> Wages rise in bigger cities, too, but not as fast as housing prices.
If you want to lower housing prices, get rid of rent control policies and ease up on the zoning. Developers will create more housing units and you'll see a substantial increase in supply, leading to a lowering of the price level.
The problem is that those already living in the city don't want this. They are against new development and they're all for rent control. They want to continue paying artificially low prices, while keeping anyone else who may want to live there out. Just a tad bit selfish.
One of the big complaints about "increasing rents" is more of the matter that low-income rental stock is almost never built, whereas luxury apartments are built constantly (though they have to provide a number of low-income units that are the same quality as everything else in the building). The low-income stock still exists, it's just the most sought after rental stock in the Boston market.
If you want to lower housing prices, get rid of rent control policies and ease up on the zoning. Developers will create more housing units and you'll see a substantial increase in supply, leading to a lowering of the price level.
The problem is that those already living in the city don't want this. They are against new development and they're all for rent control. They want to continue paying artificially low prices, while keeping anyone else who may want to live there out. Just a tad bit selfish.