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- Hacker News
- > If all this sounds like wishful thinking, consider the polar case where housing deregulation drives the price of housing to zero. Yes, this wipes out the value of whatever housing you already own. But it also means that you can move to a palace anywhere on Earth for free. Indeed, it means that you could own a palace in every location you desire for free. Lose the value of your home, gain access to every home of your dreams. It’s not just a fair trade. It’s the deal of a lifetime.
Umm, what? If you start with "If this all sounds like wishful thinking", maybe departing into even more unhinged fantasy isn't the next step that helps you? The supposition that _deregulation_ could cause the price to go to zero is crazy; houses are built with labor using materials, on land. In the absence of regulation they shouldn't cost significantly _more_ than their labor+materials+land value, but they shouldn't cost _zero_. If you wanted the world where you don't pay for housing, I think you need a _lot_ of regulation -- after all building millions of Stalin blocks took a lot of intervention.
Throughout the piece, Caplan seems to assume that the only impact of regulation worth discussing is on prices, which seems suspect. But assuming that the only source of prices is regulation is worse.
If you think that NIMBY policies are ultimately harmful, maybe the only thing rougher than talking to NIMBYs is seeing a supposed expert try to argue against them but do it really really badly.
by abeppu - an article about housing that totally ignores the fact that most homes are bought with mortgages. the whole part about a $1M dollar house falling in value being totally fine because other houses fall in value too ignores that when house prices go down mortgage holders can't sell for a price high enough to even buy the now-cheaper price
this is a shitty article with no understanding of reality
by bcftbca - I wonder how the people using the term 'NIMBY' feel about other non-consensual acts.by PeterStuer
- It looks like this is a poor attempt to argue for deregulation in the housing sector?
I agree that this is needed, but regulation would be required to compel neighborhoods to allow increased density as well...
by bpt3 - One thing a lot of YIMBYs get wrong is that you can't deregulate your way out of a housing crisis because of how new housing is financed. Builders depend on outside investors to finance new housing projects. These investors base their investment not only on the land value and potential rent they'd be able to collect when the housing is built, but also how much they'd be able to raise the rent after it's built. This means that when the rent in a given area isn't rising enough to make new housing an attractive investment, new housing will stop being built in that area.
A big factor in why housing was affordable for most of the 20th century was the Savings and Loan associations, a product of New Deal era banking regulation. S&Ls were the only financial institutions allowed to take deposits in most communities due to limits on bank branching. They had access to very cheap financing because of regulations prohibiting interest on checking accounts, and limiting interest rates on other types of deposits. They were also only allowed to lend money for local real estate projects. This meant that you had a captive market where local savings could fund local housing development. The system fell apart after Reagan era deregulation forced the S&Ls to compete with national institutions offering higher returns. The S&Ls were pressured into offering higher returns themselves by shifting from residential financing to more speculative commercial real estate projects. The result was the failure of many S&Ls, and the rest of them being absorbed into the larger banking system.
The S&L system meant that it was possible to finance housing ahead of demand, which caused a relative decline in housing costs. Between 1950 and 1980, rents in urban areas rose by about 30% less than the CPI as a whole. Meanwhile, in the last 10 years, rents in urban areas rose by about 30% more than the CPI. (see https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/CUUR0000SEHA , https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/CPIAUCSL ). Housing prices will always increase more than inflation as long as new housing development has to compete with all other types of investment.
The YIMBYs are right that blocking any given building from being built will push housing prices up higher in that area, so new development is overall good for housing prices. What they miss is that deregulation will never reduce housing prices back to what they previously were or lower because developers will never come in and build new housing in a market where rents are stagnant or decreasing.
by ndiddy - Really? Deregulation will never do this? Care to wager before I provide examples to the contrary?by slopinthebag
- I'm a rabid NIMBY, and I know that my house price will go UP when density increases.
I don't care. I want to live in my house, not sell it.
by cyberax - Props to you both for honesty and understanding the economics.by pchristensen
- You're entitled to whatever policy preferences you might have (within reason, I guess; this housing position is within reason).
Whether your surrounding community should honor that preference is a different question. Depending on where you live, your preference, and even those of the consensus of incumbent residents, can be more or less persuasive.
If you live out in the middle of nowhere --- an exurb, say, with large lots and built around people who have consciously chosen to opt into long commutes and out of metro hub and metro county services --- your neighborhood's preference against density can indeed be somewhat compelling. Though I'd note that states are moving towards a directional consensus that local governments should not be able to impose single-family exclusionary zoning preferences no matter where you are. To that whole scenario: big shrug.
On the other hand, if you're in an inner ring suburb, the equation changes sharply. Your community likely siphons high-dollar tax checks out of the regional school system fabric and into a mostly economically homogenous enclave of concentrated opportunity. You'd benefit from close connectivity to the metro hub, short commutes, economic spillover, all while walling yourself off from the area.
In that scenario, it is reasonable (and probably the straightforward correct policy) to ignore your personal preferences, and to think about the preferences of the entire region and of the prospective future residents density would enable.
It all depends.
by tptacek - Not sure this home math is right. Usually home builders are profit seekers, so if they build in a neighborhood of 1MM homes, they will price aggressively against those comps and quality. Let’s say a home goes for half price, then those homes will get snapped up and eventually everything resells closer to the true valve. Given real estate rarely drops a lot in value, that price might be a bit below 1MM.by nyc_pizzadev
- If this were I I'd rip every CD and upload FLACs to the Internet Archive, vibe code a free music playing app and release it for free.
None of these restrictive arguments would stop me from doing the next 2-3 steps even, after buying those many discs.
by vkaku - I think NIMBY is an overly generous term. I take no issue with someone who doesn't want higher density in their own, literal backyard i.e. land they own. NIMBYs want to control other people's land.by triceratops
- BANANAs
Build Absolutely Nothing Anywhere Near Anything
by LatteLazy - It sounds like you think "NIMBY" sometimes refers to one's own property, but it has always referred to things that affect one's home and community that are not occurring literally on your private property. There are already many reasonable laws controlling such things, since that's obviously a real problem, regardless of NIMBY concerns. We live in communities, not in concrete boxes. It's perfectly reasonable to care about what happens outside the literal boundaries of one's legal property. That's fundamental - not really arguable. It's just about where you draw the line.
- A tortured analogy. The concept of `NIMBY === house as investment` is a very common strawman. Believe it or not, most people care about their homes and communities for their intrinsic value, which is where most NIMBYism comes from.
- > most people
Citation needed*
by seanclayton - Mmmhmm, and the fact that it results in loads of money in NIMBY pockets at outsiders' expense is purely coincidental?
I don't believe you.
- I've got to agree there. The whole article had the smell of somebody arguing with themself.by GaryBluto
- The problem is when every neighborhood is NIMBY, something has to give or the problem will never be solved. At the end of the day, valuing aesthetics, parking, or quiet is a preference. Having shelter near jobs, schools and public transit is human necessity which is what should be prioritized.
Freezing the SFH neighborhood also doesn't protect the community long term, as NIMBYs believe. When supply gets restricted, prices go up. It prices out the local teachers, service workers, aging family, and even the NIMBY's own children get priced out, until now it's just a neighborhood of million dollar+ SFHs with no young families, no local workforce. It's economic segregation.
Continuing to allow local vetoes and restrictive zoning just pushes us out further and further into unsustainable suburban sprawl, without the transit to match, and boosting emissions.
Not popular in individualistic America, but when we have the housing crisis we do, the needs of the many are going to have to take priority over the needs of the few NIMBYs.
by thewebguyd - I agree with this. People buy a place to live usually because they like the qualities of that place. Changes to those qualities affect their day to day experience, whereas changes to their primary residence value usually only materialize when they need to access that value.
To me the issue is that densification (in the US; can't speak to other countries) usually comes with more downsides than upsides.
Mainly this is because of the US's focus on cars: the biggest downside is usually increased traffic. Unfortunately it feels towns in the US do the bare minimum to address it, like adding some traffic lights and maybe a lane or two.
Instead I wish the US had more good examples of densification for existing residents, where along with the increased housing larger steps were made to improve the community. E.g. significantly expanded mass transit, bicycling infrastructure, community third places, etc. And I get it, these things are really expensive and hard to do. But turning densification into something that more clearly benefits the day-to-day experience of existing residents would do a LOT to combat NIMBYism.
by dividefuel - Increasing housing supply does not decrease home values, because high density housing benefits from network effects/economies of agglomeration. NIMBYs don't object because they think their house will be worth less, they object because they believe their quality of life will go down (based on what is important to them).
Higher density brings both good and bad:
upside: - high paying, specialized jobs - specialized, high quality services - stores open late - better dating (more fish in the sea)
downside: - more traffic - more noise - more pollution - more anonymity, crime (people in small towns leave their doors unlocked and say hi on the sidewalk)
The people who benefit most from higher density tend to be young professionals, which tend to not currently live in the neighborhood and will move in if density goes up.
by bwhiting2356 - Where are you thinking of when you say that young professionals move when density goes up? That does not track with my observations.
- > downside: - more traffic - more noise - more pollution - more anonymity, crime (people in small towns leave their doors unlocked and say hi on the sidewalk)
Ah, yes, we live in a black-and-white world where this always happens, and so does this:
> upside: - high paying, specialized jobs - specialized, high quality services - stores open late - better dating (more fish in the sea)
There plenty of VERY affluent rural-ish areas.
There are also plenty of very nice places to live with high density that have FAR less crime rates that typical rural America, minimal traffic or noise, and far less pollution than you can find anywhere remotely rural and industrial or even agricultural areas.
The reality is - there's a lot of Karens that will do anything they can to deny everyone else of anything else they can possibly deny.
That's a large component of NIMBYism. These types will find any reason to justify it.
- Well, increasing housing supply does not always decrease home value, but I also think the home value concern is a secondary distraction.
More saliently, I don't believe you're right to imply that "young professionals" only want to live in dense areas. Sometimes they have to, but that's something we can change.
- I think you are conflating a number of factors. Increasing the supply of a good, when all other things are equal, decreases the price. Austin TX is a good example.
If increasing the amount and density of housing increases the desirability of a place thus increasing the value of the housing, this still has limits.
The SF bay area has had a housing shortage for 30 years. Its driven by people wanting to move in that have lots of money AND the refusal of local cities to allow housing to be built, also there isnt new land to build on. However the number of vacant plots in Mountain View is disgraceful.
If we allowed people to build high-rise apartments in downtown Mountain View rent would drop.
by briandw - > Increasing housing supply does not decrease home values
This contradicts every common theory of economics I've heard.
by kstrauser - > downside: - more traffic - more noise - more pollution - more anonymity, crime (people in small towns leave their doors unlocked and say hi on the sidewalk)
These aren't all foregone conclusions. For example, Arlington, VA (11th highest density county in the US) most likely has the lowest combined traffic/homicide fatality rate in the country. Traffic peaked in 2000, and by 2015 it had gone down 20% while population rose 20%. This of course required a lot of planning and investment, but that is enabled by the higher property tax revenues that more housing brings.
https://www.bloomberg.com/opinion/articles/2024-11-18/how-ar...
by enragedcacti - - more traffic: compare to now? or pre-COVID? because now it is already lower than pre-COVID, at least in SF. I have lived here for more than 20 years, and only now I see seeing empty parking spots around my house. I would never see this 10 years ago. So, if we double the population, yes there would be some additional traffic. But how would it compare to 10 years ago ?
- more noise: From traffic? electrification is making transportation quieter than before. From people in the streets? again the streets are way less busy compare to pre-COVID at least in SF. People either do not work, or work from home, get delivered everything from movies (Netflix), to food (UberEats) or shopping (Amazon), etc. foot traffic is WAY lower than pre-COVID. So if we double the population, yes there would be some additional foot traffic. But how would it compare to 10 years ago ?
- more pollution: From traffic? electrification is offsetting some of it. From trash, well those people were trashing elsewhere too.
- more anonymity, crime: That is cultural. Tokyo is fairly dense city, and with fairly low crime compare to US standards.
"The people who benefit most from higher density tend to be young professionals": Go visit a major city in Europe (Paris, Barcelona, etc) that has high density, and you would see lots of different generations, not only young professionals. It is possible to live from cradle to grave in those cities. It does not have to transition spot when you are young, professional and looking at dating. It could be where you go to kindergarten, up to university, work and retire.
I feel like the main thing that NIMBY fear is change, any change. Hausmann, where are you ?
by llsf - > more traffic - more noise - more pollution
These are often true, but not inherently so. I've lived in remote rural, suburban, and dense city environments. My dense city had disadvantages, but it was quiet and had little traffic or pollution. In my experience the suburban environment is the worst for all three once you get off the residential streets, there's loud, polluting traffic (3/3).
In two of the places I lived, I couldn't keep the window open due to the constant tire noise. It wasn't an issue in the densest place I lived, which was a low-car-traffic place and pleasant to be outside in. Now, I live right next to a freight rail yard, but I don't find the train noise grating like the highway noise.
by Rendello