We need homes. A lot of homes. Not just affordable, but also middle-income homes.
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Anonymous
It's not run by a group of extremely privileged white people, it's run by a diverse group of people who use evidence-based and proven approaches to encourage more-affordable housing and development that benefits a broad constituency, not just the parochial interests of existing homeowners. Next time, just come out and admit that your guiding philosophy is "f*ck you, I've got mine," it'll save us all some time. |
Anonymous
Hmm, the PP cited an actual person, who is white and rich. You just made claims. |
Anonymous
| Oh OK. So the worker bees all appear to be padding their fairly patchy journalism resumes, and the Board all seem to be in be "in" real estate..don't see much diversity there. |
Anonymous
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Increasing density drives housing prices up because it creates economies of scale for businesses.
When lots of people are packed into an area, restaurants and bars and boutiques want to be there too because they want foot traffic. People in turn want to live near walking distance of those restaurants and bars, which drives up demand to live in that area, which increases prices. That creates more incentive to build housing there, which draws even more businesses (more customers!), which leads more people to want to live there, which further drives up housing prices. It's an upward spiral that would have never begun if there wasn't a critical mass of people living in an area (in condos and apartments) in the first place. This is why a 800 square foot condo in Navy Yard costs more than a single family home in Michigan Park. |
Anonymous
Obviously then, the ideal housing policy is to make your jurisdiction a place where nobody wants to live! Or something. |
Anonymous
That's... certainly a hypothesis, but it is not borne out by data or research. Overwhelmingly, more supply lowers prices: https://docs.wixstatic.com/ugd/7fc2bf_ee1737c3c9d4468881bf1434814a6f8f.pdf https://research.upjohn.org/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1334&context=up_workingpapers https://lao.ca.gov/Publications/Report/3345 https://www.dropbox.com/s/oplls6utgf7z6ih/Pennington_JMP.pdf?dl=0 |
Anonymous
You keep saying this. But Navy Yard condos cost more than Michigan Park houses because they were all built as expensive luxury units in the last decade (or last couple of years), not because it's dense. And comparing Navy Yard, which was mostly not a residential area before the relatively recent development there, to longtime residential neighborhoods doesn't make much sense, anyway — it wasn't just that density increased, it was that suddenly there were people living there in large numbers, period, regardless of how many of them there are per square mile. What does drive up prices in a lot of neighborhoods is gentrification. But increased density in already wealthy neighborhoods does not drive up housing prices per square foot, it lowers them by making it possible to rent or buy apartments rather than only big single-family homes. A growing population with more disposable income may drive up rents for the bars/restaurants/businesses you say will flock to the area, but it doesn't drive up prices for housing if housing is already expensive. I see another poster has linked to various studies that have come to different conclusions than you have, too. |
Anonymous
increased density never actually happens in wealthy neighborhoods. it *only* happens in poorer neighborhoods. |
Anonymous
Here's a study from an outfit called the Federal Reserve: "We find that the rent elasticity is low, and thus marginal reductions in supply constraints alone are unlikely to meaningfully reduce rent burdens. The reason for this result appears to be that rental rates are more closely determined by the level of amenities in a neighborhood—as in a Rosen-Roback spatial equilibrium framework—than by the supply of housing." https://www.federalreserve.gov/econres/feds/files/2018035pap.pdf Of course you dont really need academic studies to show this. You can just look at the history of most any neighborhood in DC. |
Anonymous
Did you even read the paper? It doesn't actually say what you think it says. It's based on a simulation model - that one must put a nontrivial amount of faith in to begin with - that estimates the impact on median rents in the most expensive areas of as a result of improving amenities in the least expensive areas of town. For Washington DC, adding 5% to the supply of housing reduces median rent more than improving amenities in the least expensive areas of town if construction costs are low, and about as much if construction costs are high. Not only does that not refute any of the research I posted, that conclusion isn't relevant to this discussion. |
Anonymous
Closer to home, Montgomery Planning has done real world studies that show new construction stops when rents fall (most recently in the North Bethesda area), so achieving the mythical oversupply that would result in falling rents doesn't actually happen in real life, at least around here. Big landlords prefer to warehouse units or convert them to short-term rentals rather than getting locked into lower rents. Make it more expensive to delay projects, warehouse units, and convert to AirBnBs, and you'll make a dent in the housing shortfall. The best Montgomery County has been able to achieve despite being all in on urbanism is a housing policy that prevents rents from rising too quickly in Silver Spring without delivering affordable housing in Bethesda, thus reinforcing historic divides that arose from zoning practices. E. Brooke Lee would be satisfied. |
Anonymous
| Again, DC has fewer residents than it did in 1950. And DC has plenty of places where townhouses, duplexes, etc, can be built without affecting adversely neighborhoods of SFHs. More realistically, I expect DC will be growing far less in the few decades. The pandemic, on the margins, will spread people out more. Some folks who are working from elsewhere will not be returning to their former lives. |
Anonymous
What do you call City Ridge, rising next to McLean Gardens and North Cleveland Park? |
Anonymous
What on Earth are you talking about? Densification happens in wealthy neighborhoods. Take a walk through Capitol Hill, Dupont Circle, Logan Circle, or Adams Morgan. You'll see plenty of pop-ups being constructed, rowhomes being subdivided, and condos filling in what precious underdeveloped lots remain. You just don't see the massive cranes because these neighborhoods are already built up, are bumping up against ridiculous, arbitrary height restrictions, are facing onerous restrictions from the historic preservation review board, are dealing with gadflies making bad faith arguments about how any new development will irreparably alter the character of the neighborhood, or all of the above. |
Anonymous
Right… the “new normal”. All of the people going back into the office clearly missed the memo. Even if what you said was true… 20-30 years LOL… Okay. Well, in the meantime… |