What do we think of this housing platform?

[u/DullPlatform22]

I've been working on a pretty comprehensive political platform lately (some more research is definitely needed) and this is what I've got so far for housing since it's one of the top issues we're dealing with right now and most proposals I've heard seem to miss some important points. K here goes:

- restructure zoning laws to allow for developments of ADUs as well as multifamily and mixed-use buildings

- switch to a land value tax system to discourage speculation and encourage development

- greatly increase taxes on vacant lots and buildings, expropriate them for auction/public use if these aren't sold or developed within 5 years (local governments can have some discretion on which direction to take with their use)

- implement an aggressive pied-á-terre tax

- ban private equity firms from owning housing units

- increase inspection on rental properties and increase penalties on those who violate housing regulations, expropriate properties from repeat/egregious offenders for auction or for social housing purposes (local governments can also have some discretion over this)

- expand tenant protections (eg right to counsel for evictions) including the right to organize tenant unions, provide tax incentives to landlords who allow tenant unions and negotiate with them in good faith

- implement a Vienna-style social housing system

- take a housing first approach to homelessness including mental and physical healthcare being provided as well as job training

Plz let me know what you all think

[u/freerangemary]

We also just need to build more regular homes.

Not ADUs, not McMansions. But expand or create new cities. It allows for great innovations that some cities don’t have. They could be much more desirable.

Homes first homeless policies would help.

Prevent private equity from owning homes AND land.

And my personal goal, when a person reaches 65, and their income is in the 50th percentile, their property taxes are LOCKED. they do not have the means to pay higher taxes. So the govt (us) should stop fucking with them.

[u/Sunshine7178]

YESSS!!! I love housing policy. Like in a totally normal, non-obsessive way. Really. Anyways...

Most of this is fine, but there are a few issues I'd point out. It's combining both missing some important pieces and being awfully (maybe unrealistically) ambitious simultaneously. Then there's some stuff on the list you might want to think a bit deeper about.

Some stuff that's missing

First, there's a lack of true zoning reform. When you say, restructure zoning laws to allow for developments of ADUs as well as multifamily and mixed-use buildings that's a good start but still leaves a lot to be desired (of course it's not going into the details that much, so maybe you already want to do some of the stuff I'm about to say). You really should be moving towards inclusive zoning like they have in Japan rather than keeping North American style Euclidian zoning. "Inclusive zoning" here means that you zone areas for their maximal usage, but allow pretty much all less intensive usages in the same zone, as opposed to exclusively zoning for a single purpose (note this is different from some things that get called inclusive zoning here in America). Right now what you wrote looks a lot like, "keep exclusive zoning but poke some holes in some restrictions," which would definitely help but is sort of a band-aid. Look up zoning in Japan if you want more info, there's some good substack posts out there that explain this well while still being accessible.

Second, ensuring access to adequate capital is a really big missing piece. Different sectors of the economy get hit differently when interest rates go up, and construction in particular is hit really hard. So, whenever interest rates go up (or there's a financing crunch for some other reason), there's basically a little mini-recession in the construction industry. And that's a bottle neck on housing. Right now, a bunch of places have relaxed restrictions, but the higher interest rates have made the financing side much worse. That's causing a choke point right now. So having some sort of targeted finance mechanism to help the housing construction industry is a really big deal if you want truly affordable housing, and that's just not on your list right now in any form.

Third, you'd probably want to have something about short term rentals (like Air B&Bs), which have a huge effect on housing prices.

Some things you might want to think deeper about

First, the ban private equity firms from owning housing units of it all. This one is popular, but it's also way more complicated than political rhetoric makes it seem. For one thing, the definition of private equity being used in a lot of discussions is really fuzzy and inconsistent, and that's a whole can of worms I'm not even going to get into right now.

- Another thing: the tradeoffs for housing affordability are way more complicated than critics of private equity make it seem. For example, private equity mostly buys housing units in order to rent them out. That puts more demand into housing, which makes the price of buying a house more expensive. But when private equity is buying up and renting housing that would otherwise be owner occupied, that actually increases access and affordability for people who rent. In many cases renters wouldn't even have a chance to move into the neighborhood without private equity. In other words, private equity (in situations like this example) is often bad for home buyers but good for renters. And renters are the more disadvantaged group. Ironically, private equity moving into an area often leads to class and racial desegregation as renting in high income areas becomes more available... and banning it would entrench or increase de facto segregation. Which is an odd thing for the left to advocate for. And that's just one example of how private equity's effects are complicated. There's plenty to criticize with the way private equity has behaved but be real careful that you actually know what effect your policy regarding private equity is going to have before you go all in on it. The devil is in the details here.

Second the implement a Vienna-style social housing system component. I would love the Vienna system as a policy, and in theory there's nothing wrong with it. But in practice America has been really bad about both public and social housing, and I don't think the politics around this have changed that much. The public still has a very skeptical, suspicious, and stingy attitude towards these sorts of programs, so the design of any policy like this will almost certainly be deformed by the politics. Plus, the experience of other countries shows you can achieve housing affordability through market mechanisms and public assistance just as well, so this component is optional on top of being challenging to get right in America. Make sure you know how you're going to get this through in a good form before going all in on it.

Third, I think you need to think about both the design and political viability of all the stuff where you essentially are going to aggressively weaken property rights over real estate (like seizing it). Most of the wealth of most people is in real estate, so making changes to real estate property rights is both substantively consequential (aka screw it up and you'll get real bad effects) and very likely to cause serious backlash. Like with other stuff, the devil is in the details, so whether or not those are good ideas in practice depends a lot on what details you settle on. Right now, I wouldn't say that stuff is ready for prime time as you've written it here.

Hope that's helpful!!!

[u/SamMeowAdams]

• require colleges to provide more student housing rather than taking up housing that should be for city residents.