# The affordable-housing crisis -- is more supply really the answer? **URL:** \ **Category:** In My Humble Opinion\ **Created:** [March 7, 2023, 3:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-affordable-housing-crisis-is-more-supply-really-the-answer/980836 "2023-03-07T15:31:29Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 4
**Author:** ![JohnT](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/johnt/32/15048_2.png) [@JohnT](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/JohnT)\ **Post date:** [March 8, 2023, 4:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-affordable-housing-crisis-is-more-supply-really-the-answer/980836/61 "2023-03-08T16:40:19Z")
To answer the OP’s question: yes, of course building more housing (apartments, home, condos, etc) will solve the housing crisis. Here’s the big problem: Homes represent a large % of the net worth of a significant and influential block of voters, and there is no mayor who will ever win election on the platform of “we need to lower your home’s value via a program of building so many homes that the market gets, well, a little over-saturated and prices start dropping to ‘reasonable’ levels.” So the political pressure is to keep those home valuations high, and increasing housing stock by 30%, 50% over a few years just will not serve those ends. ---
**Author:** ![Horatius](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/horatius/32/3572_2.png) [@Horatius](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Horatius)\ **Post date:** [March 8, 2023, 4:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-affordable-housing-crisis-is-more-supply-really-the-answer/980836/62 "2023-03-08T16:46:33Z")
> [@JohnT](#): > > “we need to lower your home’s value via a program of building so many homes that the market gets, well, a little over-saturated and prices start dropping to ‘reasonable’ levels.” I’ve got an idea; how about we just don’t tell them that? Market it as, “We need slums for your gardeners and fast food workers to live in, so you don’t have to do all that work yourself, or wait more than 30 seconds to get fed” instead. Then just don’t make them actual slums. ---
**Author:** ![Ulfreida](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ulfreida/32/8014_2.png) [@Ulfreida](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ulfreida)\ **Post date:** [March 8, 2023, 4:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-affordable-housing-crisis-is-more-supply-really-the-answer/980836/63 "2023-03-08T16:49:26Z")
> [@Sam\_Stone](#): > > Rather than try to pack more people into a small area while large cities throughout the country have plenty of available real estate, how about working to help population relocate if they can’t afford to live in a certain place? No one has a right to live in San Fransisco if they can’t afford it. And it seems crazy to try to cram more people into some of the most expensive real estate on the continent when there is plenty available at reasonable prices elsewhere. I would guess you haven’t closely examined real estate prices in California recently. If you needed to work in San Francisco, you’d have to drive – I’m guessing here – about 100 mlles to find housing a middle class family could reasonably afford. SF has about 700 thousand people – the greater Bay Area, almost 8 million, and there isn’t much of any affordable housing in it. This is a much greater problem than you are describing. > [@Sam\_Stone](#): > > Also, you have to recognize that one of the reasons you have so much homelessness is that you subsidize it. People in tents are avoiding property raxes, fees, regulations, etc. They are allowed to skirt the law with impugnity. In a place like San Fransisco that’s a hell of a lot of subsidy compared to a homeowner. You’ve never visited a homeless camp either, have you? It’s the utmost in squalor and horribly exposed to any kind of crime and every weather. The people who live in such camps are mostly men with intractable addictions and untreated mental illness. Often both at once. The majority of the homeless are invisible, sleeping on the sofas and in the garages of friends and relatives, and in their cars. This is where all the homeless women and children are – and in the inadequate public shelters. Nobody is living it up on the taxpayer’s dime as you so self-righteously imagine. ---
**Author:** ![Maserschmidt](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/maserschmidt/32/18829_2.png) [@Maserschmidt](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Maserschmidt)\ **Post date:** [March 8, 2023, 4:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-affordable-housing-crisis-is-more-supply-really-the-answer/980836/64 "2023-03-08T16:52:11Z")
> [@OldOlds](#): > > I’m near Boston, and the same fight is raging in most of the close suburbs. Someone wants to put up a 100 unit condo (or even a 15 unit condo) and everyone freaks the fuck out. Melrose is a single-family community! Dedham schools can’t handle the influx of kids living in condos that “only” cost $450k! Wakefield can’t absorb the traffic! It’s going to be really interesting to see if the new MBTA multifamily zoning requirement is going to have any teeth. That additional zoning is something that might simply be voted down at town meeting; also, I suppose there is some possibility of constitutional challenge. Still, I like the approach. ---
**Author:** ![Stranger\_On\_A\_Train](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/13edae/32.png) [@Stranger\_On\_A\_Train](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Stranger_On_A_Train)\ **Post date:** [March 8, 2023, 4:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-affordable-housing-crisis-is-more-supply-really-the-answer/980836/65 "2023-03-08T16:58:09Z")
> [@Horatius](#): > > I’ve got an idea; how about we just don’t tell them that? Market it as, “We need slums for your gardeners and fast food workers to live in, so you don’t have to do all that work yourself, or wait more than 30 seconds to get fed” instead. Then just don’t make them actual slums. “I’m starting to like the cut of this guy’s gibberish!” Stranger ---
**Author:** ![iiandyiiii](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/iiandyiiii/32/7924_2.png) [@iiandyiiii](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/iiandyiiii)\ **Post date:** [March 8, 2023, 5:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-affordable-housing-crisis-is-more-supply-really-the-answer/980836/66 "2023-03-08T17:01:18Z")
None of these are easy problems, but there are places on Earth where they’ve been largely solved (i.e. Tokyo). We should take our cues from those places. ---
**Author:** ![Cheesesteak](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/cheesesteak/32/3694_2.png) [@Cheesesteak](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Cheesesteak)\ **Post date:** [March 8, 2023, 5:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-affordable-housing-crisis-is-more-supply-really-the-answer/980836/67 "2023-03-08T17:08:05Z")
> [@thorny\_locust](#): > > Localities can make stupid decisions, sure The problem here is not stupid decisions, it’s decisions focused only on the immediate desires of the locals. The decisions defend everybody’s current situation, but nobody is advocating for the needs of the people who would be helped by additional development. My issue is the cookie cutter complaints {town name} can’t handle more development. {town name} schools are overcrowded. {town name} roads have too much traffic. {town name} water and sewer can’t handle more people. {town name}'s character will be lost. It doesn’t matter if {town name} is a crowded suburb or a sparsely populated rural area, whether it’s populated with Liberals or Conservatives. It’s ultimately an “I’ve got mine” argument. I have the house I want in the town I want, and I want it to stay that way forever. ---
**Author:** ![Horatius](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/horatius/32/3572_2.png) [@Horatius](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Horatius)\ **Post date:** [March 8, 2023, 5:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-affordable-housing-crisis-is-more-supply-really-the-answer/980836/68 "2023-03-08T17:22:58Z")
> [@Cheesesteak](#): > > It’s ultimately an “I’ve got mine” argument. I have the house I want in the town I want, and I want it to stay that way forever. I think it was Dennis Miller who once said, “A developer is someone who wants to build a house in a forest; a conservationist is someone who already owns a house in the forest.” ---
**Author:** ![engineer\_comp\_geek](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/engineer_comp_geek/32/504_2.png) [@engineer\_comp\_geek](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/engineer_comp_geek)\ **Post date:** [March 8, 2023, 5:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-affordable-housing-crisis-is-more-supply-really-the-answer/980836/69 "2023-03-08T17:31:29Z")
**Moderator Note** > [@Ulfreida](#): > > You’ve never visited a homeless camp either, have you? Again, while this is worthy of discussion, it is off-topic for this thread. Please do not continue this hijack. ---
**Author:** ![jjakucyk](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/3d9bf3/32.png) [@jjakucyk](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/jjakucyk)\ **Post date:** [March 8, 2023, 6:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-affordable-housing-crisis-is-more-supply-really-the-answer/980836/70 "2023-03-08T18:03:09Z")
> [@Horatius](#): > > > [@tofor](#): > > > > Do you really think that empty _luxury_ apartments are a major reason normal people can’t find housing? > > It is if the builders are preferentially building high-end units that they know they can sell to investors for a premium, instead of low- or mid-range units. If there’s an unsaturated market for the luxury units then a builder would be stupid not to cater to that market. After the top end of the market is satisfied development starts moving down the ladder. > [@thorny\_locust](#): > > > [@DavidNRockies](#): > > > > In my area, there’s no end of dedicated green space that can’t be built on and may very well contribute to “quality of life” (for those who can afford entrance to the housing market), but it also does create that artificial scarcity which drives up prices. > > Green space is often also absorbing excess water during heavy rain, which reduces both flooding and drought and helps keep water supplies clean; and increasing air quality; and even increasing species survivall (yes, even in urban areas.) Surface runoff and need for retention areas are a product more of pavement than buildings. The per-capita runoff of urban cities is less than suburban areas because suburban areas spawn so much more roads and parking lots which need more buffer areas which makes walking and cycling less attractive, and it spins out of control. > [@Horatius](#): > > This is certainly a factor where I live. We have lots of downtown-ish neighborhoods that could flourish if we were to build in-fill housing to replace some older single-family homes. But our zoning laws restrict a huge part of the city’s land area to only single-family homes, and where zoning allows such in-fill, there are neighbors who fight tooth and nail to prevent new developments. Also parking requirements tend to strangle downtown revitalization efforts. Fortunately towns are starting to figure this out and are revamping their downtown zoning regs to be more flexible in that regard. > [@iiandyiiii](#): > > Upzoning can increase the value of property while reducing individual housing costs. Without proper tax structures it can also lead to speculation and stalling the redevelopment. That’s how you end up with tiny single-family shacks next to 6-story apartment blocks. Because the land itself is such a small part of the property tax assessment, there’s a disincentive to developing it and incentive to hold it vacant (downtown surface parking lots for example) in hopes of a big windfall. Region-wide or statewide upzoning (which is really just preventing the downzoning that’s currently de rigueur) would help prevent that by not concentrating all the redevelopment potential in a small area. ---
**Author:** ![Chad\_Sudan](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/chad_sudan/32/4509_2.png) [@Chad\_Sudan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chad_Sudan)\ **Post date:** [March 8, 2023, 6:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-affordable-housing-crisis-is-more-supply-really-the-answer/980836/71 "2023-03-08T18:09:16Z")
> [@Ulfreida](#): > > > [@Sam\_Stone](#): > > > > Rather than try to pack more people into a small area while large cities throughout the country have plenty of available real estate, how about working to help population relocate if they can’t afford to live in a certain place? No one has a right to live in San Fransisco if they can’t afford it. And it seems crazy to try to cram more people into some of the most expensive real estate on the continent when there is plenty available at reasonable prices elsewhere. > > I would guess you haven’t closely examined real estate prices in California recently. If you needed to work in San Francisco, you’d have to drive – I’m guessing here – about 100 mlles to find housing a middle class family could reasonably afford. SF has about 700 thousand people – the greater Bay Area, almost 8 million, and there isn’t much of any affordable housing in it. This is a much greater problem than you are describing. So true! One might assume that if you were willing to move to one of California’s most remote and least sought-after areas (such as Bakersfield), you’d readily find housing that was – by national standards – affordable. And yet… that’s just not the case! You still end up paying a shocking premium to live in _any_ part of California. [![](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_U.S._states_by_median_home_price#/media/File:Home_prices_by_county.webp) ](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_U.S._states_by_median_home_price#/media/File:Home_prices_by_county.webp) ---
**Author:** ![Dorjan](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dorjan/32/12440_2.png) [@Dorjan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dorjan)\ **Post date:** [March 8, 2023, 6:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-affordable-housing-crisis-is-more-supply-really-the-answer/980836/72 "2023-03-08T18:10:11Z")
> [@iiandyiiii](#): > > None of these are easy problems, but there are places on Earth where they’ve been largely solved (i.e. Tokyo). We should take our cues from those places. There are lots of reasons that the solutions that worked in Tokyo won’t work here. We can start with racism for one. ---
**Author:** ![Ruken](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/f475e1/32.png) [@Ruken](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ruken)\ **Post date:** [March 8, 2023, 6:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-affordable-housing-crisis-is-more-supply-really-the-answer/980836/73 "2023-03-08T18:15:09Z")
> [@Ulfreida](#): > > I would guess you haven’t closely examined real estate prices in California recently. If you needed to work in San Francisco, you’d have to drive – I’m guessing here – about 100 mlles to find housing a middle class family could reasonably afford. SF has about 700 thousand people – the greater Bay Area, almost 8 million, and there isn’t much of any affordable housing in it. This is a much greater problem than you are describing. I don’t think the point was to live elsewhere and commute to SF, but to live _and work_ elsewhere. ---
**Author:** ![Ruken](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/f475e1/32.png) [@Ruken](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ruken)\ **Post date:** [March 8, 2023, 6:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-affordable-housing-crisis-is-more-supply-really-the-answer/980836/74 "2023-03-08T18:25:31Z")
> [@Chad\_Sudan](#): > > One might assume that if you were willing to move to one of California’s most remote and least sought-after areas (such as Bakersfield), you’d readily find housing that was – by national standards – affordable. And yet… that’s just not the case! You still end up paying a shocking premium to live in _any_ part of California. Median price tells us little about the availability of affordable housing. And fwiw, I’m seeing plenty of rentals that are affordable on Bakersfield’s median household income. ---
**Author:** ![jjakucyk](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/3d9bf3/32.png) [@jjakucyk](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/jjakucyk)\ **Post date:** [March 8, 2023, 6:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-affordable-housing-crisis-is-more-supply-really-the-answer/980836/75 "2023-03-08T18:38:42Z")
> [@Ruken](#): > > I don’t think the point was to live elsewhere and commute to SF, but to live _and work_ elsewhere. Great, but where are the jobs? Between 2011 and 2017 The SF Bay Area “created 531,400 new jobs but only permitted 123,801 new housing units: This adds up to a ratio of 4.3 jobs per housing unit, a rate well in excess of a healthy balance of 1.5 jobs per housing unit.” [https://www.biabayarea.org/san-francisco-bay-area-jobs-housing-imbalance](https://www.biabayarea.org/san-francisco-bay-area-jobs-housing-imbalance) New York is little better. “Between 2001 and 2018 NYC added 770,000 jobs and 407,000 housing units, or 362,900 more net new jobs than housing units.” > **[NYC isn’t building enough housing to keep up with job growth: report](https://ny.curbed.com/2019/10/31/20941985/nyc-housing-job-growth-report-city-planning-great-recession)** > > The city’s housing production declined an average of 25 percent from pre- to post- Great Recession. ---
**Author:** ![thorny\_locust](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/thorny_locust/32/431_2.png) [@thorny\_locust](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/thorny_locust)\ **Post date:** [March 8, 2023, 6:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-affordable-housing-crisis-is-more-supply-really-the-answer/980836/76 "2023-03-08T18:49:03Z")
> [@jjakucyk](#): > > > [@Horatius](#): > > > > It is if the builders are preferentially building high-end units that they know they can sell to investors for a premium, instead of low- or mid-range units. > > If there’s an unsaturated market for the luxury units then a builder would be stupid not to cater to that market. After the top end of the market is satisfied development starts moving down the ladder. Ah, a trickle-down theory! So after the rich people have all the houses they want (and rich people often have multiple houses), then maybe the people who clean those houses can get one? They’ll probably be after the ones who do the actual physical work of the building, of course; and long after the ones who own the companies doing the building. And that’s presuming most of the developers don’t, instead, look for someplace to build where the rich people don’t think they have enough houses yet. > [@jjakucyk](#): > > Surface runoff and need for retention areas are a product more of pavement than buildings. The per-capita runoff of urban cities is less than suburban areas because suburban areas spawn so much more roads and parking lots which need more buffer areas which makes walking and cycling less attractive, and it spins out of control. The per-capita runoff may be less, but the local impact can still be large, if urban areas don’t provide for absorptive areas within and adjacent to the city as well as far away from it. Both the air quality and the summer overheating of urban areas can both also be drastically affected by a lack of properly planted green space. The impact of pavement around houses in more suburban and rural areas can be lessened by proper design, such as cluster development; and by requiring absorbtive areas to be provided. Some urban areas and many suburban and rural areas do indeed have places highly suitable for infill with houses on smaller lots and/or with multifamily housing and/or with multistory multifamily housing. But just ‘let’s fill in all this green space, it’s only there to look pretty’ is not the way to do it. > [@Ruken](#): > > I don’t think the point was to live elsewhere and commute to SF, but to live _and work_ elsewhere. And yet people are simultaneously told that they ought to be ready to move wherever the jobs are. (And, as has been pointed out elsewhere in this thread, the high-priced areas rely for their functioning on large numbers of people showing up to work there who aren’t paid enough to live there, or within any reasonable commuting distance.) ---
**Author:** ![Cheesesteak](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/cheesesteak/32/3694_2.png) [@Cheesesteak](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Cheesesteak)\ **Post date:** [March 8, 2023, 6:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-affordable-housing-crisis-is-more-supply-really-the-answer/980836/77 "2023-03-08T18:58:49Z")
> [@thorny\_locust](#): > > So after the rich people have all the houses they want (and rich people often have multiple houses), then maybe the people who clean those houses can get one? Rich people can already get any houses they want. If there is any part of the real estate development market that is just fine right now, it’s building big fancy houses. Nobody is doing new builds for starter homes, if you manage to lock down an empty lot that is zoned for a house, you build a big ass house on it. Anyone who isn’t rich but wants a house is getting a 60 year old split level, if they can find one a developer doesn’t already want to knock down to build a McMansion. ---
**Author:** ![thorny\_locust](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/thorny_locust/32/431_2.png) [@thorny\_locust](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/thorny_locust)\ **Post date:** [March 8, 2023, 7:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-affordable-housing-crisis-is-more-supply-really-the-answer/980836/78 "2023-03-08T19:03:09Z")
> [@Cheesesteak](#): > > Rich people can already get any houses they want. If there is any part of the real estate development market that is just fine right now, it’s building big fancy houses. Nobody is doing new builds for starter homes, if you manage to lock down an empty lot that is zoned for a house, you build a big ass house on it. Yes, I know. I was responding to this: > [@jjakucyk](#): > > If there’s an unsaturated market for the luxury units then a builder would be stupid not to cater to that market. After the top end of the market is satisfied development starts moving down the ladder. The problem we’re having is that no, development has not been “moving down the ladder”. Whether it ever will, I have no idea; but, in the meantime, people are homeless. ---
**Author:** ![Ulfreida](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ulfreida/32/8014_2.png) [@Ulfreida](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ulfreida)\ **Post date:** [March 8, 2023, 7:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-affordable-housing-crisis-is-more-supply-really-the-answer/980836/79 "2023-03-08T19:05:04Z")
> [@engineer\_comp\_geek](#): > > > [@Ulfreida](#): > > > > You’ve never visited a homeless camp either, have you? > > Again, while this is worthy of discussion, it is off-topic for this thread. Please do not continue this hijack. While I accept the correction, the issue homelessness and that of affordable housing are fundamentally the same problem. ---
**Author:** ![k9bfriender](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/k9bfriender/32/3283_2.png) [@k9bfriender](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/k9bfriender)\ **Post date:** [March 8, 2023, 7:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-affordable-housing-crisis-is-more-supply-really-the-answer/980836/80 "2023-03-08T19:11:33Z")
> [@Ruken](#): > > I don’t think the point was to live elsewhere and commute to SF, but to live _and work_ elsewhere. That still leaves two problems unaddressed. The first being that then you don’t have enough employees in SF. The second being, if they go somewhere else where there is high demand for employees, then the demand for housing is likely to be high as well. And it’s not just SF. I live in suburbia, 20 miles from the nearest city, and houses around here are ridiculous. I bought mine 20 years ago, so I’ve got a nice low locked in mortgage that is about a third to a quarter of what people are paying to rent. I have employees that make 70k a year that can barely get qualified for a mortgage. You could buy up a farm and turn it into hundreds or even thousands of housing units, but if there aren’t jobs nearby, why would anyone want to live there? [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-affordable-housing-crisis-is-more-supply-really-the-answer/980836.md?page=3) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-affordable-housing-crisis-is-more-supply-really-the-answer/980836.md?page=5)