As for higher buildings: I'm not going to argue that we shouldn't raise building heights in SF. I'm just saying that developers aren't going to voluntarily make any of those tall buildings cheaper than market rate. They also won't build more space than they know they can make a comfortable profit on, at current prices.
Again, name a city in the US where construction has lowered real estate prices. Developers don't have any natural incentive to do that.
Unless they're colluding, they'll keep building if it's profitable to do so. And there's a lot of margin for that in SF, especially if they get rid of some of the big obstacles.
There are various articles about 'filtering' and how it's not happening in cities like SF. Here's one - there are probably better ones:
http://www.forbes.com/sites/scottbeyer/2016/02/19/what-liber...
I know SV is a separate entity (entities, actually), but it's obviously very closely related.
People in the US are going to have to figure out density sooner or later. This stuff has knock-on effects all up and down the west coast. Lots of people move here to Bend to escape the bay area, and are driving up local prices...
if it's profitable over the long term.
Keep in mind that builders have to allocate ever-increasing percentages of units to "below-market housing".
Then, with the current bubble bursts, they're stuck with the below-market renters but will be scrambling to fill the rest of the units.
> "Filtering is the idea that, as new market-rate housing is built, higher-income people move into it, leaving behind older housing stock for lower-income people."
It does, there was an article here a few weeks ago where they had studied gentrification in SF and found that the areas that allowed more new (luxury) apartment construction had less reduction in poor people living in the area compared to the ones that didn't.
I watched Seattle build like crazy in the late 90s. It seems like every month a huge skyrise apartment building came online in Belltown. Many thousands of units were added every year. It coincided with a continuing influx of people so I don't think it lowered the absolute price of real estate, but the laws of supply and demand are pretty inviolable. Seattle is pretty affordable by present SF standards, and with much of the same cultural appeal.
(I live in SF but used to spend lots of time in Seattle)
I'll give you that Seattle is more affordable than San Francisco...but it's also at least twice the land area of SF, with fewer people and geographic constraints. And the weather is...an acquired taste.
2. Hong Kong, one of the densest cities in the world, is built on land much steeper than SF.
None of these places is really keeping up with demand. SF is simply the worst of the worst from that point of view.
I agree completely about the weather. I grew up in western Oregon and I don't know how it's possible to sustain human life further north without an IV of antidepressants!
No, housing prices do not necessarily immediately sink. Developers will only build when they believe they can turn a profit. But you can overbuild during boom times and allow housing prices to correct when demand diminishes.
Obviously, with perfect foresight, few intelligent developers would choose to begin a construction project just before a major economic retraction. But if your suggestion is that we should build now, then wait for economic armageddon to really adjust prices downward, then I guess I can't argue.
We do possess the technology to build higher buildings, rather than simply create sprawl. Housing is expensive enough in SF that said technology could be profitably employed.
This is especially important to consider in much of silicon valley, which has very few high buildings and not much density.
Adding more housing is probably not going to drastically drop prices, but it'll certainly help contain price increases.