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by fragmede 964 days ago
No, the best way is to build housing. As long as we try make developers build housing through whatever incentives we can invent, they'll always be an investment. Developers aren't going to make new housing out of the goodness of their hearts. It is a business deal, an investment with an expected ROI. Making it a less attractive investment is going to end up with less of it being made. If the government builds housing, or subsidizes it (improving ROI for developers), we'll have more housing.
4 comments
triceratops 964 days ago
GP said

> The only way to do that is to increase supply of housing

And gave some examples of reduced regulation (zoning, parking) that would make it easier to build. They didn't say anything about government subsidies.

You said

> No, the best way is to build housing

Aren't you both saying the same thing?

I think you might have stopped reading at "don't make housing such a good investment" and not considered the substance of their argument.

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foxyv 964 days ago
America sucks at socialized housing to be honest. We always build sprawling tracts of public houses in the worst locations so as not to piss off their neighbors.

Soviet style block housing with mixed use development would be awesome but rich Americans would HATE it. Especially when you are building on a 10 acre lot next to their $2M 3 bedroom house, 3-5 miles from downtown, to build 4,000 units for the poors that make them coffee and deliver their Uber Eats.

It's much more politically viable to allow them to build a 20 unit apartment building on their 1/3 acre lot and rent it for $40,000/month to help pay for their $2M mortgage.

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davidw 964 days ago
OP is talking mostly about housing being considered an 'investment' for the average homeowner, I think. Homeowners, on paper at least, are the biggest beneficiaries of the housing crisis:

https://oregoneconomicanalysis.com/2021/03/16/who-benefits-f...

Granted, those are paper gains, but still, better to have that option than to be priced out of the market completely, as many are.

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salamanderss 964 days ago
And yet when I actually go building the only place I could afford it was to go to a place with no code or safety inspections. This make HN mind melt, many folks here want to maintain the house crushing regulatory machine because all said they'd rather an extra homeless guy freeze behind a dumpster than elevate risk of fire spreading to their home.
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