Arlington "missing middle"

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:How about as a thought experiment we see if the net effect of this is to raise or lower the price of houses in Arlington? My bet is on raising. Tearing down a 900K house and building three 1.1 million townhomes does not solve an affordability crisis. Plus the price of land just jumped considerably.

Also for fun, will this make Arlington more or less diverse? My bet is on less.

Oh sure, it is well known that when you increase the supply of something, the price goes up.

Wait, what?

What you are missing is the old Arlington real estate market is now dead. Every single lot in Arlington just got a lot more $$$. Before you could build one house. Now you can build 6. Some lots will now be worth double what they were before. Wait and see. This is not going to make the market more affordable.

So the number of housing units that can be put on a lot will increase sixfold, while the price of the lot only doubles, but that won't make more units more affordable for more people? Huh.

DP - it takes money to build out the lot once you own it. More units mean more kitchens, bathrooms, etc. They won’t be any cheaper than an equivalent sized unit in a high rise.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:How about as a thought experiment we see if the net effect of this is to raise or lower the price of houses in Arlington? My bet is on raising. Tearing down a 900K house and building three 1.1 million townhomes does not solve an affordability crisis. Plus the price of land just jumped considerably.

Also for fun, will this make Arlington more or less diverse? My bet is on less.

Oh sure, it is well known that when you increase the supply of something, the price goes up.

Wait, what?

What you are missing is the old Arlington real estate market is now dead. Every single lot in Arlington just got a lot more $$$. Before you could build one house. Now you can build 6. Some lots will now be worth double what they were before. Wait and see. This is not going to make the market more affordable.

So the number of housing units that can be put on a lot will increase sixfold, while the price of the lot only doubles, but that won't make more units more affordable for more people? Huh.

Listen. Anything 4 and above is likely to be an apartment. The money to be made here is duplexes and townhomes which will sell on a unit basis. I did the math for you before, but I'll try again. Right now there is a lot in Lyon Park that sold for $900K. A developer is going to build three townhomes on it for $1.1 million each. (And make a killing, by the way, but that same lot will now sell for $1.5.) So you replace one unit that cost $900K with three units that cost $1.1 million. Cost per unit goes up. That's the math.

[Anonymous]

Developers will get their way. Money talks and the BOS is all ears.

[Anonymous]

Also, for fun, your 1.1 million home just became a teardown. Welcome to Arlington! Does that sound more affordable to you?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:How about as a thought experiment we see if the net effect of this is to raise or lower the price of houses in Arlington? My bet is on raising. Tearing down a 900K house and building three 1.1 million townhomes does not solve an affordability crisis. Plus the price of land just jumped considerably.

Also for fun, will this make Arlington more or less diverse? My bet is on less.

Oh sure, it is well known that when you increase the supply of something, the price goes up.

Wait, what?

What you are missing is the old Arlington real estate market is now dead. Every single lot in Arlington just got a lot more $$$. Before you could build one house. Now you can build 6. Some lots will now be worth double what they were before. Wait and see. This is not going to make the market more affordable.

So the number of housing units that can be put on a lot will increase sixfold, while the price of the lot only doubles, but that won't make more units more affordable for more people? Huh.

Listen. Anything 4 and above is likely to be an apartment. The money to be made here is duplexes and townhomes which will sell on a unit basis. I did the math for you before, but I'll try again. Right now there is a lot in Lyon Park that sold for $900K. A developer is going to build three townhomes on it for $1.1 million each. (And make a killing, by the way, but that same lot will now sell for $1.5.) So you replace one unit that cost $900K with three units that cost $1.1 million. Cost per unit goes up. That's the math.

Apartments aren't housing? People can't live in apartments?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:How about as a thought experiment we see if the net effect of this is to raise or lower the price of houses in Arlington? My bet is on raising. Tearing down a 900K house and building three 1.1 million townhomes does not solve an affordability crisis. Plus the price of land just jumped considerably.

Also for fun, will this make Arlington more or less diverse? My bet is on less.

Oh sure, it is well known that when you increase the supply of something, the price goes up.

Wait, what?

What you are missing is the old Arlington real estate market is now dead. Every single lot in Arlington just got a lot more $$$. Before you could build one house. Now you can build 6. Some lots will now be worth double what they were before. Wait and see. This is not going to make the market more affordable.

So the number of housing units that can be put on a lot will increase sixfold, while the price of the lot only doubles, but that won't make more units more affordable for more people? Huh.

Listen. Anything 4 and above is likely to be an apartment. The money to be made here is duplexes and townhomes which will sell on a unit basis. I did the math for you before, but I'll try again. Right now there is a lot in Lyon Park that sold for $900K. A developer is going to build three townhomes on it for $1.1 million each. (And make a killing, by the way, but that same lot will now sell for $1.5.) So you replace one unit that cost $900K with three units that cost $1.1 million. Cost per unit goes up. That's the math.

Apartments aren't housing? People can't live in apartments?

Of course they are. But developers are the ones controlling what will get built here, and they will build for max profit. 3 townhomes on a lot is where the money is. Do the math. Building a 6-plex to make money you have to sell it as a condo. There's no money in that. If people wanted condos, they would buy condos. We have plenty of condos. They won't sell like 3 townhomes will sell.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Also, for fun, your 1.1 million home just became a teardown. Welcome to Arlington! Does that sound more affordable to you?

+1

Anyone have friends in Marin County?

They tear down 3M homes. All in the name of progressive politics.

And they are filled with people making 2M a year..... all day long.

This will do nothing for the poor and impoverished.

That’s ok. It’s not meant to help the poor and impoverished.
It’s meant to help the Arlington level middle class

Arlington middle class could afford a condo now if they wanted one. That's the irony. One of the most outspoken pro-MM people I know recently bought a SFH. Complained about how long it took to do that, but could have bought a condo years ago. That's not what they wanted. They wanted a SFH. That's what a lot of people want. The price of SFH in Arlington is going to go way up now, too.

All those foolish people, successfully advocating for a policy that, if they had only listened to you, they would have understood they should have advocated unsuccessfully against!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:How about as a thought experiment we see if the net effect of this is to raise or lower the price of houses in Arlington? My bet is on raising. Tearing down a 900K house and building three 1.1 million townhomes does not solve an affordability crisis. Plus the price of land just jumped considerably.

Also for fun, will this make Arlington more or less diverse? My bet is on less.

Oh sure, it is well known that when you increase the supply of something, the price goes up.

Wait, what?

What you are missing is the old Arlington real estate market is now dead. Every single lot in Arlington just got a lot more $$$. Before you could build one house. Now you can build 6. Some lots will now be worth double what they were before. Wait and see. This is not going to make the market more affordable.

I really wonder if this will be the case. In my eyes it could go either way. And that’s terrifying for homeowners. This should have been on a ballot. I’m not sure the county did its due diligence. Has the CB put ANY restrictions on lots (square footage of x can have only a duplex, etc.)?

[Anonymous]

I don’t know exactly what will get built in Arlington but the duplexes in a place like Vancouver are gorgeous and way more attractive than the crappy new single-family houses currently getting built in Arlington.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:How about as a thought experiment we see if the net effect of this is to raise or lower the price of houses in Arlington? My bet is on raising. Tearing down a 900K house and building three 1.1 million townhomes does not solve an affordability crisis. Plus the price of land just jumped considerably.

Also for fun, will this make Arlington more or less diverse? My bet is on less.

I wish I knew the answers. All I think is that this will have several unforeseen (by the County Board) consequences.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I don’t know exactly what will get built in Arlington but the duplexes in a place like Vancouver are gorgeous and way more attractive than the crappy new single-family houses currently getting built in Arlington.

Agree, there are lots of beautiful places in other cities… but has the board put any restrictions and safeguards in place?
Or is it all up to the developer now? If so, they won’t care about aesthetics, I’m afraid.

[Anonymous]

By the time the dust settles on this the developers will have laughed all the way to the bank. Good luck, Arlington residents. You were sold out on this.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I don’t know exactly what will get built in Arlington but the duplexes in a place like Vancouver are gorgeous and way more attractive than the crappy new single-family houses currently getting built in Arlington.

If Arlington had proposed duplexes and kept parking requirements, there would not have been the same uproar over this. Esp. if they implemented it with caps.

Instead it's three times the people with half the parking! 6-plexes by right! On every lot!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:MM is a solution looking for a problem.

Building 6-plex apartments on single family lots isn't the solution. Arlington has plenty of apartments. What everyone wants is a single family home in Arlington but just can't afford it. So, sorry, but that's the way the free market works.

https://www.zillow.com/homedetails/651-S-Greenbrier-St-Arlington-VA-22204/12090510_zpid/

This is $820k. Are the proposed duplexes and THs really going to be priced lower than that?

Maybe they will, maybe they won't, but at minimum, there will be more of them. And we know the relationship between supply, demand, and price. That's the way the free market works, right?

Yes, we do. More supply invites more demand.

NIMBY logic at its finest.

I don't know how you can spout this nonsense with a straight face. Just take the mask off, embrace it. "I don't want to build anything because I got mine and screw everyone else."

Under Arlington County bulding code, a duplex is defined as one unit stacked on top of another. Neither side (include the Arlington County Board) understands that a stacked duplex will be cheaper than a semi-detached side by side housing units (which they refer to as a duplex). Except for the semi-detached and townhouses, the new units will be fee simple and sold primarily to owner occupants. The plexes are more likely to be sold to investors who can use them for passive income. Most will be rentals because of the problems with creating condo ownership with only 3 to 6 unit owners. Existing DC houses that were converted to 3 to 8 condo units have had horrible issues with rapidly increasing condo fees and homeowners who will not volunteer to be on the condo board.

We own 13 rental houses in Arlington. Builders have been after us to sell the for tear downs and new houses. We are waiting to see what they will pay after MM is passed.

Oh my oh my re: the condo association with only 6 units.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I don’t know exactly what will get built in Arlington but the duplexes in a place like Vancouver are gorgeous and way more attractive than the crappy new single-family houses currently getting built in Arlington.

Agree, there are lots of beautiful places in other cities… but has the board put any restrictions and safeguards in place?
Or is it all up to the developer now? If so, they won’t care about aesthetics, I’m afraid.

What restrictions and safeguards are there about the aesthetics of McMansions?