# At what point should we kill the gentrifiers and burn their upscale condos down? **URL:** \ **Category:** In My Humble Opinion\ **Created:** [November 1, 2017, 10:30am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/at-what-point-should-we-kill-the-gentrifiers-and-burn-their-upscale-condos-down/800373 "2017-11-01T10:30:20Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![AI\_Proofreader](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/8dc957/32.png) [@AI\_Proofreader](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/AI_Proofreader)\ **Post date:** [November 1, 2017, 10:30am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/at-what-point-should-we-kill-the-gentrifiers-and-burn-their-upscale-condos-down/800373/1 "2017-11-01T10:30:20Z")
Asking for a friend. ---
**Author:** ![HoneyBadgerDC](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/honeybadgerdc/32/1033_2.png) [@HoneyBadgerDC](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/HoneyBadgerDC)\ **Post date:** [November 1, 2017, 10:52am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/at-what-point-should-we-kill-the-gentrifiers-and-burn-their-upscale-condos-down/800373/2 "2017-11-01T10:52:02Z")
The gentrifiers are just like everyone else in the housing market, they are looking for something they can afford. Normal market forces at work. Welcome them with open arms. ---
**Author:** ![GuanoLad](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/guanolad/32/42_2.png) [@GuanoLad](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/GuanoLad)\ **Post date:** [November 1, 2017, 11:00am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/at-what-point-should-we-kill-the-gentrifiers-and-burn-their-upscale-condos-down/800373/3 "2017-11-01T11:00:44Z")
As much as I hate boring boxy townhouses, and the ridiculous house prices, I very much approve of gentrification. Most places receiving the improvements desperately need it. ---
**Author:** ![Bosda\_Di\_Chi\_of\_Tricor](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bosda_di_chi_of_tricor/32/16845_2.png) [@Bosda\_Di\_Chi\_of\_Tricor](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bosda_Di_Chi_of_Tricor)\ **Post date:** [November 1, 2017, 11:14am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/at-what-point-should-we-kill-the-gentrifiers-and-burn-their-upscale-condos-down/800373/4 "2017-11-01T11:14:00Z")
20 years ago. Fetch the guillotines & DOWN WITH THE ARISTOS! ---
**Author:** ![Lord\_Feldon](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lord_feldon/32/341_2.png) [@Lord\_Feldon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lord_Feldon)\ **Post date:** [November 1, 2017, 11:21am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/at-what-point-should-we-kill-the-gentrifiers-and-burn-their-upscale-condos-down/800373/5 "2017-11-01T11:21:34Z")
Why do the condos get burned down? Killing the people is bad and all, and a lot of the agitation about “gentrification” is silly, but I can _kind of_ get the logic of killing the people doing it if you want to stop it from happening. But shouldn’t their upscale condos get…used? Like, if the problem is that the previous residents had to leave because gentrification forced them out, shouldn’t they be invited to move into the condos, rather than have to live among the piles of burning debris? ---
**Author:** ![astorian](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/ad7895/32.png) [@astorian](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/astorian)\ **Post date:** [November 1, 2017, 11:22am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/at-what-point-should-we-kill-the-gentrifiers-and-burn-their-upscale-condos-down/800373/6 "2017-11-01T11:22:00Z")
So… White people are evil when they flee the inner city AND when they come back? ---
**Author:** ![AI\_Proofreader](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/8dc957/32.png) [@AI\_Proofreader](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/AI_Proofreader)\ **Post date:** [November 1, 2017, 11:47am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/at-what-point-should-we-kill-the-gentrifiers-and-burn-their-upscale-condos-down/800373/7 "2017-11-01T11:47:58Z")
Not a serious question, obviously; just apartment hunting as I’ve been doing for the last month and silently screaming inside. $1,000 used to get you a 2-bedroom in a decent place, now you’re lucky if you can find a 200 sq ft studio in a converted motel in a sketchy neighborhood for that price. Rent prices have doubled in the last 5 years here while wages have (surprise!) remained stagnant. Any time you have to move your budget is going to take a huge hit with the higher rent. Unfortunately this is true of the entire metro area, not just the city of Denver; they’re building yuppie enclaves faster than the paint can dry everywhere. I’d have to move a good hour and a half away from work to find anything affordable. ---
**Author:** ![Lord\_Feldon](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lord_feldon/32/341_2.png) [@Lord\_Feldon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lord_Feldon)\ **Post date:** [November 1, 2017, 11:56am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/at-what-point-should-we-kill-the-gentrifiers-and-burn-their-upscale-condos-down/800373/8 "2017-11-01T11:56:05Z")
It would probably be more expensive if they _weren’t_ building the yuppie enclaves. The way to keep housing cheap without building a bunch of new homes is to make the community a shitty place to live. Then nobody will want to move there. But that would suck for your budget too. ---
**Author:** ![Gyrate](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/gyrate/32/3588_2.png) [@Gyrate](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Gyrate)\ **Post date:** [November 1, 2017, 11:56am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/at-what-point-should-we-kill-the-gentrifiers-and-burn-their-upscale-condos-down/800373/9 "2017-11-01T11:56:42Z")
Hyperinflation of housing prices is a serious problem all over, but I’m not sure mass murder and arson are the ideal solution. ---
**Author:** ![BlankSlate](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/blankslate/32/80_2.png) [@BlankSlate](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BlankSlate)\ **Post date:** [November 1, 2017, 12:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/at-what-point-should-we-kill-the-gentrifiers-and-burn-their-upscale-condos-down/800373/10 "2017-11-01T12:09:44Z")
Condos? Why think small? When are we going to eat the rich and divide their properties up? Wipe the slate clean. ---
**Author:** ![Jackmannii](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/jackmannii/32/311_2.png) [@Jackmannii](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jackmannii)\ **Post date:** [November 1, 2017, 12:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/at-what-point-should-we-kill-the-gentrifiers-and-burn-their-upscale-condos-down/800373/11 "2017-11-01T12:29:59Z")
> [@BlankSlate](#): > > Condos? Why think small? When are we going to eat the rich and divide their properties up? Wipe the slate clean. [Soundtrack for the thread](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fS1bRgzTajI). Maybe there are strategies for encouraging construction of low-cost housing that don’t involve murder and arson? ---
**Author:** ![Little\_Nemo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/little_nemo/32/3120_2.png) [@Little\_Nemo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Little_Nemo)\ **Post date:** [November 1, 2017, 12:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/at-what-point-should-we-kill-the-gentrifiers-and-burn-their-upscale-condos-down/800373/12 "2017-11-01T12:55:01Z")
“I want you to kill every gopher on the course!” “Check me if I’m wrong Sandy, but if I kill all the golfers, they’re gonna lock me up and throw away the key…” “Gophers, ya great git! Not golfers! The little brown furry rodents!” “We can do that… we don’t even have to have a reason.” ---
**Author:** ![BlankSlate](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/blankslate/32/80_2.png) [@BlankSlate](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BlankSlate)\ **Post date:** [November 1, 2017, 1:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/at-what-point-should-we-kill-the-gentrifiers-and-burn-their-upscale-condos-down/800373/13 "2017-11-01T13:10:54Z")
> [@astorian](#): > > So… White people are evil when they flee the inner city AND when they come back? Yes, because the only people moving into gentrifying neighborhoods are white. :rolleyes: From a NYC perspective, gentrification really can suck. A lot of neighborhoods experiencing it are working class enclaves with semi-affordable rents. People are forced out by skyrocketing prices. These aren’t burned out ghettos being improved by white saviors with their Starbucks and dog grooming emporiums. The bitterness of the locals is perfectly understandable. ---
**Author:** ![kiz](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/7feea3/32.png) [@kiz](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/kiz)\ **Post date:** [November 1, 2017, 1:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/at-what-point-should-we-kill-the-gentrifiers-and-burn-their-upscale-condos-down/800373/14 "2017-11-01T13:37:39Z")
> [@BlankSlate](#): > > From a NYC perspective, gentrification really can suck. A lot of neighborhoods experiencing it are working class enclaves with semi-affordable rents. People are forced out by skyrocketing prices. These aren’t burned out ghettos being improved by white saviors with their Starbucks and dog grooming emporiums. The bitterness of the locals is perfectly understandable. Not just in NYC – it’s happening on some level in every _desirable_ metropolitan area. ---
**Author:** ![msmith537](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/d9b06d/32.png) [@msmith537](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/msmith537)\ **Post date:** [November 1, 2017, 1:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/at-what-point-should-we-kill-the-gentrifiers-and-burn-their-upscale-condos-down/800373/15 "2017-11-01T13:49:23Z")
I just got in at the right time.😉 It would be nice if, when they start redeveloping some of these neighborhoods, they varied the architectural style from “generic Toll Brothers concrete and glass yuppie ghetto with ground floor retail space for Starbucks”. ---
**Author:** ![Textual\_Innuendo](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/898d66/32.png) [@Textual\_Innuendo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Textual_Innuendo)\ **Post date:** [November 1, 2017, 2:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/at-what-point-should-we-kill-the-gentrifiers-and-burn-their-upscale-condos-down/800373/16 "2017-11-01T14:27:57Z")
> [@msmith537](#): > > It would be nice if, when they start redeveloping some of these neighborhoods, they varied the architectural style from “generic Toll Brothers concrete and glass yuppie ghetto with ground floor retail space for Starbucks”. Or as I like to think of these, “[The Villas at Kenny’s House](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l242Sj26k8M)” (youtube link to parody of these types of places). 😛 I recently did an analysis around single family home buying - for the 30% of americans who live on the West or Northeast coasts, it’s essentially impossible for the median or even the slightly-above-average person to responsibly buy a single family home, with “responsibly” defined as having a 6 month emergency fund and having a 20% down payment and closing costs. Using average housing prices and some averaged assumptions around cost of living and final take-home pay after taxes: [ul] [li]If you’re able to save 10% of your income and make the median US salary of $50k, it would take you 46 years. [/li] [li]If you make $75k (median for doctorate holders), 31 years.[/li] [li]If you make $100k (median for MBA holders), 23 years. [/li] [li]Even if you make $200k, it would take you 11 years.[/li][/ul] Now granted, this neglects dual-income households, income growth over the time period in question, and at these higher income numbers you should be able to save more (hopefully substantially more) than 10% of your income, but even if you cut those in half, how would you feel making $100k, saving 20% of your after-tax income, and having to save for 12 years before you can buy a house responsibly? But wait! You can’t even do that, because in that 12 years, the price would have actually gone up substantially in these areas, so you’re running a race where you’re perpetually falling behind - at current averaged housing appreciation rates for those areas (3.5%), it’s gone up another $255k and you need to save for another 18 years. And in _that_ 18 years housing has continued to appreciate…well you get the idea. It is rather sobering that we’re rapidly approaching a future where the majority of the population in this country may be unable to ever own a home they don’t inherit. ---
**Author:** ![Orwell](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/o/dfb087/32.png) [@Orwell](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Orwell)\ **Post date:** [November 1, 2017, 2:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/at-what-point-should-we-kill-the-gentrifiers-and-burn-their-upscale-condos-down/800373/17 "2017-11-01T14:30:32Z")
> [@BlankSlate](#): > > From a NYC perspective, gentrification really can suck. A lot of neighborhoods experiencing it are working class enclaves with semi-affordable rents. People are forced out by skyrocketing prices. These aren’t burned out ghettos being improved by white saviors with their Starbucks and dog grooming emporiums. The bitterness of the locals is perfectly understandable. While the bitterness may be understandable from their perspective, it makes no sense on an economic level. Most neighborhoods go through economic cycles, experiencing periods of renovations and decay. Economic forces are at work, and it is silly to personify them or call any participants evil. It seems especially silly to vilify people who are improving neighborhoods and making them better places to live. I would love to see improvements in my neighborhood that would raise housing prices, since I intend to sell within a few years. The odd thing is that housing prices (and rents to a lesser degree) seem somewhat detached from basic wage and economic underpinnings. How can home prices and rents increase so much faster than wage and consumer goods inflation? It certainly creates problems for businesses that rely on lower-paid labor or even middle-class labor. ---
**Author:** ![Dewey\_Finn](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dewey_finn/32/4222_2.png) [@Dewey\_Finn](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dewey_Finn)\ **Post date:** [November 1, 2017, 3:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/at-what-point-should-we-kill-the-gentrifiers-and-burn-their-upscale-condos-down/800373/18 "2017-11-01T15:13:39Z")
> [@AI\_Proofreader](#): > > Not a serious question, obviously; just apartment hunting as I’ve been doing for the last month and silently screaming inside. $1,000 used to get you a 2-bedroom in a decent place, now you’re lucky if you can find a 200 sq ft studio in a converted motel in a sketchy neighborhood for that price. > > Rent prices have doubled in the last 5 years here while wages have (surprise!) remained stagnant. Any time you have to move your budget is going to take a huge hit with the higher rent. Unfortunately this is true of the entire metro area, not just the city of Denver; they’re building yuppie enclaves faster than the paint can dry everywhere. I’d have to move a good hour and a half away from work to find anything affordable. And if you move an hour and a half away and rent an apartment, you are partly responsible for driving up rental prices in that area. So it’s your fault. In short, what you are seeing is simply market forces at work. ---
**Author:** ![kopek](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kopek/32/337_2.png) [@kopek](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/kopek)\ **Post date:** [November 1, 2017, 3:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/at-what-point-should-we-kill-the-gentrifiers-and-burn-their-upscale-condos-down/800373/19 "2017-11-01T15:27:31Z")
I live near a very poor area (in a slightly less poor area) where people are being driven and/or priced out on a regular basis and replaced by doctors and lawyers and the like. I would say last week at the latest. I understand the market forces and all that but I still don’t like seeing it. ---
**Author:** ![Lemur866](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lemur866/32/434_2.png) [@Lemur866](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lemur866)\ **Post date:** [November 1, 2017, 3:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/at-what-point-should-we-kill-the-gentrifiers-and-burn-their-upscale-condos-down/800373/20 "2017-11-01T15:38:00Z")
Think about what housing prices would be like if they couldn’t build upscale condos. Then all the yuppies and dinks who live in those upscale condos would be bidding on detached houses. The problem is supply and demand. There is a certain supply of housing in a particular location, and a certain demand for that housing, and those values go up and down. People are bidding up housing prices in cities because more people are moving there. Meanwhile, if you want a house in rural Kansas you can find plenty going for dirt cheap prices. Oh, you don’t want to move to rural Kansas? Welcome to the club. The reason the houses in rural Kansas are so cheap is because you don’t want to live there, and neither does anyone else. Building high rise housing at least gives a lot of people a place to live. Increasing the supply to meet the demand keeps prices lower. That prices are rising despite a bunch of new high rise construction just means demand is increasing even faster than supply. The only solution is even more supply, or somehow decreasing the demand. A nice economic downturn would do that. Like here in Seattle, housing prices are going insane with the tech boom. Tired of that? Hey, a tech crash will take care of the problem! Throw all those Amazon guys out of work, and they’ll leave Seattle and housing prices will crash, and it will be great. [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/at-what-point-should-we-kill-the-gentrifiers-and-burn-their-upscale-condos-down/800373.md?page=2)