California Passes Important New YIMBY Housing Law
The new legislation exempts most new urban housing construction from the previously often stifling CEQA law. YIMBY ("yes in my backyard") advocates are cheering.
The new legislation exempts most new urban housing construction from the previously often stifling CEQA law. YIMBY ("yes in my backyard") advocates are cheering.
Plus: Real rent decreases in New York City, the return of missing middle housing in Virginia, and how everyone's a socialist on housing in New York.
Despite this setback, a coalition of municipalities is challenging the state’s housing program in federal court.
YIMBY policies in Texas have led to lower rents and increasing supply. The same cannot be said for California.
America's housing shortage is worst in Western states. That's also where the federal government owns the most land.
Allegedly sane, centrist opponents of New York City's socialist mayoral candidate are all too happy to regulate rental housing into the ground.
Plus: housing reform is killed in Connecticut, bonus ADUs are gutted in San Diego, and two decades of Supreme Court-enabled eminent domain abuse.
It is part of the Yale Journal on Regulation Symposium on the 20th Anniversary of Kelo v. City of New London.
The study by leading housing economists Edward Glaeser and Joseph Gyourko finds there are 15 milion fewer housing units in the US than there would be if construction in 2000-2020 had continued at the same pace as in 1980-2000.
Plus: A new constitutional challenge to inclusionary zoning fees, a vetoed ban on rent-recommendation software, and a ill-conceived rent freeze in New York City.
Out-of-control housing costs helped Trump win the 2024 election. Is he about to make the problem worse?
Plus: The near death of starter-home reform in Texas, Colorado's pending ban on rent-recommendation software, and a very Catholic story of eminent domain abuse.
The Court has been punting for months on whether it will take up a legal challenge brought by Los Angeles landlords alleging their city's COVID-era eviction ban was a physical taking.
All to shovel more money at wasteful and ineffective programs.
During one week in February, arrests of homeless people accounted for 66 percent of all arrests in Miami Beach.
Plus: The White House proposes stiff funding cuts at HUD, Baltimore proposes "missing middle" reforms, and Gov. Gavin Newsom urges local governments to clear encampments.
Bills designed to allow more starter homes and apartments near transit face an uncertain future in the state Senate's housing committee.
Prime Minister Mark Carney's plan to create a federal housing developer is a terrible idea.
The owners, who were planning an affordable housing project on the site, first learned about the seizure from the mayor's social media post.
One proposal would create a streamlined process for selling off federal land to state and local governments, but only if they allow housing to be built on it.
Plus: Texas and Minnesota consider an aggressive suite of housing supply bills, while San Diego tries to ratchet up regulations on ADUs.
On Monday, a Montana judge roundly rejected homeowners' legal challenge to new laws allowing duplexes and accessory dwelling units in single-family areas.
Lawmakers in Arizona and California are attempting to overcome local resistance to meaningful starter home reforms.
From insurance to affordable housing mandates, California's regulatory noose tightens over wildfire rebuilding efforts.
When regulations limit what kind of housing can be built, the result is endless arguments about what people really want.
Johnston, Rhode Island, Mayor Joseph Polisena promised to "use all the power of government" to stop the privately financed 252-unit project.
Lawmakers across the country introduce bills to strengthen private property rights, crackdown on out-of-control regulators, and get the government out of micromanaging stairways.
Zoning laws, occupancy limits, and short-term rental restrictions are keeping housing off the market and driving up costs.
California Gov. Gavin Newsom must allow prices to rise if he wants homes to be rebuilt as quickly as possible.
The destruction of numerous homes exacerbated the city's already severe housing crisis. Curbing exclusionary zoning is crucial to addressing the problem.
Milton Friedman once observed that you can't have open immigration and a welfare state. He was mostly right.
Cities become affordable when lots of new housing is built, not when a larger percentage of a small amount of new housing is made "affordable" by regulation.
The latest federal homelessness survey finds an 18 percent annual rise in the number of people living without permanent shelter.
Cities and states are passing lots of productive reforms, local courts are increasingly striking them down, and local governments continue their harassment of homeless shelters.
Plus: New York City moves forward on zoning reforms, Utah city moves backward on granny flats, and D.C. considers a ban on landlords' pit bull bans.
The Yakama Nation has won a temporary restraining order preventing the City of Toppenish, Washington, from closing its new cold weather shelter.
With the help of New York’s environmental review law, local NIMBYs halted an approved housing project, adding to delays and costs in a city facing a housing shortage.
Plus: Democrats' housing-lite postelection recriminations and yet another ballot box defeat for pro–rent control forces in California.
Golden State voters decisively rejected progressive approaches to crime and housing.
A related initiative preventing the state's most prolific rent control–supporting nonprofit from funding future initiatives is headed for a narrow victory.
Proposition 33 would repeal all of California's state-level limits on rent control. It's passage could prove to be a disaster for housing supply in the Golden State.
Advocates unconvincingly argue that repealing California's limits on rent control will open up more housing for people with disabilities.
Despite homelessness being on the rise, local governments keep cracking down on efforts to shelter those without permanent housing.
Instead of focusing on the ways a rollback of zoning laws could lower housing costs for everyone, Vance wants to zealously enforce zoning codes to keep Haitians out of town.
A free market for housing is one that benefits both renters and landlords.
Federal housing officials allege a New Hampshire landlord violated the Fair Housing Act for refusing to show a unit to two women with emotional support dogs.
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