The YIMBY -- "Yes In My Backyard" -- Housing Movement
So many of my Venice neighbors -- many of whom who bought their houses back before a termite-eaten shack could go for a million-five -- are "progressives" who are "for affordable housing."
Well, that is, until you try to mortar together a brick or two with the goal of creating dwelling places anywhere with miles of where they live.
Somebody wanted to build a building -- I think 45 feet tall -- on an ugly boulevard near me, replacing a car lot. OMG. It's like they had suggested opening a restaurant where they serve fricasseed babies. 45 feet tall. The horror!
I rent, and though times are tough now, I keep working on ways to fiscally normalize again -- hoping that I could someday own a home, just so I can have a place that is mine, that I can't be evicted from, with some equity.
And no, I don't want to leave LA. This is my home and I love it here, and the minds that live and meet here.
This is a problem. Gregg jokes that, with LA's prices, any house I could afford would come with its own street gang. (With escalating real estate prices since he made that crack, I've amended that to "any doghouse...")
Bill Boyarsky, in an op-ed in the LA Times tries to take middle ground, "supporting housing growth in areas well-served by transit," aka the "Yes In My Backyard" Movement:
My wife and I bought our house, a two-bedroom fixer-upper a couple of miles south of UCLA, in 1978. My dad termed the house "a dump," and he was shocked at its outrageous price tag of $92,000.Today our modest bungalow, because of its location, would sell for something approaching $2 million, but we don't have any desire to move. We love the place, and we love the neighborhood.
But we also see the problem with leafy neighborhoods of single-family homes like ours.
My wife and I moved to the area when middle-class people could still afford to live here; today, people like we were back then are denied entrance to the neighborhood because of the high prices. Across Los Angeles, this has become true as the population has swelled and new housing has not kept pace with demand, driving prices ever higher.
My neighborhood is exactly the kind of place urban planners think should be part of the solution. With an Expo Line station less than a mile away, it's near transit, and there is already a huge residential and commercial complex going up adjacent to the station. The nearby Westside Pavilion mall is becoming Google offices, which will locate more jobs in the neighborhood.
Yet much of the area remains zoned only for single-family homes. At a time when housing is so scarce, having vast swaths of Los Angeles off-limits to multi-family homes is difficult to justify. But it's also understandable that residents don't want to sacrifice the qualities that drew them to a neighborhood.
Why do their property rights trump those of others to use their property as they wish -- in rules laid down by the state?
Here's how it would work in a free sociey -- from Ben O'Neill at Mises:
Private ownership of property allows for restrictive covenants to be agreed between the property owner and another party so that the allowable uses of land are limited according to the wishes of the parties. It follows that property owners within a given neighborhood may contractually agree to impose restrictions on themselves with respect to the allowable developments on their land or the allowable uses of their property.In some cases, restrictive covenants may mimic the kinds of restrictions present in zoning laws and may therefore be used as a means of voluntary zoning. Property owners may agree to limit developments on their land to a certain height as in existing zoning laws; they may agree to paint their properties in a similar color scheme, as with some housing complexes; or they may agree to restrict the use of their property to particular uses, such as residential use.
It is no mystery why private-property owners might voluntarily undertake to restrict their own property rights. They might do so for monetary payment or other valuable consideration. For example, some property owners might enter into restrictive covenants in order to secure similar restrictions on their neighbors. In such cases, a property owner would weigh off the benefit of having an enforceable restrictive covenant over his neighbor's property against the detriment these restrictions would cause his own property ownership. A property owner would also have regard not only to his own desired usage of his property, but also to the likely desires of prospective purchasers and the resultant effect on the market value of his property.
Instead of relying on quid pro quo restrictions, a system of voluntary zoning would also allow people to purchase restrictive covenants from a willing party. For example, a man with a strong aversion to dogs in his neighborhood could seek to purchase a restrictive covenant preventing dogs from living on his neighbors' properties even if he does not desire any particular restrictive covenant being imposed on his own property (obviously he will not allow dogs there himself, but he does not need a restrictive covenant to do this). In such a case, the neighbor would consider whether or not the money offered is more valuable to him than his existing right to have dogs living on his property. Regardless of the particular preferences of the parties involved, voluntary agreement to a restrictive covenant would demonstrate ex ante gains to all parties to the covenant.
The problem with government-imposed zoning:
Like most other government legislation, zoning laws are a violation of property rights. They involve forcibly imposing a restriction on legitimate private-property use through legislative fiat. A person, who has acquired property through homesteading or through voluntary trade with another person who legitimately owned the property, should rightly be able to use his property in any way that does not intrude upon the property rights of others....Controversy over zoning laws is aggravated by the fact that coercive zoning laws must inevitably involve arbitrary bureaucratic discretion. Changes in communities -- such as growth in population, changing demography, or growing or diminishing affluence -- can give rise to new demands for certain kinds of property and property uses, and the restrictions on property development and use must therefore be adapted to suit changing demands. In the case of voluntary zoning, restrictions like this will occur by renegotiating existing arrangements and providing consideration to induce covenant holders to allow changing restrictions. This ensures that rational economic calculation occurs. However, in the case of government-imposed zoning laws, this will instead involve political advocacy and political decision making -- in particular, zoning laws will inevitably involve substantial discretionary power being arrogated to government bureaucrats and being exercised without recourse to any rational means of economic calculation.
...Of course, there is one situation in which libertarians countenance forcible restriction of property development or use without any contractual agreement. That is the case where the development or use of property is itself an aggression against another person or their property -- that is, where a particular property development or use violates the property rights of another. This can occur in cases where a development or use of property produces excessive pollution or noise to surrounding properties or invades their space.[17] Thus, opening a coal-fire power station or an oil refinery in the middle of a residential neighborhood may legitimately be prevented by residents, since the pollution would involve a violation of their property rights.
People move to an area because they like the way it is, so of course they don't want it to change.
I often wonder why States don't develop their small, crumbling cities more.
NicoleK at February 6, 2019 10:34 PM
This is just so much nonsense.
It doesn't matter whether a government is called a Homeowner's Association or Teh City, they are going to tell you what you can and cannot do... and that is the way it will be until YOU PAY MORE OR MOVE AWAY.
In addition - people leave the hellhole they imagine for a new location, and promptly transform the new place into the hellhole they left.
I see in the news that Venetians, the CA kind, now have a problem with vagrants. La dee da, what a surprise that enablers attract the idle. Ask Panera Bread or Starbucks what the difference is between their expectations and what really happened when they tried to apply "social justice".
Why is the market not allowed to operate for housing, and do you have any idea whatsoever what the carrying capacity of the land is, anywhere you want to build condos?
Radwaste at February 7, 2019 2:52 AM
"I often wonder why States don't develop their small, crumbling cities more."
Why is this the States' job?
Radwaste at February 7, 2019 2:53 AM
Because the state already is in the business of allocating money for infrastructure for cities.
NicoleK at February 7, 2019 5:10 AM
Because the state already is in the business of allocating money for infrastructure for cities.
NicoleK at February 7, 2019 5:10 AM
The taxpayers of the state as a whole usually have other priorities. Ones that contribute to their quality of life, and payments that are mandated by their state or the federal constitution, such as schools and roads.
I know this is stereotyping, but one of the problems I have discussing this issue with people who don’t live here, like Europeans, is that they don’t understand that the US doesn’t have the top down government structure that other countries do. It is more bottom up.
Cities collect their own taxes, and when their fail to allocate their money well, they go bankrupt. Fortunately there are only a few areas where they have any leverage to force the taxpayers in other areas of their state to bail them out.
Isab at February 7, 2019 5:46 AM
States funding the (re)building of cities? I'm sure the politicians would be ecstatic over such an idea. Because it provides them with many more opportunities for corruption, graft and rent-seeking.
What? you think they'd be on time and under budget? fortunately, we have an example of a city trying to do just that.
https://www.courant.com/ctnow/movies/hc-fea-new-london-little-pink-house-eminent-domain-0408-story.html
As I recall, the taken land was cleared and is now...a weed infested emptiness. Good job, New London.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kelo_v._City_of_New_London
Amy says so I can have a place that is mine, that I can't be evicted from.
Maybe. Or maybe a local governmental body will decide that that really need it more than you do, and simply take it. Sure, they're supposed to pay you "fair market value", but I'm sure they'll find some lying weasel to low ball that market value, hoping you'll take it and go away and sue them.
I R A Darth Aggie at February 7, 2019 6:25 AM
"and NOT sue them".
I R A Darth Aggie at February 7, 2019 6:26 AM
It is actually worse than this. Zoning boards will string someone along so they spend money on impact statements, engineering reports, plans and then tell them no. Buildings that meet the official code are still denied. In areas with tons of vacant lots they will turn their nose up at some development that would be beneficial. They force apartment developers to include low income units--which is truly unconstitutional "taking".
Note that Tokyo does not have any zoning regs --they just try to keep up in terms of roads and utilities with whatever happens. Seems like a good idea to me. gov officials, however, hate independent developers.
cc at February 7, 2019 8:27 AM
If you want to see the difference between zoning and HOAs you can look at Houston and Dallas. They are relatively the same size and same location. Or at least as comparable as you are going to get. Houston has no zoning. Everything is HOA style. And HOAs are full of petty little despots who try and enforce their views on how things should be on their neighbors. And they get away with it too because they are the only people who care enough about it. Everyone else gives in due to exhaustion. Dallas has zoning and relatively no HOAs. So some faceless bureaucrat you can probably never see in person gets to approve or deny things based on obscure rules and whims.
Honestly the main difference I see between the two is Dallas has less crime mainly due to a wider picture on the building regulations. In Houston is isn't uncommon to see million dollar home subdivisions right next to roach motel apartments. And that causes crime. Poverty is fairly even distributed in the city. Dallas has a wealth gradient that stretches across the whole city. The south side is poor and you gradually get richer as you go north. There are hills and valleys but no sharp edges like in Houston.
That is pretty much it. I don't think getting rid of zoning will really solve any of these problems in LA.
Ben at February 7, 2019 8:44 AM
A city made up of patchwork restrictive covenant fiefdoms doesn't sound terribly attractive.
And a city where owners can fill up their properties to the max, years after the neighborhood streets were put down, and houses designed to house so many and not more than, or park this many cars, and not more than is San Francisco, where parking is impossible, where you may not even get to park in "your garage" either because it's been turned into another apartment and you have to share laundry etc., or because the garage has been rented to someone else for their car and you only have street parking.
Neighborhoods have limited resources dictated by city infrastructure, streets, parking, curbs, disabled cutouts, fire hydrants, electricity, carrying capacity.
Shoving more and more people in works for the first owners to do so, but soon you get mini-mansions built up to property lines, and owners fleeing because renting is more profitable, overcrowding, no parking, and your "use of your property rights" can literally be seen destroying the property rights of others to live in their property as the neighborhood was originally designed and developed.
That's not to say zoning cannot and should not be reformed, but no, I don't think it's smart to abolish zoning laws.
There may still be some oil left in Venice, why shouldn't I tear down my home and put in a well? My property after all!
jerry at February 7, 2019 9:02 AM
There may still be some oil left in Venice, why shouldn't I tear down my home and put in a well? My property after all!
jerry at February 7, 2019 9:02 AM
Humm. Because,you don’t own the mineral Rights?
Speaking of oil wells, there usd to be one right in front of the Oklahoma state capital building. Don’t think it produces anymore.
Isab at February 7, 2019 9:27 AM
Nicole there actually has been a good amount of government investment in residential and commercial development across all levels of government in the US.
The reason that it's not pursued as much any longer is that the results were consistently wasteful and even damaging. Urban development or 'renewal' was popular in the 60's and 70's. Entire districts of cities were rescaped, new housing developments and commercial districts were built. The outcome was often catastrophic to local communities and generally produced a lot of very shitty architecture and unwanted infrastructure.
After a couple of decades, much of this development has been torn down or become slums. In fact, much of the money allocated to urban development now goes to repairing the damage of earlier urban development.
corky at February 7, 2019 9:43 AM
If your purchase of the property did not include the MOG rights or the air space above, you were foolish to buy. That means someone else could, in theory, set up an excavation on an adjacent property.
Conan the Grammarian at February 7, 2019 9:49 AM
Depends on where you buy it Conan. And for what purpose. It is expensive to develop mineral rights. If you do not have the means and the inclination to do so, depending on the state, and the neighborhood, they may be worthless to you.
There are also other laws, particularly environmental laws, that keep open pit mines from being opened in a residential development.
I know some people who kept their mineral rights in northern Colorado when they sold their farms. The people buying it for farm land could not have afforded to buy the land if they had to come up with a purchase price that included the value of the mineral rights in what was already a producing oil field paying royalties.
Some states do not allow you to sever the mineral rights from the rest of the property rights, but most of the big energy producing ones do. Keeps the oil companies from having to go into the leasing business for the actual property where the oil production doesn’t take up much more than a few acres in an entire section.
You really need to learn more about this, so if you are in the real estate business now, as you have hinted, you can give better advice to potential purchasers.
You buy near an airport, you might have limited rights for a certain distance above ground as well, and you can lose those by eminent domain without losing the rest of the property.
Like the oil company, the airport isn’t interest in your house, or your crops. They are only interested in you not flying drones around or tethering a high altitude weather ballon in one of their flight paths.
Property law can be a very complex subject, which is why, I advise people who are buying and selling in a slightly more complex situation than just a house in a residential neighborhood, to get some actual legal advice. In a lot of states, the realtor works for the seller anyway.
And in my opinion, to get slightly off topic, Title insurance, in most cases, is a complete and total scam.
Isab at February 7, 2019 12:16 PM
"Speaking of oil wells, there usd to be one right in front of the Oklahoma state capital building. Don’t think it produces anymore."
It can. It just isn't profitable at current prices.
Ben at February 7, 2019 12:20 PM
Like siblings, neighbors are permanent companions selected for you by someone else.
Similarly, elections can change some aspects of the government side of this polygon, but not others.
1. It's really amusing to see freedom-loving Muricans and me-me libertarians trying to put a personal-rights frame around this topic. LA is a humongous city on the West coast, folks - the frontier of freeheld homesteads is long closed.
These are probably the same white-collar folks who gush about those lovely Dutch townhouses along the canals and "walkable historic neighborhoods" in Europe.
Did you know that many apartments in those historic zones are empty - rendered unlivable by overregulation and Disneyfication?
2. There is a three-legged waltz of sorts here. Use-n-density choices by planning boards and private owners must be coordinated with transport, energy, and other infrastructure - which are often provided by entirely different arms of gubmint (Fed, state, county).
3. We already have planning/design solutions that provide the experience of single-family-detached housing (overwhelmingly preferred by American consumers) at higher densities. In Japan this is acheived simply by eliminating sidewalks and setbacks.
Here is one professional discussing major trends in the USA - click around for examples of townhouses etc:
http://www.dclinger.com/cost-cutting-housing-concepts/
also the book "Density by Design" kicked off this rethinking of the suburbs years ago - it's available at archive.org
Ben David at February 7, 2019 1:01 PM
North Carolina allows severance, but requires disclosure prior to sale. In residential real estate, it's a rare occurrence. It's more frequent in rural areas, but still not routine here. I was not thinking of energy-producing states like Texas and Colorado where, as you point out, severance might be a fairly routine matter.
It's uncommon enough here that I'd look askew at purchasing property without the MOG rights. I'd advise clients to consult with an attorney before doing so.
BTW, I've dealt with Texas real estate law when I was in mortgage banking and anyone who truly understands Texas real estate law is probably clinically insane - or soon will be.
They do here and that sub-agency relationship is a required disclosure to both buyers and sellers.
So do I.
In a twist from my earlier experience in mortgage banking in California, attorneys do the title searches and handle the closings here so there is ample opportunity for a buyer to consult an attorney.
Conan the Grammarian at February 7, 2019 3:47 PM
"Because the state already is in the business of allocating money for infrastructure for cities."
Do you realize you didn't answer the question?
Radwaste at February 7, 2019 9:07 PM
In Texas the mineral rights and the surface rights are completely different things. I don't think I've seen a sale that included both. At least not in a city. In rural areas it is normal to own both. As for your typical residential home it is clearly marked that mineral rights are not included and usually what depth the sale goes to.
Similar deal with water right. City properties typically don't include them.
Ben at February 8, 2019 7:14 AM
"I often wonder why States don't develop their small, crumbling cities more."
I'm peripherally involved in an effort to preserve a mill-village town in a nearby city (because it has some personal meaning to me). One of the problems with decline is that it's self-perpetrating. People in the city don't want a city-long walking trail (being built from an abandoned railroad line) to go through that area because "there's too much crime", even though the presence of the trail and middle-class people using it might, over time, attract some new residents to the area, which would reduce the crime. You can't find investment money because "no one else is investing there". You can't get historic designations for buildings because "those buildings are old and they aren't worth anything". You can't get streets repaired because "no one uses those streets because they are in such bad shape." Etc.
Cousin Dave at February 8, 2019 1:21 PM
"In Texas the mineral rights and the surface rights are completely different things. I don't think I've seen a sale that included both. At least not in a city."
I've bought two houses on lots in my life, both in Texas, with one in a small town and one in a small city. The mineral rights were included in both of those sales. Maybe not as odd a situation as you think, Ben.
Causticf at February 8, 2019 6:43 PM
Sounds like it would be quite the hassle but perhaps not...and I guess where I live is similar to what is described.
There is the HOA of the development (about 250 homes) which is 4 or 5 city zoned areas...they are all zoned the same - residential class something or other - detached homes with a few town home type homes are allow...and I think 1 neighborhood store (like a mini-mart) are allowed but there are none.
There are a few sub HOAs. One is nicked named the coffee cul-de-sacs - All the buildings have to be brown, all the landscaping is controlled and maintained the HOA. There are a couple others that I am not familiar with. The town homes are part of three HOAs - the master, the north side one, and then one just for them that is responsible for all the outside maintenance.
Right next to the coffee HOA is a very pale blue home. Which I would think would be part of that HOA but it is not. Before I rented my current place I looked at renting one in the coffee HOA, since they are in the same development I believed that the landscaping was covered...nope had to do that myself.
The Former Banker at February 8, 2019 7:18 PM
Just said I haven't seen a sale that included both Causticf and I haven't. I've bought three houses in large cities and none of them included mineral rights. All of them were quite clear on that. I think the rights are typically separated by the developer when they built the subdivision. They then sell the rights to the whole subdivision as one big package. But if you are building on your own lot I can see how that wouldn't happen.
People I know who are on the edge of town do own their mineral rights. But they typically have a couple of acres (retirement farmer thing).
This was just in response to Conan claiming you are a fool if you don't own your mineral rights. If so then there are millions of fools in Texas. And to be fair that is probably true but not related to property issues.
Ben at February 9, 2019 7:24 AM
In Michigan, mineral rights generally depend on how the land tile passed from the government to private hands in the first place.
For homesteaded land (free when you lived on it, built a house, and planted a crop), mineral rights were always reserved to the federal government, which leases them to mining and oil companies. (Timber rights may have been similarly separated, and between 1849 and 1900 Michigan lumber brought more than all the gold in California - but in my lifetime that no longer mattered.) In the upper peninsula, most likely copper and iron mines bought the land or leased the rights before anyone thought of settling there, but in most of the lower peninsula, mineral rights didn't matter until 1973 when OPEC cut back production and more than tripled the price of oil. Suddenly the oil and gas under Michigan became worth the cost of extracting it. I recall worried discussions around the kitchen table about how drillers could pay the feds a small amount and come right onto our farm to drill, with no obligation to pay us anything - theoretically they were required to clean up afterwards, but that seemed to be impossible to enforce. But the oil company preferred to avoid lawsuits and bad publicity, so they offered contracts that would pay a little up front plus royalties if they actually drilled or even sucked the oil or gas out from under us to wells on other land, in exchange for not making them go through a court. It wasn't much, but it was better than the legally nothing we were entitled to - and as it worked out, they eventually decided there was nothing worth going after under our land, so Dad got a few bucks for just a signature.
Earlier, land was handed out instead of back pay for Revolutionary and War of 1812 veterans under "land patents", and all rights came with those. I own 30 acres near Gaylord under a land patent - but when they drilled on the neighboring property, we got nothing for the gas being pumped from that land. (And dammit, we still had to buy propane - the raw natural gas requires some refining before you can use it in ordinary appliances.) They did have to pay us a few hundred for an easement to run a pipeline across the front of our property, but that check bounced! There was an unholy tangle of shell companies, and getting a lawyer to untangle it and maybe be able to hold a company that actually had assets responsible would have cost much more than the pay-out...
There was also land that was sold by the feds rather than given away, and there must have been some British and French titles from before Michigan became US territory. I expect that when mineral rights come to matter on that land, they'll have to dig right back to the original sales contract or other original title. I'd also guess that much of Texas and the nearby states have a similar situation with titles dating to the Lone Star Republic, Mexico, and Spanish rule...
markm at March 12, 2019 12:50 PM
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