Southie pol urges condo clampdown
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tmac9wr
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underground
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Ironically, these idiots are going to end up pricing their constituents right out of the neighborhood. It's like supply and demand is a complete mystery to some people.
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^ A fair number of NIMBYs don't believe in Supply and Demand where housing is concerned. It's quite remarkable.
fattony
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This belief is surprisingly pervasive. I'd love to read a coherent presentation of the reasoning, if anyone knows of one. I used to have a practically religious faith in S&D and I've learned to temper that. If there are some unique issues surrounding housing that limit the effectiveness of increasing supply on lowering price I would certainly like to understand how it works.
My intuition and experience tells me that S&D does in fact dominate the housing market, but I'm open to hearing an argument against.
AmericanFolkLegend
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Homeowners (I imagine a fairly high percentage of politically-active, long-time residents), are acutely aware of supply and demand:
1. New supply could lower the price of existing homes.
2. New supply could bring in more terrifying yuppies.
They only think of their own little corner of the world. Most of the people on this board think of Greater Boston at a macro level.
My experience is that certain (not all) so-called progressives observe two things:
A typical manifestation is to point at "luxury development" as somehow being the cause of high prices. People like this are endlessly puzzled about why cities just keep on allowing "luxury condos" all the time, but unfortunately that curiosity usually does not lead to the questioning of assumptions.
- More construction going up
- Prices going up
A typical manifestation is to point at "luxury development" as somehow being the cause of high prices. People like this are endlessly puzzled about why cities just keep on allowing "luxury condos" all the time, but unfortunately that curiosity usually does not lead to the questioning of assumptions.
Interestingly, it does appear that new development often attracts new higher priced housing options that were not previously there, which then can attract new more well-funded buyers who previously wouldn't have considered buying in that neighborhood. Boston and New York are both seeing this.
I firmly believe building more housing will reduce prices in the long term, but in the short term it does indeed appear to lead to increased demand AND increased price, at least for the new construction. I think this is because a formerly un-hip neighborhood becomes hip and then suddenly many more people want to live there!
There also seems to be a trend of wealthy international buyers becoming interested in Boston lately. Lots of cash offers, parents buying condos for their college-aged student, buying properties that they may eventually move into but perhaps just rent out, etc. So there isn't just latent demand from MA residents, but a new increasing demand from overseas as well. Even more reason to keep building, and faster!
I firmly believe building more housing will reduce prices in the long term, but in the short term it does indeed appear to lead to increased demand AND increased price, at least for the new construction. I think this is because a formerly un-hip neighborhood becomes hip and then suddenly many more people want to live there!
There also seems to be a trend of wealthy international buyers becoming interested in Boston lately. Lots of cash offers, parents buying condos for their college-aged student, buying properties that they may eventually move into but perhaps just rent out, etc. So there isn't just latent demand from MA residents, but a new increasing demand from overseas as well. Even more reason to keep building, and faster!
It's true that there are complications due to network effects. For example, improving a neighborhood can make it more desirable, leading to higher prices. If the development of condos also leads to the improvement of the neighborhood then that same effect could be triggered.
The knee jerk response is to block all new development. That solves nothing, as we all know.
The right response is to promote broad-based neighborhood improvement AND housing supply increases across the entire city and region. If only one neighborhood gets nice, then yes, there will be a lot of displacement. But if many neighborhoods get nice at the same time, then displacement can be minimized or even completely eliminated, because the stakes are so much lower.
I also think there's a place for inclusionary zoning or other affordable housing market interventions to soften the sharp edges of the market. Since no plan is perfect, and nothing ever works out as planned anyway, but we need to make sure people aren't harmed in the process, there's a need for tools like IZ, even though they aren't "ideal" free market solutions.
I think there's been a much better approach in recent years with the various CDCs and other non-profits building mixed market/middle-income/low-income housing alongside neighborhood or transit improvements in existing places. All transportation projects should be paired with a neighborhood building program such as that and more. I was really hoping that Somerville would be a leader in this respect, but now I am wondering about Curtatone... anyway, different thread.
The knee jerk response is to block all new development. That solves nothing, as we all know.
The right response is to promote broad-based neighborhood improvement AND housing supply increases across the entire city and region. If only one neighborhood gets nice, then yes, there will be a lot of displacement. But if many neighborhoods get nice at the same time, then displacement can be minimized or even completely eliminated, because the stakes are so much lower.
I also think there's a place for inclusionary zoning or other affordable housing market interventions to soften the sharp edges of the market. Since no plan is perfect, and nothing ever works out as planned anyway, but we need to make sure people aren't harmed in the process, there's a need for tools like IZ, even though they aren't "ideal" free market solutions.
I think there's been a much better approach in recent years with the various CDCs and other non-profits building mixed market/middle-income/low-income housing alongside neighborhood or transit improvements in existing places. All transportation projects should be paired with a neighborhood building program such as that and more. I was really hoping that Somerville would be a leader in this respect, but now I am wondering about Curtatone... anyway, different thread.