[HN Gopher] The long-awaited Friend Compound laws in California
___________________________________________________________________
The long-awaited Friend Compound laws in California
Author : simonebrunozzi
Score : 56 points
Date : 2025-03-26 13:21 UTC (9 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (supernuclear.substack.com)
(TXT) w3m dump (supernuclear.substack.com)
| cratermoon wrote:
| Why do I feel like this is going to supercharge short-term
| rentals like AirBnB and do little to ease the housing crunch?
| AstralStorm wrote:
| Instead of high density housing this will do slightly higher
| density in low density zones. You cannot really increase
| density by that much with it, but you for sure can cut the
| yards... And parking space.
|
| I'm pretty sure this won't make housing more affordable by
| much. Or will even have an opposite effect. To build these
| houses a pretty serious investment or Amish-sized group is
| required. Who has that?
| outer_web wrote:
| I thought the post says one person buys the lot and then
| sells it to friends who individually fund the houses.
| cratermoon wrote:
| > I thought the post says one person buys the lot and then
| sells it to friends who individually fund the houses.
|
| One company buys the lot and then sells it to its own
| subsidiaries who individually fund the houses. I'm sure
| there are numerous ways to juggle the finances.
| outer_web wrote:
| Yup. Or it is bought by Friends LLC.
| justonceokay wrote:
| Additionally, what happens after 5 years when the first
| friend moves out? I see this complex as a terrible HOA-in-
| the-making since neighbors will be sharing more resources.
| Reminds me of when I was doing factory work and living in a
| punk house.
| llm_nerd wrote:
| Yeah the "friend compound" thing seems nebulous, and one of
| the stated benefits is specifically that it can be financed
| independently and resold to third parties. So basically
| it's just higher density housing and pretty soon it's just
| very close houses of random people with some sort of weird
| condo fees for the commons (surely there is shared
| walkways, etc), etc.
| cratermoon wrote:
| It may seem odd to people who grew up in the single-
| family detached housing world of the postwar US, but
| there are cultures and societies around the world even
| today where multi-family housing is common. See for
| example _Casas de Vecindad_ , a typical form of housing
| in the US/Mexico borderlands for hundreds of years.
| wil421 wrote:
| You put an ad for more friends on Find a Friend Facebook
| groups or Craigslist. Maybe match makers appears to solve a
| gap in the market.
| dylan604 wrote:
| > but you for sure can cut the yards... And parking space.
|
| As if each of the people moving into the subdivided spaces
| still won't need parking. Now, you've actually increased the
| demand for parking. Where is that parking going to happen?
| wmf wrote:
| This stuff is only feasible in places that are served by
| transit which are pretty rare.
| bryanlarsen wrote:
| This is for suburbia. There isn't massive demand for AirBnB in
| suburbia. There's such a massive shortage of housing that the
| small AirBnB demand is large relative to the supply of empty
| houses, but that's because a small number divided by a number
| very close to zero results in a large number. More supply will
| help a lot more than limiting AirBnB.
| llm_nerd wrote:
| It allows to subdivide lots down to 600 sq ft parcels. I can
| find _endless_ examples in the core of every major California
| city, including San Francisco, where this is applicable, and
| could 5x or 10x the number of houses in single family
| areas[1]. San Francisco currently zones for a minimum of 4000
| sq feet lots in RH-1 zones, and at least 1000 sq ft lot per
| residence in RH-3.
|
| Should it or would it? Probably not. But this weird image of
| the suburbs vs "the city" (someone else used the term "metro"
| which humorously includes the suburbs, but whatever) doesn't
| seem reality based.
|
| Doubly so given that the suburbs are car-centric, and plans
| like this are car-antagonistic. It seems to specifically
| _exclude_ the suburbs, if anything.
|
| [1] This law only applies to multi-family zoning, which in SF
| is RH-3. Regardless, funny to see people saying this is some
| low density suburb thing when many of the cores of cities
| have zoning requiring significantly more land.
| dylan604 wrote:
| > (someone else used the term "metro" which humorously
| includes the suburbs, but whatever)
|
| Not really sure where the humor is being found. There are
| areas where suburbs grew into their own cities that now
| blend back into the larger urban area they were once
| separated from. They are no longer suburbs, and it is now
| more than one city, so metroplex/metropolitan area is the
| term used.
| llm_nerd wrote:
| I was referring to someone saying "works for suburbs I'm
| guessing - I don't see how it helps out in metro areas?".
|
| A "metro area" is by definition the overarching container
| (often including multiple cities and the suburbs of those
| cities, such as the Bay Area metro area), most definitely
| containing said suburbs. So if something "works for the
| suburbs", it works for the metro.
| dmitrygr wrote:
| "Replacing parking" is going to cause all sorts of fun. Where
| will the cars go?
|
| And please spare me the tired "transit that is safe and not full
| of stabby hoboes will magically sprout out of nothing overnight"
| nonsense.
| ceejayoz wrote:
| > Where will the cars go?
|
| Half of some cities' downtown space is parking.
|
| https://thehill.com/changing-america/resilience/smart-cities...
|
| Every apartment complex in my area clearly has way, way more
| parking that needed - at no time of day are they more than 50%
| occupied.
| jajko wrote:
| In Europe generally all new bigger construction has most
| parking below ground, even 2-3 floors. Very few outside if
| any, normally just for quick drop off or services.
|
| I've even seen locals blocking a successful local bank trying
| to build a additional building and planning way too many of
| those - citing concern of too much added traffic in
| neighborhood. Not entirely sure if thats the best approach,
| but thats how how respect for laws and locals looks like. At
| the end, bank managed just fine despite that restriction.
| lotsoweiners wrote:
| > at no time of day are they more than 50% occupied
|
| Why is that? Is there more than one parking space per bedroom
| or do people not have cars?
| ceejayoz wrote:
| America has eight parking spots per car.
|
| https://www.fastcompany.com/90645900/america-has-eight-
| parki...
|
| > Parking standards were created arbitrarily, without
| adequate data. Zoning laws usually require one parking
| space per apartment, one per 300 square feet of commercial
| development, and one per 100 square feet for restaurants.
| For context, a parking space measures 160 square feet on
| average, plus additional area for driveways and driving
| lanes, so an eatery's parking lot may be three times the
| size of its dining area.
| bryanlarsen wrote:
| The problem is that parking is too cheap. It's not hard to find
| parking in downtown NYC but you have to pay an arm and a leg
| for it.
|
| Get rid of free parking and you'll never be short of it again.
| Putting a proper price will reduce demand and increase supply.
| richwater wrote:
| This is literally just a regressive tax.
|
| Especially (but not solely) in areas with lack of quality
| public transportation (ie, doesn't double the time it takes
| to get somewhere)
| bryanlarsen wrote:
| Free parking is also regressive, the poor pay a much higher
| portion of their income for "free" parking than the rich
| do.
|
| More generally, parking is a service. All market goods &
| services are highly regressive, because the rich and poor
| pay basically the same price. Addressing inequality at the
| individual goods level always creates more problems than it
| solves. Addressing it for parking is particularly unfair,
| because the very poorest don't have cars.
|
| The poor would be far better off with more welfare and a
| less regressive tax system so they have more money to
| choose what they need. Paying for "free" parking via
| property taxes and baked into the costs of local stores is
| inefficient and regressive.
| thesuitonym wrote:
| Transit that is safe will never sprout if you keep building
| parking lots.
| bigstrat2003 wrote:
| Maybe, maybe not. But you need to solve people's
| transportation problems _first_ , not claim that if they give
| up car transportation options something else will materialize
| later.
| thesuitonym wrote:
| I never said otherwise, but continuing to prioritize cars
| only makes everything, even car travel, worse.
| dmitrygr wrote:
| > > But you need to solve people's transportation
|
| > > problems first, not claim that if they give up
|
| > > car transportation options something else will
|
| > > materialize later
|
| .
|
| > I never said otherwise, but continuing to prioritize
|
| > cars only makes everything, even car travel, worse.
|
| .
|
| You have JUST said otherwise! You want to deprioritize
| what works in favour of what does not exist while
| offering no path for it to exist and dodging the reality
| that no such path exists.
| thesuitonym wrote:
| Okay, thank you for telling me what I want to do. You
| see, I thought I wanted start working on other forms of
| transit _while still leaving cars as they are_. I thought
| I wanted to stop saying one more lane will fix it, and
| actually try adding transit options. I thought I wanted
| to build safe sidewalks and bike infrastructure that
| actually goes somewhere, instead of just adding more
| parking lots.
|
| I'm really glad you were here to tell me what I actually
| wanted. I'm glad you were here to twist my words up so
| bad that I finally understand that what I really wanted
| is to completely get rid of cars overnight, and then sit
| around on our thumbs and hope that someday a magic carpet
| will come and carry us all off to our destinations.
| Workaccount2 wrote:
| The more popular mass transit becomes, the better the
| proposition of driving a car becomes.
|
| You cannot escape that as transit drives down traffic and
| frees up parking, cars become much more enjoyable to use.
| Edman274 wrote:
| It is taken as flatly impossible that parking would be
| reclaimed for other uses?
| rickydroll wrote:
| We don't build parking smart here in the States, period.
| Parking lots should be multi-story to serve multiple
| buildings and have an array of solar panels on the roof
| to contribute to the city's power needs.
| guhidalg wrote:
| In theory? In practice and when I have a choice, I will
| always pick mass transit instead of driving because I
| prefer to walk and avoid the hassles of traffic lights,
| risk of crashing or running someone over, wear and tear on
| my car, gasoline, etc...
| dmitrygr wrote:
| > I will always pick mass transit
|
| I'm going to guess you've never had some drugged-up crazy
| try to stab you in a bus? After the second time it
| happens, you never ever consider it again. Life is too
| short to die like that.
| thesuitonym wrote:
| I'm going to guess you've never had some drugged-up crazy
| nearly ram into you at high speed in a car? Life is too
| short to die like that, and to spend it sitting in
| traffic to boot.
| dmitrygr wrote:
| Car has airbags. My chances are better than "knifed on
| BART". And your chances of a fatal collision in stop-and-
| go traffic are as close to zero as a number can be - the
| kinetic energy just isn't there at those speeds.
| dwallin wrote:
| As best as I can tell your gut feeling and anecdotal
| experience here is not supported by evidence / data.
|
| One particular example that had a good breakdown: https:/
| /digitalcommons.usf.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1...
| outer_web wrote:
| Who doesn't enjoy a good equilibrium?
| holden_nelson wrote:
| This is true, but only in a car-centric city like those in
| the US. If we extend this hypothetical to include
| additional changes to our infrastructure such as:
| reclaiming lanes for wider sidewalks, bike lanes, and
| bus/taxi lanes, restricting car traffic on heavily foot-
| trafficked streets, or building housing where parking was,
| cars remain cumbersome to use.
|
| I'm not actually pitching this course of action for any
| specific city; I actually live in an extremely rural area
| and don't have a horse in this race. Just want to make the
| point that mass transit investments can't happen in a
| vacuum if we want to achieve the desired results.
| JumpCrisscross wrote:
| > _Where will the cars go?_
|
| Idk, don't move there if having on-site parking is a
| dealbreaker for you. It isn't for a lot of people. Why should
| they subsidize someone else's parking preferences?
| rickydroll wrote:
| This is where you have to be smart about parking. Building
| small houses like that, raised up so you can park a car
| underneath, gets dual use out of the same square footage. While
| you are at it, orient the building properly so that installing
| PV panels on the roof makes sense. Now we have three uses for
| the same square footage.
| boringg wrote:
| This works for suburbs I'm guessing - I don't see how it helps
| out in metro areas? Where does this work best for? Buy and re-
| develop for friends?
| fckgw wrote:
| Since this is California law, it helps tremendously in places
| like LA which were built as large suburban SFH neighborhoods
| but have long exhausted all free space. Building denser housing
| within existing SFH neighborhoods will help to alleviate the
| housing crisis.
| outer_web wrote:
| Exactly, rather than sending people farther and farther out
| of county, it lets LA's existing, sprawling suburbs look a
| tiny bit more like a real city.
| mindslight wrote:
| Anything but building significantly upwards, amirite?
| ebiester wrote:
| Increasing density in suburbs is a giant win.
| aeontech wrote:
| The second law adds ability to replace parking spaces with
| ADU's, which could be useful even in more denser metro areas.
| colanderman wrote:
| As someone interested in "friend compounds", I'm missing what in
| either of these laws enables that specifically. They both just
| seem to provide for denser housing generally. (Particularly SB684
| almost literally just seems to allow subdividing lots which
| couldn't be subdivided before.)
| tptacek wrote:
| Yes, that's the whole subtext. These kinds of developments with
| multiple freestanding units on a single lot are generally
| disallowed by the previous generation of zoning and planning
| rules. Note how these changes are allowing "friend complexes"
| _on lots zoned multifamily already_.
| ThinkBeat wrote:
| So a fancy trailer park basically? but one where relocation and
| moving can be more difficult?
|
| People get divorced, relocate for work, relocate for mental
| health,end up in jail, People end up hating each other, have kids
| and need space, get a raise a want space, and people die.
|
| How long does the friend structure survive? There will be people
| moving in and out just like any part of real estate.
|
| Do the original owners turn into landlords and rent out the
| homes?
|
| There would be an interesting dynamic if the homes were mobile,
| when you could move to a different friend compound if you wanted
| to leave.
|
| But again, all of this is solved in trailer parks.
|
| I am -not- being derisive of trailer parks. I am saying that this
| is a rich person's reinvention of it with some added attributes.
| Spending time studying the dynamics of a trailer park over time
| would provide lessons on mistakes not to make, and nifty
| solutions to problems not yet pondereed.
|
| (Yeah if you can afford a mini house on its own real estate in
| California these days you are rich)
| ceejayoz wrote:
| > So a fancy trailer park basically?
|
| Would you describe an apartment building this way?
| rickydroll wrote:
| No. Apartment buildings are little bricks stacked together
| into a larger structure. In the original example, individual
| houses are spaced close together, they have the feel of a
| trailer park.
|
| These two living environments have in common that they are
| one--to two-person places to sleep, cook, and watch videos.
| Everything else that makes life interesting has to be done
| somewhere else. There are no gardens, no workshops for CNC
| machines and 3d printers, and no space for outdoor
| recreational equipment like kayaks, paddleboards, bikes, etc.
|
| I can concede I am biased, and I'm blessed by being able to
| afford a property with a garden of about 2,000 square feet.
| I'm looking to expand it by another 500 square feet this
| year. My basement is just half full with my workshop and home
| lab; the other half is my partner's art studio.
|
| There was a recent discussion on HNN about developers who
| quit their jobs to start a farm or otherwise leave the tech
| world behind, but I do a version of that in the small. I am
| content to hang around the house and garden, relax outside,
| watch birds, and occasionally hike in neighboring State
| Parks.
| Daishiman wrote:
| > Everything else that makes life interesting has to be
| done somewhere else.
|
| So you've never lived in a city? All the things you have
| are typical suburbia pastimes. I don't see in your listing
| for "things that make life interesting" going to the
| theater, pub, hanging out with your neighborhood friends at
| the local restaurant 10 minutes away.
|
| And all these things are enabled by dense housing and
| essentially inaccessible for suburbanites.
| rickydroll wrote:
| I have lived in cities. Going to the theater held little
| charm for me, although I did go when a friend of mine was
| acting in a community theater. I went to support him, not
| because the play was a draw. I never had any neighborhood
| friends. In most of my apartment blocks, very few people
| spoke to each other. I quickly found out I had nothing in
| common with those who did talk to me. When they went to
| the local restaurants, it was to talk about American
| sports and drink beer. I don't do American sports or
| drink beer.
| acheron wrote:
| L'enfer, c'est les autres.
| Daishiman wrote:
| Sure, just pay the appropriate property tax and don't
| externalize the cost of your own highly inefficient
| housing on others.
| tekla wrote:
| > There are no gardens, no workshops for CNC machines and
| 3d printers, and no space for outdoor recreational
| equipment like kayaks, paddleboards, bikes, etc.
|
| Funny, since I live in a dense city and I do all of that
| daily.
| Thorrez wrote:
| >So a fancy trailer park basically?
|
| Don't trailer parks rent the land? Here it sounds like they
| sell the land:
|
| >Step 3: Sell the new lots to friends
| fckgw wrote:
| > So a fancy trailer park basically?
|
| No, not at all.
| Maken wrote:
| The "group of friends or families living together" is probably
| the least likely application of this legislation. It main goal
| seems to be increasing the housing density of residential
| areas, so investors can buy a single plot of land, develop the
| property, and sell up to ten houses. Which I guess is the
| intended purpose, giving investors a more socially productive
| way to get profits than speculating with limited pre-existing
| real state.
| jagger27 wrote:
| This is a response to decades of poor planning in an
| appropriately compromised way. Ideally, big chunks of low
| density California should be bulldozed and be rezoned to be
| more like Paris or Amsterdam, but this will have to do.
|
| Work with what's there.
| Workaccount2 wrote:
| The overall idea is pretty good, but I take issue the image that
| shows the $1M plot turning into $2.5M by building small homes.
|
| This makes sense in a vacuum (maybe) but in reality, the areas
| that get subdivided like this will become less valuable with each
| new division.
|
| There needs to be a feedback mechanism that prevents every lot
| from being turned into a bunch of micro-lots in a race to do what
| the image depicts before the area loses value.
| Maken wrote:
| Isn't homes becoming more affordable an _intended_ side effect
| of this legislation?
| Workaccount2 wrote:
| Yes, but you want a system that can dial in a level of
| affordability rather than a "rapidly multiply every home in
| an area by four" race to the bottom.
|
| I don't know the specifics of the bill, but if it's a 2.5x
| investment cheat code for the fastest actors, it's going to
| cause mayhem and hard backlash.
| bryanlarsen wrote:
| If by "rapidly" you mean "over several decades". That's the
| scale at which neighborhoods turn over.
| Workaccount2 wrote:
| By "rapidly" I mean on the span of a few years. If your
| neighbor subdivides their lot, the smartest thing for you
| to do is subdivide yours (after all, it will turn your
| $1M into $2.5M, no?). It will have a domino effect
| because the last house in the neighborhood full of
| subdivisions will have the lowest sale value (and the
| first house to subdivide will be the most valuable).
|
| The intent is good but the system needs a moderating
| factor to prevent runaway.
| meragrin_ wrote:
| > after all, it will turn your $1M into $2.5M, no?
|
| Um, no. The graphic intends to show money spent by all
| parties on housing. The original party pays $1M and
| receives $300k for the plots of land. The subplot parties
| then spend $500k to build houses. There is nothing
| magically turning a $1M home into multiple homes without
| additional capital.
| thaumasiotes wrote:
| Why do we want to prevent runaway? You're worried that
| houses will be too affordable?
| cco wrote:
| Just to be clear, your concern here is the destruction of
| wealth for middle and lower class homeowners?
| cdblades wrote:
| If the capacity existed to build residential properties
| at that scale (much less at a price that wasn't absurd),
| there wouldn't be a need for this bill.
| meragrin_ wrote:
| > if it's a 2.5x investment cheat code for the fastest
| actors
|
| It isn't a 2.5x investment cheat code. You're spending $1M
| for the original home. You're spending $500k on the
| construction of each new home. That's $2.5M invested. They
| would need to sell each house for more than $1.5M each for
| a "2.5x investment cheat code". If the original house cost
| $1M, how are they going to sell 4 houses with less land at
| a higher asking price? Even if they somehow managed that,
| do you honestly think sellers in the area aren't going to
| catch on?
| barryrandall wrote:
| How many of these would it take to drive down property values
| in a neighborhood?
| Workaccount2 wrote:
| How much more would you pay for a house with 1 or 2 neighbors
| instead of 4 or 8 neighbors?
|
| There is your answer.
| tptacek wrote:
| That's what North Dakota is for.
| meragrin_ wrote:
| I think you missed the actual point of the graphic. It is to
| point out that the laws enable cheaper housing. Instead of
| people having to pay $1M for a single home, you're enabling 4
| homes at $700k or less each.
| mr3martinis wrote:
| That's absolutely not true. Higher population density almost
| always increases land values and it certainly would increase
| the total value of the land that was subdivided.
| awongh wrote:
| Except that this is California, where real estate prices are
| crazy. And not just recently, prices have continually been
| getting less and less affordable for 40 years.
|
| There could be macroeconomic forces that affect that estimate,
| but in Berkeley in the historical context of home prices it
| makes perfect sense.
| crmd wrote:
| In a friends/family compound that is subdivided, you need a
| covenant on the original deeds that controls what happens when a
| member wants to sell their lot, e.g. the existing members
| collectively have to approve the buyer, or have right of first
| refusal to buy back the property, etc
|
| Otherwise what starts as a family compound will eventually just
| become a "normal" neighborhood of strangers.
|
| Subdivided family compounds are one of the extremely rare cases
| where you actually want a deeded homeowners association.
| daft_pink wrote:
| As someone that's dealt with families trying to sell real
| estate owned jointly by several different families, owning real
| estate that requires all your friends and/or family to approve
| your sale sounds like a recipe for disaster.
| KerrAvon wrote:
| Yes. Even when all parties are directionally aligned and
| fundamentally agree on everything it can be a nightmare
| simply to get all the ducks in a row.
|
| But if I understand this correctly, this is just a way to
| allow for high density housing; there's nothing specific to
| friends / family here? A developer can buy a large lot and
| subdivide it to tiny, tiny houses. Doesn't sound pleasant to
| me, tbh, but high-density advocates gonna high-dense, I
| guess.
| toomuchtodo wrote:
| Not much different than private equity that requires board
| approval to transfer. As long as the terms are in the
| operating agreement (or other ownership structure agreement),
| caveat emptor.
|
| (am member/owner in family friend's family farm)
| m463 wrote:
| All the stories I've heard about families not getting along
| pale in comparison to stories of when the parents die. Game
| of Thrones come to life.
|
| I would love to know how people have successfully resolved
| this for their families.
|
| I wonder if this compound stuff might work better for 6
| secondary homes, like in the woods for summer. Everyone
| pitches in to build them.
| logifail wrote:
| > To get this going, we had to buy 1 home, not 6 of them
|
| You had to buy land for six, though?
|
| This side of the pond buying (vacant) land to build _one_ family
| home would run well into six figures (USD $$$,$$$ where the first
| digit is definitely a 2 and if you 're unlucky it's higher still)
| - then you have to finance the house(s) on top.
| s1artibartfast wrote:
| Yeah, I think the article captures that pretty well. The
| infographic shows 4 lots for 100k each.
|
| In most cities it is close to impossible to find several lots
| for sale side by side.
| Mountain_Skies wrote:
| At the risk of sounding glib, the Detroit Land Bank has some
| amazing deals on adjacent vacant properties when you buy a
| property to rehabilitate. If a family wants to have their own
| virtual compound and can stomach the safety implications,
| buying a Land Bank house and adjacent properties would give
| everyone plenty of elbow room.
| wmf wrote:
| They're talking about buying one lot and splitting it into 6
| micro lots. That sounds ridiculously small to me.
| ramesh31 wrote:
| Now you get the privilege of paying a mortgage to live in a
| Hooverville.
| outer_web wrote:
| I think for many the only alternative is renting. Having your
| rent go towards ownership is preferable in many cases.
| foogazi wrote:
| That's just one of many preferred outcomes - not the top one
|
| 1. Buy cheap sfh
|
| 2. Buy cheap condo
|
| 3. Rent cheap sfh
|
| 4. Rent cheap condo
|
| ...
|
| 20. Buy expensive micro-house
|
| Edit:formatting
| outer_web wrote:
| Speak for yourself. For me, buying is better than any
| rental options and a freestanding building is better than
| anything attached or in an HOA.
| foogazi wrote:
| Really ? You would buy vs rent under any circumstance ?
| outer_web wrote:
| Of course not. There are plenty of circumstances that
| would change the order. But that'd be my 'all things
| being equal' ranking. I had hoped it was implied that I'd
| prefer to rent a non-haunted condo over owning a haunted
| mansion.
| meepmorp wrote:
| Owning a home sucks, but it's still better than renting
| one.
| ramesh31 wrote:
| >I think for many the only alternative is renting.
|
| Indeed it is, and that's kinda my point. These were the
| $8,000 starter homes our working class grandparents bought on
| a single salary from Sears in their 20s. Now they are a
| stretch goal for middle aged dual income families.
| s1artibartfast wrote:
| And all of them would be illegal to build today. Safety
| first!
| game_the0ry wrote:
| Is it just me, or does this seem like a another example of how
| housing in CA is broken? The demand is totally insatiable.
|
| I grew up in the state, and am in the East Coast for now (which
| also has its own problems), but I can't imagine moving back if I
| had to live in an ADU. The whole concept of an ADU just seems
| like a bad sign for the market, not mention the increase in
| traffic bc more density = more people.
|
| You would think the market would normalize and people would move
| to other states, which is happening, yet people are contemplating
| making these mini houses.
|
| Yet another symptom of American standard of living decreasing --
| younger people are just getting less with the same amount of
| money. That's the root of the problem.
| outer_web wrote:
| Is insatiable demand equivalent to 'broken' housing? Seems like
| the latter is a pejorative and the former is the better of two
| possible problems.
|
| Considering people live in apartments and condos, what's the
| problem with an ADU (or tinyhouse as they called them years
| ago)?
|
| The density/traffic thing is not straightforward. Increased
| capacity will add traffic, sure. To the extent that capacity
| remains static and people can live closer to their commute
| destinations, you have fewer people taking longer trips and
| more people taking shorter trips (or other transport).
| Obviously both of these will be the case. As will people moving
| from high density housing to ADUs in the suburbs.
|
| Agreed on the standard of living issue.
| Daishiman wrote:
| > I can't imagine moving back if I had to live in an ADU.
|
| People have different imagination from you
|
| > I can't imagine moving back if I had to live in an ADU.
|
| More density implies that services get built closer together. A
| corner store needs a high level of density to exist, but when
| it does it cuts down your trips to a large grocery store.
|
| I live in a dense city. I have a grocer half a block away, 10
| coffee shops in a 5-block radius, etc.
|
| You have an extremely Americanized view of a fundamentally
| unsustainable housing mechanism; American car-dependent suburbs
| don't make any sense as the main source of housing.
| game_the0ry wrote:
| > I live in a dense city. I have a grocer half a block away,
| 10 coffee shops in a 5-block radius, etc
|
| "Density in CA" is not the same as "Density in
| Copenhagen/NY/Berlin/etc". Density in CA means it takes you
| an hour to drive to get to Whole Foods that's 7 miles away bc
| of traffic, something I experienced in Venice Beach. Density
| in CA makes already bad traffic way worse, and its not like
| the infrastructure is going to upgrade such that coffee shops
| spring up on every neighborhood corner.
|
| > You have an extremely Americanized view of a fundamentally
| unsustainable housing mechanism
|
| Bc I live in America.
|
| > American car-dependent suburbs don't make any sense as the
| main source of housing.
|
| Agreed, but I do not think ADUs make much sense in a suburban
| area that does not support the infrastructure for more dense
| housing.
| ahmeneeroe-v2 wrote:
| A starter home in the 1950s is so much closer to an ADU than
| the median SFH from 1990+
| diebeforei485 wrote:
| It would be nice if the yards could face each other. So people
| could basically have a large open space that is private to the
| residents.
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