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this post was submitted on 26 Jan 2024
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the_dunk_tank
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I don't disagree that these units exist, but the report you mentioned only discusses one point in time, which doesn't give much context. If you look at the historical data from the census (8 and 8a) rather than just one year of it, you'll see that the vacancy rates have been basically steady in LA, never moving by much more than a percent (excepting 2008) since 2005.
I'm sure we both agree that the homelessness crisis has intensified over the same timeframe, but if the vacancy rate isn't changing, I find it hard to accept as the cause.
Obviously it is unjust for there to be those who have two (or more) homes in a place where many have none, but if we're talking about systemic changes that need to be pursued, more housing seems like an obvious one that can produce more units than just things like a vacancy tax or even requisition (not that those should not be pursued). And your report advocates for that too, specifically pointing out land speculation or land held vacant by the city.
i posted that not to advocate for that project, but to point out that, yes, in fact, there are plenty of vacant housing units where there are people who want and need housing. not just in northwest Arkansas and the other places liberals like to characterize as places "no one wants to live".
my point is, there is already highly desirable housing in HCOL areas purposely kept vacant to serve the material interests of a wealthy rentier class seeking to extract more and more from the working class.
building more housing without addressing vacancy is wasted effort. those speculators with net worth/lines of credit already ballooned by vacant housing will continue to buy up whatever percentage of new housing will allow them to maintain or increase the power of their position. the solution to the housing crisis will require several lines of attack against the material interests of rentiers, but the existence of more vacant housing than homeless people remains a salient point.
Do you think that building more housing will cause the percentage of non-market vacancies to increase? I expect that number is pretty inelastic wrt supply for a given area and you can consider it a measurable inefficiency of the market.
So if we assume that rate is static at roughly 3% for LA, to me it seems that getting that number down to 2% or less is the real wasted effort. There need to be more homes. Whether 97 or 99 of every 100 new units built enter the market doesn't seem like it's worth focusing on over just getting those 100 new homes built in the first place.
By all means, if vacancy taxes or more radical measures get passed to get those non-market vacancies available I'm all for it, I just feel like non-market vacancies are orders of magnitude fewer than the number of homes not built for other reasons (zoning, land speculation, etc).
My main point being that when people make the argument "there are enough homes in desirable places to house every homeless person" it's usually deployed as ammo for the further argument that new housing construction is unnecessary, or that new market-rate housing construction is unnecessary, which I disagree with.