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I have to note cynically that its authors appear to be trying to get a free ride from another housing bond, Proposition 1C, that is on the state wide ballot. They might be hoping for voter confusion between the two bills, but these are fairly different matters, including from a straight financial perspective. Proposition 1C is a $2.8 billion state bond, while this is a $1 billion municipal bond. Keep in mind that the state’s annual revenues are over $90 billion while the city’s budget is under $7 billion. So, this is, in reality, a much bigger move. In fact, it is the largest bond in the city’s history. I’ve seen all kinds of figures bandied about as to the cost of this proposition for tax payers, but there seems to be a lot of debate about the real cost. Here’s the simple bit: LA’s population is ~3.7 million. Divide up $1 billion across those people and you’re averaging at least $300 per person. Then you have to factor in bond interest, which I have to image could more than double this number. Then, if you are a home owner, adjust this for what percentage of the city you think paid what you paid for your house. It starts to get pretty grim pretty quickly (the one consoluation being that property taxes are deductible on your federal income tax). I’m pretty easily imagining this costing me in the area of five figures if I stay in LA.

So, what does this bond do with all that money? Well, it divides up the money in to basically four categories based on median incomes. I hate this kind of stuff in propositions, because the question that always goes through my mind is, “how did you determine the best way to bracket up people and how much money each bracket needed?” (most likely answer: “we made it up”).

Now, the issue is a compelling one: it is getting harder and harder to make rent in LA. The supply of low-cost rental units is actually declining. Only a very small percentage of the city can actually afford to own a home. Wage increases have definitely not be tracking rent and housing price increases.

I found this article to be fairly informative. It mentions that while “12,800 affordable rental units had been built using city money since 2001, 11,000 existing rent-controlled apartments were either torn down or converted to condominiums during the same period”.

That, I suspect, is the heart of the matter. We’ve got a supply/demand problem here, and the problem is that the supply hasn’t been building to match the demand. We’ve essentially been building rent control units in one place and tearing them down in another. As far as I can tell the main purpose of this has been to line developers pockets.

The article also talks about how zoning laws have factored in to creating this problem. Most of LA has a NIMBY problem: nobody wants dense, low-cost housing built in their neighbourhoods. It seems like that is the real problem, which unfortunately will require significant political backbone to address. If we’ve really got a shortage of affordable rental units… don’t let developers tear them down to build expensive condoes as part of an “urban renewal” project gone mad. Recognize that you’re going to have to tick off a number of neighbourhoods and start allowing some dense apartment complexes along transit corridors (which would do wonders for the city’s traffic problems as well).

One of the trickiest parts about H is that it doesn’t address these zoning rules, so it’s very hard to know what exactly how this problem will be addressed. Will they just pack ‘em in even more tightly in the few places that welcome low-cost housing? Will developers push some zoning changes through city hall so they can build in neighbourhoods that don’t want new growth?

The other problem with this bill is that not all of it is for rent control. $250 million is for building housing for the homeless (defined as those earning less than 30% of the city’s “average median income” –isn’t average and medium used together kind of confusing?). $250 million is for building rent control housing for those earning between 30-60% of the median income, and another $100 million for building rent control housing for those earning between 60-80% of the median income (although this money can be siphoned off to help out those in the 30-60% range). Then there is $250 million to help those at or below 150% of the median income buy a house.

Yup, that’s right, we’re all going to be paying increased property taxes and rents so that someone well above median income in the city, who maybe moves here a decade from now, can buy their first house (at which point they’ll be paying the taxes as well). There isn’t any specification of how exactly the money would be used to help them buy a home (give them cash? interest free loan? help pay closing costs? subsidize developers who build “starter homes”?). The funny part is that I have to think this financial assistance will just drive up the asking prices on starter homes. So the money will ironically go back to existing home owners, after a nice chunk of it has been siphoned off by developers and the city’s bureaucracy.

Honestly, I really do feel for anyone trying to get by in this town. It’s tough for me, and I make more than most. Rent is high, housing prices are even higher. More and more people come here each year, and they just don’t build nearly enough homes to keep pace. That said, the reason they don’t build nearly enough homes to keep pace seems to be more about zoning rules preventing redevelopment than about developers not being interested. By limiting new construction so greatly, you of course end up with a shortage on the supply side and the inflated prices that come with it.

If the problem really was that developers could make more money with expensive condos, one would think the economics of the situation would have corrected the problem by now. Sooner or later there’d be a glut of high priced condos (okay, I can definitely see that one on the horizon) and a shortage of lower-cost rental units. Suddenly, developers would make less money off of the condos and more money off of the rental units. Even if the rental units ended up costing 50% more than they used to, you’d start to see wages having to go up to compensate (hey, that’s going on too!). Bottom line: there are lots of employers who need employees who can afford to live in the city, and lots of employees who need an affordable place to live in the city, and lots of developers who will build a building if they can make a buck. The problem seems to be that we don’t let the buildings get built to match the demand.

I think I’m going to give this one a thumbs down, and maybe let my representative on the city council know that I’d be okay with a more modest proposal focused on building housing for the indigent and increasing zoning for development of low-cost housing.