CommentsVIEW FROM HERE - Homeowners vote! There is a no more consistent voter than a homeowner. Is it wise for Newsom to attack homeownership?
This question may become the pivotal Recall issue if Newsom signs the SB 10 which allows developers to buy and destroy single-family homes in order to construct multi-unit housing. As woker US District Court Judge David Carter opined, racist white people in single family homes caused Blacks to be homeless. Thus, the solution to homelessness is to get rid of R-1 neighborhoods. Although SB 10 places some limitations on Wokerism, SB 10 is still a myopic attack on the single-family home, especially on Los Angeles middle class Family Millennials.
The Big Lie Under SB 10 –The Bogus Housing Shortage
California has no housing shortage! Los Angeles has about 93,000 vacant apartments and houses. The 2020 Census conclusively establishes that California and in particular Los Angeles are losing population. A city whose population has been in decline for decades cannot have a housing shortage. Just look at Hollywood as a prime example. SB 10 type housing near Transit Districts continues to cause people to flee. The more they build, the fewer people we have.
In 1990, Hollywood had 213,858 ppl. By 2000, the population had declined by 3,034 pp to 210,824. By 2010, the population had decreased by another 12,596 ppl pl to 198,228, and by 2019, Hollywood’s population was down to 195,709. By 2010 Eric Garcetti’s council district 13 had ceased to exist as a legal entity due to the population exodus. Under a 1925 law, however, the city must have 15 council districts. Thus, it could not abolish CD 3, but instead it had to take parts of CD 4 and Koreatown and make those areas part of CD 13. Under Garcetti’s Mini-Me, Councilmember Mitch O’Farrell, CD 13 lost another 12,702 residents between 2010 and 2020. That is the greatest population loss of any council district despite the constant construction of more high rises and Infill units.
Thus, Hollywood shows the world the results of SB 10 type multi-unit construction on major bus lines and next to subway stations – a vast increase in homeless people who have been evicted from rent controlled units to construct the Infill multi-units projects which remain vacant. SB 10, now allows the construction to take place in single family areas which are merely near a bus line.
Under SB 10. Developers Can Decimate Single Family Areas
The Franklin Avenue - Los Feliz Boulevard area and up Beachwood Canyon will be two prime targets for destruction of older homes in favor of multi-unit complexes.
Too many developers foolishly think that they cannot rent their new units in the Flats because they built in a high crime area. Thus, they believe that if they can move into the Hills, then everything will be OK. Family Millennials, however, do not want to be apartment dwellers. Rather, they want single-family homes with yards. Anyone smart enough to hold down a high paying job is not be so dumb as to pay a landlord thousands of dollars per month to rent a small unit but gain zero equity. Family Millennials know what they want. That is why Family Millennials have been fleeing LA and the glut of vacant units grows daily.
Too Many Developers Have Drunk Their Own Kool Aid
Since single family homes are cheaper than buying a 12 unit rent controlled apartment complex, they believe that if they buy a single-family home north of Los Feliz or up Beachwood Canyon for $2 Million, then they can construct their multi-unit complex in a non-crime neighborhood. While the maxim of Buy Low Sell High is valid, that does not mean Supply Side economics is rational. Constructing housing which people do not want is a idiotic move no matter how much the developer cuts costs
People who have been cooped up in apartments during the pandemic are fueling the single home buying market. As more people work from home, the demand for larger homes will increase. We know that telelearning will become widespread and so will teleworking and teleshopping. That means more of the family will be at home more of the time and each family member will demand the own tele-devices.
Just as TV sets did not remain tiny little circles around which people crowded in the living rooms of the early 1950's, our tele-devices will soon be wall size monitors with visual and audio tracking so that one can move about the room as they teleport their image. This enhanced mode of teleporting is sometimes call TelePresence (Cisco) or Virtual Presence (not virtual reality).
Virtual Presence will require larger homes not only so that there can be more rooms with wall size tele-devices, but also so that families will have indoor and outdoor spaces to get away from each other. Yards will become more important as people place more emphasis on Quality of Life. Has no one noticed that the density mavens never speak about quality of life for the families that they want to cram into small apartments near TODs? In Los Angeles, none of the community plans even has a heading for Quality of Life! 100% of each community plan has one goal – some fakakta scam to make Wall Street wealthier while lowering the quality of life. Density transfers wealth upwards to the 1%, while sprawl spreads the wealth around. Highly dense LA has become the poorest city since it has the greatest gap between the huge subclass of poor and a tiny cadre of wealthy in the Hills. Our GINI Index is worst of US metropolitan areas.
SB 10 will make everything that is bad about LA worse: traffic congestion, high housing costs, homelessness, substandard infrastructure, the divide between rich and poor, real disposable income, etc. Middle class Family Millennials will continue to flee for good jobs and less expensive but nicer homes elsewhere, while Los Angeles will descend into the netherworld of bankruptcy and ask Congress for a bailout.
If homeowners wake up in the next couple weeks, they may be the group who votes Newsom out. Sometimes one has to fight the wolf at the door even if he will be replaced by laughing hyena. On the other hand, Newsom could veto SB 10!
(Richard Lee Abrams is a Los Angeles attorney and a CityWatch contributor. He can be reached at: [email protected]. )
