What do you think of YIMBYs?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:This "entitlement" stuff really relies on twisting the literal meaning of YIMBY. I live in upper NW Ward 3, in a single-family house that we own, and I'm in favor of building much more density here, especially affordable housing but also both small and large apartment buildings. So I'd consider myself a YIMBY because -- unlike NIMBYs -- I don't oppose new development near my house ("in my backyard"). How is it "entitled" for me to want things to happen that, according to all the people here who oppose YIMBYism, will make my neighborhood less pleasant, change its character, reduce my home value and increase crowding in my kids' schools?

Wow look at you saving the world by sharing your remarkable neighborhood with the poors!!! Except now less desirable Places like suitland and SE DC will never get sufficiently developed and resourced, whoops! Yimby’s like you are well meaning but just make greedy developers richer.

Just look at Houston which has no zoning laws and it’s just a sprawling traffic nightmare clusterf$ck with much worse class segregation than dc.

You can't be against gentrification but for upzoning. Gentrification arguably damages poorer areas, while upzoning damages richer areas. Gentrification at least allows some poorer families who happen to own land in a poorer neighborhood to get a financial benefit. Upzoning simply takes money from the rich in the form of reduced property values. I suggest a preferred approach would be to improve poorer neighborhoods. You can either pull down the top, or you can pull up the bottom. I prefer the latter.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I concur with a PP who stated that YIMBYism relies on a basic failure of understanding economics. But it’s worse than that, because it’s also a failure of understanding basic finance.

If the expectation is that increasing the supply of infill housing units will drive down rental costs, then no one would invest in multi-family residential RE because there would be no profit.

Trust me, the PE funds, REITs, asset managers and developers understand the finance and economics of this a lot more than you do and they will never, ever invest in anything without a near guarantee of maximizing profits at high margins.

Also, I find it a bit odd that YIMBYs claim that we desperately need housing but turn their noses up at the new housing that is built or just pretend that it doesn’t exist. Just because you personally don’t like the tens of thousands of new units of single family homes, townhomes and apartments being built in Clarksburg or Leesburg doesn’t mean that it’s not real and that a lot of people do want it and prefer it.

Tearing up farms to build farther out is not sustainable. What happens when there is no more arable land, so that people can have single family houses?

And here we go. This is where you totally lose me because it is clear that you are only thinking about the bubble of you and your cohort’s limited wants and needs.

As you yourself confirm, the YIMBY calls for more housing come with an asterisk. I guess the acronym should be changed to “yes, but only in the yards that I want.”

If your foundational belief is doing everything possible to increase affordable market rate housing supply, the truth is that new build greenfield housing has historically been the only proven and effective means to do it. Which makes it odd that it is the only type of housing that you absolutely do not want.

If you got out of your bubble, what you would learn is that:
- Way more people live in the suburbs than in the city.
- Way more jobs in the suburbs than in the city.
- Greenfield is the only housing type that can be built at low unit cost to provide market rate “affordable housing”.
- These new developments are highly racially integrated, particularly including a lot of immigrant families realizing their own American dream.
- The most “dense” cities in the world have massive suburbs. Manhattan, for example, is surrounded by a 4 state area of suburbs of varying density extending from northern NJ, to PA, to the Hudson River Valley, to Fairfield and up to New Haven and the across Island Sound.

I think you all need to get out and start meeting people outside of your limited friend groups. Pretty ironic for people that have somehow anointed themselves as the champions of diversity.

It’s funny to me that

Ok, so at some point, there won't be more greenspace to build on.
Your vision maximizes car dependency, and is the least efficient use of land, or transportation investment and sprawl. It is such a loser game to keep doing what doesn't work until there is nothing left.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:This "entitlement" stuff really relies on twisting the literal meaning of YIMBY. I live in upper NW Ward 3, in a single-family house that we own, and I'm in favor of building much more density here, especially affordable housing but also both small and large apartment buildings. So I'd consider myself a YIMBY because -- unlike NIMBYs -- I don't oppose new development near my house ("in my backyard"). How is it "entitled" for me to want things to happen that, according to all the people here who oppose YIMBYism, will make my neighborhood less pleasant, change its character, reduce my home value and increase crowding in my kids' schools?

May I ask you, Ward 3, where all this density you desire will be built? Tearing down 1920s homes and trees, perhaps? Building on the small pieces of greenspace that exist?

Maybe you ask AU to build some of that housing on its campus? Instead of dorms?

There is a tremendous amount of development going on now (view from Maine Avenue and over to Nats park and then some) in D.C. But - yes, you do you and build a condo in your back yard.

I am a different Ward 3 resident.

There are a ton of surface parking lots that can be developed.
The Wardman as a site can be a lot of new buildings.
The entirety of Friendship Heights can be redeveloped.
There can be moderate increased density allowed on parts of Connecticut Avenue that could allow for some expansions or infill development.
Property owners can be encouraged to add ADUs.
Just like all of those garden apartments, there can be added density in that form up and down all of our transit corridors.
There can be new structures built that look like a single family home, but are, in fact, 2,3 or 4-plexes.

So yes, there are a lot of places where new density can go without impinging on your single family house.

Sounds charming! Send us your traffic impact reports on Western/Wisconsin area and Connecticut - which already has a slew of condo buildings. Maybe bring a Dollar Store or Five Below too.

Add bus and bike lanes and make it harder for people to keep wasting space with single occupancy vehicles. Frankly, I don't care how suburbanites need to get into the city. They chose to live "out there" - why should I sacrifice and subsidize their choices with the quality of life on our streets?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

You pick your neighborhood because of the characters of the residences there! You can always change/remodel/rebuild your residence; you yourself can't change the character of the neighboring residences. If you buy a SFH in a neighborhood, you want a neighborhood of SFHs, not something else. The end result of upzoning will be the departure of folks from DC. DC has done well financially over the last several decades, because they wealthy have done well. If you drive them out, you lose your tax base. What COVID has made clear is that many of these folks do not need to be in DC. In fact, the number of folks working remotely from beach houses is huge.

The wealthy aren't leaving DC. It is where things happen, where the action is. The US is shifting to the global urban model where the dontowns have the wealthy and the middle and lower classes are forced to the suburbs and related inconvenicenes of bad location and housing stock.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

You pick your neighborhood because of the characters of the residences there! You can always change/remodel/rebuild your residence; you yourself can't change the character of the neighboring residences. If you buy a SFH in a neighborhood, you want a neighborhood of SFHs, not something else. The end result of upzoning will be the departure of folks from DC. DC has done well financially over the last several decades, because they wealthy have done well. If you drive them out, you lose your tax base. What COVID has made clear is that many of these folks do not need to be in DC. In fact, the number of folks working remotely from beach houses is huge.

The wealthy aren't leaving DC. It is where things happen, where the action is. The US is shifting to the global urban model where the dontowns have the wealthy and the middle and lower classes are forced to the suburbs and related inconvenicenes of bad location and housing stock.

I don't know any "wealthy" people who left beltway suburbs to move to DC. nope. You must be young and/or transplant. Real estate in NOVA is BOOMING. And people are fleeing cities right now.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:This "entitlement" stuff really relies on twisting the literal meaning of YIMBY. I live in upper NW Ward 3, in a single-family house that we own, and I'm in favor of building much more density here, especially affordable housing but also both small and large apartment buildings. So I'd consider myself a YIMBY because -- unlike NIMBYs -- I don't oppose new development near my house ("in my backyard"). How is it "entitled" for me to want things to happen that, according to all the people here who oppose YIMBYism, will make my neighborhood less pleasant, change its character, reduce my home value and increase crowding in my kids' schools?

May I ask you, Ward 3, where all this density you desire will be built? Tearing down 1920s homes and trees, perhaps? Building on the small pieces of greenspace that exist?

Maybe you ask AU to build some of that housing on its campus? Instead of dorms?

There is a tremendous amount of development going on now (view from Maine Avenue and over to Nats park and then some) in D.C. But - yes, you do you and build a condo in your back yard.

I am a different Ward 3 resident.

There are a ton of surface parking lots that can be developed.
The Wardman as a site can be a lot of new buildings.
The entirety of Friendship Heights can be redeveloped.
There can be moderate increased density allowed on parts of Connecticut Avenue that could allow for some expansions or infill development.
Property owners can be encouraged to add ADUs.
Just like all of those garden apartments, there can be added density in that form up and down all of our transit corridors.
There can be new structures built that look like a single family home, but are, in fact, 2,3 or 4-plexes.

So yes, there are a lot of places where new density can go without impinging on your single family house.

Sounds charming! Send us your traffic impact reports on Western/Wisconsin area and Connecticut - which already has a slew of condo buildings. Maybe bring a Dollar Store or Five Below too.

Add bus and bike lanes and make it harder for people to keep wasting space with single occupancy vehicles. Frankly, I don't care how suburbanites need to get into the city. They chose to live "out there" - why should I sacrifice and subsidize their choices with the quality of life on our streets?

If you think that DC would survive without the subordinates, I have a used car to sell you.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I concur with a PP who stated that YIMBYism relies on a basic failure of understanding economics. But it’s worse than that, because it’s also a failure of understanding basic finance.

If the expectation is that increasing the supply of infill housing units will drive down rental costs, then no one would invest in multi-family residential RE because there would be no profit.

Trust me, the PE funds, REITs, asset managers and developers understand the finance and economics of this a lot more than you do and they will never, ever invest in anything without a near guarantee of maximizing profits at high margins.

Also, I find it a bit odd that YIMBYs claim that we desperately need housing but turn their noses up at the new housing that is built or just pretend that it doesn’t exist. Just because you personally don’t like the tens of thousands of new units of single family homes, townhomes and apartments being built in Clarksburg or Leesburg doesn’t mean that it’s not real and that a lot of people do want it and prefer it.

Tearing up farms to build farther out is not sustainable. What happens when there is no more arable land, so that people can have single family houses?

I think you are under the illusion that the people buying homes on those torn up farms work in DC. They do not. They work out there. Their are entire business communities in this region that have nothing to do with DC, and want nothing to do with DC.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

You pick your neighborhood because of the characters of the residences there! You can always change/remodel/rebuild your residence; you yourself can't change the character of the neighboring residences. If you buy a SFH in a neighborhood, you want a neighborhood of SFHs, not something else. The end result of upzoning will be the departure of folks from DC. DC has done well financially over the last several decades, because they wealthy have done well. If you drive them out, you lose your tax base. What COVID has made clear is that many of these folks do not need to be in DC. In fact, the number of folks working remotely from beach houses is huge.

The wealthy aren't leaving DC. It is where things happen, where the action is. The US is shifting to the global urban model where the dontowns have the wealthy and the middle and lower classes are forced to the suburbs and related inconvenicenes of bad location and housing stock.

Yes. They are. And they certainly will even more so if upzoning continues to be pushed.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

You pick your neighborhood because of the characters of the residences there! You can always change/remodel/rebuild your residence; you yourself can't change the character of the neighboring residences. If you buy a SFH in a neighborhood, you want a neighborhood of SFHs, not something else. The end result of upzoning will be the departure of folks from DC. DC has done well financially over the last several decades, because they wealthy have done well. If you drive them out, you lose your tax base. What COVID has made clear is that many of these folks do not need to be in DC. In fact, the number of folks working remotely from beach houses is huge.

The wealthy aren't leaving DC. It is where things happen, where the action is. The US is shifting to the global urban model where the dontowns have the wealthy and the middle and lower classes are forced to the suburbs and related inconvenicenes of bad location and housing stock.

I don't know any "wealthy" people who left beltway suburbs to move to DC. nope. You must be young and/or transplant. Real estate in NOVA is BOOMING. And people are fleeing cities right now.

Nope, native Washingtonian. Compare the quality of housing stock. Who wants cookie cutter tyvek and pressboard suburban sprawl? Yes, real estate EVERYWHERE is booming. But the trope about people leaving cities is actually false.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I concur with a PP who stated that YIMBYism relies on a basic failure of understanding economics. But it’s worse than that, because it’s also a failure of understanding basic finance.

If the expectation is that increasing the supply of infill housing units will drive down rental costs, then no one would invest in multi-family residential RE because there would be no profit.

Trust me, the PE funds, REITs, asset managers and developers understand the finance and economics of this a lot more than you do and they will never, ever invest in anything without a near guarantee of maximizing profits at high margins.

Also, I find it a bit odd that YIMBYs claim that we desperately need housing but turn their noses up at the new housing that is built or just pretend that it doesn’t exist. Just because you personally don’t like the tens of thousands of new units of single family homes, townhomes and apartments being built in Clarksburg or Leesburg doesn’t mean that it’s not real and that a lot of people do want it and prefer it.

Tearing up farms to build farther out is not sustainable. What happens when there is no more arable land, so that people can have single family houses?

I think you are under the illusion that the people buying homes on those torn up farms work in DC. They do not. They work out there. Their are entire business communities in this region that have nothing to do with DC, and want nothing to do with DC.

good. We don't want anything to do with them. But guess what, they come to the city to take their kids to the zoo, or a Nats game, or a rock concert, or the art museum. We don't go to the suburbs. Ever.

[Anonymous]

Upzoning reduces gentrification.
Upzoning reduces gentrification.
Upzoning reduces gentrification.

Anonymous wrote:
You can't be against gentrification but for upzoning. Gentrification arguably damages poorer areas, while upzoning damages richer areas. Gentrification at least allows some poorer families who happen to own land in a poorer neighborhood to get a financial benefit. Upzoning simply takes money from the rich in the form of reduced property values. I suggest a preferred approach would be to improve poorer neighborhoods. You can either pull down the top, or you can pull up the bottom. I prefer the latter.

Upzoning reduces gentrification.

Upzoning Ward 3 would create more housing units. This would create more places for people to live. Prices in other parts of DC would go down.

This is why upzoning reduces gentrification.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I concur with a PP who stated that YIMBYism relies on a basic failure of understanding economics. But it’s worse than that, because it’s also a failure of understanding basic finance.

If the expectation is that increasing the supply of infill housing units will drive down rental costs, then no one would invest in multi-family residential RE because there would be no profit.

Trust me, the PE funds, REITs, asset managers and developers understand the finance and economics of this a lot more than you do and they will never, ever invest in anything without a near guarantee of maximizing profits at high margins.

Also, I find it a bit odd that YIMBYs claim that we desperately need housing but turn their noses up at the new housing that is built or just pretend that it doesn’t exist. Just because you personally don’t like the tens of thousands of new units of single family homes, townhomes and apartments being built in Clarksburg or Leesburg doesn’t mean that it’s not real and that a lot of people do want it and prefer it.

Tearing up farms to build farther out is not sustainable. What happens when there is no more arable land, so that people can have single family houses?

And here we go. This is where you totally lose me because it is clear that you are only thinking about the bubble of you and your cohort’s limited wants and needs.

As you yourself confirm, the YIMBY calls for more housing come with an asterisk. I guess the acronym should be changed to “yes, but only in the yards that I want.”

If your foundational belief is doing everything possible to increase affordable market rate housing supply, the truth is that new build greenfield housing has historically been the only proven and effective means to do it. Which makes it odd that it is the only type of housing that you absolutely do not want.

If you got out of your bubble, what you would learn is that:
- Way more people live in the suburbs than in the city.
- Way more jobs in the suburbs than in the city.
- Greenfield is the only housing type that can be built at low unit cost to provide market rate “affordable housing”.
- These new developments are highly racially integrated, particularly including a lot of immigrant families realizing their own American dream.
- The most “dense” cities in the world have massive suburbs. Manhattan, for example, is surrounded by a 4 state area of suburbs of varying density extending from northern NJ, to PA, to the Hudson River Valley, to Fairfield and up to New Haven and the across Island Sound.

I think you all need to get out and start meeting people outside of your limited friend groups. Pretty ironic for people that have somehow anointed themselves as the champions of diversity.

It’s funny to me that

Ok, so at some point, there won't be more greenspace to build on.
Your vision maximizes car dependency, and is the least efficient use of land, or transportation investment and sprawl. It is such a loser game to keep doing what doesn't work until there is nothing left.

For people that consider the supply of housing to be a crisis that requires extreme measures, it’s funny to me that you believe housing should only be increased within the policy constraints that fit your priors.

Apparently everyone else needs to compromise and sacrifice in order to provide for ensuring that the objective that you want is met except for you, the actual chief promoters of the objective.

In short, according to YIMBYs, zoning is bad except for when it’s good and the free market is good, except for when it’s bad.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:This "entitlement" stuff really relies on twisting the literal meaning of YIMBY. I live in upper NW Ward 3, in a single-family house that we own, and I'm in favor of building much more density here, especially affordable housing but also both small and large apartment buildings. So I'd consider myself a YIMBY because -- unlike NIMBYs -- I don't oppose new development near my house ("in my backyard"). How is it "entitled" for me to want things to happen that, according to all the people here who oppose YIMBYism, will make my neighborhood less pleasant, change its character, reduce my home value and increase crowding in my kids' schools?

Wow look at you saving the world by sharing your remarkable neighborhood with the poors!!! Except now less desirable Places like suitland and SE DC will never get sufficiently developed and resourced, whoops! Yimby’s like you are well meaning but just make greedy developers richer.

Just look at Houston which has no zoning laws and it’s just a sprawling traffic nightmare clusterf$ck with much worse class segregation than dc.

You can't be against gentrification but for upzoning. Gentrification arguably damages poorer areas, while upzoning damages richer areas. Gentrification at least allows some poorer families who happen to own land in a poorer neighborhood to get a financial benefit. Upzoning simply takes money from the rich in the form of reduced property values. I suggest a preferred approach would be to improve poorer neighborhoods. You can either pull down the top, or you can pull up the bottom. I prefer the latter.

How does upzoning damage richer areas? Is 14th Street or the Wharf damaged? Navy Yard? Those areas are thriving with retail and fun activities, and housing that is 6 and 7 figures.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

You pick your neighborhood because of the characters of the residences there! You can always change/remodel/rebuild your residence; you yourself can't change the character of the neighboring residences. If you buy a SFH in a neighborhood, you want a neighborhood of SFHs, not something else. The end result of upzoning will be the departure of folks from DC. DC has done well financially over the last several decades, because they wealthy have done well. If you drive them out, you lose your tax base. What COVID has made clear is that many of these folks do not need to be in DC. In fact, the number of folks working remotely from beach houses is huge.

The wealthy aren't leaving DC. It is where things happen, where the action is. The US is shifting to the global urban model where the dontowns have the wealthy and the middle and lower classes are forced to the suburbs and related inconvenicenes of bad location and housing stock.

I don't know any "wealthy" people who left beltway suburbs to move to DC. nope. You must be young and/or transplant. Real estate in NOVA is BOOMING. And people are fleeing cities right now.

Keep watching Fox and reading DC Examiner and WSJ. They surely don’t distort what they tell you about cities! You won’t be misinformed about any issues going forward this way!!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Upzoning reduces gentrification.
Upzoning reduces gentrification.
Upzoning reduces gentrification.

Anonymous wrote:
You can't be against gentrification but for upzoning. Gentrification arguably damages poorer areas, while upzoning damages richer areas. Gentrification at least allows some poorer families who happen to own land in a poorer neighborhood to get a financial benefit. Upzoning simply takes money from the rich in the form of reduced property values. I suggest a preferred approach would be to improve poorer neighborhoods. You can either pull down the top, or you can pull up the bottom. I prefer the latter.

Upzoning reduces gentrification.

Upzoning Ward 3 would create more housing units. This would create more places for people to live. Prices in other parts of DC would go down.

This is why upzoning reduces gentrification.

So, you are for destroying rich SFH neighborhoods but not for destroying poorer areas. On what basis? Why not simply improve poorer neighborhoods?