It feels like the biggest spot you could improve things would be legalizing row houses, and either increasing the percentage of a lot that can be filled with home or just eliminating the rule entirely. When you consider that most of these inner suburban houses are using less then half the space they occupy, you could really ramp up available housing just by fitting in more homes.
On a separate note, have you looked into/seen any research on what happens to the value of condos over time? Unlike with any sort of housing where you own the land, a condo is a pure play on the availability of housing, so an increase in supply should tank their price, not to mention the downside risk of the unit degrading. Like people treat homes as non-degrading assets, largely because they are conflating the land and the building, but they then take that mindset and apply it to condos, where you just have the degrading asset. I'd be curious how those "investments" have held up.
Great question - I have not seen data on condos but I'm going to see if I can track any down. You've made me curious.
Row houses is a good concept to think about, too. And why not rural areas too? There's plenty of land in Maine, for example, that could fit a lot of row houses (or some sort of rural version of them). In some of the cities even here in Maine like Portland you'd have to start building vertically into the air instead, which may actually be coming soon: https://bangordailynews.com/2021/05/26/news/portland/portland-approves-construction-of-maines-tallest-building/
I have trouble wrapping my mind around the demographics that can feasibly support a tiny home lifestyle (<400sf). I have to assume only a small fraction could go this route, but maybe my thinking is too limited on this. Do banks ever see clientele interested in financing a TH?
Good discussion of zoning regs and rising home prices (for latter, thanks for adjusting for inflation). No mention of land prices though - a topic worthy of a future post, perhaps. Would be interesting to see data on how the dearth of developable land materialize as home cost increases in (i.e.) Bangor, Portland and LA.
You make a great point about land prices. A useful parcel of land in rural Maine, for example, would sell for pennies on the dollar compared to a parcel in a big city let alone someplace like San Francisco or New York.
I'll have to check in with my bank's residential lending team to see if they are getting many tiny home requests. I don't think we are able to finance them, generally. But maybe the State of Maine's loosening of regulations will help. I do know we fielded a request from someone recently who wanted to do a storage unit home and we were not able to proceed with the request because we don't finance those as a personal residence.
It feels like the biggest spot you could improve things would be legalizing row houses, and either increasing the percentage of a lot that can be filled with home or just eliminating the rule entirely. When you consider that most of these inner suburban houses are using less then half the space they occupy, you could really ramp up available housing just by fitting in more homes.
On a separate note, have you looked into/seen any research on what happens to the value of condos over time? Unlike with any sort of housing where you own the land, a condo is a pure play on the availability of housing, so an increase in supply should tank their price, not to mention the downside risk of the unit degrading. Like people treat homes as non-degrading assets, largely because they are conflating the land and the building, but they then take that mindset and apply it to condos, where you just have the degrading asset. I'd be curious how those "investments" have held up.
Great question - I have not seen data on condos but I'm going to see if I can track any down. You've made me curious.
Row houses is a good concept to think about, too. And why not rural areas too? There's plenty of land in Maine, for example, that could fit a lot of row houses (or some sort of rural version of them). In some of the cities even here in Maine like Portland you'd have to start building vertically into the air instead, which may actually be coming soon: https://bangordailynews.com/2021/05/26/news/portland/portland-approves-construction-of-maines-tallest-building/
I have trouble wrapping my mind around the demographics that can feasibly support a tiny home lifestyle (<400sf). I have to assume only a small fraction could go this route, but maybe my thinking is too limited on this. Do banks ever see clientele interested in financing a TH?
Good discussion of zoning regs and rising home prices (for latter, thanks for adjusting for inflation). No mention of land prices though - a topic worthy of a future post, perhaps. Would be interesting to see data on how the dearth of developable land materialize as home cost increases in (i.e.) Bangor, Portland and LA.
You make a great point about land prices. A useful parcel of land in rural Maine, for example, would sell for pennies on the dollar compared to a parcel in a big city let alone someplace like San Francisco or New York.
I'll have to check in with my bank's residential lending team to see if they are getting many tiny home requests. I don't think we are able to finance them, generally. But maybe the State of Maine's loosening of regulations will help. I do know we fielded a request from someone recently who wanted to do a storage unit home and we were not able to proceed with the request because we don't finance those as a personal residence.