Comments on: The Age of the U.S. Housing Stock https://eyeonhousing.org/2024/02/the-age-of-the-u-s-housing-stock/ National Association of Home Builders Discusses Economics and Housing Policy Sun, 07 Apr 2024 18:54:13 +0000 hourly 1 By: Robert Blake https://eyeonhousing.org/2024/02/the-age-of-the-u-s-housing-stock/#comment-2235615 Sun, 07 Apr 2024 18:54:13 +0000 https://eyeonhousing.org/?p=34637#comment-2235615 “Multi-family construction” housing in the US are almost entirely rental units (over 96%), so they aren’t even being discussed by this article, which covers owner-occupied housing stock. No one in America wants to still be renting when they’re 35+ and have a family, they aspire to single family zoned owner-occupied housing.
What is sorely needed is a better, more incentivized system of helping people in older, increasingly decaying and obsolescent housing stock (the majority now over 40 and thus over the designed lifespan of the major systems in the structure, from plumbing to electrical, concrete to roofing) obtain low cost funding to rehab, remodel, replace, and repair. Once a structure has been neglected sufficiently it becomes more cost effective to tear it down and replace.

]]> By: Eduard https://eyeonhousing.org/2024/02/the-age-of-the-u-s-housing-stock/#comment-2234016 Thu, 22 Feb 2024 16:43:43 +0000 https://eyeonhousing.org/?p=34637#comment-2234016 The aging U.S. housing stock underscores the demand for renovation and new construction projects, which can be supported by construction loans. As properties age, these loans play a crucial role in financing both the rehabilitation of existing homes and the development of new ones, ensuring the vitality and modernization of the housing market.

]]> By: Rick Rybeck https://eyeonhousing.org/2024/02/the-age-of-the-u-s-housing-stock/#comment-2234010 Mon, 12 Feb 2024 15:13:29 +0000 https://eyeonhousing.org/?p=34637#comment-2234010 Both new construction and remodeling are hampered by several factors. Excessive single-family zoning that artificially constricts multi-family construction. And both new construction and remodeling are hampered by the upside-down incentives of the traditional property tax that penalize owners with higher taxes for constructing or improving buildings while rewarding owners who allow buildings to deteriorate. (One of the problems with the housing supply is the deterioration of older homes when maintenance and remodeling become too expensive.) And new construction is also hampered by high land prices. And land prices are higher than they should be because owners of vacant lots are often not motivated to sell. Owners of vacant lots pay much less tax than neighbors with buildings, even though it costs their communities about the same to construct, operate and maintain streets, sidewalks, sewers and water mains in front of similar-sized properties, regardless of whether they are vacant or improved.

Some communities are remedying excessive zoning restrictions by reducing the footprint of single-family zoning or by allowing matter-of-right development of duplexes and triplexes within them. And some communities are also remedying the upside-down incentives of the property tax by reducing the tax rate applied to privately-created building values while increasing the tax rate applied to publicly-created land values. For more info about the tax reform, see https://www.shareable.net/land-value-return-and-building-a-more-equitable-economy/ .

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