“After a decade of building 8,000 apartments in Oakland, market rate 1-bedroom units are now affordable to low income people,” says a Bay Area writer named Joshua Davis. The implication is that the 8,000 apartments had something to do with Oakland become more affordable. It didn’t.
After a decade of building 8,000 apartments in Oakland, market rate 1-bedroom units are now affordable to low income people, as defined by HUD.
Today the SF Chronicle reported:
– Oakland has largest rent decline (-7.2%) among top 100 US cities.
– Median one-bedroom rent in… pic.twitter.com/SFrGceIbxh
— Joshua Davis (@byJoshuaDavis) October 8, 2023
Cities all over the country are building apartments, many of them subsidized with so-called affordable housing funds. The mid-rise and high-rise apartments that aren’t subsidized aren’t going to rent for affordable prices because they are far more expensive to build than single-family homes.
The San Francisco Chronicle article Davis refers to says that Oakland apartment rents declined by 7.2 percent over the past year, which the biggest decline of the nation’s 100 largest cities. If building more apartments is responsible for that decline, then why didn’t prices fall by that much elsewhere?
The answer is that the real reason prices declined in Oakland is that people are moving out of Oakland and other cities made expensive by urban-growth boundaries. Prices also declined in San Francisco and 69 other cities out of the nation’s top 100 (though by less than 7 percent), mainly because people are moving out of a lot of those cities. Meanwhile, cities whose populations are growing are seeing apartment rents rise to record levels.
Theoretically, more apartments should mean lower rents. But most Americans don’t want to live in apartments. Building housing that people don’t want to live in, especially when that housing is expensive (including anything taller than two stories), won’t make housing markets more affordable.
Looks like in 2010 Oakland had 173,851 housing units.
Developers grew the number of housing units by 4.6%.
Rents are going down all over in the US.
https://www.sfchronicle.com/bayarea/article/oakland-apartment-rent-bedroom-18411037.php
most Americans don’t want to live in apartments.”
Well tough tiddies…..
Here’s an idea build more duplexes, Cape Cods, ranchers, bungalows and villages…..
Starter homes, not McMansions
even better, remove those front yards that no-one uses in the first place to create more space for more homes and parks and such
But those front, side, and back yards ARE used. At a minimum they provide an area of exclusive use space for the property owner. They don’t want to have their front door open a few feet away from the neighbor’s front door. They aren’t interested in being limited to “shared space” as promoted by planners.
I have never seen anyone use their front yard for anything in my suburb aside from the crazy trump cultist who filled the entire yard with rocks, potted plants, ceramics, and various “patriotic” paraphernalia. And why not have your door open a couple yards from your neighbors? Also I never said backyards. PLenty of people use those because they’re behind the house and people feel safer letting their kids play out there cause cars wont hit them there. Just move houses closer to the curb, and if you value not interacting with other people THAT much, just move to the countryside.
If that’s all you can imagine about the suburbs, then you need to get out more.
Demand in Oakland is going down.