Re: [sudo-discuss] new occuption in SF: #gezigardens

Yeah Jehan that's how I understand it. Eddie's scenario though is that rich_guy CAN'T move into the nice new apt, because before he gets there, some rich_guy_2 moves into the apt from Mountain View, and *rich_guy_2 would not have moved into SF if the new apartments hadn't been built*. This is a scenario, so we should explore its antecedents and consequences. My first response is - so what if this happens. In this scenario rents go neither up or down. I don't think it's realistic to expect that all new building will be taken up like this, but, since I don't know the future, it's worth imagining this extreme outcome and asking, is it bad? if it is bad, is it so bad that we shouldn't take the risk of it happening? I don't see it as bad. Like I said before, it will have no net affect on rent, so we lose nothing, and there might be ancillary benefits: my $13 jam business might improve, or my $75/ hour personal yoga coach business. Maybe I'm a social worker, and this means there will be more money in the city budget for my organization. whatever. Next, more interestingly, let's consider what could possibly cause rich_guy_2's behavior. Usually people move to be closer to work, to be closer to some fun city center, to be closer to family, they make the decision and then they look for housing. They do not hear of new housing being built and say, on that fact alone, 'I will now move!' If someone hears of new housing being built, and he then says, 'I will now move,' it is because he is (1) very strict about only living in brand new housing (not likely) or (2) RESPONDING TO AN INCREASE IN SUPPLY AT HIS PRICE POINT. Have you ever heard someone say "there are no available apartments in SF"? Of course he doesn't mean there are no available apartments, of course there are apartments: http://sfbay.craigslist.org/sfc/apa/ there's a $5000 2 bedroom at the top of the list. What he means is "there are no available apartments in SF at my price point." So, this person, who wants to spend say, $3000 for a nice 2 bedroom lives somewhere else, and waits for the supply of $3000 2 bedroom apartments to increase. This is rich_guy_2. This person is currently priced out of San Francisco. Hard to believe, but true, there are many levels of rich. You can be house shopping and be priced out at almost any price point. I'm sympathetic to people that are priced out. I don't want to see anyone priced out. I'm not going to discriminate based on income high or low. No one should be priced out. If you can pay $300/mo or $3000 you should be able to find something you think is reasonable in this town. The supply of housing in SF is too small at all but the highest price point. At whatever level a developer wants to supply more housing, I will say YES. DO IT. MOREOVER. If it's expensive to build, developers will only be able to afford to build high priced projects. One of the things that makes building expensive is fighting with neighbors. So its ironic (and a little sad) to see people who want lower priced housing doing things that make building expensive. I think I said this in another email, but if a smaller budget developer wants to build a cheaper project, but sees that even the very rich developer can barely get his project finished because he has to spend time and resources fighting with neighbors, then the smaller developer will be like forget it, I can't do this. On Mon, Jun 10, 2013 at 1:46 PM, Jehan Tremback <jehan.tremback(a)gmail.com>wrote;wrote: