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

That $5,000/month 2-BR apartment translates to $60K/year for rent, which means that the owner isn't even going to look at anyone with an income below $180K, or a married couple with joint income of $180K and perfect credit ratings. Re. "many levels of rich": the average millionaire is closer to his/her gardener in terms of net worth, than to the plutocrats (but most millionaires have no clue about this). In any case, there are enough people in the 1% to account for 95% of the spending in the economy (keyword search "plutonomy" and look for the report that was leaked from one of the major banks on that topic), so the bottom 99% is almost irrelevant ("supply and demand" for human lives, again). Re. "at whatever level a developer wants to provide more housing, I'll say YES DO IT..." Be careful what you wish for... Re. "tall buildings..." (preceding email): When the inevitable 7.0 on either the Hayward or San Andreas occurs, even if the building remains standing (this can't be taken for granted either, given the problems with the imported steel in the Bay Bridge) power & water will be out for weeks, possibly months in some areas. Elevators and air conditioning won't be working in those buildings. So now you have highrises full of people, some of whom are elderly, disabled, or have small kids, with no food or water, and no sanitation. Asking neighbors to carry food up the stairs might work, but lugging water up ten or twenty flights is a non-starter (a 2-day supply for one person for drinking and cooking, is about 25 lbs.). Even earthquake-denialism doesn't help us, because adding high-rises adds demand for water, sewer, and parking, all the time. Assuming that most high-rise residents won't have cars doesn't help much, because some will, and those will still add up to more cars than there is space to park them. Water and sewer are the biggies, and any move toward highrise development will require digging up streets and installing new water & sewer mains, which translate to higher costs either in rent or in taxes. Albert Einstein was a pacifist, and Edward Teller was a hawk. Both agreed that the exponential function is the most dangerous math on Earth. -G. ===== On 13-06-10-Mon 3:41 PM, Sonja Trauss wrote: 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 _______________________________________________ sudo-discuss mailing listsudo-discuss@lists.sudoroom.orghttp://lists.sudoroom.org/listinfo/sudo-discuss _______________________________________________ sudo-discuss mailing list sudo-discuss(a)lists.sudoroom.org http://lists.sudoroom.org/listinfo/sudo-discuss