Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Let me explain how expanding the housing supply will reduce prices.

A developer buys a rowhouse in Petworth for $600,000. He levels it, and in its place, puts up five condos, each costing between $600,000 and $1.2 million.

No, that is not affordable housing by any stretch of the imagination.

But the people who buy them trade up from other places. And they leave behind places that other people trade up to. And those people leave behind places that other people trade up to. And so on. And so on. And so on. And so on. And so on. And so on. And so on.

The last area in that chain, the place where people least want to live -- housing prices go down there, because there, finally, supply exceeds demand.

Voila! Increasing the housing supply in Petworth leads to lower housing prices in Hagerstown, Maryland.

Don't let anyone tell you that increasing the housing supply won't reduce housing prices.

That's a super squishy and nice theory, but that's not how it works.

I already have, several times on this thread. I am the public finance lawyer. I have my MBA as well. I’ve been practicing 25+ years. Your theory doesn’t equate to reality. I do not agree that changing zoning laws will equate to an increase in affordable housing in this area. I do not believe in the “food pyramid” theory of upward mobility. You are first assuming all those people at the bottom on the pyramid are only there because the supply of something a little more expensive and to them more desirable. You are assuming that if D is built, someone from C will move into D, B will then upgrade into C, A into B and then someone who didn’t have housing before (homeless?, co-sharing?) will then become the new A. Even if you mix it up with rentals, the answer is still no. You are also assuming the market will self correct and rents/home prices automatically go down with an increase in supply.

1) developers are in the business to make a profit. There exist very few true nonprofit developers. People are not in the business of building an real property and selling/ renting it below cost. Period. This is why we have HUD, to subsidize rentals and home ownership programs.

2). Municipalities (local and state) have their own programs (in conjunction with HUD) to own and operate multi family housing. These are your Section 8. Operating a section 8 building is an insane amount of work. Besides the daily upkeep and maintenance of the building, there are additional requirements that must be met and certified every single year by HUD and the IRS. It is just too hard and expensive to have supply meet demand, anywhere, hence HAP vouchers exist but landlords really don’t want the hassle.

3). Single family affordable housing is super tricky. I worked on a deal in DC where the developer was strong armed by the DC government to allocate and donate 1/3 of the townhomes in the development they were building to be given under a special program where an owner would only need to pay $30,000 over a 20 year period, no down payment and they would own fee simple the property at the end of the mortgage. The towns homes at the time were worth over $450,000. It was a special home ownership program. People had to meet certain requirements (be employed, already be a resident of the ward, no gun charge convictions). A third party was brought in to be neutral and review applications and establish a lottery. Then the special requests started (a councilmember wanted his niece at the top of the list, the city only wanted unions who lived in that ward to work on the construction crew, the city asked for proffers for the police, hospital and schools, etc). After 18 months on the deal, the developer walked. It never was built.

4). There are just too many A and Bs in this area. Too many lower and lower middle class people who aren’t moving, they can’t. They won’t suddenly move up the pyramid if luxury condos are built and some people move up. When luxury condos are built, empty nested, DINKs, and very wealthy new comers move in. If it’s an empty nester, who moves into their old house? A family who needed more space when they had a second kid. Who moved into their old house? DINK. Who moved into their old apartment? A BIGLAW first year associate. The As and Bs are staying right where they are. No increase in affordable housing has been created.

A true increase in affordable housing will occur with a city/county builds more multi family. Period.

I'm the person who wrote the post about building condos in Petworth leading to lower housing prices in Hagerstown, and I actually agree with you. This business about how loosening zoning laws will lead to affordable house, in my opinion, is a bunch of hokum. No one can even explain how it would work. Sometimes people in favor of loosening zoning laws will say, "yes, the condos being built are for the well-to-do, but those people leave behind old places for someone else, and everyone will trade up." That seems like wishful thinking to me, and I was trying to make fun of that logic by suggesting the chain of people trading up would be extremely long, and that the real beneficiaries of building condos in Petworth would be people who live an hour and a half away in Hagerstown. Clearly the sarcasm didn't come through.

I used to be a pure supply and demand guy on housing problem is housing is a much more complex good

This article finally let me see the light

https://shelterforce.org/2019/02/19/why-voters-havent-been-buying-the-case-for-building/

Cliff notes version housing is segmented and building high end housing doesn't help anyone besides those close to the high-end.

"If housing markets are segmented, then when we build more luxury housing, the price of luxury housing falls (Econ 101). But if each new luxury unit does not correspond to one less household in the next market down (the ‘high-cost’ submarket), then the prices in the high-cost market will move less noticeably than the luxury prices.

Why wouldn’t there be a 1-1 change? For every new luxury unit, doesn’t someone vacate a less expensive unit down market? Not exactly. There are many reasons why the submarket units are imperfect substitutes. For one thing, as prices fall, households in the luxury segment of the market may consume more housing. This can happen when someone buys a second home or even when two roommates respond to lower prices by each renting their own place. But also, some luxury units may be taken off the market when prices fall, while others may be downgraded to lower-quality buildings because the lower rents may no longer be enough to support luxury amenities and services. There are a great many possible permutations, but at each stage in the process, adding one unit or removing one household from one tier does not automatically mean that one additional household will step up into that tier.

I think it is clear from this that we can’t expect new luxury development to have the same impact on rents at the bottom of the market as it does at the top. But how much less impact is not clear. In technical terms, there is no good recent data on the cross-price elasticity of demand between luxury housing and lower-cost housing. A large group of urbanists have taken to talking about the housing market as if these elasticities were close to 1 (increases in luxury supply have a big impact on the low-end rent). But it’s just as likely that the elasticity is closer to 0 (the rent at the bottom of the market is very insensitive to the level of supply at the top of the market)."

Then it seems like preserving rent control rather than tossing up lots of high end/dense housing in ward 3 should be a goal of this Mayor? Notice no one in Ward 3 has an issue with rent control. Everyone has an objection with building on every inch of land.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Let me explain how expanding the housing supply will reduce prices.

A developer buys a rowhouse in Petworth for $600,000. He levels it, and in its place, puts up five condos, each costing between $600,000 and $1.2 million.

No, that is not affordable housing by any stretch of the imagination.

But the people who buy them trade up from other places. And they leave behind places that other people trade up to. And those people leave behind places that other people trade up to. And so on. And so on. And so on. And so on. And so on. And so on. And so on.

The last area in that chain, the place where people least want to live -- housing prices go down there, because there, finally, supply exceeds demand.

Voila! Increasing the housing supply in Petworth leads to lower housing prices in Hagerstown, Maryland.

Don't let anyone tell you that increasing the housing supply won't reduce housing prices.

That's a super squishy and nice theory, but that's not how it works.

I already have, several times on this thread. I am the public finance lawyer. I have my MBA as well. I’ve been practicing 25+ years. Your theory doesn’t equate to reality. I do not agree that changing zoning laws will equate to an increase in affordable housing in this area. I do not believe in the “food pyramid” theory of upward mobility. You are first assuming all those people at the bottom on the pyramid are only there because the supply of something a little more expensive and to them more desirable. You are assuming that if D is built, someone from C will move into D, B will then upgrade into C, A into B and then someone who didn’t have housing before (homeless?, co-sharing?) will then become the new A. Even if you mix it up with rentals, the answer is still no. You are also assuming the market will self correct and rents/home prices automatically go down with an increase in supply.

1) developers are in the business to make a profit. There exist very few true nonprofit developers. People are not in the business of building an real property and selling/ renting it below cost. Period. This is why we have HUD, to subsidize rentals and home ownership programs.

2). Municipalities (local and state) have their own programs (in conjunction with HUD) to own and operate multi family housing. These are your Section 8. Operating a section 8 building is an insane amount of work. Besides the daily upkeep and maintenance of the building, there are additional requirements that must be met and certified every single year by HUD and the IRS. It is just too hard and expensive to have supply meet demand, anywhere, hence HAP vouchers exist but landlords really don’t want the hassle.

3). Single family affordable housing is super tricky. I worked on a deal in DC where the developer was strong armed by the DC government to allocate and donate 1/3 of the townhomes in the development they were building to be given under a special program where an owner would only need to pay $30,000 over a 20 year period, no down payment and they would own fee simple the property at the end of the mortgage. The towns homes at the time were worth over $450,000. It was a special home ownership program. People had to meet certain requirements (be employed, already be a resident of the ward, no gun charge convictions). A third party was brought in to be neutral and review applications and establish a lottery. Then the special requests started (a councilmember wanted his niece at the top of the list, the city only wanted unions who lived in that ward to work on the construction crew, the city asked for proffers for the police, hospital and schools, etc). After 18 months on the deal, the developer walked. It never was built.

4). There are just too many A and Bs in this area. Too many lower and lower middle class people who aren’t moving, they can’t. They won’t suddenly move up the pyramid if luxury condos are built and some people move up. When luxury condos are built, empty nested, DINKs, and very wealthy new comers move in. If it’s an empty nester, who moves into their old house? A family who needed more space when they had a second kid. Who moved into their old house? DINK. Who moved into their old apartment? A BIGLAW first year associate. The As and Bs are staying right where they are. No increase in affordable housing has been created.

A true increase in affordable housing will occur with a city/county builds more multi family. Period.

I'm the person who wrote the post about building condos in Petworth leading to lower housing prices in Hagerstown, and I actually agree with you. This business about how loosening zoning laws will lead to affordable house, in my opinion, is a bunch of hokum. No one can even explain how it would work. Sometimes people in favor of loosening zoning laws will say, "yes, the condos being built are for the well-to-do, but those people leave behind old places for someone else, and everyone will trade up." That seems like wishful thinking to me, and I was trying to make fun of that logic by suggesting the chain of people trading up would be extremely long, and that the real beneficiaries of building condos in Petworth would be people who live an hour and a half away in Hagerstown. Clearly the sarcasm didn't come through.

I used to be a pure supply and demand guy on housing problem is housing is a much more complex good

This article finally let me see the light

https://shelterforce.org/2019/02/19/why-voters-havent-been-buying-the-case-for-building/

Cliff notes version housing is segmented and building high end housing doesn't help anyone besides those close to the high-end.

"If housing markets are segmented, then when we build more luxury housing, the price of luxury housing falls (Econ 101). But if each new luxury unit does not correspond to one less household in the next market down (the ‘high-cost’ submarket), then the prices in the high-cost market will move less noticeably than the luxury prices.

Why wouldn’t there be a 1-1 change? For every new luxury unit, doesn’t someone vacate a less expensive unit down market? Not exactly. There are many reasons why the submarket units are imperfect substitutes. For one thing, as prices fall, households in the luxury segment of the market may consume more housing. This can happen when someone buys a second home or even when two roommates respond to lower prices by each renting their own place. But also, some luxury units may be taken off the market when prices fall, while others may be downgraded to lower-quality buildings because the lower rents may no longer be enough to support luxury amenities and services. There are a great many possible permutations, but at each stage in the process, adding one unit or removing one household from one tier does not automatically mean that one additional household will step up into that tier.

I think it is clear from this that we can’t expect new luxury development to have the same impact on rents at the bottom of the market as it does at the top. But how much less impact is not clear. In technical terms, there is no good recent data on the cross-price elasticity of demand between luxury housing and lower-cost housing. A large group of urbanists have taken to talking about the housing market as if these elasticities were close to 1 (increases in luxury supply have a big impact on the low-end rent). But it’s just as likely that the elasticity is closer to 0 (the rent at the bottom of the market is very insensitive to the level of supply at the top of the market)."

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:
Why not grandfather in long term residents , tax breaks etc. When you say pushed out it sort of implies they arent selling. A lot of people sell for a profit. Incentivize them to stay if you value them in the city.

There already are substantial tax breaks for lower income elderly homeowners. But I am more concerned about renters who are forced out.

Of course providing incentives for homeowners who might have moved to stay, likely means the gentrifiers will instead bid up the price of units being rented out, accelerating displacement there.

The way to avoid displacement is to increase supply, not to shift around who gets the units that exist.

I'm not sure I agree. Why not focus on the renters 'forcing out' part? Isn't that often when apartment buildings are renovated by developers into more expensive units? The city could look at grandfathering in current tenants. Your concern is with people being 'forced out', yes?

It’s more complicated. If developers are allowed to build a lot more market rate units in Ward 3, that will reduce gentrification pressures in other areas, increase the overall supply of housing, and provide more tax revenues to DC, all of which can increase affordability.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Let me explain how expanding the housing supply will reduce prices.

A developer buys a rowhouse in Petworth for $600,000. He levels it, and in its place, puts up five condos, each costing between $600,000 and $1.2 million.

No, that is not affordable housing by any stretch of the imagination.

But the people who buy them trade up from other places. And they leave behind places that other people trade up to. And those people leave behind places that other people trade up to. And so on. And so on. And so on. And so on. And so on. And so on. And so on.

The last area in that chain, the place where people least want to live -- housing prices go down there, because there, finally, supply exceeds demand.

Voila! Increasing the housing supply in Petworth leads to lower housing prices in Hagerstown, Maryland.

Don't let anyone tell you that increasing the housing supply won't reduce housing prices.

That's a super squishy and nice theory, but that's not how it works.

I already have, several times on this thread. I am the public finance lawyer. I have my MBA as well. I’ve been practicing 25+ years. Your theory doesn’t equate to reality. I do not agree that changing zoning laws will equate to an increase in affordable housing in this area. I do not believe in the “food pyramid” theory of upward mobility. You are first assuming all those people at the bottom on the pyramid are only there because the supply of something a little more expensive and to them more desirable. You are assuming that if D is built, someone from C will move into D, B will then upgrade into C, A into B and then someone who didn’t have housing before (homeless?, co-sharing?) will then become the new A. Even if you mix it up with rentals, the answer is still no. You are also assuming the market will self correct and rents/home prices automatically go down with an increase in supply.

1) developers are in the business to make a profit. There exist very few true nonprofit developers. People are not in the business of building an real property and selling/ renting it below cost. Period. This is why we have HUD, to subsidize rentals and home ownership programs.

2). Municipalities (local and state) have their own programs (in conjunction with HUD) to own and operate multi family housing. These are your Section 8. Operating a section 8 building is an insane amount of work. Besides the daily upkeep and maintenance of the building, there are additional requirements that must be met and certified every single year by HUD and the IRS. It is just too hard and expensive to have supply meet demand, anywhere, hence HAP vouchers exist but landlords really don’t want the hassle.

3). Single family affordable housing is super tricky. I worked on a deal in DC where the developer was strong armed by the DC government to allocate and donate 1/3 of the townhomes in the development they were building to be given under a special program where an owner would only need to pay $30,000 over a 20 year period, no down payment and they would own fee simple the property at the end of the mortgage. The towns homes at the time were worth over $450,000. It was a special home ownership program. People had to meet certain requirements (be employed, already be a resident of the ward, no gun charge convictions). A third party was brought in to be neutral and review applications and establish a lottery. Then the special requests started (a councilmember wanted his niece at the top of the list, the city only wanted unions who lived in that ward to work on the construction crew, the city asked for proffers for the police, hospital and schools, etc). After 18 months on the deal, the developer walked. It never was built.

4). There are just too many A and Bs in this area. Too many lower and lower middle class people who aren’t moving, they can’t. They won’t suddenly move up the pyramid if luxury condos are built and some people move up. When luxury condos are built, empty nested, DINKs, and very wealthy new comers move in. If it’s an empty nester, who moves into their old house? A family who needed more space when they had a second kid. Who moved into their old house? DINK. Who moved into their old apartment? A BIGLAW first year associate. The As and Bs are staying right where they are. No increase in affordable housing has been created.

A true increase in affordable housing will occur with a city/county builds more multi family. Period.

I'm the person who wrote the post about building condos in Petworth leading to lower housing prices in Hagerstown, and I actually agree with you. This business about how loosening zoning laws will lead to affordable house, in my opinion, is a bunch of hokum. No one can even explain how it would work. Sometimes people in favor of loosening zoning laws will say, "yes, the condos being built are for the well-to-do, but those people leave behind old places for someone else, and everyone will trade up." That seems like wishful thinking to me, and I was trying to make fun of that logic by suggesting the chain of people trading up would be extremely long, and that the real beneficiaries of building condos in Petworth would be people who live an hour and a half away in Hagerstown. Clearly the sarcasm didn't come through.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Let me explain how expanding the housing supply will reduce prices.

A developer buys a rowhouse in Petworth for $600,000. He levels it, and in its place, puts up five condos, each costing between $600,000 and $1.2 million.

No, that is not affordable housing by any stretch of the imagination.

But the people who buy them trade up from other places. And they leave behind places that other people trade up to. And those people leave behind places that other people trade up to. And so on. And so on. And so on. And so on. And so on. And so on. And so on.

The last area in that chain, the place where people least want to live -- housing prices go down there, because there, finally, supply exceeds demand.

Voila! Increasing the housing supply in Petworth leads to lower housing prices in Hagerstown, Maryland.

Don't let anyone tell you that increasing the housing supply won't reduce housing prices.

That's a super squishy and nice theory, but that's not how it works.

I already have, several times on this thread. I am the public finance lawyer. I have my MBA as well. I’ve been practicing 25+ years. Your theory doesn’t equate to reality. I do not agree that changing zoning laws will equate to an increase in affordable housing in this area. I do not believe in the “food pyramid” theory of upward mobility. You are first assuming all those people at the bottom on the pyramid are only there because the supply of something a little more expensive and to them more desirable. You are assuming that if D is built, someone from C will move into D, B will then upgrade into C, A into B and then someone who didn’t have housing before (homeless?, co-sharing?) will then become the new A. Even if you mix it up with rentals, the answer is still no. You are also assuming the market will self correct and rents/home prices automatically go down with an increase in supply.

1) developers are in the business to make a profit. There exist very few true nonprofit developers. People are not in the business of building an real property and selling/ renting it below cost. Period. This is why we have HUD, to subsidize rentals and home ownership programs.

2). Municipalities (local and state) have their own programs (in conjunction with HUD) to own and operate multi family housing. These are your Section 8. Operating a section 8 building is an insane amount of work. Besides the daily upkeep and maintenance of the building, there are additional requirements that must be met and certified every single year by HUD and the IRS. It is just too hard and expensive to have supply meet demand, anywhere, hence HAP vouchers exist but landlords really don’t want the hassle.

3). Single family affordable housing is super tricky. I worked on a deal in DC where the developer was strong armed by the DC government to allocate and donate 1/3 of the townhomes in the development they were building to be given under a special program where an owner would only need to pay $30,000 over a 20 year period, no down payment and they would own fee simple the property at the end of the mortgage. The towns homes at the time were worth over $450,000. It was a special home ownership program. People had to meet certain requirements (be employed, already be a resident of the ward, no gun charge convictions). A third party was brought in to be neutral and review applications and establish a lottery. Then the special requests started (a councilmember wanted his niece at the top of the list, the city only wanted unions who lived in that ward to work on the construction crew, the city asked for proffers for the police, hospital and schools, etc). After 18 months on the deal, the developer walked. It never was built.

4). There are just too many A and Bs in this area. Too many lower and lower middle class people who aren’t moving, they can’t. They won’t suddenly move up the pyramid if luxury condos are built and some people move up. When luxury condos are built, empty nested, DINKs, and very wealthy new comers move in. If it’s an empty nester, who moves into their old house? A family who needed more space when they had a second kid. Who moved into their old house? DINK. Who moved into their old apartment? A BIGLAW first year associate. The As and Bs are staying right where they are. No increase in affordable housing has been created.

A true increase in affordable housing will occur with a city/county builds more multi family. Period.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Let me explain how expanding the housing supply will reduce prices.

A developer buys a rowhouse in Petworth for $600,000. He levels it, and in its place, puts up five condos, each costing between $600,000 and $1.2 million.

No, that is not affordable housing by any stretch of the imagination.

But the people who buy them trade up from other places. And they leave behind places that other people trade up to. And those people leave behind places that other people trade up to. And so on. And so on. And so on. And so on. And so on. And so on. And so on.

The last area in that chain, the place where people least want to live -- housing prices go down there, because there, finally, supply exceeds demand.

Voila! Increasing the housing supply in Petworth leads to lower housing prices in Hagerstown, Maryland.

Don't let anyone tell you that increasing the housing supply won't reduce housing prices.

That's a super squishy and nice theory, but that's not how it works.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:
Why not grandfather in long term residents , tax breaks etc. When you say pushed out it sort of implies they arent selling. A lot of people sell for a profit. Incentivize them to stay if you value them in the city.

There already are substantial tax breaks for lower income elderly homeowners. But I am more concerned about renters who are forced out.

Of course providing incentives for homeowners who might have moved to stay, likely means the gentrifiers will instead bid up the price of units being rented out, accelerating displacement there.

The way to avoid displacement is to increase supply, not to shift around who gets the units that exist.

I'm not sure I agree. Why not focus on the renters 'forcing out' part? Isn't that often when apartment buildings are renovated by developers into more expensive units? The city could look at grandfathering in current tenants. Your concern is with people being 'forced out', yes?

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Let me explain how expanding the housing supply will reduce prices.

A developer buys a rowhouse in Petworth for $600,000. He levels it, and in its place, puts up five condos, each costing between $600,000 and $1.2 million.

No, that is not affordable housing by any stretch of the imagination.

But the people who buy them trade up from other places. And they leave behind places that other people trade up to. And those people leave behind places that other people trade up to. And so on. And so on. And so on. And so on. And so on. And so on. And so on.

The last area in that chain, the place where people least want to live -- housing prices go down there, because there, finally, supply exceeds demand.

Voila! Increasing the housing supply in Petworth leads to lower housing prices in Hagerstown, Maryland.

Don't let anyone tell you that increasing the housing supply won't reduce housing prices.

That's a super squishy and nice theory, but that's not how it works.

Anonymous wrote:Let me explain how expanding the housing supply will reduce prices.

A developer buys a rowhouse in Petworth for $600,000. He levels it, and in its place, puts up five condos, each costing between $600,000 and $1.2 million.

No, that is not affordable housing by any stretch of the imagination.

But the people who buy them trade up from other places. And they leave behind places that other people trade up to. And those people leave behind places that other people trade up to. And so on. And so on. And so on. And so on. And so on. And so on. And so on.

The last area in that chain, the place where people least want to live -- housing prices go down there, because there, finally, supply exceeds demand.

Voila! Increasing the housing supply in Petworth leads to lower housing prices in Hagerstown, Maryland.

Don't let anyone tell you that increasing the housing supply won't reduce housing prices.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:
Why not grandfather in long term residents , tax breaks etc. When you say pushed out it sort of implies they arent selling. A lot of people sell for a profit. Incentivize them to stay if you value them in the city.

There already are substantial tax breaks for lower income elderly homeowners. But I am more concerned about renters who are forced out.

Of course providing incentives for homeowners who might have moved to stay, likely means the gentrifiers will instead bid up the price of units being rented out, accelerating displacement there.

The way to avoid displacement is to increase supply, not to shift around who gets the units that exist.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The mayor of Alexandria is pushing this rezoning agenda too, with the same excuse: adding housing will increase affordable housing.

Posters on here need to educate themselves on public finance, HUD, the IRS code and urban planning. Do people really understand how "affordable" units/ multifamily units get built and financed? The municipality cannot just waive a magic wand and build more. A municipality requiring a developer to add affordable units to their condo building, while does happen, does not result in significant additions to the supply of affordable units. A 501c3 developer or a developer will the main purpose of building and maintaining affordable units is rare, as it is usually a money losing enterprise and isn't sustainable. The only ones I have worked with in the DMV that are able to stay in business for any significant amount of time are ones associated with religious organizations and even those do very small projects. Hence government agencies do it.

Traditionally a municipality uses public finance/ tax-exempt financing to fund the development of affordable units. Otherwise your taxes get raised. There isn't room in a budget to build and maintain a building of affordable units. So DC for instance may issue muni bonds to get the money to finance the building. But just like you cannot print as munch money as you want forever you cannot keep issuing tons of bonds, you have to be able to pledge an income/ asset for the debt service. DC has already pledged all real estate taxes on everything, for infinity so a traditional TIF financing won't work (where you are making the prediction that by adding additional density or real property improvements that real estate values and thus real estate taxes will increase, and thus you are pledging that future increase in receivable real estate taxes towards payment of future debt service). This is how Alexandria City and Arlington County are quietly financing the tax incentive/breaks pledged to Amazon for their HQ.

A TIF on future increases in sales tax could work in DC. This is how DC financed improvements to Gallery Place/ Chinatown and the Navy Yard, but that was mainly to attract business. If you build it , they will come so to speak.

With all this in mind, a train of thought in public finance world has been ways to encourage private development to fund and develop affordable housing. Hence the "theory" if a municipality removes zoning restrictions on SFH, then a developer will immediately want to get more bang for their buck, a build a duplex/condo building/apartment building on the same lot. This will thereby increase the number of housing units in a jurisdiction and thereby raise supply and the economic principle is if you raise supple, the price will decrease. And easy peasy if the price on housing goes down then you have more "affordable" housing, and the government didn't have to fund it, organize it or build it. Hurrah. Genius.

But as many posters have pointed out, in a location like this that is so densely populated, that is so highly educated with a very high average income, that is very transient with people moving into the area constantly to work in a new administration or other fed government supporting work, with an ever increasing population, the theories don't equate to reality when the changes are instituted.

What is your definition of "affordable"? It should mean that people who earn 60% of the average income for the area (as defined by HUD) can afford to live there. It should not mean that a developer takes a big house, makes four $800,000 condos out of it, and sells them to people who qualify for that high of a mortgage. Don't play games, that isn't increasing affordable housing whatsoever. That isn't making it easier for your teachers, first responders, elderly on a fixed income, your trash collectors, your grocery store clerks, your restaurant servers, your construction workers, etc who work in your jurisdiction be able to afford a place to live. This just adds to the housing supply so that UMC people have more options. Don't stick the word affordable in front of something, then point fingers when called out that it is disingenuous, purposefully misleading and not pushing the proper agenda at all. Just like bike lanes help poor people get to work.

Oh look there's someone here who actually knows what they're talking about. Weird.

Anonymous wrote:
Why not grandfather in long term residents , tax breaks etc. When you say pushed out it sort of implies they arent selling. A lot of people sell for a profit. Incentivize them to stay if you value them in the city.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:What doesn't work? Supply and demand in the housing market? Somebody tell the economists.

If you increase the supply in a place like DC, demand goes up too. Prices don't change because supply and demand are both going up. This is why NYC is both incredibly dense and incredibly expensive.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote: It should not mean that a developer takes a big house, makes four $800,000 condos out of it, and sells them to people who qualify for that high of a mortgage.

We have multiple housing cost problems and multiple tools. We have publicly financed housing - Alexandria is putting money into preserving and creating committed AH at various income levels as is DC (and there has just been a big proposal in Md)

But yes creating more market rate units also helps - where do those households who buy the 800K condos (thats only in a few parts of DC of course, condos in most parts of Alexandria are not nearly that expensive) come from? They otherwise would have bought something else, and older condo or a small house. And pushed someone else out, who would then have bought someplace older or further out, displacing someone else.

Yuppies do not spontaneousl generate. Adding new housing, even at the top of the market, has knock on effects.

It also provides tax revenues to help fund AH, as well social services.


Whenever someone proposes committed AH we get complaints about why not just let the market work. Whenever someone proposes ALLOWING market rate housing, by making zoning restrictions less onerous, we get "oh its not affordable enough"

Why not grandfather in long term residents , tax breaks etc. When you say pushed out it sort of implies they arent selling. A lot of people sell for a profit. Incentivize them to stay if you value them in the city.