MOCO - County Wide Upzoning, Everywhere

[Anonymous]

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Anonymous wrote:Twitter thread has great debate on this. This is what’s coming and so blah compared to past builds.
https://t.co/h7csmWmcJ7

Did you actually read the whole thread? The author says that zoning is the problem....

Don’t be ridiculous. Developers would still build this cheap trash if zoning allowed them to build it elsewhere. We don’t need to encourage them to ruin all of America with this junk. They are absolutely terrible to live in. There is no soundproofing, the smell of your neighbors marijuana flows readily through the wall into other units. It should be illegal to build apartment buildings unless they are made of concrete.

Just reading the thread that was posted. This is what it says as one of the causes:

"In American cities, very little land is legal to build multi-family homes on. In San Jose, 94% of residential land is single-family only. Zones where multi-family homes can be built are sparse and thus extremely competitive — only the biggest developers can compete. Once these developers have the plot, they economize. They squeeze the building right up to the boundaries, and build on a scale that small, local developers can't afford. Then they save more money by copy-pasting the designs in every city they operate in."

"zoning laws benefit the scaled developers."

"When America restructured around the motorcar, people moved out to the suburbs and commuted in via the new highways.

"Retail was relegated to operating where people drive rather than live — again because of zoning."

This is all facts. Suburbs are an abomination in human culture. You know when parents tell their kids it’s bad to stay in their rooms all day playing video games? Suburbs are like that but for adults.

That’s not even true. 0% of San Jose is zoned exclusively for single family houses because California banned single family zoning. Your lifestyle preferences are not facts and Density bros are trying force local communities to change their zoning against the will of voters. Zoning is not a one size fits all solution and local communities know what works best for the place they actually live in. You guys are just dishonest and want to eliminate the suburbs altogether so you can force everyone to live in densely populated cities.

Indeed. Nuking the suburbs is the compromise policy, my friend.

Do you listen to yourself? What do you think if/when you do?

These people are actively trying to reduce existing property values as a housing strategy. There is nothing sane about most of their arguments.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Twitter thread has great debate on this. This is what’s coming and so blah compared to past builds.
https://t.co/h7csmWmcJ7

Did you actually read the whole thread? The author says that zoning is the problem....

Don’t be ridiculous. Developers would still build this cheap trash if zoning allowed them to build it elsewhere. We don’t need to encourage them to ruin all of America with this junk. They are absolutely terrible to live in. There is no soundproofing, the smell of your neighbors marijuana flows readily through the wall into other units. It should be illegal to build apartment buildings unless they are made of concrete.

Just reading the thread that was posted. This is what it says as one of the causes:

"In American cities, very little land is legal to build multi-family homes on. In San Jose, 94% of residential land is single-family only. Zones where multi-family homes can be built are sparse and thus extremely competitive — only the biggest developers can compete. Once these developers have the plot, they economize. They squeeze the building right up to the boundaries, and build on a scale that small, local developers can't afford. Then they save more money by copy-pasting the designs in every city they operate in."

"zoning laws benefit the scaled developers."

"When America restructured around the motorcar, people moved out to the suburbs and commuted in via the new highways.

"Retail was relegated to operating where people drive rather than live — again because of zoning."

This is all facts. Suburbs are an abomination in human culture. You know when parents tell their kids it’s bad to stay in their rooms all day playing video games? Suburbs are like that but for adults.

That’s not even true. 0% of San Jose is zoned exclusively for single family houses because California banned single family zoning. Your lifestyle preferences are not facts and Density bros are trying force local communities to change their zoning against the will of voters. Zoning is not a one size fits all solution and local communities know what works best for the place they actually live in. You guys are just dishonest and want to eliminate the suburbs altogether so you can force everyone to live in densely populated cities.

Indeed. Nuking the suburbs is the compromise policy, my friend.

Do you listen to yourself? What do you think if/when you do?

These people are actively trying to reduce existing property values as a housing strategy. There is nothing sane about most of their arguments.

I agree that it's bonkers to talk about "nuking the suburbs" by allowing 2-unit, 3-unit, or 4-unit residential buildings where currently only 1-unit residential buildings are allowed.

[Anonymous]

This is a private equity dream. You never know with zoning changes how they will turn out, but guaranteed this will not achieve what the council intended. Very, very depressing and frustrating. SMH.

[Anonymous]

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Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:There is zero chance that MoCo will not lose its taxpaying and upper income citizens because of this change. What is even stupid is that MoCo has plenty of underutilized commercial land that can be converted to housing of multiple types. Much of that land will never be office or retail.

I think that they are ok with that. What they lose in quality they plan to make up for in volume.

How so? More volume of poverty and social needs who take more in tax expenditures then they can possibly pay in tax is a net negative. MoCo is going the way of Baltimore where they mane it extremely difficult to do business and drive out everyone with means who actually make up the bulk of the tax base. The area will crumble when all of the taxpayers who can pay taxes leave. You cannot make up tax revenues from a $250k household by bringing in 5 $50k households to replace. The $50k households will barely pay tax and require all sorts of subsidies, vouchers for lunches and will likely pay $0 in income taxes after all of the write offs and deductions. The county will get more poor with more volume, because the volume is going to come from poverty and low income households.

The family moving into a duplex or triplex is not living in poverty. Those homes will still cost around 500K minimum. They will pay taxes, or the landlord will pay taxes.

No, they’ll be rentals. Property tax doesn’t cover the same as income taxes. A single multiplex property tax will not make up for 4 below poverty line families who will all get stuffed into there and who’ll pay $0 income taxes because of their low inc9me and who’ll need more in tax expenditures than they pay.


You also think all of these multiplexes are going to be high quality. lol. We all know they’ll be cheap garbage flips or the units will have properties that are barely taken care of. It will just bring low income to good neighborhoods and ruin everything. I cannot wait until this stupendously backfires on the county and they panic as their budgets get blown up after there is mass exodus of high tax paying citizens.

Why in the world do you think these people would be below the poverty line and not paying income taxes?

You are really stupid if you think all of these dense units are going to be bought and owned by higher income families. They’re going to be bought up by slum lords, conglomerates, and investment funds who have zero motivation to maintain the properties because their entire goal is to minimize expenditures on property maintenance. They’re going to rent them out to low income masses.

This. Of course. Anyone who believes otherwise is just ignorant.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

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Anonymous wrote:No one should worrry about slummy properties or multiplexes changing the economic profile of their neighborhoods. Even making optimistic assumptions about land, construction costs, financing costs, and operating costs, rent would need to be north of $3,500 a month per unit to achieve a 7 percent cap rate. That rent requires a $140k annual household income.

The problem for potential small apartment building investors is that there are already a lot of units in DTSS and Bethesda available for less than $3,500 a month. The problem for potential small apartment builders who need financing is that there are already a lot of investments that deliver a better cap rate than 7 percent with less risk.

If you live in a marginal neighborhood then you could see a lot of change as a result of upzoning.

This is all a show. Planning even knows it. Planning and the council want it to look like they’re doing something on housing and economic growth but this iteration of smart growth isn’t going to move the needle any more in the right direction than the previous iterations.

This is the problem. The various policy changes combine to undercut the detached SFH communities in the closer-in suburbs that are among the most affordable.

Bye bye Four Corners. Bethesda & Chevy Chase? No real change. Just widening the gap.

Four Corners already has SFH subdivided into rental apartments, but any new multiplex rentals probably will end up commanding more in rent than most owners pay on their mortgage right now, so maybe you get some gentrification but the new residents aren’t going to bring the neighborhood down.

I get that it isn’t Chevy Chase, but some parts of 4corners is actually pretty nice right now, but hasn’t had the chance to go full cycle with home rehabs throughout the neighborhoods. There is now way that it won’t drag it down.

Construction for multiplexes won’t be cheap. Those costs alone will push rent toward $2k and that’s before land and operating costs. If those rents are too high for the market, no one is going to build.

Wrong. Huge investment funds have plenty of money to build, and plenty of time to wait for profits. The buying of SFHs by investors is one of the biggest problems this country faces (e.g., Arizona), as people become renters and home ownership as a means of upward mobility diminishes. Without question investors are watching this.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:There is zero chance that MoCo will not lose its taxpaying and upper income citizens because of this change. What is even stupid is that MoCo has plenty of underutilized commercial land that can be converted to housing of multiple types. Much of that land will never be office or retail.

I think that they are ok with that. What they lose in quality they plan to make up for in volume.

How so? More volume of poverty and social needs who take more in tax expenditures then they can possibly pay in tax is a net negative. MoCo is going the way of Baltimore where they mane it extremely difficult to do business and drive out everyone with means who actually make up the bulk of the tax base. The area will crumble when all of the taxpayers who can pay taxes leave. You cannot make up tax revenues from a $250k household by bringing in 5 $50k households to replace. The $50k households will barely pay tax and require all sorts of subsidies, vouchers for lunches and will likely pay $0 in income taxes after all of the write offs and deductions. The county will get more poor with more volume, because the volume is going to come from poverty and low income households.

The family moving into a duplex or triplex is not living in poverty. Those homes will still cost around 500K minimum. They will pay taxes, or the landlord will pay taxes.

No, they’ll be rentals. Property tax doesn’t cover the same as income taxes. A single multiplex property tax will not make up for 4 below poverty line families who will all get stuffed into there and who’ll pay $0 income taxes because of their low inc9me and who’ll need more in tax expenditures than they pay.


You also think all of these multiplexes are going to be high quality. lol. We all know they’ll be cheap garbage flips or the units will have properties that are barely taken care of. It will just bring low income to good neighborhoods and ruin everything. I cannot wait until this stupendously backfires on the county and they panic as their budgets get blown up after there is mass exodus of high tax paying citizens.

Why in the world do you think these people would be below the poverty line and not paying income taxes?

You are really stupid if you think all of these dense units are going to be bought and owned by higher income families. They’re going to be bought up by slum lords, conglomerates, and investment funds who have zero motivation to maintain the properties because their entire goal is to minimize expenditures on property maintenance. They’re going to rent them out to low income masses.

This. Of course. Anyone who believes otherwise is just ignorant.

The idea that a higher income family will live in a SFH with multiple multi-unit complexes is bizare. Higher income families have choices. They will live elsewhere.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:No one should worrry about slummy properties or multiplexes changing the economic profile of their neighborhoods. Even making optimistic assumptions about land, construction costs, financing costs, and operating costs, rent would need to be north of $3,500 a month per unit to achieve a 7 percent cap rate. That rent requires a $140k annual household income.

The problem for potential small apartment building investors is that there are already a lot of units in DTSS and Bethesda available for less than $3,500 a month. The problem for potential small apartment builders who need financing is that there are already a lot of investments that deliver a better cap rate than 7 percent with less risk.

If you live in a marginal neighborhood then you could see a lot of change as a result of upzoning.

This is all a show. Planning even knows it. Planning and the council want it to look like they’re doing something on housing and economic growth but this iteration of smart growth isn’t going to move the needle any more in the right direction than the previous iterations.

This is the problem. The various policy changes combine to undercut the detached SFH communities in the closer-in suburbs that are among the most affordable.

Bye bye Four Corners. Bethesda & Chevy Chase? No real change. Just widening the gap.

Four Corners already has SFH subdivided into rental apartments, but any new multiplex rentals probably will end up commanding more in rent than most owners pay on their mortgage right now, so maybe you get some gentrification but the new residents aren’t going to bring the neighborhood down.

I get that it isn’t Chevy Chase, but some parts of 4corners is actually pretty nice right now, but hasn’t had the chance to go full cycle with home rehabs throughout the neighborhoods. There is now way that it won’t drag it down.

Construction for multiplexes won’t be cheap. Those costs alone will push rent toward $2k and that’s before land and operating costs. If those rents are too high for the market, no one is going to build.

Wrong. Huge investment funds have plenty of money to build, and plenty of time to wait for profits. The buying of SFHs by investors is one of the biggest problems this country faces (e.g., Arizona), as people become renters and home ownership as a means of upward mobility diminishes. Without question investors are watching this.

If this were true then we would have more construction and lower rents in MoCo already. The hedge funds want to make money right away and have plenty of options, almost all outside of MoCo, for doing so.

[Anonymous]

Here is what I expect will be the end result:

First, there will be fewer SFHs and fewer neighborhoods with mostly SFHs. This is of course the goal-namely, reduce the number of SFHs. Otherwise, there is no increase in housing. Second, SFHs have been shown to generate wealth for decades. Condos and other housing options have not. Third, middle class and upper middle class families will have fewer opportunities to generate wealth over their lifetimes. They will be poorer or will leave MoCo. Fourth, the families living on these multi-unit complexes will be poorer than the single family being replaced. The change will be a net tax loss to MoCo. Fifth, the rich will be fine, as their SFHs tend to be in more expensive neighborhoods, where the economics may not work (at least not now) in favor of multi-unit complexes. Sixth, regardless, the wealthy are less dependent on housing for their net worth. Seventh, at some point, even the more expensive areas will succumb to multi-unit complexes, at which point the rich who have not already left will then move elsewhere, creating more tax losses to MoCo. Eighth, what upzoning fails to address the extensive underutilized commercial property in MoCo, where thousands of condos and townhouses could be built.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Here is what I expect will be the end result:

First, there will be fewer SFHs and fewer neighborhoods with mostly SFHs. This is of course the goal-namely, reduce the number of SFHs. Otherwise, there is no increase in housing. Second, SFHs have been shown to generate wealth for decades. Condos and other housing options have not. Third, middle class and upper middle class families will have fewer opportunities to generate wealth over their lifetimes. They will be poorer or will leave MoCo. Fourth, the families living on these multi-unit complexes will be poorer than the single family being replaced. The change will be a net tax loss to MoCo. Fifth, the rich will be fine, as their SFHs tend to be in more expensive neighborhoods, where the economics may not work (at least not now) in favor of multi-unit complexes. Sixth, regardless, the wealthy are less dependent on housing for their net worth. Seventh, at some point, even the more expensive areas will succumb to multi-unit complexes, at which point the rich who have not already left will then move elsewhere, creating more tax losses to MoCo. Eighth, what upzoning fails to address the extensive underutilized commercial property in MoCo, where thousands of condos and townhouses could be built.

I'm scratching my head about the math on this one. Multi-unit buildings will replace single-unit buildings, but there will not be any increase in housing? When I do math, 2>1. Could you please explain?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Here is what I expect will be the end result:

First, there will be fewer SFHs and fewer neighborhoods with mostly SFHs. This is of course the goal-namely, reduce the number of SFHs. Otherwise, there is no increase in housing. Second, SFHs have been shown to generate wealth for decades. Condos and other housing options have not. Third, middle class and upper middle class families will have fewer opportunities to generate wealth over their lifetimes. They will be poorer or will leave MoCo. Fourth, the families living on these multi-unit complexes will be poorer than the single family being replaced. The change will be a net tax loss to MoCo. Fifth, the rich will be fine, as their SFHs tend to be in more expensive neighborhoods, where the economics may not work (at least not now) in favor of multi-unit complexes. Sixth, regardless, the wealthy are less dependent on housing for their net worth. Seventh, at some point, even the more expensive areas will succumb to multi-unit complexes, at which point the rich who have not already left will then move elsewhere, creating more tax losses to MoCo. Eighth, what upzoning fails to address the extensive underutilized commercial property in MoCo, where thousands of condos and townhouses could be built.

This is mostly right, but MFH replacement won’t happen fast enough to swing neighborhoods to “mostly MFH.” There will be a negligible increase in total housing units, but nearly every MFH project will result in a net fiscal loss (maybe they think they can make it up in volume?). When this proposal fails to generate a significant increase in units or affordability, the YIMBYs will either claim that it worked or it wasn’t their idea.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Here is what I expect will be the end result:

First, there will be fewer SFHs and fewer neighborhoods with mostly SFHs. This is of course the goal-namely, reduce the number of SFHs. Otherwise, there is no increase in housing. Second, SFHs have been shown to generate wealth for decades. Condos and other housing options have not. Third, middle class and upper middle class families will have fewer opportunities to generate wealth over their lifetimes. They will be poorer or will leave MoCo. Fourth, the families living on these multi-unit complexes will be poorer than the single family being replaced. The change will be a net tax loss to MoCo. Fifth, the rich will be fine, as their SFHs tend to be in more expensive neighborhoods, where the economics may not work (at least not now) in favor of multi-unit complexes. Sixth, regardless, the wealthy are less dependent on housing for their net worth. Seventh, at some point, even the more expensive areas will succumb to multi-unit complexes, at which point the rich who have not already left will then move elsewhere, creating more tax losses to MoCo. Eighth, what upzoning fails to address the extensive underutilized commercial property in MoCo, where thousands of condos and townhouses could be built.

I'm scratching my head about the math on this one. Multi-unit buildings will replace single-unit buildings, but there will not be any increase in housing? When I do math, 2>1. Could you please explain?

I don’t think that’s what they said at all.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Here is what I expect will be the end result:

First, there will be fewer SFHs and fewer neighborhoods with mostly SFHs. This is of course the goal-namely, reduce the number of SFHs. Otherwise, there is no increase in housing. Second, SFHs have been shown to generate wealth for decades. Condos and other housing options have not. Third, middle class and upper middle class families will have fewer opportunities to generate wealth over their lifetimes. They will be poorer or will leave MoCo. Fourth, the families living on these multi-unit complexes will be poorer than the single family being replaced. The change will be a net tax loss to MoCo. Fifth, the rich will be fine, as their SFHs tend to be in more expensive neighborhoods, where the economics may not work (at least not now) in favor of multi-unit complexes. Sixth, regardless, the wealthy are less dependent on housing for their net worth. Seventh, at some point, even the more expensive areas will succumb to multi-unit complexes, at which point the rich who have not already left will then move elsewhere, creating more tax losses to MoCo. Eighth, what upzoning fails to address the extensive underutilized commercial property in MoCo, where thousands of condos and townhouses could be built.

This is mostly right, but MFH replacement won’t happen fast enough to swing neighborhoods to “mostly MFH.” There will be a negligible increase in total housing units, but nearly every MFH project will result in a net fiscal loss (maybe they think they can make it up in volume?). When this proposal fails to generate a significant increase in units or affordability, the YIMBYs will either claim that it worked or it wasn’t their idea.

They will look at the decrease in property values and cite that data as some bizarro world victory. See, we made everything so terrible that it’s cheaper! Ta-da!

[Anonymous]

Not really buying the assumption that developers would rather built multi-family housing. I think a lot prefer SFH. It's faster, easier and it's what they know.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Here is what I expect will be the end result:

First, there will be fewer SFHs and fewer neighborhoods with mostly SFHs. This is of course the goal-namely, reduce the number of SFHs. Otherwise, there is no increase in housing. Second, SFHs have been shown to generate wealth for decades. Condos and other housing options have not. Third, middle class and upper middle class families will have fewer opportunities to generate wealth over their lifetimes. They will be poorer or will leave MoCo. Fourth, the families living on these multi-unit complexes will be poorer than the single family being replaced. The change will be a net tax loss to MoCo. Fifth, the rich will be fine, as their SFHs tend to be in more expensive neighborhoods, where the economics may not work (at least not now) in favor of multi-unit complexes. Sixth, regardless, the wealthy are less dependent on housing for their net worth. Seventh, at some point, even the more expensive areas will succumb to multi-unit complexes, at which point the rich who have not already left will then move elsewhere, creating more tax losses to MoCo. Eighth, what upzoning fails to address the extensive underutilized commercial property in MoCo, where thousands of condos and townhouses could be built.

I'm scratching my head about the math on this one. Multi-unit buildings will replace single-unit buildings, but there will not be any increase in housing? When I do math, 2>1. Could you please explain?

I don’t think that’s what they said at all.

That is what they said. There will be a decrease in SFH (which apparently doesn't include townhouses), there will be new multi-unit buildings where there used to be SFH, but there will be no increase in housing. It's the kind of math where 1 + 4 = 0, or something.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Twitter thread has great debate on this. This is what’s coming and so blah compared to past builds.
https://t.co/h7csmWmcJ7

Did you actually read the whole thread? The author says that zoning is the problem....

Don’t be ridiculous. Developers would still build this cheap trash if zoning allowed them to build it elsewhere. We don’t need to encourage them to ruin all of America with this junk. They are absolutely terrible to live in. There is no soundproofing, the smell of your neighbors marijuana flows readily through the wall into other units. It should be illegal to build apartment buildings unless they are made of concrete.

Just reading the thread that was posted. This is what it says as one of the causes:

"In American cities, very little land is legal to build multi-family homes on. In San Jose, 94% of residential land is single-family only. Zones where multi-family homes can be built are sparse and thus extremely competitive — only the biggest developers can compete. Once these developers have the plot, they economize. They squeeze the building right up to the boundaries, and build on a scale that small, local developers can't afford. Then they save more money by copy-pasting the designs in every city they operate in."

"zoning laws benefit the scaled developers."

"When America restructured around the motorcar, people moved out to the suburbs and commuted in via the new highways.

"Retail was relegated to operating where people drive rather than live — again because of zoning."

This is all facts. Suburbs are an abomination in human culture. You know when parents tell their kids it’s bad to stay in their rooms all day playing video games? Suburbs are like that but for adults.

Then why do people keep moving to them? And why did you?