Comments on The Experts Agree ... With Me

Josh I think the problem is more what we let be built on non single family zoned property than how much there is. These backyard townhouses put 3 or 4 unit on a lot where 10 or 20 apartments could fit. These semi dense uses don't bring enough people for commercial success yet change the nature of the neighborhood.

But this goes counter to the we must provide a quick trip to the outlands so new arrivals can own a house with a yard argument. Check the transit rtid comments.

Josh, kudos for your unparalleled coverage of Josh Feit. The fact that the mainstream media have written nothing about this important subject is apalling.

Increased density via re-zoning will cause a severe outbreak of NIMBY wherever applied. Most home owners are not real happy to have jumped thru all the hoops necessary to obtain their H&Y only to have the place next door turned into an economic halfway home for those without resources.

Not to mention the sheer ugliness of all the insta-slum housing that passes for desirable and affordable today.

I am confused: There are two median house prices listed in this post, neither of which is the $500K I had recently heard. Where did that number come from?

I think perhaps the reason your writings have had no effect is that you're writing for a paper that cranks out column after column about a council candidate's (former, hypothetical) positions on gay marriage and abortion rather than their positions on zoning.

And your Supreme Main Editor says the whole thing is "theater" anyway.

So you can be the goofy paper or the paper that has influence, but you can't be both.

changing SF zoning to L is NOT going to get anyone re-elected. it will get them un-elected. & it will always be so.

the main reason developers are filling up the L zones with cookie cutter 6 & 8 pack townhomes is FEE-SIMPLE PROPERTY LAWS & EHB 1848. this condo law regarding envelope design makes anything but townhomes on their own lot financial suicide.

Elenchos be fair. This was a slog post.

The Stranger doesn't matter. No one pays any attention to The Stranger. That's why I come to the Stranger's blog every day. Just to remind everyone else reading The Stranger that they are not to pay attention to the Stranger.

Show me the new condo priced under $359K.

@ 8. I agree. Me? I'm upset. Just sitting here. Chafing. Itching, from the ennui. Somebody Slog something, please. Anything. I want to say a touche or two!

BB: why don't you find them yourself? According to Windermere.com there are 20 on North Capitol Hill under $300k, 30 in Ballard, 47 in the 98103 zip and so on.

Josh, please don't repeat the P-I's custom of designating for-profit development magnates as "experts." Esp. re affordable housing economics. They ain't unbiased, as the word "expert" implies in this context. Actual affordability studies (see calculatedrisk.com etc.) seem to suggest zoning made absolutely no substantial difference in fueling or squashing spiraling prices, just as they have nothing to do with the price-lowering happening now. It's a red herring, apparently.

@8 Oh jeez Josh, at least if you're going to comment on your own post and/or try to smack down someone who doesn't agree with what you've written, come up with an original name! I mean, jeez, whatever happened to the good ol' days of I.P. Freely, Chuck U. Farley, and Hu Flung Pu?

I can remember not too long ago when Seattle's median housing price was not high at all. Housing prices were low because no one wanted to live here. No jobs, lousy climate and so on. Now the economy is doing well and lots of people want to live here because of it. So demand is strong. But if you think by allowing developers to stick those ugly, stupid skinny houses with no lawns and oversized condo complexes into single family neighborhoods is going to lower the median price - you're a fool. All you would get it is ugly houses and tacky condos costing just as much as the homes they destroyed. And the developers who built them living in gated communities far, far from the city. Wise up, Josh.

Until we get real and start building 100-story tall residential rental apartment buildings with green space around them (mini-parks), none of this will change.

We can preserve most of our single-family housing while increasing density. What needs to happen is for low-density retail neighborhoods along arterials to be targeted for high-density mixed-use development. Every strip mall block could easily be replaced with residential high-rises (or at least 4-6 floors of apartments) with street-level retail. By sticking to arterials, we encourage the development of transit corridors and create walk-friendly streets both for new residents and those in single-family homes.

If there are single-family homes on major arterials, these can be rezoned for density, but there's no reason to rezone whole neighborhoods or get rid of zoning entirely. A thriving city has a mix of incomes and types of housing. It's not that we have too many single-family homes, it's that we don't have enough affordable apartments in dense urban neighborhoods. The hard part is ensuring that new developments are something other than condos. It might just be that in the short term we get too many condos, which will transition to apartments over time when the condo market exhausts itself and condos are converted to apartments.

Zoning is the enemy? Ha ha ha. Imagine how fucked up our cities would be without zoning. Goofy.

And there is nothing wrong with condos. Look at Vancouver BC -- the model that so many of the "Seattle sucks" crowd so often site when they tell us what we should be like.

Exactly, I never said, @17, that condos were bad.

I just said it won't get better until we wise up and build lots of 100-story green-space-surrounded residential apartment building.

Like Vancouver.

I'll tell you what could "help explain" why Seattle's median housing price is so high: we're in the middle of a goddamned housing bubble!

Seriously...have you not been reading the news? Change the zoning laws on a plot of land from single-family to multi-family, and I'll guaran-fucking-tee you that in a year, the scumbag property developer that this asshole "expert" works for (Trammell Crow), will fill that plot with a McTownhome, complete with McBamboo flooring, and McStainless appliances...and it isn't going to be priced below the median, either!

The solution will not be found in re-application our current zoning laws -- the solution is to place real constraints on what developers can do with existing apartments and multi-family development. It would be a lot easier to maintain affordable housing if the scumbag developers weren't allowed to turn every apartment into an overpriced condominium....

If you want a housing bubble so bad, move somewhere other than Seattle or Santa Barbara or San Francisco.

Have fun with that.

Uh, what?

Will, you're smoking something wild if you think that the 20%+ price increases of the last three years have been justified by anything other than the easy availability of bad loans.

The home market is already slowing by double-digit percentages. Just wait a few years; our "affordable housing crisis" is going to take a back seat to "where the fuck did all of the buyers go?"