I am ( perhaps thankfully) not particularly familiar with the range of powers of Home Owners Associations: if the city really did open up ADUs in all single-family zoning, could exiting and newly created HOAs override the homeowners freedom to allow it?

Escalating cost of living in Fort Worth
#51
Posted 21 October 2023 - 08:00 AM
#52
Posted 21 October 2023 - 08:40 AM
I am ( perhaps thankfully) not particularly familiar with the range of powers of Home Owners Associations: if the city really did open up ADUs in all single-family zoning, could exiting and newly created HOAs override the homeowners freedom to allow it?
Interestingly enough, in California, they passed a bill blocking HOA's from interfering with the construction of and rental of ADU's by HOA's but are allowed to have "reasonable restrictions," I'm assuming perhaps impacting certain design choices, colors, maintenance etc.
#53
Posted 04 January 2024 - 04:54 PM
A couple of outlets are covering a City proposal to eliminate the developers from using the payment option for in leui of providing affordable housing in NEZ areas.
https://fortworthrep...rdable-housing/
https://www.wfaa.com...rdable-housing/
#54
Posted 04 January 2024 - 09:41 PM
It seems like the developer's economic choices speak for themselves and it is more favorable for them to just pay in -- so that number needs to be adjusted.
But more to the point, it seems like we spend too much time talking about "affordability" and not enough time talking about the real reason that prices are high -- in any "market" scarcity of something in demand drives up prices.
We just need more, and it doesn't matter too much what the more consists of: If someone built 20,000 $2M homes in Fort Worth, in the not too long term it would create more "affordable " housing -- because that extra inventory would flood the market, and some subset of people would move to those new homes, freeing up their current homes, and people would move to them, freeing up their homes, and so on. Eventually creating a full pyramid of housing that includes some that was more affordable than before, because there would not be the scarcity that there was before.
Also, I don't think that our city, which endures all kinds of complications of being in a region with so many other cities, should think we need to work alone to solve a housing crisis -- the burden should be shared with all of our neighboring cities. I don't know what the gold star we get on our report card looks like if we become the affordable housing champion of the metroplex when neighboring more-affluent-per-capita cities are running away with all of the corporate relocations.
What we need is a good and proper balance at every strata, with offerings for a mix of economic levels, and making sure we have enough of an economic engine to fuel them.
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#55
Posted 05 January 2024 - 07:51 AM
It seems like the developer's economic choices speak for themselves and it is more favorable for them to just pay in -- so that number needs to be adjusted.
But more to the point, it seems like we spend too much time talking about "affordability" and not enough time talking about the real reason that prices are high -- in any "market" scarcity of something in demand drives up prices.
I think there's significant tension between the first line of your post and the rest—in the rest, you recognize the dire scarcity of housing, which I agree with. But in the first line I think you propose to increase the regulatory cost of building more housing, which would worsen the scarcity crisis, all other things being equal. Right? You don't write "that number needs to be adjusted" upward so the developers have to pay more, but I think that's what you mean. If I haven't misunderstood your post, how do you resolve this tension?
#56
Posted 05 January 2024 - 09:39 AM
For sure they are two different thoughts -- the article read as if there was some kind of build incentive, but I don't know what that actually is. I was mostly poking at them not thinking through the numbers correctly if they were actually trying to incentivize building a particular product and they obviously low-balled that number if they were going to accomplish what they were trying to do.
You are spot-on that I don't agree with their methodology to solve the inventory problem, and they should not be dictating what is built there, but rather just that something is built at all.
#57
Posted 05 January 2024 - 10:13 AM
For sure they are two different thoughts -- the article read as if there was some kind of build incentive, but I don't know what that actually is. I was mostly poking at them not thinking through the numbers correctly if they were actually trying to incentivize building a particular product and they obviously low-balled that number if they were going to accomplish what they were trying to do.
You are spot-on that I don't agree with their methodology to solve the inventory problem, and they should not be dictating what is built there, but rather just that something is built at all.
Thanks, that makes sense!
Yeah, I thought the article language about the incentive was pretty goofy:
City ordinance currently offers incentive packages for developers looking to build in these zones by requiring them to either set aside 20% of the proposed units for low-income tenants or pay $200 per unit for five years to the Fort Worth Housing Finance Corp. to opt out.
Lol, what?
#58
Posted 05 January 2024 - 03:17 PM
I guess this also brings up the old topic of "The Poor Door" on some of these fancier developments / high rises.
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#59
Posted 06 January 2024 - 07:47 AM
I guess this also brings up the old topic of "The Poor Door" on some of these fancier developments / high rises.
I swear I've read about poor doors in class-segregated Victorian England, but after five minutes of Internet searching all I can find are 21st-century affordable housing examples and 20th-century race-segregated Jim Crow examples. Weird; I'm sure class-segregated poor doors aren't a new thing, right?
Separately: when we read about "affordable housing" development in Fort Worth, does that always refer to housing eligible for vouchers from Fort Worth Housing Solutions? Or can it have a different meaning in some context?
#60
Posted 07 January 2024 - 11:06 AM
I think we use language that makes it seem like it is developers’ faults that there is not less expensive housing — I guess it is easier to characterize the problem as some kind of corporate greed instead of simply the ordinary economic incentive of making investment decisions.
#61
Posted 07 January 2024 - 08:38 PM
I think we use language that makes it seem like it is developers’ faults that there is not less expensive housing — I guess it is easier to characterize the problem as some kind of corporate greed instead of simply the ordinary economic incentive of making investment decisions.
It seems to me that everything being built is “affordable” or we would not have an inventory shortage — it is just not affordable for everyone. Almost nothing is affordable by everyone. For sure that inventory shortage is making it all seemingly way too high, another reason we can all get behind this idea that someone must be greedy in all of this.Part of this is that we obviously need to do something to increase the opportunities for higher wage employment — that is part of the machinery of a healthy city’s economic engine, and it means figuring out how to shore that employment up at every level, since every earner (the higher the better) is also a consumer that can help activate our economy.Still, there will always be some portion of the population that because of health circumstances or family responsibilities or a shortfall of earlier education / training are unable to have employment or to have employment that is skilled enough to rise above supply to be valued with higher wages.It seems that from basic human kindness everyone deserves to have the dignity of a roof over their head in a clean and safe place, and the city / county / state / federal government is going to have to come up with dollars to do that for them.
To pick on the first part of what you said, another way to make things affordable is to pay people more. Several years ago, the company I work for started outsourcing non-core tasks like trash collection. Sanitation services used to be done by people that actually worked for the company. I remember early career people being amazed that the person that went around and picked up their trash made more than them. But this person had 30+ years with the company. That position most likely also came with benefits like sick time, vacation, 401k/pension.
Now that the job has been outsourced, you know those people aren't making anywhere near the salary or benefits. They simply can't, because it has to be cheaper for my company to hire another company to do a job that they used to pay people to do. And the company they hired has to make a profit on their employee's labor.
Back in the day, being loyal to a company lead to a good chance that you could live what was considered a middle class lifestyle, which included being able to afford a house.
#62
Posted 08 January 2024 - 07:56 AM
A nice little house went on the market a couple blocks from me. They are asking more than 2X what we paid 6 years ago, on a square foot basis, and about 1.5 times what we we paid straight up, for a house that's about 3/4 the size of our house.
#63
Posted 31 May 2024 - 06:26 PM
#64
Posted 01 June 2024 - 07:30 AM
An estimated 26% of Fort Worth's single family homes are owned by companies, city says
Glad they wrote an article on this.
A common complaint I hear from my millennial cohort is ‘Blackstone owns all the housing’. There’s certainly some institutional investors with skin in the game. Blackstone did formerly own Invitation Homes, one of the largest SFH renters in the country and now own a rival. People may just fixate on a simplistic answer with private equity being the boogeyman. Rather than fixing our zoning practices at a local level. Research appears to institutional investors aren’t driving the housing affordability crisis as much as Reddit experts would have you think. Jerusalem Demsas in The Atlantic has covered research on the relation of homelessness and housing affordability.
That 26% includes people without a homestead, primary address doesn’t match the house address, and folks with a trust. This is all anecdotal, but I know a relative who hasn’t filed the Homestead Exemption after pushing them last year, I know many homes in Fairmount held in trusts, I’ve met several people who’s parents own homes they live in as an investment, and then of course people who have moved with jobs, then just rent out their house.
#65
Posted 03 June 2024 - 11:33 AM
When we moved in, our neighbor across the street grew up in that house across from us. He inherited it from his parents jointly with his brother, but due to a disagreement with his brother who refused to sign the paperwork, he was never able to get a homestead exemption. He's since passed on and someone else bought the house.
I know of a woman in the neighborhood who's husband retired from GM, and has since passed away. Her income depends in part on a number of rental homes they bought over the years (three or four). I'm not sure if they're held in a trust, or she's incorporated or what. But even the people who think corporate ownership of single family homes should be limited would probably agree that she's not the situation they're upset about.
Without reading the Atlantic article, I think the fact that there is corporate money in the housing market does elevate the prices; it's simple economics- the increased "demand" created by having more buyers in the market pushes prices up.
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#66
Posted 03 June 2024 - 10:15 PM
Regarding your neighbor. That seems like the ideal type of landlord - someone local with strong community roots.. I don’t plan on selling my house. If I ever move I’ll hopefully rent this one out and take pride in that.
#67
Posted 04 June 2024 - 05:54 AM
Yeah the first house they bought, they intended to live there. Then they decided it was too close to I-20 so they moved a few blocks north, but managed to keep the other house and rent it out; she still owns that original house. Then they bought another couple of houses. She's aging now and has been living with cancer for a while. She said she and her husband did most of the upkeep on the houses, and she continued to do so even after he passed away, but she just doesn't have the stamina anymore and she has to hire out the work now.
#68
Posted 28 August 2024 - 08:23 AM
This article, which links to a report from the Texas Comptroller’s office, outlines the need that more homes need to be built in Texas to reduce housing costs: https://www.texastri...-affordability/
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#69
Posted 28 August 2024 - 11:10 AM
This article, which links to a report from the Texas Comptroller’s office, outlines the need that more homes need to be built in Texas to reduce housing costs: https://www.texastri...-affordability/
If only the state government would allow themselves to realize that some kind of smart immigration reform that encouraged skilled labor to build those homes is one element to that solution. The blindness to the types of folks who actually do our construction and the contractors who actually install our infrastructure (conventional and technology in the ground) is weird to me -- instead of all of the vitriol, I wish there was a shaping of policy to match a willing skilled work force with the state's desire for growth.
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#70
Posted 28 August 2024 - 10:20 PM
I don't want to turn this into a political thread, but I think a lot of the anti-immigration sentiment in the state government is more about pandering to the voting base than actually not liking immigrants. They know who does the work, but immigration reform would mean that the workforce would no longer be illegal/undocumented/whatever you want to call it, and therefore more expensive and harder to unfairly exploit. I'll get off my social justice soapbox now.
#71
Posted 29 August 2024 - 09:46 AM
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#72
Posted 29 August 2024 - 11:08 AM
It blows my mind how much you hear Texas leaders talk about this issue. Where would we be without Hispanic immigrants? They literally do everything around here. If you get rid of them, Texas would likely shut down!
Exactly how I feel about it. I work a lot with new home builders and many of them know what would happen if we lost our migrant workforce yet many don't step up and speak out about it or they knowingly vote against their interest because they don't want to be shunned by their communities for speaking out.
I agree that some reform is needed and maybe even a better way to obtain work visas so that they many of the workforce can go back and forth much more easily. Many of the Mexican migrants would rather live in Mexico and work here but they know that as it stands now that if they go back they may not be able to or it would be much more difficult to return.
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#74
Posted 18 January 2025 - 10:00 AM
Texas Tribune:
Fort Worth is inching closer to 1 million residents. Here's why.
Eye-opening stats from this article: "Rents are 30% higher than before the COVID-19 pandemic, Zillow data show. Among the state's largest cities, Fort Worth had the highest rents toward the end of last year -- surpassing even Austin."
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#75
Posted 18 January 2025 - 11:54 AM
Texas Tribune:
Fort Worth is inching closer to 1 million residents. Here's why.
Eye-opening stats from this article: "Rents are 30% higher than before the COVID-19 pandemic, Zillow data show. Among the state's largest cities, Fort Worth had the highest rents toward the end of last year -- surpassing even Austin."
Definitely a shocking number.
RentCafe has some different numbers, fwiw
(avg price/avg square footage)
Fort Worth = $1,443/879sf
Austin = 1,696/862sf
Dallas = $1,580/850sf
Houston = $1,355/882sf
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#76
Posted 18 January 2025 - 12:00 PM
Texas Tribune:
Fort Worth is inching closer to 1 million residents. Here's why.
Eye-opening stats from this article: "Rents are 30% higher than before the COVID-19 pandemic, Zillow data show. Among the state's largest cities, Fort Worth had the highest rents toward the end of last year -- surpassing even Austin."
Definitely a shocking number.
RentCafe has some different numbers, fwiw
(avg price/avg square footage)Fort Worth = $1,443/879sf
Austin = 1,696/862sf
Dallas = $1,580/850sf
Houston = $1,355/882sf
This is an interesting site: https://www.zumper.c...h/fort-worth-tx
"We analyze our inventory and calculate this information on a 30-day rolling basis"
What I don't always wrap my head around is rent in Fort Worth at large, vs rent in Fort Worth in the hot spots in and around downtown. Not sure it makes a huge difference other than when comparing it to say Austin are we talking rent in hip parts of Austin or Austin including places as far out as Pflugerville? Compare and contrast is hard for me to understand I guess.
I'd lean more on Downtown Fort Worth, Inc. for reliable stats, as they seem to have a handle on these definitions of areas surrounding and in downtown which is where my brain tends to want to compare....no offense to other parts of town.
#77
Posted 31 January 2025 - 09:03 AM
Tarrant County has the second highest property taxes among large counties in the country, only behind King County, WA (Seattle). Dallas is #3.
Source: https://www.corelogi...xes-go-up-2024/
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#78
Posted 31 January 2025 - 11:08 AM
I really need to understand county, school, and the city finances better. I would like to think we are flush with cash at all levels. Not only have property taxes increased almost 30% in 5 years, but we also have had one of the largest influxes of people into the county/city in the country. Are we spending it as fast as we get it, across all levels, on infrastructure? Large parts of the tax base may be outside of the city, but in my neighborhood and others in central Fort Worth houses that were once appraised at 70k last decade are now at 400k. Are we getting the best outcome from city services proportional to the tax growth? I honestly don’t know, but I think about the history of the city giving up on public services - zoo, botanic garden, forest park pool, central library - and think shouldn’t we be in a golden age of the city providing better public goods to us now.
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#79
Posted 31 January 2025 - 12:32 PM
I think I talked about it in this thread about a year ago, but I think the city of Fort Worth doesn't have nearly the money that we need to support our population and all of the usual amenities that we might expect. It is pretty easy to do the comparative (total city budget) / (city population) dollars-per-citizen and understand why we are sliding behind so much. And this completely ignores what we are spending the money on -- there is not enough overall, so reallocating it is not going to help too much. For sure there are some less-compressible budget items that wreck the more discretionary ones even more.
We just do not have enough commercial sources of revenue in this city, and the burden falls on residential sources that require our residential rates to be up at the top just to get along.
I don't know that the influx of people helps us much -- even if I am extremely optimistic about the finances of the newcomers, the reality is that there are a lot of leading infrastructure and operations costs the city has to outlay before those newcomers’ contributions get ahead of break-even and contribute to the existing city.
I completely agree with you that we should do an honest evaluation of how all of the various factors affect the financial well-being of our city. We are basically in the 4th or 5th decade past when it seemed like we were on a good balanced trajectory, all of that time the "conventional wisdom" about what would make our city better has simply not played out -- in big part because the “conventional wisdom” comes from cities that are not so regionally bound up.
And now we have even stronger conservatism forces trying to apply even more non-functional “conventional wisdom” onto our city, things that would only work if all of Fort Worth's population had the financial resources of the population of Southlake -- we do not.
#80
Posted 31 January 2025 - 12:48 PM
I think I talked about it in this thread about a year ago, but I think the city of Fort Worth doesn't have nearly the money that we need to support our population and all of the usual amenities that we might expect. It is pretty easy to do the comparative (total city budget) / (city population) dollars-per-citizen and understand why we are sliding behind so much. And this completely ignores what we are spending the money on -- there is not enough overall, so reallocating it is not going to help too much. For sure there are some less-compressible budget items that wreck the more discretionary ones even more.
We just do not have enough commercial sources of revenue in this city, and the burden falls on residential sources that require our residential rates to be up at the top just to get along.
I don't know that the influx of people helps us much -- even if I am extremely optimistic about the finances of the newcomers, the reality is that there are a lot of leading infrastructure and operations costs the city has to outlay before those newcomers’ contributions get ahead of break-even and contribute to the existing city.
I completely agree with you that we should do an honest evaluation of how all of the various factors affect the financial well-being of our city. We are basically in the 4th or 5th decade past when it seemed like we were on a good balanced trajectory, all of that time the "conventional wisdom" about what would make our city better has simply not played out -- in big part because the “conventional wisdom” comes from cities that are not so regionally bound up.
And now we have even stronger conservatism forces trying to apply even more non-functional “conventional wisdom” onto our city, things that would only work if all of Fort Worth's population had the financial resources of the population of Southlake -- we do not.
What blows my mind is how often I look at filings for 400+ acres of new residential developments throughout the outskirts of our city limits. It's a bit like chasing a moving target and reminds me a lot of SIMCity where more houses need more utilities and more roads and more fire stations and more schools. It's almost like we're in a state of triage trying to figure out who needs what first, but never quite catching our breath.
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#82
Posted 31 January 2025 - 02:19 PM
https://www.strongtowns.org/ has a nice video explaining what they refer to as the "Growth Ponzi Scheme" that one could argue applies to our city.
Once again, our cities relatively LOW population density makes it ever more difficult and expensive for municipalities to have the revenues needed to pay for the desired services
https://en.wikipedia...s_by_population
#83
Posted 01 February 2025 - 09:01 PM
If Fort Worth had done more growing up instead of out, it could have generated much more revenue per acre and required less infrastructure to support it.
I am probably going to say this wrong, but the city has impact fees that are supposed to cover the cost of providing infrastructure to these new neighborhoods. However, the city, as long as I've been here, has never charged the full fee.
https://fortworthrep...ld-get-that/
I've always wished that Fort Worth would just set itself some boundaries and not worry about growth or development outside of them. For example, I've always felt that Walsh should have never been a neighborhood in Fort Worth. If people really wanted to live out there, they should have just formed their own town.
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