Middle class living in Boulder
Published in the Boulder Daily Camera, 2/24/13
The Boulder City Council got some bad news from the housing consultant we hired to help make Boulder more middle class friendly. We all know the current story -- Boulder's poor can take advantage of longstanding policies requiring Boulder builders to create permanently affordable housing. The rich can shop the rest of Boulder's housing stock that's either pretty darned expensive or pretty darned small. However, if you're in the middle, as in "middle class," you can either buy one of those 1,000 square foot homes for $350,000 or head for the suburbs.
I'm sure the city was hoping our consultant would just look through the mirror and tell us where to order the pixie dust specially formulated to create cheap and nice middle income housing within city limits. Instead, our consultant gave us the cold, hard reality -- Boulder is a great place to live, everyone knows it, and people are willing to pay a lot to live here.
Most city governments would welcome the answer of "it's really nice here" to any question they might have asked. But, this being Boulder without pixie dust, we still had a problem to solve -- we want our middle class.
Consultants are paid to solve problems so our guy turned to the law of supply and demand. He told us that bringing down housing prices will take either increasing the supply or reducing the demand for housing. Straightforward, yes. Easy, not so much.
To increase Boulder's housing supply we'd need to change land use policies and build more houses. The problem with this idea is that, in the 32 years I've lived in Boulder, I have never seen a smidgen of interest in abandoning our open space policies or height limits to help the middle class or anyone else. While our parks, open space, and views may be substantial relative to other towns, we like it that way. So, big changes in Boulder's housing supply are probably not on the horizon.
So, if we can't increase housing supply, how about reducing housing demand? Given Boulder's natural beauty, wonderful climate, and great lifestyle, that could be tough. Our consultant pointed out that Boulder's quality of life was - I love this phrase - the Rocket Fuel (not mere "jet fuel") that drives Boulder housing prices through the roof. He noted that we could bring housing prices down by emulating cities with large stocks of middle class housing like, for example, Buffalo. So, dump Rocket Fuel, be more like Buffalo, and the middle class will come to live in Boulder. There's a thought.
I grew up in Buffalo and I can assure you that Buffalo knows how to create affordable middle class housing. My sister-in-law just bought a 3,600 square foot house 15 minutes from downtown Buffalo on three beautifully landscaped acres with a pool and cabana. It cost a very middle class $395,000. My wife and I took turns guessing what this house would cost in Boulder and we came in at about $1.5-2 million.
However, creating that kind of middle class housing takes time and effort. Buffalo, for example, had to first become a major city and then allow 50 years of government mismanagement and union greed in the face of global competition to destroy the local economy leading to an evacuation of over half it's population and lots of vacant houses. Boulder has some serious work to do if it wants to follow Buffalo's lead in creating an abundant supply of middle class housing.
Thankfully, our consultant also offered another idea -- maybe what Boulder really should do is sit quietly for a moment, count our blessings, and ask ourselves if we really want to change the things about Boulder that make it such a lovely place for people to live. It's really virtuous that we want people of all ethnicities and income levels to call Boulder home and we know that this would make Boulder even better. But, what are we willing to give up to get that kind of diversity? My guess is that the answer is, "Not enough to make it happen."
Sure, it's expensive to live here, but San Francisco, Manhattan, and Maui are a lot more so. More affordable housing sits just outside the city limits. Our City Council may just have to face the music and accept that the policies that have helped make Boulder such a great place have also made it an expensive place for our children, employees, and friends to live in. In balance, we could do a lot worse.
The Boulder City Council got some bad news from the housing consultant we hired to help make Boulder more middle class friendly. We all know the current story -- Boulder's poor can take advantage of longstanding policies requiring Boulder builders to create permanently affordable housing. The rich can shop the rest of Boulder's housing stock that's either pretty darned expensive or pretty darned small. However, if you're in the middle, as in "middle class," you can either buy one of those 1,000 square foot homes for $350,000 or head for the suburbs.
I'm sure the city was hoping our consultant would just look through the mirror and tell us where to order the pixie dust specially formulated to create cheap and nice middle income housing within city limits. Instead, our consultant gave us the cold, hard reality -- Boulder is a great place to live, everyone knows it, and people are willing to pay a lot to live here.
Most city governments would welcome the answer of "it's really nice here" to any question they might have asked. But, this being Boulder without pixie dust, we still had a problem to solve -- we want our middle class.
Consultants are paid to solve problems so our guy turned to the law of supply and demand. He told us that bringing down housing prices will take either increasing the supply or reducing the demand for housing. Straightforward, yes. Easy, not so much.
To increase Boulder's housing supply we'd need to change land use policies and build more houses. The problem with this idea is that, in the 32 years I've lived in Boulder, I have never seen a smidgen of interest in abandoning our open space policies or height limits to help the middle class or anyone else. While our parks, open space, and views may be substantial relative to other towns, we like it that way. So, big changes in Boulder's housing supply are probably not on the horizon.
So, if we can't increase housing supply, how about reducing housing demand? Given Boulder's natural beauty, wonderful climate, and great lifestyle, that could be tough. Our consultant pointed out that Boulder's quality of life was - I love this phrase - the Rocket Fuel (not mere "jet fuel") that drives Boulder housing prices through the roof. He noted that we could bring housing prices down by emulating cities with large stocks of middle class housing like, for example, Buffalo. So, dump Rocket Fuel, be more like Buffalo, and the middle class will come to live in Boulder. There's a thought.
I grew up in Buffalo and I can assure you that Buffalo knows how to create affordable middle class housing. My sister-in-law just bought a 3,600 square foot house 15 minutes from downtown Buffalo on three beautifully landscaped acres with a pool and cabana. It cost a very middle class $395,000. My wife and I took turns guessing what this house would cost in Boulder and we came in at about $1.5-2 million.
However, creating that kind of middle class housing takes time and effort. Buffalo, for example, had to first become a major city and then allow 50 years of government mismanagement and union greed in the face of global competition to destroy the local economy leading to an evacuation of over half it's population and lots of vacant houses. Boulder has some serious work to do if it wants to follow Buffalo's lead in creating an abundant supply of middle class housing.
Thankfully, our consultant also offered another idea -- maybe what Boulder really should do is sit quietly for a moment, count our blessings, and ask ourselves if we really want to change the things about Boulder that make it such a lovely place for people to live. It's really virtuous that we want people of all ethnicities and income levels to call Boulder home and we know that this would make Boulder even better. But, what are we willing to give up to get that kind of diversity? My guess is that the answer is, "Not enough to make it happen."
Sure, it's expensive to live here, but San Francisco, Manhattan, and Maui are a lot more so. More affordable housing sits just outside the city limits. Our City Council may just have to face the music and accept that the policies that have helped make Boulder such a great place have also made it an expensive place for our children, employees, and friends to live in. In balance, we could do a lot worse.