So much of the housing conversation tends to focus just on affordable housing, or housing for those under a certain average median income (AMI). But after decades on inaction, to create true affordability, we need to increase supply across the board. I’ve spoken to companies that struggle to find local Read more…
The critical issues facing this country at the moment has really focused my mind on what it is that we are not doing right? In the immigrant rights movement for example, we have for as long as I can remember talked about the idea of serious “intersectional”/cross sector approach to Read more…
Government needs to reform planning processes that have been in place decades to serve a population in California from 50 years ago. This is a primary cause of the affordability crisis as we have simply not built the housing to accompany our population growth. Governments also need vigorously enforce housing Read more…
If you haven’t noticed, our climate is nice and other places are not quite so at times. Swarms of people if given their choice would choose Southern California as their home. Unfortunately, we have made it extremely expensive to buy or build a home here. Total DIF or development impact Read more…
The public conversation has been framing the affordability problem the wrong way. As usually stated, the implied need is for subsidized housing so that people can pay no more than 30% of income on rent. Yet 60% of SoCal renters are paying more than 30% of their income on rent, Read more…
The fact that nearly half of the 8 million people living with past convictions in California have trouble finding housing. Most people have children and have been years removed from the justice system but still face 5,000 legal restrictions that make it difficult to find housing that affordable. As a Read more…
What’s missing is a recognition that this is a problem deeply embedded in our contemporary economy. The growing level of income inequality means that those of means can easily price others out, particularly in areas that are jobs- and amenities-rich. The growing reliance on a knowledge economy also means a Read more…
Abuse of the California Environmental Quality Act (CEQA) has exacerbated the state’s housing affordability issues by making it more difficult and more expensive for developers to bring homes to the market. In particular, the law has been used to stymie high-density and in-fill housing projects that would help ease housing Read more…
The issue of housing affordability can be tied directly to economic justice. Liberty Hill recently co-published a report entitled Priced Out, Pushed Out, Locked Out: How Permanent Tenant Protections Can Help Communities Prevent Homelessness and Displacement in LA County. This report describes how tenants across unincorporated LA County are facing Read more…
We never talk about how much what is acceptable to pay for housing. In other words we should talk about what are acceptable rents (should simple studios be $750 a month, 2 bedrooms, $1,500, 3 bedrooms $2,000) and anything above that should be justified. There are apartments in some of Read more…
A 2018 Pacific Research Institute study found that in a survey of 200 CEOs with businesses looking to expand in California, nearly nine in 10 cited the cost of housing as a significant factor in their decision-making. California’s reputation of being a difficult place to do business is not new, Read more…
There is a growing realization that California’s housing crisis is fundamentally a supply problem, but too many of the commonly proposed solutions fail to address the issues that discourage homebuilding in the state – and many would even make things worse. Soaking taxpayers with expensive housing bonds will only add Read more…
All layers of government must continue to streamline processes to reduce the costs and time to construction approvals. California’s building code is waist-high, no wonder it takes upwards of 3 years to bring a housing project to fruition. Every city should be required to build their fair share of housing Read more…
New housing is change for a community, and existing residents can be fearful of change as well as newcomers. But debunking the myths is important. For example: –Will my property values go down? Not one study exists that building new housing decreases existing property values; in fact, some studies actually Read more…
There are several things missing from the discussion. People needing subsidized housing are not failures, lazy or undeserving. They are households whose employment does not pay the level of wages required to afford market-rate housing in Southern California. What’s missing is an understanding of who needs help in affording housing, Read more…
What is missing in the conversation regarding affordable housing is the current cost per door to build housing in California and our local city councils reluctance to approve housing. Recent reports show that affordable housing costs are on average $400,000 per unit in the Los Angeles area. In fact studies Read more…
The government’s role is the problem, not the solution. The effect of climate-related regulations on housing construction is the subject of a lawsuit against the California Air Resources Board by a group called The Two Hundred, a statewide coalition led by civil rights and social justice advocates. The lawsuit notes Read more…
There are three main opportunities. One is to take advantage of the coming tsunami of redundant retail space that can be converted into all kinds of housing, from patio homes to townhouses and larger multi-family. This can be done without much new infrastructure and destroying existing middle income neighborhoods. The Read more…
The factors leading to increased housing costs and their effect on affordability are discussed quite a bit, as are exhortations for government to provide programs that assist people or projects to address their needs. However, there is little discussion regarding the fact that, given the wealth gap in the country Read more…
When it comes to the lack of affordable housing in Southern California, there’s been a failure to seriously address the crippling effect which government overregulation has on new housing construction. Most notably, policymakers have avoided making a sincere effort to reform the California Environmental Quality Act (CEQA). Originally enacted in Read more…
Solving California’s housing crisis isn’t as simple as making it easier to build homes by eliminating red tape, reducing fees, or strategies that singularly aim to provide more homes in job-rich areas. 200,000 residential units are already entitled in Western Riverside, yet only 25,000 have been built in the last Read more…
Although the lack of housing stock and high demand for housing in SoCal is widely recognized, a lessor-known factor in the cost of increasing affordability is the high cost of building in the State of California. As we take steps to increase the development of additional housing units across the Read more…
The first question to tackle is do we owe people “affordable housing?” Decades ago thousands relocated to the inland regions seeking lower cost housing. They traded a longer commute to higher paying jobs for lower housing costs. Now, the inland housing values have gone up and there is a hue Read more…
The scarcity of affordable housing is in large part due to the add-ons local governments impose on developers, supposedly for the impact the new housing has on the community, but, in many cases, just for revenue purposes. Requiring a much tighter fit between the impact fee assessed and a measure Read more…
While affordable housing for middle-income working people like teachers and first responders gets some attention, very little attention is paid to housing affordability/access for low wage workers – particularly those who are overcoming high barriers to return to or join the workforce (e.g. the populations served by REDF’s portfolio of Read more…
Regulation and taxation are rarely discussed. I’ve seen few clearer illustrations of that one-sided debate than in the recent gubernatorial race. Gavin Newsom talked about producing more “affordable” housing through government spending and lawsuits against cities failing to do their fair share; John Cox, a home builder, underscored the high Read more…