Comment by Someone1234
2 days ago
The problem with "increase supply" is that existing property owners rarely want that.
In almost all cities land has run out, so the only way to actually increase supply is to increase density. That means fewer single-family-homes, and more townhomes, multi-family, condos, and apartments.
The "American Dream" is a single-family-home, surrounded by other single-family homes, but even with urban sprawl we simply run into the limits of a commute and prices skyrocket.
Ironically we actually solved this problem: Indefinite Telecommuting. But then decided to take our solution that reduces property prices, reduces air pollution, and improves quality of life and then just threw it away because commercial property owners were losing money.
I think it's possible to make apartment/condo living more attractive in the US, but you'd need a few changes. For example:
* American apartment complexes are typically ugly as hell. They're little building islands in a sea of asphalt, disconnected from the wider street grid too. They'd be more attractive if they were more like the complexes I saw while living in Munich: more green up front, car parking basically all underground.
* Require substantial backyards/courtyards for said complexes.
* More tenant protections that prevent landlords from arbitrarily non-renewing a lease, so that people in apartments can have long-term stability. If you break the rules repeatedly or severely, then sure, landlords should be able to remove you, but otherwise you should be left alone to live your life.
While in Munich, we lived in the Solln neighborhood. It's mostly apartments of some kind (we lived in an apartment, and then a backyard duplex), but they just look a lot less ugly than they typically do in the US. Example area: https://www.google.com/maps/place/Munich,+Germany/@48.081098...
> The problem with "increase supply" is that existing property owners rarely want that.
Yup. I'm a weirdo who owns his home but wants a shit-ton more housing built in his city, even if it means my home value goes down. I do know some like-minded folks here, but I would be very surprised if we weren't in the minority.
And it makes sense. We're taught (in the US) to treat our primary residence as an investment, and for most US homeowners it's the most expensive asset they'll ever own, and will be their main vehicle for maintaining their wealth through their later years, and for transferring the remainder of that wealth to their children.
Given that, you'd either have to be self-sabotaging-ly altruistic, or otherwise wealthy enough (outside of your home) that a significant dip in your property's value doesn't tank your finances. I expect that describes a small number of people.
Increasing supply would see your property value rise astronomically. Suddenly there would be developers wanting to build a 30 storey building in place of your single family unit. The ROI on that 30 storey would be high enough for them to give you multiple millions of dollars for your land. What would decrease is the beauty of the neighborhood, but people can be taught to appreciate the beauty of highrise buildings
> In almost all cities land has run out, so the only way to actually increase supply is to increase density. That means fewer single-family-homes, and more townhomes, multi-family, condos, and apartments.
Existing property owners can only afford to hold this opinion because land rents are insufficiently taxed. Through some sort of monumental stupidity we decided to tax labor instead of land. In this sense the SFH, “Americans like suburbia” problem is just a function of poor tax strategy. If homeowners were faced with the economic reality of their choices then markets would fix land use by themselves.
> we decided to tax labor instead of land
I live in Wyoming. We don't tax labor. Just extraction, consumption (sales), some investments and property. Our property is still expensive.
> If homeowners were faced with the economic reality of their choices then markets would fix land use by themselves
The problem begins and ends with supply restrictions.
More than 70% of the US population lives in a state with state income tax. So I think it's fair to say that "we" tax labor, in general, even if it's not universal.
And regardless, "we" also means the US federal government here, and everyone in the US is subject to US income tax, regardless of which state you live in.
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That means the American Dream is unsustainable, and until people can break through the entrenched interests and do something rational, American cities will continue to decline.
> In almost all cities land has run out
That's incredibly untrue. There are numerous cities, even in CA and NY, that have plenty of room for new single family homes.
The response to that is usually some variant of "eww, gross".
More importantly, there's huge tracts of land that could be new cities.
In the past, we had that incidentally or almost "accidentally" as new industries would create or vastly expand existing towns, and development would occur around them.
Now most "work" is more fluid, and doesn't build company towns, instead you get endless suburbs expanding off an existing city, even when they're technically their "own legal framework".
Even after we moved off the "factory town" type new cities, the suburb development wasn't a major issue because each new exurb usually involved a new highway direct to the city center - but new highways have been rare mainly because all the "reasonable" ones have been built now.
You could either create demand for cities somehow (look at Las Vegas, built out of nowhere) or you could use high-speed commuter rail to empty areas to give room for a seed to grow.
Where else do we simply accept that incumbents get to have full protection from loss at the expense of literally everyone else? Certainly other examples exist but we certainly wouldn’t tolerate wheat farmers stopping their neighbors from growing wheat.
No, we threw it away because executives wanted their control fantasy of being able to push people around like little chess pieces, as opposed to setting a vision, hiring professionals, and then giving them the tools to achieve the vision and staying the hell out of their way.
can someone who downvoted this comment explain why? I'm guessing you're management and find it offensive? Feels pretty accurate in my experience