Ghost Towns
This piece on the housing crisis, via Daily Kos is really interesting:
Recent studies suggest that buyers underestimated the costs of their long commutes. Those expenses can add up to more than the buyers saved on the home. Developers also miscalculated, lured by cheap land and rising home prices. They overreached, “partly because the bubble collapsed, but partly because these developments were just bad ideas to begin with,” Stiff said.
Many of the projects were simply too far away from places that people need to go.
As some of you know, I’ve been griping about Philadelphia for some time, and have considered moving to a different state or to a different area of the city. Christina has always argued that we stay where we are and for very specific reasons (and I’m going to ask her to contribute to this piece over the weekend).
Christina says that commuting and residence was very different before World War 2 and the rise of the ‘burbs. Basically, the wealthy lived in the inner city, the middle class lived in the surrounding area, and the really poor folks lived in the sticks and commuted in. Because there were so fewer cars, many domestic workers lived during the week with their employers (hence so many scullery and maid entrances and staircases in larger houses). One way people made money was by renting out rooms to this incoming population of workers. Her argument is that we are well-placed for housemates as people find they need to move back to the city, and that our property value will eventually rise substantially as cities become more favorable places to live.
I have probably grievously misrepresented what she said, and will ask her to post this weekend.
3 Responses to “Ghost Towns”
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April 25th, 2008 at 3:01 pm
She’s basically right. As the price of the commute goes up and home values continue to drop, those pricey condos and such in the cities start to look like a really good value. It’s a reversal of sorts. People spread out into the burbs to escape the shitty city. Now the price of the commute has skyrocketed with no end in sight. Making life in the burbs disproportionately expensive to living closer to the job venue. Factor in the ride into the city for weekend recreation and the burbs look even worse. It’s just the other end of the cycle coming back around. Eventually, it will go back the other way.
April 25th, 2008 at 7:06 pm
here in austin we have more new lofts than people can fill. but that is at the moment. prices are lower than have been in quite a few years which makes people scared. commutes aren’t too bad since the city is fairly well planned out and gridded. when i moved here, there were 1/4 of a million people. i think there are now 1.5 in city limits. but in 18 years, it hasn’t changed much - still relaxed and mellow and happy and very in tune with nature. where else can you see willie or roky erickson on a tuesday night? where else can i sit out in my hammock (in central austin) in shorts with a local beer in february and hear nothing but birds? as long as you don’t mind pot smoke being blown in your face at concerts and people not EVER committing to plans, this place is awesome! i tried to go back to RI for a few years,but found myself going crazy by april from the darkness.
i guess what i am saying is that you just have to figure out what is important to you. i work to live, not the other way around. some people are career people and that works here too - almost everyone at every coffee shop is hooked into the wifi - me included.
it just comes down to where you are happiest. i loved newport and providence, but they made me too dark and i rather like being referred to as ‘darlin’.
April 26th, 2008 at 5:37 pm
While I like the idea of the urban middle class, I see a lot of resistance even with increasing commuting costs.
To most Americans, large cities are for cultural and sporting events. Some of them may live in one for a few years after graduation, then they’re planning to spawn in the burbs.
They’ll go bankrupt before they move into the cities.