Marc Elrich doesn’t think there “is demand for market housing.” He’s never going to fix our housing.

[Anonymous]

Take 1 acre of land. Buy it for $1M. Build one house on it and sell it for $1.5-2M or build 8 condos and sell each for $300K-$400k.

In the first scenario I make $500k to $1M in profit. In the second I make $1.4M to $2.2M. I’ll take the second please and also have 8 times as many people living in the county, performing MC and LC jobs and paying sales tax and real estate tax in my county. It is not about affordable housing, it is about smart business and free markets and not letting rich NIMBYs have their way in hoarding land for large estates and preserved green space.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The issue is that that price of land in the county has eclipsed the average wage/affordability. We have a lot of rich people in MoCo (as does surrounding counties of the DMV), but also lots of middle and lower income people too. Developers make better profits catering to the wealthier residents, but that market is tapped out. The demand for housing is enormous among lower and middle class residents, yet the speculative prices for land are just too high to cater to that demographic. How do we bridge the gap?

Summary: There is no more cheap land. But we still have insatiable demand among lower and middle-income residents. How do we fix it?

By enabling more housing to be built, including on land where there already is housing.

There's no reason to build low income housing if there is middle class demand.

County needs to focus on the middle class. Otherwise, County will continue its never ending decline.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Take 1 acre of land. Buy it for $1M. Build one house on it and sell it for $1.5-2M or build 8 condos and sell each for $300K-$400k.

In the first scenario I make $500k to $1M in profit. In the second I make $1.4M to $2.2M. I’ll take the second please and also have 8 times as many people living in the county, performing MC and LC jobs and paying sales tax and real estate tax in my county. It is not about affordable housing, it is about smart business and free markets and not letting rich NIMBYs have their way in hoarding land for large estates and preserved green space.

Dude: MC families want sfh neighborhoods, not mf units.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:There's plenty of land available. It's just preserved for no reason.

Exactly. The biggest fallacy is that land is somehow limited. It’s not.

Lots of underutilized commercial space in MC.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Take 1 acre of land. Buy it for $1M. Build one house on it and sell it for $1.5-2M or build 8 condos and sell each for $300K-$400k.

In the first scenario I make $500k to $1M in profit. In the second I make $1.4M to $2.2M. I’ll take the second please and also have 8 times as many people living in the county, performing MC and LC jobs and paying sales tax and real estate tax in my county. It is not about affordable housing, it is about smart business and free markets and not letting rich NIMBYs have their way in hoarding land for large estates and preserved green space.

Dude: MC families want sfh neighborhoods, not mf units.

+1. I don’t want that $400K unit when I can move to another county and get a SFH with a yard for the same price. (Already made this decision, actually. We looked into MoCo and then selected a house in a neighboring county.)

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The issue is that that price of land in the county has eclipsed the average wage/affordability. We have a lot of rich people in MoCo (as does surrounding counties of the DMV), but also lots of middle and lower income people too. Developers make better profits catering to the wealthier residents, but that market is tapped out. The demand for housing is enormous among lower and middle class residents, yet the speculative prices for land are just too high to cater to that demographic. How do we bridge the gap?

Summary: There is no more cheap land. But we still have insatiable demand among lower and middle-income residents. How do we fix it?

AND... the government and activists want to put low income housing on the MOST expensive land, rather than just achieving the most units by concentrating them on the cheapest land available in the county.

How did we get from rezoning to allow duplexes to "putting low income housing on the MOST expensive land"?

Not to mention that it would be housing policy (I guess) for the county to (somehow) finance and build 50 high-rise towers for poor people on cheap land next to the Dickerson incinerator, but it wouldn't be good housing policy.

There are plenty of people calling for affordable housing in Potomac, Bethesda, etc. in a bid to stop "segregation." MDPUs and HOC units in high cost new developments are exactly this -putting a small number of more affordable units on land that is by definition too expensive to produce them. And expecting the rest of us to bear both the higher cost of our own housing plus subsidize it directly for the increasing number of low income folk who continue to move to MoCo.

So, do we really want to encourage more low income folks to move to MC? We obviously should try to take care of our own, but MC will decline even faster if it adopts an aggressive anti-poverty mentality. It will drive up costs, and drive taxpayers out of MC.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The issue is that that price of land in the county has eclipsed the average wage/affordability. We have a lot of rich people in MoCo (as does surrounding counties of the DMV), but also lots of middle and lower income people too. Developers make better profits catering to the wealthier residents, but that market is tapped out. The demand for housing is enormous among lower and middle class residents, yet the speculative prices for land are just too high to cater to that demographic. How do we bridge the gap?

Summary: There is no more cheap land. But we still have insatiable demand among lower and middle-income residents. How do we fix it?

AND... the government and activists want to put low income housing on the MOST expensive land, rather than just achieving the most units by concentrating them on the cheapest land available in the county.

How did we get from rezoning to allow duplexes to "putting low income housing on the MOST expensive land"?

Not to mention that it would be housing policy (I guess) for the county to (somehow) finance and build 50 high-rise towers for poor people on cheap land next to the Dickerson incinerator, but it wouldn't be good housing policy.

There are plenty of people calling for affordable housing in Potomac, Bethesda, etc. in a bid to stop "segregation." MDPUs and HOC units in high cost new developments are exactly this -putting a small number of more affordable units on land that is by definition too expensive to produce them. And expecting the rest of us to bear both the higher cost of our own housing plus subsidize it directly for the increasing number of low income folk who continue to move to MoCo.

So, do we really want to encourage more low income folks to move to MC? We obviously should try to take care of our own, but MC will decline even faster if it adopts an aggressive anti-poverty mentality. It will drive up costs, and drive taxpayers out of MC.

That’s some bizarre and twisted logic. I hesitate to ask, but please walk through your thinking here and provide examples in other jurisdictions of this “backfiring”.

Last time I checked, the “problem” with places like Atherton, CA that effectively ban low income housing is just that, they are immoral for banning low income housing. The idea that they are somehow economically suffering is preposterous.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The issue is that that price of land in the county has eclipsed the average wage/affordability. We have a lot of rich people in MoCo (as does surrounding counties of the DMV), but also lots of middle and lower income people too. Developers make better profits catering to the wealthier residents, but that market is tapped out. The demand for housing is enormous among lower and middle class residents, yet the speculative prices for land are just too high to cater to that demographic. How do we bridge the gap?

Summary: There is no more cheap land. But we still have insatiable demand among lower and middle-income residents. How do we fix it?

AND... the government and activists want to put low income housing on the MOST expensive land, rather than just achieving the most units by concentrating them on the cheapest land available in the county.

How did we get from rezoning to allow duplexes to "putting low income housing on the MOST expensive land"?

Not to mention that it would be housing policy (I guess) for the county to (somehow) finance and build 50 high-rise towers for poor people on cheap land next to the Dickerson incinerator, but it wouldn't be good housing policy.

There are plenty of people calling for affordable housing in Potomac, Bethesda, etc. in a bid to stop "segregation." MDPUs and HOC units in high cost new developments are exactly this -putting a small number of more affordable units on land that is by definition too expensive to produce them. And expecting the rest of us to bear both the higher cost of our own housing plus subsidize it directly for the increasing number of low income folk who continue to move to MoCo.

So, do we really want to encourage more low income folks to move to MC? We obviously should try to take care of our own, but MC will decline even faster if it adopts an aggressive anti-poverty mentality. It will drive up costs, and drive taxpayers out of MC.

That’s some bizarre and twisted logic. I hesitate to ask, but please walk through your thinking here and provide examples in other jurisdictions of this “backfiring”.

Last time I checked, the “problem” with places like Atherton, CA that effectively ban low income housing is just that, they are immoral for banning low income housing. The idea that they are somehow economically suffering is preposterous.

People forgot that Bill Clinton already tried this social engineering experiment and tried to export poverty from places like Chicago to Iowa and it backfired. It did little to improve outcomes and resulted in spreading more crime. Just because you take poor people and out them in more affluent areas doesn't solve anything. Success and wealth do not magically rub off. The lions share of the job rests on the shoulders of parents. It is parental responsibility to know where your kids are at all times, to make sure they're not getting trouble in the streets, and to stay involved in their lives. Poor people overwhelmingly fail st that, because they were often brought up in terrible households. The cycles just keep repeating over and over. Moving those same people to wealthy areas does very little to make terrible parents into good parents.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The issue is that that price of land in the county has eclipsed the average wage/affordability. We have a lot of rich people in MoCo (as does surrounding counties of the DMV), but also lots of middle and lower income people too. Developers make better profits catering to the wealthier residents, but that market is tapped out. The demand for housing is enormous among lower and middle class residents, yet the speculative prices for land are just too high to cater to that demographic. How do we bridge the gap?

Summary: There is no more cheap land. But we still have insatiable demand among lower and middle-income residents. How do we fix it?

AND... the government and activists want to put low income housing on the MOST expensive land, rather than just achieving the most units by concentrating them on the cheapest land available in the county.

How did we get from rezoning to allow duplexes to "putting low income housing on the MOST expensive land"?

Not to mention that it would be housing policy (I guess) for the county to (somehow) finance and build 50 high-rise towers for poor people on cheap land next to the Dickerson incinerator, but it wouldn't be good housing policy.

There are plenty of people calling for affordable housing in Potomac, Bethesda, etc. in a bid to stop "segregation." MDPUs and HOC units in high cost new developments are exactly this -putting a small number of more affordable units on land that is by definition too expensive to produce them. And expecting the rest of us to bear both the higher cost of our own housing plus subsidize it directly for the increasing number of low income folk who continue to move to MoCo.

So, do we really want to encourage more low income folks to move to MC? We obviously should try to take care of our own, but MC will decline even faster if it adopts an aggressive anti-poverty mentality. It will drive up costs, and drive taxpayers out of MC.

That’s some bizarre and twisted logic. I hesitate to ask, but please walk through your thinking here and provide examples in other jurisdictions of this “backfiring”.

Last time I checked, the “problem” with places like Atherton, CA that effectively ban low income housing is just that, they are immoral for banning low income housing. The idea that they are somehow economically suffering is preposterous.

Pretty simple, actually.

Many immigrants, legal and illegal, move to the USA for better economic opportunities.
Many illegal immigrants walk hundreds of miles to enter the US for economic opportunities.
Technology professionals move to Silicon Valley and Boston for better jobs.
Rich move to Florida for lower taxes.
Many move to MC for its good public school system.
All smart decisions.

But more low income residents would not move to MC for its high quality social services programs.

Do you think low income residents are stupid?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

So, do we really want to encourage more low income folks to move to MC? We obviously should try to take care of our own, but MC will decline even faster if it adopts an aggressive anti-poverty mentality. It will drive up costs, and drive taxpayers out of MC.

Do you think you're better off if the people who cook your restaurant food, stock the shelves at the grocery store, clean your office, maintain your yard, watch your children, take your blood pressure, change the oil in your car, fix your roof, care for your elderly parents or grandparents, and deliver your Amazon packages have a long and expensive trip to work, or double/triple up in overcrowded housing, or can't work in Montgomery County at all due to the high cost of housing + transportation? I don't.

Also, you know what else? All of the people who do these things pay taxes too.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Take 1 acre of land. Buy it for $1M. Build one house on it and sell it for $1.5-2M or build 8 condos and sell each for $300K-$400k.

In the first scenario I make $500k to $1M in profit. In the second I make $1.4M to $2.2M. I’ll take the second please and also have 8 times as many people living in the county, performing MC and LC jobs and paying sales tax and real estate tax in my county. It is not about affordable housing, it is about smart business and free markets and not letting rich NIMBYs have their way in hoarding land for large estates and preserved green space.

Where are you going to get an acre of land for $1 million? In Chevy Chase, that’s 6-7 lots. It’s about the same in E Bethesda or Woodside. It’s a little less in Edgemoor. Land alone would be worth well over $1 million. You’d probably end up spending at least $2 million on land alone even around Woodside, and would be more like $6-$10 million around Bethesda or Chevy Chase. In your sales plan, you’re under water before you’ve even built the structure. That could maybe work around Wheaton, but there are lower risk ways of making $1.4 to $2 million in profit, like building 4 SFH on your acre of land.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The issue is that that price of land in the county has eclipsed the average wage/affordability. We have a lot of rich people in MoCo (as does surrounding counties of the DMV), but also lots of middle and lower income people too. Developers make better profits catering to the wealthier residents, but that market is tapped out. The demand for housing is enormous among lower and middle class residents, yet the speculative prices for land are just too high to cater to that demographic. How do we bridge the gap?

Summary: There is no more cheap land. But we still have insatiable demand among lower and middle-income residents. How do we fix it?

AND... the government and activists want to put low income housing on the MOST expensive land, rather than just achieving the most units by concentrating them on the cheapest land available in the county.

How did we get from rezoning to allow duplexes to "putting low income housing on the MOST expensive land"?

Not to mention that it would be housing policy (I guess) for the county to (somehow) finance and build 50 high-rise towers for poor people on cheap land next to the Dickerson incinerator, but it wouldn't be good housing policy.

There are plenty of people calling for affordable housing in Potomac, Bethesda, etc. in a bid to stop "segregation." MDPUs and HOC units in high cost new developments are exactly this -putting a small number of more affordable units on land that is by definition too expensive to produce them. And expecting the rest of us to bear both the higher cost of our own housing plus subsidize it directly for the increasing number of low income folk who continue to move to MoCo.

So, do we really want to encourage more low income folks to move to MC? We obviously should try to take care of our own, but MC will decline even faster if it adopts an aggressive anti-poverty mentality. It will drive up costs, and drive taxpayers out of MC.

I'm the one arguing your point. Was responding to the "putting low income housing on the MOST expensive land" comment

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Take 1 acre of land. Buy it for $1M. Build one house on it and sell it for $1.5-2M or build 8 condos and sell each for $300K-$400k.

In the first scenario I make $500k to $1M in profit. In the second I make $1.4M to $2.2M. I’ll take the second please and also have 8 times as many people living in the county, performing MC and LC jobs and paying sales tax and real estate tax in my county. It is not about affordable housing, it is about smart business and free markets and not letting rich NIMBYs have their way in hoarding land for large estates and preserved green space.

Do you understand that those cheap condos will lower the desirability and value of the neighborhood. Soon it will be a hodge pudge of housing of varying quality. Soon no more $1.5-2 M houses will be built because builders can make more money selling multi family units. Land values will fall and then $200K-$300K condos can be built.

Realtors did block busting in the 1960s and now local governments want to do it. The first to third sellers get a good price but the prices then fall with each sale as the neighborhood becomes less desirable.

I am all for because I work for a builder. But it will definitely change areas.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

So, do we really want to encourage more low income folks to move to MC? We obviously should try to take care of our own, but MC will decline even faster if it adopts an aggressive anti-poverty mentality. It will drive up costs, and drive taxpayers out of MC.

Do you think you're better off if the people who cook your restaurant food, stock the shelves at the grocery store, clean your office, maintain your yard, watch your children, take your blood pressure, change the oil in your car, fix your roof, care for your elderly parents or grandparents, and deliver your Amazon packages have a long and expensive trip to work, or double/triple up in overcrowded housing, or can't work in Montgomery County at all due to the high cost of housing + transportation? I don't.

Also, you know what else? All of the people who do these things pay taxes too.

Well you probably aren’t

But I am

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The issue is that that price of land in the county has eclipsed the average wage/affordability. We have a lot of rich people in MoCo (as does surrounding counties of the DMV), but also lots of middle and lower income people too. Developers make better profits catering to the wealthier residents, but that market is tapped out. The demand for housing is enormous among lower and middle class residents, yet the speculative prices for land are just too high to cater to that demographic. How do we bridge the gap?

Summary: There is no more cheap land. But we still have insatiable demand among lower and middle-income residents. How do we fix it?

AND... the government and activists want to put low income housing on the MOST expensive land, rather than just achieving the most units by concentrating them on the cheapest land available in the county.

How did we get from rezoning to allow duplexes to "putting low income housing on the MOST expensive land"?

Not to mention that it would be housing policy (I guess) for the county to (somehow) finance and build 50 high-rise towers for poor people on cheap land next to the Dickerson incinerator, but it wouldn't be good housing policy.

There are plenty of people calling for affordable housing in Potomac, Bethesda, etc. in a bid to stop "segregation." MDPUs and HOC units in high cost new developments are exactly this -putting a small number of more affordable units on land that is by definition too expensive to produce them. And expecting the rest of us to bear both the higher cost of our own housing plus subsidize it directly for the increasing number of low income folk who continue to move to MoCo.

So, do we really want to encourage more low income folks to move to MC? We obviously should try to take care of our own, but MC will decline even faster if it adopts an aggressive anti-poverty mentality. It will drive up costs, and drive taxpayers out of MC.

That’s some bizarre and twisted logic. I hesitate to ask, but please walk through your thinking here and provide examples in other jurisdictions of this “backfiring”.

Last time I checked, the “problem” with places like Atherton, CA that effectively ban low income housing is just that, they are immoral for banning low income housing. The idea that they are somehow economically suffering is preposterous.

Pretty simple, actually.

Many immigrants, legal and illegal, move to the USA for better economic opportunities.
Many illegal immigrants walk hundreds of miles to enter the US for economic opportunities.
Technology professionals move to Silicon Valley and Boston for better jobs.
Rich move to Florida for lower taxes.
Many move to MC for its good public school system.
All smart decisions.

But more low income residents would not move to MC for its high quality social services programs.

Do you think low income residents are stupid?

Nevermind low income, many people strategically move disabled, elderly, and SN adults to Arlington because of high social welfare benefits.
Affluent first generation children impoverish their parents so that they can live in affordable housing for the elderly.

There are cheap apartments in a top Arlington school district with many Russian, Bangladeshi, Nigerian, and Indian families who get housing benefits but claw their way into those apartments rather than the stuff on Columbia Pike.

People can play the system to their benefit.