Opinion: America’s love affair with the
single-family house is slowly cooling
MarketWatch,
by
Robert Parker
&
Rebecca Lewis
Original Article
Posted By: mc squared,
1/5/2020 10:07:07 AM
For decades, land-use regulation across the U.S. has emphasized single-family houses on large lots. This approach has priced many people out of the quintessential American dream: home ownership. It also has promoted suburban sprawl — a pattern of low-density, car-dependent development that has dominated growth at the edges of urban areas since the end of World War II. Now, however, Americans may be starting to question the desirability of a private house. In the past year, the Minneapolis City Council and the state of Oregon have voted to allow duplexes and other types of multi-unit housing in neighborhoods where currently only single-family homes currently are allowed.
Reply 1 - Posted by:
WhamDBambam 1/5/2020 10:16:46 AM (No. 279320)
Leftists couldn't leave normal folks alone if their lives depended on it. Keep pushing like this and perhaps they may.
33 people like this.
Reply 2 - Posted by:
The Remnants 1/5/2020 10:16:46 AM (No. 279321)
Less children changes everything.
16 people like this.
Reply 3 - Posted by:
rockeysroomie 1/5/2020 10:24:36 AM (No. 279327)
Bogus.
19 people like this.
Reply 4 - Posted by:
NancyD 1/5/2020 10:28:14 AM (No. 279330)
Remember when BO was trying to mandate that public housing being built in neighborhoods to force diversity? THAT is what this is... It's crap. This article is just more gov't telling us what we want regardless. Notice it's Minneapolis and Oregon. Go Figure...
BTW, homes are selling in our area within 1 day of being on the market.
36 people like this.
Reply 5 - Posted by:
chumley 1/5/2020 10:38:25 AM (No. 279346)
What horse did this plop out of? By all means, we all want to surrender the American dream and live in a little kollektiv egg crate that is fully dependent on local government for everything, and you can easily hear the neighbor through the walls getting better than you ever did. And you wont need your car because public transportation will handle all your needs.
Yes, we all long for drone quarters in the socialist paradise.
20 people like this.
Reply 6 - Posted by:
curious1 1/5/2020 10:43:47 AM (No. 279358)
I still can't find any power given the federal or state governments in their constitutions that allows government to even remotely do this. Including zoning. Anyone wanting to actually give government such power is an unthinking fool or corrupt and planning to make money off it..
19 people like this.
Reply 7 - Posted by:
Namma 1/5/2020 10:45:16 AM (No. 279360)
This is known as Agenda 21. look it up. Its terrible. They want to get rid of suburbs. no single housing. apartments for all. mass transportation or ride ride a bike. This is why all those bike lanes have been put on roadways. Car lanes are down to a single lane, which slows traffic and causes congestion. They want you on a bike!
#4 is correct. Houses sell before they are even placed on the market. BTW, do you think any one forcing this on people are gong to live this way. of course not.
take the time to look up Agenda 21, its downright scary
32 people like this.
Reply 8 - Posted by:
Bazi 1/5/2020 10:47:14 AM (No. 279361)
Malarkey! Unelected City Councils like the one in Minneapolis are pushing/forcing people into high density housing. It's THEIR plan. Leftists hate "suburban sprawl". ...can't have some people owning property when others can't own any. Ties in with their aim is to destroy the family unit. Leftists want you to give up your cars and take public transit. Basically, they want they want to control every aspect of your life. Every new development must have some subsidized housing units. It's going on in my old stomping Minneapolis grounds and going on here in Maryland.
What happened to the studies in the 1960s where multitudes rats living in close quarters went crazy and apoplectic? They are using the studies against us. Rat/mouse utopia https://www.smithsonianmag.com/smart-news/how-mouse-utopias-1960s-led-grim-predictions-humans-180954423/
13 people like this.
Reply 9 - Posted by:
Gnana1 1/5/2020 10:53:53 AM (No. 279372)
This is stupid. We have examples of multi family structures all over the larger cities, and even in rural areas like where I live. Apartments everywhere. Nothing good comes from crowding people like roaches and ants. Look at the problems in NYC for example....multi level dwellings that are too expensive, unsafe, and don't work efficiently. People who have been raised in these places are mean, nasty, and unkind. This is a piece of poop article. I hope to God that this never becomes the norm. Look at Japan, UK, China. Robots. People are robots. Small cubicles to live in and small ones to work in. Oh, but we must make prisons like a spa. Give me a break. Stop murdering the unborn, stop siding with the terrorists, stop trying to take my weapon, I MAY think about it.
18 people like this.
Reply 10 - Posted by:
swarfer 1/5/2020 11:08:51 AM (No. 279391)
These people are right out of Stalin's central planning committee. Tell people what they want. Then give them no choice.
22 people like this.
Reply 11 - Posted by:
jacksin5 1/5/2020 11:12:02 AM (No. 279394)
You've just received your college degree in womyn's studies or political science or some such rot. Where do you go now? If you go home to your parent's basement.you'll be isolated from all the like minded young Socialists you went to school with.
Solution: Enter a rent-controlled enclave in Minneapolis. The tighter these whack jobs are packed in, the more political influence they have in a given community or State. And George Soros need not have far to look to round up volunteers for the next rent-a-mob.
11 people like this.
Reply 12 - Posted by:
Sandbar 1/5/2020 11:16:43 AM (No. 279401)
Obama wanted to force subsidized housing into the suburbs. Then a couple of years ago, financial "experts" started telling us than owning a home wasn't the smart thing to do, that repairs, taxes, etc.,etc., etc, would eat up any dreams of appreciation owners might dream of. Now, this is the third article I've seen this week telling us that ownership is on "the wrong side of history".
11 people like this.
Reply 13 - Posted by:
red1066 1/5/2020 11:27:21 AM (No. 279414)
BS article. Every person I know under the age of 30 wants a large single family home. The problem is, they can't afford it. My father bought a single family home on a half acre of ground in 1947 while making less than 60 dollars a week. Worker wages have not kept up with inflation for more than 20 years. The cost of paying for college has kept what money young people could have saved for that home, used to pay for college loans. Look at the price of a new car. I recently read that the price of a new car is almost out of the reach of anyone making less than 50 grand a year unless that person is living at home with mom and dad. Income only goes so far. Lower paying jobs keeps people from getting married, having children, saving for retirement any many other things. It's expensive getting started in life, but thinking about having a single family home isn't dead, it's just a lot harder to obtain these days.
13 people like this.
Reply 14 - Posted by:
Chuzzles 1/5/2020 11:32:30 AM (No. 279419)
Not buying it for a moment. This is just more BS designed to manipulate the easily influenced among us. What is going to hurt is the upcoming bans on natural gas hookups in new construction of both residential and commercial buildings. So far, Seattle and Cali are doing this, and I think that it is the most ignorant stunt these people will have ever pulled. NG is cheaper than electricity for the most part, and quite efficient, especially in commercial buildings. I truly hope that Dr. Carson and Trump got rid of that Obama regulation that allows government to force diversity on neighborhoods. Because if they do it to the normal folks, they can also do it to the elites as well.
13 people like this.
Reply 15 - Posted by:
DVC 1/5/2020 11:48:40 AM (No. 279436)
Your own home, where you are entirely free to do what you want with it and in your yard, and the private automobile where you can go anyplace at any time of your choosing, carrying any THING of your choosing (even a gun) is anathema to their CONTROL need.
They want us in apartments where we get used to having someone controlling our every move. Rules set by others run your life in an apartment, you are much less free. And public transportation makes it hard to "do the wrong things", can't just go anywhere in the country that you want on a whim.
They want us less free. They want more control.
14 people like this.
Reply 16 - Posted by:
dwa 1/5/2020 12:02:12 PM (No. 279453)
This is nothing more than a move to control the population. If Americans are in high-rises or bunched together in mulit family dwellings, it is much easier to control them than if they are spread across hundreds of miles in individual houses. It is also an attempt to destroy individualism
11 people like this.
Reply 17 - Posted by:
Jesuslover54 1/5/2020 12:08:54 PM (No. 279465)
These feckless people are just jealous that they can't afford a house so don't want anyone else to have one.
And as for building low income housing in well-to-do neighborhoods, just take a look at the property Obama owns -- just try that in Kalorama or Martha's Vineyard.
8 people like this.
Reply 18 - Posted by:
HotRod 1/5/2020 12:37:07 PM (No. 279486)
Who wants to live in a ratty apartment? Only the rich can live in upscale, guarded condos, and they also usually have a house elsewhere. Check out rental or purchase prices for multi-unit housing in New York, San Francisco, or other urban sh*t-hole.
Flyover country is doing just fine, in spite of what the urban bureaucrats think!
10 people like this.
Reply 19 - Posted by:
franq 1/5/2020 12:48:29 PM (No. 279499)
Agree, #4. My son and daughter-in-law found homes being on the market only a day or two. They paid $10k over asking to get the one they are in.
5 people like this.
Reply 20 - Posted by:
smcchk 1/5/2020 12:55:22 PM (No. 279507)
That’s strange. Just moved son and family into a single family home. Daughters will both be moving into ones in a few months. Last one has to wait another year to buy hers. It costs them a fortune - a greater percentage than we had to deal with - but they still want them. Big government does not want them to.
8 people like this.
Reply 21 - Posted by:
NorthernDog 1/5/2020 12:57:44 PM (No. 279510)
They called such housing Khrushchyovka is the former Soviet Union since Krushchev promoted the idea. Towering, drab, concrete-slab apartments which the KGB could keep a close eye on.
3 people like this.
Reply 22 - Posted by:
hershey 1/5/2020 1:12:14 PM (No. 279524)
THX 1138
1 person likes this.
Reply 23 - Posted by:
anniebc 1/5/2020 1:12:38 PM (No. 279525)
No, what we want is for government to stop taxing us on our single family homes. Stop the overregulation that makes our homes so expensive. Stop telling us how much water we can use, how hot our water can be, and if we pay for gas but didn't oversee the installment of gas lines, when there's a gas leak or some other issue that happens to come from the gas lines on our property, don't make us pay for the repairs. There was a time when people lost their jobs or were down on their luck, that they didn't have to worry about losing their homes. Not so today. Don't get me started on taxes in general. In other words, what Americans want is limited government that gets government out of our pockets. Stop telling us we want this leftist crap. STOP! We don't!
5 people like this.
Reply 24 - Posted by:
Newtsche 1/5/2020 1:21:58 PM (No. 279538)
Redefining common sense and the conventional wisdom, like it or lump it.
There's a greater good to appease and the very best will show us the way.
Pro Tip: cinder block futures
2 people like this.
Reply 25 - Posted by:
TXknitter 1/5/2020 3:02:15 PM (No. 279645)
Baloney. Even in desirable rural areas in West Texas, there are always bargains. No thank you to all those government designed, ugly, rows and rows of semi-detached housing all over England. Yuk. Government wants the great unwashed in densely-populated urban areas where they can be controlled. Americans will always mostly desire to own their own family homes.
3 people like this.
Reply 26 - Posted by:
lakerman1 1/5/2020 3:02:17 PM (No. 279646)
Adding to #10'a post, one of the points in the Communist Manifesto is controlling the location of populations.Having visited Moscow twice,in 1996, we saw no single family dwellings, just apartment buildings. We stayed with a Russian family of four, and they had a two bedroom apartment, which is a sign that they had been communist party members.
It was a grim place to live.
1 person likes this.
Reply 27 - Posted by:
Muguy 1/5/2020 4:24:17 PM (No. 279701)
Nice to hear from TxKnitter again!
It is much easier to control a populace who is huddled into small areas on top of each other.
The wide expanse of West Texas is an ideal place for families, far away from places where the socialists gather-- The Panhandle, South Plains, Permian Basin, and Big Country are the places that have saved us at the ballot box from having Austin, Kalifornia take over Texas!
0 people like this.
Reply 28 - Posted by:
BigGeorgeTX 1/5/2020 5:57:58 PM (No. 279761)
I currently live on Social Security and a moderate portfolio. I own my home however, and can't imagine someone trying to keep their head above water on SS if they needed to pay monthly for an apartment, while dealing with constant rent increases. You can't get a decent apartment for under $1200/month, and I'm sure it's worse in many major cities.
2 people like this.
More propaganda. If that's the case, how come people call me all day trying to buy my home for cash ?
What will force the elderly out of homes is higher taxes, HOAs, and higher homeowner's insurance.You never really own your home.
If millennial's want apartments, it's because they are too lazy to cut their own grass or fix anything.
2 people like this.
Reply 30 - Posted by:
Mushroom 1/6/2020 2:42:47 AM (No. 279973)
Remember, #30, SS wasn't supposed to be a complete replacement. I too have SS and a fixed pension as well as an IRA. My wife is still working. HER company's idea of a 'pension' is a 2% contribution based on HER contribution to a horrible 'no cost to the company' firm living off the Principal..of her payments.
Thank goodness I live on the Vanguard of finances!
0 people like this.
Reply 31 - Posted by:
ROLFNader 1/6/2020 7:57:58 PM (No. 280752)
All we need is free WiFi and a gubmint subsidized apartment.
0 people like this.
Reply 32 - Posted by:
Penney 1/6/2020 10:48:31 PM (No. 280863)
More dem/socialist propaganda. Only in the dem/socialist micro-managed & dictated cities could this policy be implemented.
0 people like this.
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This will be the next battle. The tax base leaves the cities to live where they want, so government will mandate what their neighborhood looks like - it ain't pretty.
Hey - it works for illegals who hate it here. so they re-build their old crapholes here and raise their old flag.