Reforms to the real estate transfer tax, which is assessed when properties are sold or otherwise change ownership, are an effective and equitable solution to immediate budget needs, while also supporting important long-term priorities including affordable housing and tenant assistance.
An estimate of the market-feasible production if the state were to allow fourplexes on single-family parcels and analysis of how these impacts vary across regions and cities.
The San Francisco Bay Area's housing target fails to account for the fact that the region leads the nation in super-commuters, many of whom work in the Bay Area but have been driven to live outside of it.
An explanation of how city councils and planning departments can use the housing element law to increase housing supply, but find themselves constrained by neighborhood-level opposition to change.
This report examines whether new development in Los Angeles is resulting in the widespread loss, through demolition, of older, more affordable housing units.
A fee deferral program would preserve the quantity — and depending on policy design, also the timing — of public fee revenues, while reducing private carrying costs.
Should cities only allow new housing on the condition that the developers of that housing deliver public benefits in return? This idea is often called “value capture”, and is used to justify — among other things — various forms of inclusionary zoning.
In this report, we analyze local plans and housing development rates in nearly 100 cities in the San Francisco Bay Area. We assess production on sites presented by cities to the state government as apt for housing, as well as elsewhere in the city.
In this paper I introduce the concept of the “zoning buffer” — the gap between the existing housing stock and the maximum number of homes allowed by current zoning — and describe how it affects land values and ultimately the production and affordability of housing.
This brief studies the relationship between transit ridership and the housing development process. Even if new multifamily housing is allowed on a site, a complicated, lengthy or unpredictable process could still discourage its production and thus, transit ridership.
