Building codes aren't the problem, it's zoning. If a developer had an empty acre in SF or Palo Alto, or permission to replace low rise housing with skyscrapers, they'd build.

The cost of building probably does have an effect on the margin, but it is so much less of a factor than restrictions on what can be built.

A recent article about building in Millbrae mentions developer fees of 26k per unit being build. I'm all for deregulation to make it easier to build, but the code compliance and fees are also part of the problem.

http://www.smdailyjournal.com/news/local/millbrae-bart-stati...

From the National Association of Home Builders, it looks like "average" is approximately $9,400 per unit in "fees". Not sure if that's apple to apples with the Bay Area, but in either way that fee just seems kind of crazy. Rows A-C, summing fees, on the Construction Costs table here: https://www.nahbclassic.org/generic.aspx?genericContentID=24...

The price of land dwarfs the cost of construction. Outside of the Bay there are huge housing developments underway and although I am sure property developers would rather have less regulation they do not seem to be struggling to build homes. In a state with active fault lines and environmental pressures from much of it being in the desert deregulation is not going to help our long term prosperity or safety.

This is kind of part of the problem. Housing developers are enabling large hub cities to offload the cost of housing to smaller outlying towns. Of course, the developers aren't doing this willingly.

The other problem is that housing developers in California have a tendency to build huge, sprawling suburban communities. This just increases sprawl.

Imagine a 1 sq. mile tract of land. Assuming a housing developer builds a ton of two story, single family homes here, each on a 1/4 acre of land, we can calculate that they can build 2560 homes +/- 500 based on topography and landscaping etc. There are no reliable numbers as to the average of units in an apartment building. Therefore, we will have to make some assumptions. Let's go ahead and say that that the developer decides to build apartments instead of tract-homes. Each apartment building will be 2 acres in area. Even if the apartments are huge: 1500 sq ft +, we can calculate that a 2 acre apartment building can have about 20 units per floor. Lets say that these apartment buildings are a modest 2 stories tall. 20 * 2 = 40. That means, covering the same 1 sq. mile of land with modest apartment buildings could create 12800 residences. That's a 500% increase in residences.

In urban centers, zoning laws allow for much taller structures. Structures can be hybridized to allow for both commercial and residential tenants.

Building large, hybrid-use, multi-tenant structures will alleviate some of the pressure on the housing market and lead to shorter commutes for most people. This is because you can fit more people into a smaller land area. It's common sense I'm sure. So, why aren't developers building these structures? The short answer is that they can't. City zoning laws, angry property owners, and the lack of open land in desirable areas all get in the way.

When zoning aggressively blocks dense housing, I don't think it's the little code details that matter.

You are correct, I was conflating zoning and building codes a bit there. Zoning should take the lions share of blame when it comes to costs.

I didn't really understand zoning until I witnessed a bunch of Southern middle-class white moms agreeing with their middle-class black mom neighbor about how they all hoped that the new construction on the [formerly agricultural] lot next to the subdivision would be restaurants instead of apartment buildings, because the latter attracts "the wrong kind of people".

Then I looked at the zoning map for the municipality, and read the zoning codes.

From outward appearances, it's to keep the poor people away from the rich people. And not just at night when everyone goes home, either. All the time, everywhere. Jobs, schools, commutes, shopping, entertainment. It's the new age of redlining, with a global substitution of bank account sizes for skin colors.

I couldn't tell what degree of intent was there, but on the ground, the zoning board has reinvented the ghetto. The poor folks get to live next to the railroad tracks. Rich folks get to live next to the zone marked as protected wetland/watershed, so that it can never be developed.

The kind of behavior is the status quo everywhere not just the south. It's a byproduct of people only getting involved in these things when they think it's going to affect them in a negative way. I.e. Only the people who associate apartments with black people and don't like black people care about the issue.

That's a nice idea, but this is a region where the ground you build on is your enemy.

Counterpoint: Tokyo.

I am highly confident that the regulation in Tokyo is stricter, not less strict

Isn't the door pull thing for handicapped accessibility?