Urbanexus Update - Issue #87
H. Pike Oliver compiles this weekly update of real estate and community development news. This week, the focus is on housing--the good news and the bad news. Please note that some links may lead to items behind a paywall.
Next week, Urbanexus Update will take a New Year's break. Best Holiday wishes to all!
Housing
Value of new home sales in the USA
Per a post at the Political Calculations blog, things are looking up for homebuilders in the USA as 2019 draws to a close.
An inventory crisis for existing home sales in the USA It’s no surprise to anyone in the real estate or mortgage industry that there’s a critical shortage of homes for sale – the four-month supply of homes for sale today is between 30-40% lower than the number of homes for sale in a normal, healthy market. How did we get here? And how do we fix it?
Housing production shortages in California
A slide presentation by Dowell Myers of the University of Southern California on the magnitude and characteristics of housing shortages in California.
A California homeless camp is a dire place
Thomas Fuller and Josh Haner of the San Francisco Bureau of the New York Times spent three months documenting the conditions of one homeless camp in Oakland, CA. Then they traveled to a slum in Mexico City for a comparison. Unlike in Oakland, where there are only a few portable toilets and where many use the bathroom at a McDonald's next door, the residents in Mexico have working toilets in each shack.
Three good ideas for dealing with homelessness
Washington State Senator Hans Zeiger believes that government should: 1) help divert people out of homeless where possible; 2) create a guardianship (or conservatorship) program to improve care for people struggling with drug addiction and mental illness, and increase the likelihood that they will get help, and; 3) create job opportunities for homeless adults who want to work.
Multifamily operators gave a tutorial on the 20 best ways in which their firms are boosting net operating income (NOI) during France Media’s 10th annual InterFace Multifamily Southeast conference.
Regional and metropolitan dynamics
Four coastal metro areas dominate startup dIversity
Just four coastal areas of the USA dominate on the Startup Complexity Index, a new measure of technological diversity developed by researchers at the Brookings Institution.
Charles Schwab moving San Francisco HQ to Texas
Ten other corporate headquarters moves out of San Francisco since the start of 2018 include Aatonomy, Bechtel, Circa of America, Core-Mark Holding Co., GoCheck Kids, Lottery.com, Maxar Technologies, McKesson Corp, PrePaid2Cash Holdings and Xero. If we were to include moves of companies out of Santa Clara, San Mateo and Alameda counties, the result would show Silicon Valley is the epicenter of companies opting for out-of-California locations in full or in part.
Around the world
Professionals seek shelter in abandoned buildings in Lagos
Adekunle Adigun is gainfully employed as a commercial lawyer on Victoria Island in Lagos, yet as he finishes work each day he does not know where his home for the night will be. For that, he turns to a man known as Papi, who leases space to Adigun and hundreds like him in abandoned and often unfinished buildings in the Lagos Island district - for about 200 naira ($0.65) a night. Despite his professional stature, Adigun's 40,000 naira ($130) monthly pay means he cannot find a permanent place to live in Nigeria's commercial capital.