Why millennials are (partly) to blame for the housing shortage
The rush of young people to U.S. cities over the past few years is partly to blame for America’s worsening housing shortage. In some of the country’s largest and most prosperous markets, such as New...
Regulation nation
A lawyer for Duarte Nursery said the case is important because it could set a precedent requiring other farmers to obtain costly, time-consuming permits just to plow their fields. “The case is the first time...
The ever-prescient landlord
In August 2016, Seattle, Wash., a city where the U.S. Census bureau estimates that 48 percent of the population are renters, the city council revised its open housing ordinance to include “first-in-time, first-in-line” provisions....
The unexpected solution to America’s affordable housing crunch: the urban movement
The ones currently doing the kicking are the YIMBYs, a loosely allied collection of pro-development housing advocates whose name plays on the acronym NIMBY (“Not In My Backyard”), replacing the “Not” with an emphatic...
Welcome to paradise
Anant Yardi faced such a dilemma in the early 80s while living in Santa Barbara, Calif., where he worked as a software developer for Burroughs, a business equipment manufacturer (Burroughs merged with Sperry Univac...
Leaning tower of San Francisco
A luxury high-rise in the heart of San Francisco City has been dubbed the “leaning tower of San Francisco” after the building began to sink—and satellite images have now revealed just how bad the...
15 Years in the pipeline
Cranes are on the horizon in San Francisco in a most unlikely place, South of Market’s (SoMa) Harrison Street. The area with a most lively history is one of the last to relent to...
Gunfight at the Airbnb coral
That means Airbnb and others must stick to advertising San Francisco hosts who have registered with the city and haven’t exceeded the number of nights they’re allowed to rent. The penalty? Platforms can be...
When will affordable housing advocates push for more supply and fewer rules?
The lack of market rate supply contributes to high prices that puts market rate housing out of reach, and as long as that problem goes unaddressed, more and more subsidies will need to be...
Getting inside multifamily’s utility management operation
“In many states we’re seeing an increase in the trend to mandate submetering for any residential and commercial new building construction. Around eight states already have the law in place, up from around three...
The camel that had no hump
This especially irritates Rob Pressman, the principal of Burbank, Calif.-based TGP, Inc. Landscape Architecture, who believes that aesthetics do not have to be discarded for the sake of sustainability. Multifamily developers employ landscape architects like...
An apartment that knows your next move
That’s the vision some technologists have for the future of domestic living, and a startup named Brain of Things says that it is developing what the company’s founder refers to as “robot homes” in...
Paradise lost
San Francisco has topped the list of every national rental report since Zumper began publishing them in August 2014, and was named the most expensive city in the U.S. years before that. The rapid...
The next target in California’s drought? Renters.
The result amounted to a savings in water use in June of 23 percent, just below the mandate required by the governor. But while single-family homeowners sacrifice their lawns and are saving water, multifamily residents...
Utility costs rising
It isn’t just the additional cost that’s irking California residents—it’s the growing suspicion among neighbors suddenly stuck splitting one big water bill. A vast majority of California’s apartment communities have one master water meter,...
