Comments on just up the pike: millennials & affordable housing: a clarification

Presumably the savings -- gas, car, time -- would ...

2012-01-27T08:29:50.177-05:00

Presumably the savings -- gas, car, time -- would pay for the higher rent. All the urban living advocates I know tell me that living in a city saves you more than it costs because of the ability to walk everywhere, the short commute, etc, etc.

If you shop locally and rarely drive, you'll save a few hundred dollars a month, plus dozens of hours of time, which is why urban living is cost effective. Consider: If you shave 90 minutes off your commuting time and can walk to work, and you value your personal time at just $20/hr, you save $600 a month. Not driving is $120 a month in gas, and probably as much in wear and tear on your car, which you probably don't even need anyway, so you can ditch the $200/mo car payment, $50/mo insurance, and so forth (though Zipcar rentals and metro fares for social outings will add up, so we'll call your car savings only $100/mo). Now you're $820/mo richer.

Most of that is in saved time, not actual money -- only $220 is money). If you use your new time effectively, you can use it to either find savings elsewhere (cook your own meals to save money for lunch and dinner), or make money (side business).

My SIL has a small 1br, just three blocks from the Capitol building, that costs under $1500/mo utilities included. The difference between a Columbia 1br and that is more than made up by the savings of living in the city.

It's not just 20-somethings. There's also...

2012-01-26T15:30:33.998-05:00

It's not just 20-somethings. There's also a limited amount of housing for middle aged folks with moderate incomes, especially singles. I'd like to see a broader range of housing options for everyone.

The problem with subsidies is that they tend to split the housing market into very low end and very high end, as developers try to offset the subsidized housing with extremely expensive units. People in the middle who don't qualify for subsidies tend to be priced out of the market.

I just read through some of the of the comments. I...

2012-01-26T15:24:51.275-05:00

I just read through some of the of the comments. It really is remarkable how many people assume you're calling for subsidies given the total absence of call for such (or even set asides or other less direct mechanisms) from your article or the comments.

So there weren't many comments calling for aff...

2012-01-26T11:32:36.660-05:00

So there weren't many comments calling for affordable housing via subsidies? Interesting.

I'd guess that would reflect a policy shift in group 3. Groups 1 and 2 don't really see a problem so I doubt that they are the traditional affordable housing advocates.