Urbanexus Update - Issue #137

Ten charts that defined last year from the New York Times.

More charts from McKinsey & Company

Developers are converting former grain, textile, and water mills into vibrant destinations, saying they offer strategic locations, scenic views and flexible designs that offer ample room. The space is a draw, but it can also hinder developers when there’s just too much.

Three fundamental forces suggest it could endure for some time yet. Consider that: a) credit scores of those receiving mortgages are good; b) shifting preferences may favor increased housing consumption; c) increasing supply is constrained by a variety of factors.

In Building from the Ground Up: Reclaiming the American Housing Boom, Kevin Erdmann argues that an inappropriate fear of excessive homebuilding led to a self-fulfilling prophecy of recession and financial crisis, which continues to inflate the cost of living and limit the economic potential for American families today.

Economic forces and generational preferences are leading to a new kind of housing: subdivisions designed for renters and managed like apartment buildings. What does it mean for suburbia?

Since the pandemic began, housing experts (including one of the authors of this article) have been predicting that the pandemic’s economic fallout would produce an eviction “tsunami” that could put as many as 40 million people out of their homes. The experts are still waiting.

Theories abound as to why we have not witnessed a cascade of evictions. Some observers think that social policies, like the eviction moratorium, stimulus payments, extended unemployment insurance, and rental assistance have staved off disaster. Others think “mom-and-pop landlords” who tend to deal with lower-income tenants have been more accommodating or reluctant to lose tenants than expected. A few commentators have pointed to problems with the data underlying predictions of an eviction tsunami, and to the existence of contradictory data. Another view is that a tsunami of evictions is indeed occurring, only we can’t see it: Even as courts halted formal evictions, millions of tenants faced “informal evictions” over the course of the pandemic, with landlords refusing to make necessary repairs or changing the locks without notice or using other means of harassment. 

The reality is undoubtedly some combination of the above, and given the lack of nationwide eviction data, parsing out the relative contributions of these factors is likely not possible. 

A lack of new home inventory despite the consistent and growing demand for new homes was generally cited as the reason for modest growth by master-planned community developers.

RCLCO has created an interactive map tool that visualizes the sales at Top-Selling MPCs across the country from 2013 to year-end 2020.

Officials in Utah have undertaken a search for development partners to build the Point, a from-scratch neighborhood and “innovation hub” that to be constructed on roughly one square mile of state-owned land. But unlike many master-planned communities. Their vision for the Point aims to “reduce the need for cars with extensive, regionally connected biking, walking, and transit systems.”The concept for the Point as a “one-car community,” where each of the ultimate 7,400 households can survive with one car — cars that they hope residents will only use occasionally since everyday destinations will be accessible by other modes.

President Biden’s $1.2 trillion infrastructure law departs from the sweeping national build-outs of the 20th century, but we still need big visions to meet the future. 

The Phoenix metro topped the nation for growth in life sciences employment between 2019 and 2020, according to a new CBRE Group Inc. study, and that employment growth has fueled a need for specialized real estate space that can accommodate lab and research uses. Phoenix area life sciences employment grew 8.5%, between 2019 and 2020, the highest total job growth of all markets studied, according to the study. The metro ended the year with about 22,000 life sciences jobs.

Florida and Texas dominated the list of top 25 growth cities highlighted in the U-Haul Growth Index, an annual metric tracked by the Phoenix-based moving giant.

It’s not just another perk in a benefits package — remote work could fundamentally reshape the urban geography of the United States.

Where we live has been dictated by where we can find a good job. That truism has defined much of where Americans reside — clustered in and around lucrative job markets.

In particular, “superstar cities” have been a defining technological advancement. According to a 2018 article by economist Richard Florida, “the five leading metros account for more than 80 percent of total venture capital investment and 85 percent of its growth over the past decade.” Another economist, Enrico Moretti, recently noted that “the ten largest clusters [cities] in computer science, semiconductors, and biology account for 69 percent, 77 percent, and 59 percent of all US inventors.”

Remote work could change that.

Fueled by a desire for space and liberated by remote work, homebuyers are pushing development ever deeper into the suburban outskirts of U.S. cities. 

When housing markets heat up, livability ratings help guide demand—but not all assessments are worth their salt, and some are, frankly, rank.

Cayalá is a new town on the edge of crime-ridden Guatemala City. It has a lovely mixture of Spanish and Mayan design influences.