Quote:
Originally Posted by drummer
This is tough because developers aren't always interested in appealing to the original residents, but rather wealthy tenants or buyers. That said, it's hard to force businesses to do stuff...yet affordable housing is good...
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No and yes..... Developers care about one thing, money. They don't care if the existing residents buy/rent or if newcomers come in. BTW, in my considerable experience with developers, I'd say 20-30% of the new occupants ARE from the neighborhood, and are PUMPED to have a new/nice place to live.
Developers don't care about who the hell buys/rents. They really don't. It's the NIMBY's who only want people like themselves to live there. They project their tribalism onto developers.
The word "affordable" has no business ever being linked to "housing". Affordable to who? Everyone? It is all relative. If it was truly "un-affordable" the units will not sell....banker will foreclose and sell them at "affordable" rates, to recoup their money at a loss. Happens all the time, might happen in the near future if you believe all the rumors of a recession.
Subsidized housing is VERY expensive to build and maintain, and then, who gets to live there and who doesn't? Why is one person more deserving than another? How does the prospect of losing a housing voucher affect the upward mobility of some tenants (I've literally seen a sec 8 tenant turn down a big job promotion, because she didn't want to lose her voucher)
Not to mention, the cost is passed through to us all via increased taxes, duh.
Developers build new properties and they become "all the rage" because they are "new" and things like; they are much more efficient than older housing stock, etc. The land costs a ton of money, the cost to build is very expensive, the materials are crazy expensive. The result = expensive housing.......but the flip side is, when you allow developers to "over-build" which they invariably do (its impossible to time a market downturn), prices of older units come down. Just like a new car is not affordable, but a good used one can be. I've lived through this exact example in Austin 3 different times....late 80's, early 00's, and again in '08. My housing prices declined as a percentage of my expenditures each of those times.
The only way out of a housing shortage......IS TO BUILD MORE FREAKING HOUSING.....FFS. Want prices to decrease, build too much, and watch landlords offer 2 months free.
The progressives offer zero credible theories as to how to reduce housing prices. They really are the "no" people, quoting the movie.
BTW, why is it ok to assume a certain group can't afford to live in any one area of town? My ex-wife's father in law, was appalled that people assumed Hispanics needed assistance. It insulted him, as a proud "Chicano"- was the word he used. He was born and raised in E Austin, attended UT in the 60's, like his father before him in the 40's.
He felt the white people in W Austin placated the Austin Hispanic community, and tried to appease them with handouts. He demanded that his daughter not be considered as Hispanic on her application to UT Engineering school. He said, I taught my daughter her whole life that she is just as smart as anyone else, why is the admissions department saying she needs special help? He said it undermined him as father. Strong willed man...who made a lot of good points. Miss talking with him.
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