either the view they don't own or the money they think the view might be worth to a future buyer.
Furthermore homeowners have externalized other costs associated with their profits by making it harder for others to find places to live and work while simultaneously benefiting from municipal growth.
Real estate as an investment has made housing more unaffordable. This amounts to a national ponzi scheme, given that prices can't outpace inflation forever without something happening eventually. Our kids, or grandkids, and taxpayers in general, will probably have to deal with a crash in prices at some point, declining suburbs and the infrastructure these communities won't be able to maintain, underfunded HOAs in disrepair, more abandoned shopping centers, more taxpayer bailouts, etc. These are all externalized future costs born by other people to prop up current homeowner values.
I understand that the current system incentivizes rising residential real estate prices and a lot of people have most of their nest egg in their home equity, and/or are highly leveraged, and/or spend way too much time working to pay their mortgage. So I understand why people do this. Water view is worth a lot more than no water view. Neighbor against neighbor.
> Sure, there are some neighbors who are absolute asses and will deny everything for spite, and that can be as annoying as micromanaging.
I agree, but wouldn't push the point. I'd call things like this an outgrowth of a bad system. That's the problem with giving people power over others, it will be abused. I've heard other anecdotes, like the neighbor of my dentist who fought him building a garage like other people had, apparently because she thought a garage in his yard would make her yard look smaller.
HOAs can be another big problem in this regard, empowering petty people to harass their neighbors. There's often a strong push for uniformity in many of these places, with not much acceptance of anything different, even down to the color of curtains and the type of grass. For decades most new home construction has been in developer subdivisions subject to HOA rules.
The bad attitude of so many homeowners is plainly visible on the Next Door website, their disdain for "less desirable" people, opposition to extending bus routes with disregard for the difficulty their hired help has getting back and forth to clean their toilets or whatever, the people who want to keep non-locals away from "their" non-locally funded beach, the people who want more jobs to help grow the area but don't want to allow more housing for the janitors, teachers, clerks, nurses, and everyone else who keeps the lights on, the people who want to remove the benches in the park so that "those people" don't sit there, the people who don't want anyone economically different to live near them, etc. Even worse is the historic connection between zoning and racism, which is still alive today. People often make decisions based on emotion, not reason and logic.
So one effect of the current rules is to enable bad people to do bad things to other people.
> I do not consider it to be my right to do whatever TF I want, and the hell with how it affects my neighbor - and in particular, I want the same treatment - golden rule.
You invoked this in defense of doing someone doing something bad to their neighbor, blocking them from an modifying their house. I assume you meant that the neighbor should have gone out of their way to not block the other person's view? As I mentioned before, I don't understand why they think they are entitled to something they didn't pay for. It seems that you want others to go out of your way for you, but I'm not sure how you feel about going out of your way for people who want something different.
As much as I'd argue with you against this, I can't say that you are completely wrong. Part of me wishes I could prohibit people from getting dogs that bark, and installing floodlights. Everyone has an axe to grind. Everyone is different. It's takes a certain amount of give and take, and compromise, to live near to others. It's not easy to codify. Perhaps that is why so many want to segregate, to be surrounded only by people just like them?
> The problem is that developers DO work by the different golden rule - he who has the gold makes the rules. They are basically growth hackers (and not in a good way). Any hole in the rules they WILL attempt to exploit in order extract maximum profit from a plot of land.
I have something to run by you. Maybe single use single family zoning actually helps developers, to the detriment of everyone else.
For the last several or more decades developers have been buying land on the outskirts of towns, clear cutting it and building a bunch of houses as quickly as possible, nothing else, then handing it off to a homeownwers association, so that neither the developer nor the town have to spend any extra money on amenities. The developer makes their money, then looks for another subdivision to build. What could be more convenient? The houses all look the same, because that is cheapest. Many of them are not well made. These subdivision neighborhoods are all pretty much identical, just house after house, empty streets except for the occasional dog walker, a car being required to get to the nearest strip mall, just past the nearest gas station, everything built since at sometime in the 70s seems to follow this pattern.
Perhaps this is why single familt single use zoning is so prevalant across the country, because that is convenient for developers who want to go on building more subdivisions. Single family homes are the best way to get the most markup per housed person. Either that, or apartment complexes that look like people warehouses. Maybe defending the current zoning regulations plays right into their hands. Works out nice for banks and car companies, too. Developers don't care what these neighborhood are like to live in or the long term problems, as long as they can turn a good profit this year.
Many people, myself included, find all these new corporate developed neighborhoods to be alienating, even dystopian. You say you are against developers but they are the ones who we're currently optimized for. They are making money off the current rules, and leaving behind so many externalities - not just financial but so many quality of life issues, commutes for home owners and service workers, the loss of neighborhood gathering spots, the deteriorated relationships with neighbors and small business owners, serendipity walking down the street, dependence on cars, decades of working to pay for this stuff, kids with nothing to do, insular, isolating, monoculture, etc.
Now we even have the problem of hedge funds buying up housing! I am truly dismayed thinking where that trend leads, given the influence the rich have over politicians to warp things more to their profitability without regard for personal or societal damage.
I'm expressing some of my dislikes above... In the spirit of communicating my fears on this issue, which we haven't addressed yet.
It seems to me that you are arguing to keep things the same, to let developers continue to build these inhumane (to many of us) places to live. Yuck. Keeping things the same sucks so much for so many people.
> So, as soon as you allow general conversion from single to duplex/triplex, most of it will be builders buying up lots that can then be built out.
I would say this happens of how regulated housing is. Only developers have the expertise to navigate the system. That's why often corporations are in favor of regulations, they know that individuals and small companies can't deal with the overhead. Regulatory capture. It did not used to be this way.
Regulation for non-safety issues adds a considerable amount to the price of a new house. We could halve those costs, at least. Other places do. Some places have 99 year leases on the land and houses are depreciating assets, like cars, which people often have rebuild to taste, some every time they move. In some countries the average person pays off the average house in three years. Lots of things are possible, just saying.
Somewhat related, I would be game to tax primary residences differently than investor owned property. Houses and neighborhoods should be for people to live in, not for the rentier class to make money.
> So, while these ideas sound wonderful and egalitarian, the reality is that being more loose about it inevitably leads directly do developer abuses and destruction of what has been created.
Do you not agree that developers have been driving the last several or more decades of building, given that most new construction has been subdivisions and corporate apartment complexes during that time?
It's become almost impossible to do otherwise, based on the current regulations you are in favor of.
I feel like we've been letting developers, corporations, and profit destroy neighborhoods in this country for decades, it's causing significant problems, and that we need to make changes.
> There may be solutions to this, but if it was easy, it would have already been done.
It has been done! There are other places that have solved this. They don't have the problems with developers or housing costs that we have. We didn't have these problems in the past. I'm encouraged that there are more and more places in this country making changes.
Of course those making money off the current system will see these changes as a financial threat and continue to resist. Many others are in favor of these changes for numerous reasons, and will continue to push for them.
I apologize for any erroneous assumptions I may have made above about your position while I was expressing my dissatisfaction above with the way things are.
I guess we could talk about how current zoning regulations make it difficult for individuals to build new housing and have resulted in more subdivisions and apartment complexes, how this has changed neighborhoods for the worse over the last several decades, and the belief that upzoning and/or a better system is not possible.
I look forward to what you have to say about all this.
I can tell you that no one is "freezing anything in time", or "micromanaging the living spaces of other neighbors", or "doing it for their own convenience", or attempting to "morally marginalize people I'm afraid of".
I'm making no assumtions, merely responding to what you put in print. Maybe you are merely playing dumb, but you show little evidence of knowing how any of this actually works, or evidence of having even participated in a town meeting, much less actively worked to get any changes done.
>>I'm not in favor of big developers or corporations or profits.
Actually, that is EXACTLY who you are in favor of - that is how it works.
I've seen in multiple locales how developers make alliance with the old-timers that don't like rules, and then they push through zoning variances, overrides, or elimination. And what goes up is NOT anything in remote characterization related to the neighborhood -- what goes up IS as many units as possible, stacked as high as they can go, or shopping malls/factories if that's more profitable.
If you don't want "single use zoning", you WILL get multi-use, because the appraisal of everything is done by "best and highest use", which means whatever brings in the most money. So, if they can develop a high-rise or factory within an inch if your property line and make the most money, that's what you'll get.
>>words like steal, destroy, trash, etc. This seems to be something that you are emotional about.
Yes, I care about it a lot, but my direct experience is that these are the most accurate words to describe what actually happens (not in your idealized concept).
We literally have right now, on my backyard, a 50+ acre lot that a developer recently bought in a 2-acre zoned area, with typical lots 3-7 acres. This area is very hilly and includs the wetlands that also stretch onto more than half of my lot and harbor multiple endangered species and a great variety of other wildlife. we and our neighbors literally enjoy this wildlife multiple times every day (and some of it also enjoys our gardens).
Did he propose to put up a handful of homes to increase the density but in keeping with the neighborhood? No one would have seriously objected to that, and he could put up a handful of quite profitable high-end homes.
Instead he proposed 5 different plans with 60-300+ 4-story condo units. These 60-300+ units would all add that miultiples of the current traffic to a street that now only serves 20 houses.
It would also completely trash the environment- Their plan was to literally strip-mine the place, put up 35ft+ retaining walls, plant a few trees and some grass. And tap into the same water supply that feeds the 30-odd wells from the same lot - so this could easily run us all out of water. AAnd the land is so steep that the roadways would exceed the allowable specs for fire trucks in the summer, and this is New England which has winters, so people could easily be trapped in multi-unit buildings with fire & rescue unable to reach them.
So, whether you want to talk environment, community, traffic, water, or safety, these interloper developers -- yes, they come from out-of-state and have zero local investment -- are perfectly happy to trash all of it for their own profit, then leave town.
This is literally taking paradise and putting up a parking lot - you don't know what you've got till it's gone.
And this is typical. There are these multi-hundred 3-4 story projects going up everywhere in the region - anywhere they can find a plot and push it through.
And yes, upon finding out about Planning Board meetings to get variances for this, we worked late and weekends for about a month, and shut down this abomination for at least a few years. More people showed up at that Planning Board meeting than ever before, by an order of magnitude. ZERO of them were concerned about their property values. I literally never heard it brought up in a single conversation, email, or meeting. Everyone had concerns, whether it was traffic, safety, environment, water supply, waste treatment, infrastructure, or whatever, but:
ZERO ever even mentioned property values.
ZERO ever mentioned who might move in (and some of these were proposed to be low-income units, because that gets the developers lower regulations).
Yet those are your first accusation, that everyone is greedy and just cares about their prop values, and is "afraid" of who might move in.
And your concerns about "steal", "destroy", "trash" are not emotional, they are simply accurate descriptions of what happens.
And yes, this is a democracy, and you do not have a vote in the towns which you presume you should improve their rules. If you don't have any skin in the game in the locale you propose to change, your are literally an interloper - just check any definition [1-5].
If you like Japan, go there. If you want to make a difference here, then go to a town or city. Get involved in the governance. They are always looking for people to help. run for a position - you will be welcomed in any decent place. INVEST your money and your time in the place. THEN you will legitimately have a say in how it is run.
Until then, stop being so entitled and stop the clueless rhetoric.
While you think you are helping yourself and some other poor people, all you are doing is literally helping developers 1) steal value from others who have spent generations building it, 2) destroy the existing environment and culture where they build, and 3) trash the surroundings.
> I've seen in multiple locales how developers make alliance with the old-timers that don't like rules, and then they push through zoning variances, overrides, or elimination.
I'd say this is why we need a system of more uniformly applied rules, so that we don't have decisions made at the discretion of local boards and variances. A process like that is easy to abuse and corrupt, just as you described above. Those with the money and connections can game the system.
p.s. We might be overloading this comment thread! lol
I replied to your sibling reply. I think that you are on a side-track bringing and focusing on large developers. I mentioned zoning in Japan, and they don't allow for that. To the contrary, they do more than we do to cultivate neighborhoods with small businesses.
> Until then, stop being so entitled and stop the clueless rhetoric.
We both feel passionate about this stuff. It's easy to go off the rails. Doesn't look good, though.
Commuting enables this. If people couldn't commute, they couldn't invade your area. I've long claimed one of the biggest problems with the UK is the tube; it enables people to pile into London every day. Get rid of the tube, and people and business would be more spread out, which would in turn get rid of the elephant in the room being the UK is a one trick pony - "What do you have, UK?" - "London.", "What else?" - "London", "What else?" - "London". Oh, and then there's the medieval monarchy nonsense...
What you did wrong was not keep up economically with the average earnings of those in your community. The market believes that you are not productive enough to live where you currently do. Capitalists believe that you must turn the other cheek for the invisible hand of the free market...
That can happen all kinds of ways. In my case, the economic crisis, then Obamacare's impact on small medical biz, then embezzlement by a biz partner, then my wife developed psychosis & left me w/o a vehicle for a year, eventually agism and most recently housing has increased 70% from last year while transportation costs have tripled.
A lot of times, one's proximity to work, friends, family has a non-trivial cost associated with it. Not everyone can be mobile. That said, the other side of the coin with regard to homelessness - some fall in the above; some follow to where the services/ease of access to one's vice/tolerance (also known as compassion) is.
With regard to moving to a smaller town. The median income in the county in CA I live in is ~40k/year. The average house price has essentially doubled in the last 5ish years. Income, hasn't changed so much. I bought my place ~5.5 years ago and it's basically doubled and is a condo. Same issues around a lack of affordable housing in this rural mountain red county is mirrored by some of the bay area counties I moved from.
Roughly 1 in 10 people in the USA already live more than an hour away from their job, a number that's been increasing over the last ~15 years as people move to cheaper places. This sustained migration of workers has not yet fixed the whole issue of housing.
I wonder if there could be an evaporative cooling like effect in play here? That is, everyone who is willing to move has already moved; as a result, the remaining population biases towards those unwilling to move.
A local move (cheap market) is 4k out of pocket after factoring in 1st/last/sec, utility deposits & endless move/cleaning expenses. The local move (cheap market until this year) we just did was ~5x that.
Moving to another city where savings have to be firehosed until enough jobs are secured (us:3-4) can easily burn thru ten/tens of thousands of dollars. A pretty big chunk of America doesn't have that much cash sitting around.
