When the majority of politicians or their partners own second homes, that ain't going to happen.
For one, who is going to build these properties for low-income people only? Costs will be almost the same, profits will be way less. So why would a developer bother?
In fact, the recent change to require a higher percentage of low income units in new structures has killed the pipeline for new building starts.
Even if it seems counterproductive to the goal of helping low income people, historically new building starts have always been aspirational. Which makes sense - everyone wants a new car, but if you have little money you are better off getting a reliable used car. It is exactly the same for housing. When someone moves into a new condo that opens up a unit (and lowers the price incrementally) for someone who has less to spend.
Would it make sense to force carmakers to build cheap cars that only low-income people are eligible to buy?
Why not deal with the problem by manipulating the supply side of the equation?
Remove the majority of zoning, and the free market will solve the housing problem quite quickly.
Sure houses will be up next to each other, and they'll be smaller, and the yards will cost even more than they do now, but housing will be affordable.
Sure, factories with toxic waste in residential neighborhoods are a great idea!
> Sure houses will be up next to each other
And we learned nothing from the massive urban fires othe 17th, 18th, and 19th centuries apparently.
All these onerous regulations you whinge about exist because thousands of people DIED from the conditions they outlaw.
Remove set backs, get rid of minimum yard requirements, loosen height restrictions.
The rest of the world has houses right next to each other, as do America's most prosperous cities.
Manhattan, the dense parts of SF, Boston, Chicago, etc.
The regulations about minimum grass and 4 foot of set back and no more than 1 or 2 stories, have nothing to do with fire regs and everything to do with long disproven ideas about suburban design that hark back to 1950s ideals.
Visit a modern dense city, Tokyo and London don't have massive fire outbreaks (sprinklers and modern fire codes still work even at density), but they do have an insane about of economic activity in the dense neighborhoods.
Want to solve the housing crisis and get people off the streets? Dump 50% more houses on to the market, heck have cities subsidize their construction if need be, and watch housing prices plummet. Watch mass transit become the life blood of a city, and watch entire new types of jobs become available. (People in NYC may be annoyed at bike messengers, but it is a job created by density!)
In this context, would you agree that rent control seems counterproductive unless we were to switch to a socialized economy overall?
> There is no capitalist solution to this problem.
I'm curious if others here would agree with this; I don't have a strong opinion yet.
[0] https://www.ft.com/content/023562e2-54a6-11e6-befd-2fc0c26b3...
Sorry, but this is the worst possible solution. Source: basic economics.
Rent control is one of the most dangerous "solutions" to high housing costs people ever toss out. It would destroy the housing market and make it vastly more expensive than it is now.
> These results highlight that forcing landlords to provided insurance against rent increases leads to large losses to tenants
—The Effects of Rent Control Expansion on Tenants, Landlords, and Inequality: Evidence from San Francisco[1]
The study largely fins that, in addition to rent control causing the available supply to decrease, and tenant mobility/freedom to decrease, it largely harms new renters, and results in a wealth transfer to existing renters.
It does not solve the problem, and it does not on the whole benefit society.
I mean, if it wasn't possible to exempt a building from the regulations, there wouldn't be an issue with rent control.
[1] https://www.crainsnewyork.com/article/20100610/BLOGS01/30610...
Even in that case though, what was the percentage of buildings burnt because of rent controls? if it was extremely low (as in less then 0.01%), then there is no real problem.
There was a photo-essay of the devastation (seriously, it looked like a war zone) posted on HN about a month ago. I can't find the link now, but if you Google "pictures of 1970s Bronx", the Image Search links give you a sense.
Is it like Vienna, where you go on a wait list?
Doesn't the latter make the former moot, or is this a limit on rent of spare rooms in owner-occupied housing?