{"items": [{"author": "Daniel", "source_link": "https://www.facebook.com/jefftk/posts/938614716462?comment_id=938626333182", "anchor": "fb-938626333182", "service": "fb", "text": "Letting rich people use vacant apartments as investment vehicles seems fine to me. One of the best real arguments against increased development is that the infrastructure can't handle the additional load of people. But if an apartment sits vacant, the city is getting free money from property taxes without stressing the infrastructure.", "timestamp": "1524498634"}, {"author": "Nathan", "source_link": "https://www.facebook.com/jefftk/posts/938614716462?comment_id=938626333182&reply_comment_id=938634377062", "anchor": "fb-938626333182_938634377062", "service": "fb", "text": "→ I guess it depends on what you mean by \u201cstressing the infrastructure.\u201d Having a bunch of vacant buildings may bring about a slew of problems of its own.", "timestamp": "1524501542"}, {"author": "Jeff Kaufman", "source_link": "https://www.facebook.com/jefftk/posts/938614716462?comment_id=938626333182&reply_comment_id=938636637532", "anchor": "fb-938626333182_938636637532", "service": "fb", "text": "→ Nathan I think you're thinking of vacant buildings in the sense of \"derelict\" as opposed to \"rich person's Nth home\" or \"investment property\"?", "timestamp": "1524502000"}, {"author": "Nathan", "source_link": "https://www.facebook.com/jefftk/posts/938614716462?comment_id=938626333182&reply_comment_id=938638883032", "anchor": "fb-938626333182_938638883032", "service": "fb", "text": "→ Jeff Kaufman developing an area into unused buildings may initially be \u201crich Nth homes\u201d but give it 50 years and you may see a very different scene.
Certainly if you\u2019re only referring to Boston proper or some similar urban center the intrinsic value may stay high, but typically when we talk about development, we aren\u2019t referring to 100 story buildings.
My point is that buildings require people. A building without people will not have anyone to care about it and will become a detriment. See Pruitt-Igoe (an example where there WERE people but the nobody cared about the building and so it failed miserably as a housing development).", "timestamp": "1524503137"}, {"author": "opted out", "source_link": "#", "anchor": "unknown", "service": "unknown", "text": "→ this user has requested that their comments not be shown here", "timestamp": "1524504974"}, {"author": "Jeff Kaufman", "source_link": "https://www.facebook.com/jefftk/posts/938614716462?comment_id=938626333182&reply_comment_id=938645484802", "anchor": "fb-938626333182_938645484802", "service": "fb", "text": "→ Nathan: Pruitt-Igoe is a weird example to bring up here. It's an extreme example of a kind of modernist failure where authorities wholesale replaced a neighborhood, destroying existing social structures, with pretty bad outcomes. I'm not advocating this kind of centralized urban renewal; it very clearly has not worked out well in places where it's been tried.", "timestamp": "1524506583"}, {"author": "Jeff Kaufman", "source_link": "https://www.facebook.com/jefftk/posts/938614716462?comment_id=938626333182&reply_comment_id=938645749272", "anchor": "fb-938626333182_938645749272", "service": "fb", "text": "→ Nathan: \"Certainly if you\u2019re only referring to Boston proper or some similar urban center the intrinsic value may stay high, but typically when we talk about development, we aren\u2019t referring to 100 story buildings.\"
The kind of building I think is most urgent to allow is in places with very high housing demand. Downtowns in thriving cities, but also their suburbs (Cambridge/Somerville, many of the Bay Area suburbs, etc). It sounds like you're worried that we'll overbuild so much that rents won't just fall but crater, to where it's not worth it for landlords to maintain the properties?", "timestamp": "1524506887"}, {"author": "Nathan", "source_link": "https://www.facebook.com/jefftk/posts/938614716462?comment_id=938626333182&reply_comment_id=938657226272", "anchor": "fb-938626333182_938657226272", "service": "fb", "text": "→ Jeff Kaufman yes, I am saying that for renting to be safe and enriching to the community there needs to be enough profit to be worth maintaining the property.
However just to be clear, I am not \u201cworried\u201d about over building. I don\u2019t have much stake in this issue. I have simply made observations around the country, having lived in many places, and I am just throwing out some alternate viewpoints for perspective.", "timestamp": "1524512707"}, {"author": "Alexander", "source_link": "https://www.facebook.com/jefftk/posts/938614716462?comment_id=938641926932", "anchor": "fb-938641926932", "service": "fb", "text": "You can get vacancy numbers by city from the American Community Survey data on https://factfinder.census.gov (table B25004 Vacancy Status, divided by table 25001 Housing Units). For example, of the 33642 housing units in Somerville, 1431 (4.3%) are currently vacant: 564 (1.7%) for rent, 169 (0.5%) rented but not yet occupied, 84 (0.2%) for sale, 39 (0.1%) sold but not yet occupied, 86 (0.3%) \"seasonal, recreational or occasional use\" (which I believe includes Airbnbs and such), and 471 \"other vacant\" which I believe generally means units undergoing renovation or otherwise not habitable.
The supposed \"foreign investor money storage condos\" would show up as \"sold but not yet occupied\" or perhaps as \"seasonal, recreational or occasional use\", but while cities like NYC and SF have higher rates of this than Somerville, they still have only around 0.5% \"sold not occupied\" and 2% \"seasonal/recreational/occasional\". Nearly all \"foreign investors\" who buy condos in such cities rent them out, since with rents as high as they are in those cities failing to rent them out is leaving a huge amount of money on the table. As far as I can tell, the claim that \"a significant number of condos are bought by foreign investors and left vacant\" is a racist myth.", "timestamp": "1524504404"}, {"author": "Alexander", "source_link": "https://www.facebook.com/jefftk/posts/938614716462?comment_id=938641926932&reply_comment_id=938647201362", "anchor": "fb-938641926932_938647201362", "service": "fb", "text": "→ (Regarding the validity of these numbers, I think if anything they're more likely to overstate vacancy than understate it, since for example a rich person who lived in an NYC condo might claim to only stay there \"occasionally\" to avoid paying city income tax? I don't know much about the methodology though.)", "timestamp": "1524507821"}, {"author": "Jeff Kaufman", "source_link": "https://www.facebook.com/jefftk/posts/938614716462?comment_id=938641926932&reply_comment_id=938648753252", "anchor": "fb-938641926932_938648753252", "service": "fb", "text": "→ American Community Survey is the census, right? Your census answers aren't going to affect your taxes; the census doesn't share data at all (at least not until they're unsealed, decades later).", "timestamp": "1524508742"}, {"author": "Alexander", "source_link": "https://www.facebook.com/jefftk/posts/938614716462?comment_id=938641926932&reply_comment_id=938653568602", "anchor": "fb-938641926932_938653568602", "service": "fb", "text": "→ Jeff Kaufman I'm not sure if the ACS housing data is based on surveys or other sources. Even if it is surveys (which in principle there should be no legal reason to lie to) I imagine people who are lying to the IRS are more likely to tell the same lie to the census. The rate of either may be quite low, just noting I think it's more likely than lying the other way (claiming a unit is occupied when it's vacant).", "timestamp": "1524510568"}, {"author": "Josh", "source_link": "https://www.facebook.com/jefftk/posts/938614716462?comment_id=938656946832", "anchor": "fb-938656946832", "service": "fb", "text": "Buying property that could be generating income, but keeping it idle, seems totally bonkers to me. I mean, people engage in unwise speculation on various kinds of investments all the time, but this seems like a particularly unwise one.", "timestamp": "1524512629"}, {"author": "opted out", "source_link": "#", "anchor": "unknown", "service": "unknown", "text": "→ this user has requested that their comments not be shown here", "timestamp": "1524514678"}, {"author": "Alexander", "source_link": "https://www.facebook.com/jefftk/posts/938614716462?comment_id=938656946832&reply_comment_id=938664157382", "anchor": "fb-938656946832_938664157382", "service": "fb", "text": "→ Indeed it would be bonkers, and there's no evidence that it happens on any significant scale. People believing and spreading total lies to scapegoat foreigners is nothing new.", "timestamp": "1524516629"}, {"author": "Phillip", "source_link": "https://www.facebook.com/jefftk/posts/938614716462?comment_id=938656946832&reply_comment_id=938664836022", "anchor": "fb-938656946832_938664836022", "service": "fb", "text": "→ Elliot Not so much hide, as get it out of a country with strict currency controls. Also there seems to be a certain amount of purchase for child going to college in a desirable urban center.", "timestamp": "1524516808"}, {"author": "Alexander", "source_link": "https://www.facebook.com/jefftk/posts/938614716462?comment_id=938656946832&reply_comment_id=938665579532", "anchor": "fb-938656946832_938665579532", "service": "fb", "text": "→ Phillip You can't buy the unit until you've already gotten the money out past currency controls. And once you own it, whatever the motivation, you may as well pay a management company to rent it out for you, so it makes money rather than costing money (for condo fees etc, which you'd otherwise have to continuously get money out through currency controls to pay). So unsurprisingly, basically all condo investors (foreign and domestic) rent out their units.
As for buying property for children attending university... those aren't vacant units, they're being used to house somebody (who would otherwise be renting somewhere else), why would you possibly consider that a problem?", "timestamp": "1524517253"}, {"author": "Phillip", "source_link": "https://www.facebook.com/jefftk/posts/938614716462?comment_id=938656946832&reply_comment_id=938668309062", "anchor": "fb-938656946832_938668309062", "service": "fb", "text": "→ Alexander I am simply aware that happens. It could be that purchasing of a foreign asset is easier to do than buy foreign securities. It also may simply be that certain elite groups get to do this, and do. don't know. I am not considering any of this behavior necessarily a problem, just passing on what i have heard from professionals involved in the transactions. I, too, don't understand why the units aren't being rented.", "timestamp": "1524519252"}, {"author": "Alexander", "source_link": "https://www.facebook.com/jefftk/posts/938614716462?comment_id=938656946832&reply_comment_id=938668603472", "anchor": "fb-938656946832_938668603472", "service": "fb", "text": "→ Phillip They ARE almost all being rented! (See the ACS vacancy data I posted above.) The claim that they aren't is a racist/xenophobic lie!", "timestamp": "1524519318"}, {"author": "Phillip", "source_link": "https://www.facebook.com/jefftk/posts/938614716462?comment_id=938656946832&reply_comment_id=938669207262", "anchor": "fb-938656946832_938669207262", "service": "fb", "text": "→ Alexander It could simply be a pig in the snake problem. I heard about some transactions, at the time none were rented (can't rent a whole building in an instant), and now they are rented. My bias, such as it is, is that East Asian's are more entrepreneurial than people in the US (similar to people here 100 years ago), which is why I found it so strange. There may be other groups also buying here, but those are not transactions that have come to my attention.", "timestamp": "1524519653"}]}