MoCo Housing Strategies effect on MCPS

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Do they have any projections of the impact on schools? I feel like this would maybe add 10 families per year to an elementary school boundary area. Just based on how many houses would get sold in a year to a developer who chooses to build a duplex or triplex or quadplex. Not all of them have school-age kids and if they do not all at the same level. So maybe 2 kids per year to each elementary, 8-12 to middle and high schools? They should really be trying to calculate this and the cost to the school system and how that will be paid for. It will probably add more property tax revenue.

They don’t even have projections of how many units will be built or whether the strategy will cause prices to rise or fall. They assume it will make prices go down because they assume multiplexes won’t affect other apartment/condo production and because they didn’t take economics past Econ 101.

PP here. Number of units built seems very difficult to project. I can't imagine any projection would be remotely correct. I think the number of units would be marginal at best and the impact on prices will also be very marginal.

I'm curious though, are you saying if they build a quadplex that means 3 fewer units in a large apartment building?

I’m not looking for a precise number of units. I’m looking for rough orders of magnitude.

Yes, I am saying if they build quads (not just one, which won’t make a difference), will fewer large apartment building be built? I would put that in the category of bad outcomes because we would lose single family housing stock without adding any multi family units beyond what was going to be built anyway.

I think of duplexes etc. as very different from apartment buildings. They are essentially townhouses. They are attached single family homes.

Anyone who is talking about duplexes hasn’t been following this. The number of duplexes that get built would be in the dozens because the math doesn’t work well in most places. I agree that duplexes are different and would be helpful but so would unicorns. Townhouses would be good too and they work in a few more places.

Anything stacked is going to be a substitute for apartments. Most of the units added are going to be stacked because the math generally works better for those. We will trade SFH for apartments, which is bad for the housing market.

But what they are proposing making "by right" is small scale which is up to 2.5 stories. Quadplexes won't be allowed everywhere - that is for near transit/growth corridors. So they can't so three stacked units by right, perhaps 2 and 2 stacked units in some places. If what you are saying is right then most neighborhoods won't be impacted by this at all since they aren't going to build any significant number of side by side duplexes or triplexes.

A triplex is a basement apartment plus two above-ground apartments and fits within the 2.5-story envelope. 2x2s are also apartment substitutes. A lot of land will be available for apartment/condo construction, and some will be built. It’s hard to see how this doesn’t suppress starts on large projects, so at least some of the units gained through upzoning will be offset by large projects not built. In addition, the mere possibility of more units entering the market through small projects may make big developers less likely to build big projects. These are the hearts of our downtown cores, so if there’s a slowdown in production, it’s not just the housing market that will hurt.

Those are projects of very different scale, with different developers and different investors.

If it impacts large-scale projects at all, it would be because increased housing stock has reduced housing prices. That by itself would be good news.

I’m not suggesting capital would shift to multiplexes. I’m suggesting that demand is constant at a given price and the small apartment projects would draw demand from the large ones. Big developers definitely are aware of the competitive environment and avoid projects where there’s competition for consumers.

That would be a good sign. That would mean we're driving prices down.

Sure!

And those lower prices will take huge bites out of the equity people have in their houses and are depending upon for their retirement.

Wait till the General population figures that out. Then the fur will really fly.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Do they have any projections of the impact on schools? I feel like this would maybe add 10 families per year to an elementary school boundary area. Just based on how many houses would get sold in a year to a developer who chooses to build a duplex or triplex or quadplex. Not all of them have school-age kids and if they do not all at the same level. So maybe 2 kids per year to each elementary, 8-12 to middle and high schools? They should really be trying to calculate this and the cost to the school system and how that will be paid for. It will probably add more property tax revenue.

They don’t even have projections of how many units will be built or whether the strategy will cause prices to rise or fall. They assume it will make prices go down because they assume multiplexes won’t affect other apartment/condo production and because they didn’t take economics past Econ 101.

PP here. Number of units built seems very difficult to project. I can't imagine any projection would be remotely correct. I think the number of units would be marginal at best and the impact on prices will also be very marginal.

I'm curious though, are you saying if they build a quadplex that means 3 fewer units in a large apartment building?

I’m not looking for a precise number of units. I’m looking for rough orders of magnitude.

Yes, I am saying if they build quads (not just one, which won’t make a difference), will fewer large apartment building be built? I would put that in the category of bad outcomes because we would lose single family housing stock without adding any multi family units beyond what was going to be built anyway.

I think of duplexes etc. as very different from apartment buildings. They are essentially townhouses. They are attached single family homes.

Anyone who is talking about duplexes hasn’t been following this. The number of duplexes that get built would be in the dozens because the math doesn’t work well in most places. I agree that duplexes are different and would be helpful but so would unicorns. Townhouses would be good too and they work in a few more places.

Anything stacked is going to be a substitute for apartments. Most of the units added are going to be stacked because the math generally works better for those. We will trade SFH for apartments, which is bad for the housing market.

But what they are proposing making "by right" is small scale which is up to 2.5 stories. Quadplexes won't be allowed everywhere - that is for near transit/growth corridors. So they can't so three stacked units by right, perhaps 2 and 2 stacked units in some places. If what you are saying is right then most neighborhoods won't be impacted by this at all since they aren't going to build any significant number of side by side duplexes or triplexes.

A triplex is a basement apartment plus two above-ground apartments and fits within the 2.5-story envelope. 2x2s are also apartment substitutes. A lot of land will be available for apartment/condo construction, and some will be built. It’s hard to see how this doesn’t suppress starts on large projects, so at least some of the units gained through upzoning will be offset by large projects not built. In addition, the mere possibility of more units entering the market through small projects may make big developers less likely to build big projects. These are the hearts of our downtown cores, so if there’s a slowdown in production, it’s not just the housing market that will hurt.

Those are projects of very different scale, with different developers and different investors.

If it impacts large-scale projects at all, it would be because increased housing stock has reduced housing prices. That by itself would be good news.

I’m not suggesting capital would shift to multiplexes. I’m suggesting that demand is constant at a given price and the small apartment projects would draw demand from the large ones. Big developers definitely are aware of the competitive environment and avoid projects where there’s competition for consumers.

That would be a good sign. That would mean we're driving prices down.

Sure!

And those lower prices will take huge bites out of the equity people have in their houses and are depending upon for their retirement.

Wait till the General population figures that out. Then the fur will really fly.

The "I got mine" attitude that MoCo is known for.

Not that there's any chance we're going to significantly increase supply to have that kind of impact on prices. It's really just a question of how much faster will house prices rise compared to incomes.

If that's really your concern, though, you should like higher density zoning. That generally makes the underlying property more valuable. The only way to both preserve the value of existing properties while facilitating the development of less expensive new homes is to allow higher density. Funny how math works.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Very little of this thread seems to be about the effect on MCPS.

The main effect of this on MCPS is that the gap in the capital budget will get even bigger because impact fees are set below seat costs and because the Attainable Housing Strategy proposed setting some impact fees at zero. If you like overcrowded schools, this is your strategy.

The capital budget does not need to come from only impact fees. We paid for schools long before impact fees.

And it doesn’t come only from impact fees! It comes from impact fees, recordation tax, and GO bonds. We’ve had impact fees for more than 30 years and before that we had proffer. I don’t know why you’re so opposed to the county capturing part of the value it adds to land through taxes.

Paying for schools through local property taxes and income taxes is what we should do. But large one-time fees discourage the activity they're attached to. And we shouldn't be discouraging more housing.

Austin has the highest impact fees in its region and the fastest housing growth. I get that developers don’t want to pay taxes. No one does, really, but you’re overstating their impact on production. Developers usually spend more on lawyers to get their projects approved than they do on impact fees, so maybe we should work on getting rid of that really high cost, which doesn’t provide societal benefit, before we talk about lowering taxes.

Austin's impact fees are far less than Montgomery County's.

Not as a percentage of the median sales price. They anre about the same, with Austin maybe slightly higher.

Part of the value of a housing is the value of the infrastructure that services it. You think developers should be able to book all of that as profit. I think the county should recapture that value so it can build more nice things for the community.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Very little of this thread seems to be about the effect on MCPS.

The main effect of this on MCPS is that the gap in the capital budget will get even bigger because impact fees are set below seat costs and because the Attainable Housing Strategy proposed setting some impact fees at zero. If you like overcrowded schools, this is your strategy.

The capital budget does not need to come from only impact fees. We paid for schools long before impact fees.

And it doesn’t come only from impact fees! It comes from impact fees, recordation tax, and GO bonds. We’ve had impact fees for more than 30 years and before that we had proffer. I don’t know why you’re so opposed to the county capturing part of the value it adds to land through taxes.

Paying for schools through local property taxes and income taxes is what we should do. But large one-time fees discourage the activity they're attached to. And we shouldn't be discouraging more housing.

Austin has the highest impact fees in its region and the fastest housing growth. I get that developers don’t want to pay taxes. No one does, really, but you’re overstating their impact on production. Developers usually spend more on lawyers to get their projects approved than they do on impact fees, so maybe we should work on getting rid of that really high cost, which doesn’t provide societal benefit, before we talk about lowering taxes.

Austin's impact fees are far less than Montgomery County's.

Not as a percentage of the median sales price. They anre about the same, with Austin maybe slightly higher.

Part of the value of a housing is the value of the infrastructure that services it. You think developers should be able to book all of that as profit. I think the county should recapture that value so it can build more nice things for the community.

They can and will-- through local taxes on the property and its occupants.

I'm not sure where you're getting the idea that Austin's is higher. Median sales prices are similar between MoCo and Austin, yet Austin's impact fees are about half that of MoCo's.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Very little of this thread seems to be about the effect on MCPS.

The main effect of this on MCPS is that the gap in the capital budget will get even bigger because impact fees are set below seat costs and because the Attainable Housing Strategy proposed setting some impact fees at zero. If you like overcrowded schools, this is your strategy.

The capital budget does not need to come from only impact fees. We paid for schools long before impact fees.

And it doesn’t come only from impact fees! It comes from impact fees, recordation tax, and GO bonds. We’ve had impact fees for more than 30 years and before that we had proffer. I don’t know why you’re so opposed to the county capturing part of the value it adds to land through taxes.

Paying for schools through local property taxes and income taxes is what we should do. But large one-time fees discourage the activity they're attached to. And we shouldn't be discouraging more housing.

Austin has the highest impact fees in its region and the fastest housing growth. I get that developers don’t want to pay taxes. No one does, really, but you’re overstating their impact on production. Developers usually spend more on lawyers to get their projects approved than they do on impact fees, so maybe we should work on getting rid of that really high cost, which doesn’t provide societal benefit, before we talk about lowering taxes.

Austin's impact fees are far less than Montgomery County's.

Not as a percentage of the median sales price. They anre about the same, with Austin maybe slightly higher.

Part of the value of a housing is the value of the infrastructure that services it. You think developers should be able to book all of that as profit. I think the county should recapture that value so it can build more nice things for the community.

Why don't we similarly tax home sales then?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Do they have any projections of the impact on schools? I feel like this would maybe add 10 families per year to an elementary school boundary area. Just based on how many houses would get sold in a year to a developer who chooses to build a duplex or triplex or quadplex. Not all of them have school-age kids and if they do not all at the same level. So maybe 2 kids per year to each elementary, 8-12 to middle and high schools? They should really be trying to calculate this and the cost to the school system and how that will be paid for. It will probably add more property tax revenue.

They don’t even have projections of how many units will be built or whether the strategy will cause prices to rise or fall. They assume it will make prices go down because they assume multiplexes won’t affect other apartment/condo production and because they didn’t take economics past Econ 101.

PP here. Number of units built seems very difficult to project. I can't imagine any projection would be remotely correct. I think the number of units would be marginal at best and the impact on prices will also be very marginal.

I'm curious though, are you saying if they build a quadplex that means 3 fewer units in a large apartment building?

I’m not looking for a precise number of units. I’m looking for rough orders of magnitude.

Yes, I am saying if they build quads (not just one, which won’t make a difference), will fewer large apartment building be built? I would put that in the category of bad outcomes because we would lose single family housing stock without adding any multi family units beyond what was going to be built anyway.

I think of duplexes etc. as very different from apartment buildings. They are essentially townhouses. They are attached single family homes.

Anyone who is talking about duplexes hasn’t been following this. The number of duplexes that get built would be in the dozens because the math doesn’t work well in most places. I agree that duplexes are different and would be helpful but so would unicorns. Townhouses would be good too and they work in a few more places.

Anything stacked is going to be a substitute for apartments. Most of the units added are going to be stacked because the math generally works better for those. We will trade SFH for apartments, which is bad for the housing market.

But what they are proposing making "by right" is small scale which is up to 2.5 stories. Quadplexes won't be allowed everywhere - that is for near transit/growth corridors. So they can't so three stacked units by right, perhaps 2 and 2 stacked units in some places. If what you are saying is right then most neighborhoods won't be impacted by this at all since they aren't going to build any significant number of side by side duplexes or triplexes.

A triplex is a basement apartment plus two above-ground apartments and fits within the 2.5-story envelope. 2x2s are also apartment substitutes. A lot of land will be available for apartment/condo construction, and some will be built. It’s hard to see how this doesn’t suppress starts on large projects, so at least some of the units gained through upzoning will be offset by large projects not built. In addition, the mere possibility of more units entering the market through small projects may make big developers less likely to build big projects. These are the hearts of our downtown cores, so if there’s a slowdown in production, it’s not just the housing market that will hurt.

Those are projects of very different scale, with different developers and different investors.

If it impacts large-scale projects at all, it would be because increased housing stock has reduced housing prices. That by itself would be good news.

I’m not suggesting capital would shift to multiplexes. I’m suggesting that demand is constant at a given price and the small apartment projects would draw demand from the large ones. Big developers definitely are aware of the competitive environment and avoid projects where there’s competition for consumers.

That would be a good sign. That would mean we're driving prices down.

Sure!

And those lower prices will take huge bites out of the equity people have in their houses and are depending upon for their retirement.

Wait till the General population figures that out. Then the fur will really fly.

The "I got mine" attitude that MoCo is known for.

Not that there's any chance we're going to significantly increase supply to have that kind of impact on prices. It's really just a question of how much faster will house prices rise compared to incomes.

If that's really your concern, though, you should like higher density zoning. That generally makes the underlying property more valuable. The only way to both preserve the value of existing properties while facilitating the development of less expensive new homes is to allow higher density. Funny how math works.

It’s not the supply that’s the problem. It’s the change in the “character” of the neighborhood. And the fall in home values and people’s equity that goes with it. Once people catch on that this is going to be result, there’s going to be a seismic push-back.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Do they have any projections of the impact on schools? I feel like this would maybe add 10 families per year to an elementary school boundary area. Just based on how many houses would get sold in a year to a developer who chooses to build a duplex or triplex or quadplex. Not all of them have school-age kids and if they do not all at the same level. So maybe 2 kids per year to each elementary, 8-12 to middle and high schools? They should really be trying to calculate this and the cost to the school system and how that will be paid for. It will probably add more property tax revenue.

They don’t even have projections of how many units will be built or whether the strategy will cause prices to rise or fall. They assume it will make prices go down because they assume multiplexes won’t affect other apartment/condo production and because they didn’t take economics past Econ 101.

PP here. Number of units built seems very difficult to project. I can't imagine any projection would be remotely correct. I think the number of units would be marginal at best and the impact on prices will also be very marginal.

I'm curious though, are you saying if they build a quadplex that means 3 fewer units in a large apartment building?

I’m not looking for a precise number of units. I’m looking for rough orders of magnitude.

Yes, I am saying if they build quads (not just one, which won’t make a difference), will fewer large apartment building be built? I would put that in the category of bad outcomes because we would lose single family housing stock without adding any multi family units beyond what was going to be built anyway.

I think of duplexes etc. as very different from apartment buildings. They are essentially townhouses. They are attached single family homes.

Anyone who is talking about duplexes hasn’t been following this. The number of duplexes that get built would be in the dozens because the math doesn’t work well in most places. I agree that duplexes are different and would be helpful but so would unicorns. Townhouses would be good too and they work in a few more places.

Anything stacked is going to be a substitute for apartments. Most of the units added are going to be stacked because the math generally works better for those. We will trade SFH for apartments, which is bad for the housing market.

But what they are proposing making "by right" is small scale which is up to 2.5 stories. Quadplexes won't be allowed everywhere - that is for near transit/growth corridors. So they can't so three stacked units by right, perhaps 2 and 2 stacked units in some places. If what you are saying is right then most neighborhoods won't be impacted by this at all since they aren't going to build any significant number of side by side duplexes or triplexes.

A triplex is a basement apartment plus two above-ground apartments and fits within the 2.5-story envelope. 2x2s are also apartment substitutes. A lot of land will be available for apartment/condo construction, and some will be built. It’s hard to see how this doesn’t suppress starts on large projects, so at least some of the units gained through upzoning will be offset by large projects not built. In addition, the mere possibility of more units entering the market through small projects may make big developers less likely to build big projects. These are the hearts of our downtown cores, so if there’s a slowdown in production, it’s not just the housing market that will hurt.

Those are projects of very different scale, with different developers and different investors.

If it impacts large-scale projects at all, it would be because increased housing stock has reduced housing prices. That by itself would be good news.

I’m not suggesting capital would shift to multiplexes. I’m suggesting that demand is constant at a given price and the small apartment projects would draw demand from the large ones. Big developers definitely are aware of the competitive environment and avoid projects where there’s competition for consumers.

That would be a good sign. That would mean we're driving prices down.

Sure!

And those lower prices will take huge bites out of the equity people have in their houses and are depending upon for their retirement.

Wait till the General population figures that out. Then the fur will really fly.

The "I got mine" attitude that MoCo is known for.

Not that there's any chance we're going to significantly increase supply to have that kind of impact on prices. It's really just a question of how much faster will house prices rise compared to incomes.

If that's really your concern, though, you should like higher density zoning. That generally makes the underlying property more valuable. The only way to both preserve the value of existing properties while facilitating the development of less expensive new homes is to allow higher density. Funny how math works.

It’s not the supply that’s the problem. It’s the change in the “character” of the neighborhood. And the fall in home values and people’s equity that goes with it. Once people catch on that this is going to be result, there’s going to be a seismic push-back.

Supply is the problem, though. There's a lack of supply leading to unaffordable prices.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Very little of this thread seems to be about the effect on MCPS.

The main effect of this on MCPS is that the gap in the capital budget will get even bigger because impact fees are set below seat costs and because the Attainable Housing Strategy proposed setting some impact fees at zero. If you like overcrowded schools, this is your strategy.

The capital budget does not need to come from only impact fees. We paid for schools long before impact fees.

And it doesn’t come only from impact fees! It comes from impact fees, recordation tax, and GO bonds. We’ve had impact fees for more than 30 years and before that we had proffer. I don’t know why you’re so opposed to the county capturing part of the value it adds to land through taxes.

Paying for schools through local property taxes and income taxes is what we should do. But large one-time fees discourage the activity they're attached to. And we shouldn't be discouraging more housing.

Austin has the highest impact fees in its region and the fastest housing growth. I get that developers don’t want to pay taxes. No one does, really, but you’re overstating their impact on production. Developers usually spend more on lawyers to get their projects approved than they do on impact fees, so maybe we should work on getting rid of that really high cost, which doesn’t provide societal benefit, before we talk about lowering taxes.

Austin's impact fees are far less than Montgomery County's.

Not as a percentage of the median sales price. They anre about the same, with Austin maybe slightly higher.

Part of the value of a housing is the value of the infrastructure that services it. You think developers should be able to book all of that as profit. I think the county should recapture that value so it can build more nice things for the community.

Why don't we similarly tax home sales then?

We do. It’s called the recordation tax.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Very little of this thread seems to be about the effect on MCPS.

The main effect of this on MCPS is that the gap in the capital budget will get even bigger because impact fees are set below seat costs and because the Attainable Housing Strategy proposed setting some impact fees at zero. If you like overcrowded schools, this is your strategy.

The capital budget does not need to come from only impact fees. We paid for schools long before impact fees.

And it doesn’t come only from impact fees! It comes from impact fees, recordation tax, and GO bonds. We’ve had impact fees for more than 30 years and before that we had proffer. I don’t know why you’re so opposed to the county capturing part of the value it adds to land through taxes.

Paying for schools through local property taxes and income taxes is what we should do. But large one-time fees discourage the activity they're attached to. And we shouldn't be discouraging more housing.

Austin has the highest impact fees in its region and the fastest housing growth. I get that developers don’t want to pay taxes. No one does, really, but you’re overstating their impact on production. Developers usually spend more on lawyers to get their projects approved than they do on impact fees, so maybe we should work on getting rid of that really high cost, which doesn’t provide societal benefit, before we talk about lowering taxes.

Austin's impact fees are far less than Montgomery County's.

Not as a percentage of the median sales price. They anre about the same, with Austin maybe slightly higher.

Part of the value of a housing is the value of the infrastructure that services it. You think developers should be able to book all of that as profit. I think the county should recapture that value so it can build more nice things for the community.

Why don't we similarly tax home sales then?

We do. It’s called the recordation tax.

That's paid on new home sales, too, and is much less than the impact fees.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Very little of this thread seems to be about the effect on MCPS.

The main effect of this on MCPS is that the gap in the capital budget will get even bigger because impact fees are set below seat costs and because the Attainable Housing Strategy proposed setting some impact fees at zero. If you like overcrowded schools, this is your strategy.

The capital budget does not need to come from only impact fees. We paid for schools long before impact fees.

And it doesn’t come only from impact fees! It comes from impact fees, recordation tax, and GO bonds. We’ve had impact fees for more than 30 years and before that we had proffer. I don’t know why you’re so opposed to the county capturing part of the value it adds to land through taxes.

Paying for schools through local property taxes and income taxes is what we should do. But large one-time fees discourage the activity they're attached to. And we shouldn't be discouraging more housing.

Austin has the highest impact fees in its region and the fastest housing growth. I get that developers don’t want to pay taxes. No one does, really, but you’re overstating their impact on production. Developers usually spend more on lawyers to get their projects approved than they do on impact fees, so maybe we should work on getting rid of that really high cost, which doesn’t provide societal benefit, before we talk about lowering taxes.

Austin's impact fees are far less than Montgomery County's.

Not as a percentage of the median sales price. They anre about the same, with Austin maybe slightly higher.

Part of the value of a housing is the value of the infrastructure that services it. You think developers should be able to book all of that as profit. I think the county should recapture that value so it can build more nice things for the community.

They can and will-- through local taxes on the property and its occupants.

I'm not sure where you're getting the idea that Austin's is higher. Median sales prices are similar between MoCo and Austin, yet Austin's impact fees are about half that of MoCo's.

Austin single family detached median price was $600k in August.

MoCo single family detached median price was $810k in August.

A 33 percent spread isn’t similar. You don’t seem to have a very good handle on the numbers or the tax regime but you’re convinced we should let developers capture the value of public infrastructure as profit.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Very little of this thread seems to be about the effect on MCPS.

The main effect of this on MCPS is that the gap in the capital budget will get even bigger because impact fees are set below seat costs and because the Attainable Housing Strategy proposed setting some impact fees at zero. If you like overcrowded schools, this is your strategy.

The capital budget does not need to come from only impact fees. We paid for schools long before impact fees.

And it doesn’t come only from impact fees! It comes from impact fees, recordation tax, and GO bonds. We’ve had impact fees for more than 30 years and before that we had proffer. I don’t know why you’re so opposed to the county capturing part of the value it adds to land through taxes.

Paying for schools through local property taxes and income taxes is what we should do. But large one-time fees discourage the activity they're attached to. And we shouldn't be discouraging more housing.

Austin has the highest impact fees in its region and the fastest housing growth. I get that developers don’t want to pay taxes. No one does, really, but you’re overstating their impact on production. Developers usually spend more on lawyers to get their projects approved than they do on impact fees, so maybe we should work on getting rid of that really high cost, which doesn’t provide societal benefit, before we talk about lowering taxes.

Austin's impact fees are far less than Montgomery County's.

Not as a percentage of the median sales price. They anre about the same, with Austin maybe slightly higher.

Part of the value of a housing is the value of the infrastructure that services it. You think developers should be able to book all of that as profit. I think the county should recapture that value so it can build more nice things for the community.

Why don't we similarly tax home sales then?

We do. It’s called the recordation tax.

That's paid on new home sales, too, and is much less than the impact fees.

That depends. It’s not sensitive to the type of unit sold so for condos and expensive SFH the recordation tax is actually higher.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Some coverage of the meeting at BCC

https://moco360.media/2024/09/26/zoning-changes-major-opposition-at-bethesda-listening-session/

Not good coverage, poorly representing the concerns shared at the session.

They are spouting the same nonsense they did when they were working on the Bethesda Downtown Plan and the Woodmont Triangle. All we are seeing is the few affordable apartments (the oft derided Naturally Occurring Affordable Housing) and small or mid-sized houses being torn down to make way for low income housing and McMansions. Bethesda is becoming more split between government subsidized low income MPDUs and huge homes.

This is what voters want. Our local politicians have been targeting the middle class for the past 10-20 years.

Our ‘leaders’ have been slowly but surely squeezing out the middle class in MoCo.

Allowing developers to build duplexes or triplexes offers an alternative to McMansions.

What's your plan to build housing for the middle class?

There's also tons and tons of unused land further out.

In Frederick or Howard Co?

In the Ag Reserve.

And they can just teleport to their jobs.

Why not set up that darling of Planning, BRT? That actually might work well servicing a few central points along two routes, one east to Metro & job centers along 270 and one south through Potomac to cross Cabin John to Tysons.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Very little of this thread seems to be about the effect on MCPS.

The main effect of this on MCPS is that the gap in the capital budget will get even bigger because impact fees are set below seat costs and because the Attainable Housing Strategy proposed setting some impact fees at zero. If you like overcrowded schools, this is your strategy.

The capital budget does not need to come from only impact fees. We paid for schools long before impact fees.

And it doesn’t come only from impact fees! It comes from impact fees, recordation tax, and GO bonds. We’ve had impact fees for more than 30 years and before that we had proffer. I don’t know why you’re so opposed to the county capturing part of the value it adds to land through taxes.

Paying for schools through local property taxes and income taxes is what we should do. But large one-time fees discourage the activity they're attached to. And we shouldn't be discouraging more housing.

Austin has the highest impact fees in its region and the fastest housing growth. I get that developers don’t want to pay taxes. No one does, really, but you’re overstating their impact on production. Developers usually spend more on lawyers to get their projects approved than they do on impact fees, so maybe we should work on getting rid of that really high cost, which doesn’t provide societal benefit, before we talk about lowering taxes.

Austin's impact fees are far less than Montgomery County's.

Not as a percentage of the median sales price. They anre about the same, with Austin maybe slightly higher.

Part of the value of a housing is the value of the infrastructure that services it. You think developers should be able to book all of that as profit. I think the county should recapture that value so it can build more nice things for the community.

They can and will-- through local taxes on the property and its occupants.

I'm not sure where you're getting the idea that Austin's is higher. Median sales prices are similar between MoCo and Austin, yet Austin's impact fees are about half that of MoCo's.

Austin single family detached median price was $600k in August.

MoCo single family detached median price was $810k in August.

A 33 percent spread isn’t similar. You don’t seem to have a very good handle on the numbers or the tax regime but you’re convinced we should let developers capture the value of public infrastructure as profit.

Is that representative of the year, or is it an anomaly? The Planning justification/baseline for the crisis is based, in part, on MoCo SFH sales averaging in the mid 900s.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Very little of this thread seems to be about the effect on MCPS.

The main effect of this on MCPS is that the gap in the capital budget will get even bigger because impact fees are set below seat costs and because the Attainable Housing Strategy proposed setting some impact fees at zero. If you like overcrowded schools, this is your strategy.

The capital budget does not need to come from only impact fees. We paid for schools long before impact fees.

And it doesn’t come only from impact fees! It comes from impact fees, recordation tax, and GO bonds. We’ve had impact fees for more than 30 years and before that we had proffer. I don’t know why you’re so opposed to the county capturing part of the value it adds to land through taxes.

Paying for schools through local property taxes and income taxes is what we should do. But large one-time fees discourage the activity they're attached to. And we shouldn't be discouraging more housing.

Austin has the highest impact fees in its region and the fastest housing growth. I get that developers don’t want to pay taxes. No one does, really, but you’re overstating their impact on production. Developers usually spend more on lawyers to get their projects approved than they do on impact fees, so maybe we should work on getting rid of that really high cost, which doesn’t provide societal benefit, before we talk about lowering taxes.

Austin's impact fees are far less than Montgomery County's.

Not as a percentage of the median sales price. They anre about the same, with Austin maybe slightly higher.

Part of the value of a housing is the value of the infrastructure that services it. You think developers should be able to book all of that as profit. I think the county should recapture that value so it can build more nice things for the community.

They can and will-- through local taxes on the property and its occupants.

I'm not sure where you're getting the idea that Austin's is higher. Median sales prices are similar between MoCo and Austin, yet Austin's impact fees are about half that of MoCo's.

Austin single family detached median price was $600k in August.

MoCo single family detached median price was $810k in August.

A 33 percent spread isn’t similar. You don’t seem to have a very good handle on the numbers or the tax regime but you’re convinced we should let developers capture the value of public infrastructure as profit.

Is that representative of the year, or is it an anomaly? The Planning justification/baseline for the crisis is based, in part, on MoCo SFH sales averaging in the mid 900s.

I agree that we should build more SFH and collect taxes when they’re built. I’m sure Planning, having identified the most severe part of the housing crisis, has plans for increasing the SFH stock.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Very little of this thread seems to be about the effect on MCPS.

The main effect of this on MCPS is that the gap in the capital budget will get even bigger because impact fees are set below seat costs and because the Attainable Housing Strategy proposed setting some impact fees at zero. If you like overcrowded schools, this is your strategy.

The capital budget does not need to come from only impact fees. We paid for schools long before impact fees.

And it doesn’t come only from impact fees! It comes from impact fees, recordation tax, and GO bonds. We’ve had impact fees for more than 30 years and before that we had proffer. I don’t know why you’re so opposed to the county capturing part of the value it adds to land through taxes.

Paying for schools through local property taxes and income taxes is what we should do. But large one-time fees discourage the activity they're attached to. And we shouldn't be discouraging more housing.

Austin has the highest impact fees in its region and the fastest housing growth. I get that developers don’t want to pay taxes. No one does, really, but you’re overstating their impact on production. Developers usually spend more on lawyers to get their projects approved than they do on impact fees, so maybe we should work on getting rid of that really high cost, which doesn’t provide societal benefit, before we talk about lowering taxes.

Austin's impact fees are far less than Montgomery County's.

Not as a percentage of the median sales price. They anre about the same, with Austin maybe slightly higher.

Part of the value of a housing is the value of the infrastructure that services it. You think developers should be able to book all of that as profit. I think the county should recapture that value so it can build more nice things for the community.

They can and will-- through local taxes on the property and its occupants.

I'm not sure where you're getting the idea that Austin's is higher. Median sales prices are similar between MoCo and Austin, yet Austin's impact fees are about half that of MoCo's.

Austin single family detached median price was $600k in August.

MoCo single family detached median price was $810k in August.

A 33 percent spread isn’t similar. You don’t seem to have a very good handle on the numbers or the tax regime but you’re convinced we should let developers capture the value of public infrastructure as profit.

If that's what you think is going on, then why are we letting curent homeowners pocket "the value of public infrastructure as profit"? The recordation tax is paid on new home sales, too, so that doesn't explain the difference.

The development impact fees for a townhome in Montgomery County total $33k-$57k, depending on the area. In Austin, they are between $2200 and $13900. That's a big difference.