this post was submitted on 27 Oct 2023
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251
White House opens $45 billion in federal funds to developers to convert offices to homes (www.marketwatch.com)
submitted 1 year ago by MicroWave@lemmy.world to c/politics@lemmy.world
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The White House kicked off a multiagency push on Friday to help finance real-estate developers convert more office buildings in big cities emptied by the pandemic into affordable housing, taking aim at the nation’s housing crisis.

The initiative looks to harness an existing $35 billion in low-cost loans already available through the Transportation Department to fund housing developments near transit hubs, folding it into the Biden administration’s clean energy push.

It also opens up additional funding sources and tax incentives, offering a new guidebook to 20 different federal programs that can be tapped by developers and offers technical assistance in what can end up being tricky and expensive conversions.

A third peg of the program will see the federal government draw up a public list of buildings it owns that could be made available for sale to help bolster development.

“These downtowns and central business districts that we are taking about today often already designed and orientated around public transit,” said Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg, in a press briefing. “Our intention is to make the most of this opportunity to add more housing near transit in ways that not only reduces the cost of housing, but also often reduces the cost of transportation.”

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[–] TransplantedSconie@lemm.ee 47 points 1 year ago (6 children)

Whoever is in charge of the White House's messaging is a complete moron and should be fired and blacklisted for incompetence.

All these good things for the middle class and the working class and we don't see a fucking peep out of them.

Trump would be absolutely bleating out the 4.9% increase to the GDP like no tomorrow across every fucking network and also promoting the hell out of this as well.

It's fucking maddening the lack of information coming from the WH.

[–] NuXCOM_90Percent@lemmy.zip 12 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (3 children)

I am not sure if this is the win people think it is. Those are going to need MASSIVE retrofits to be meaningfully habitable. There is a reason why hotels are often in "weird" shapes as opposed to giant rectangles. And a lot of that has to do with making sure every room has a window, there is proper insulation (sound and thermal) between rooms, etc. Contrast that with office buildings where you tend to have a huge cube farm in the middle of the floor or people will shank one another over windows.

Buildings with a big center atrium are well suited(-ish) to conversion, but have limited space as a result. And likely need significant work on the floors/ceilings.

As for messaging: The Democrats have always been horrible at that. Part of it is because a lot of it is "this is basic human decency?". But mostly it is because Democrats are built around actually wanting something. I want UBI. You want student loan forgiveness. Sally wants basic human rights. Maybe we are both happy when Sally gets what she wants, but I resent that they are focusing on a stopgap measure with loan forgiveness and you resent that they are ignoring your personal needs with UBI experiments.

Contrast that with republicans where all a candidate has to do is fuck over a gay person or a woman and then EVERYONE cheers.

[–] TransplantedSconie@lemm.ee 5 points 1 year ago (1 children)

I think this all stems from the they go low, you go high b s. It's almost like they believe that if you crow about your accomplishments or attempts at accomplishing something, you're putting the party in a bad position because of optics.

No, you stuffy ancient peacocks! You get in the trenches and fight in the mud and hammer them with their faults and horrible policy. Because if you don't there might not be a next time.

[–] NuXCOM_90Percent@lemmy.zip 2 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (1 children)

In another thread, the general response to the new speaker of the house being compromised by russia is "no shit?"

It has nothing to do with "going high". It has to do with people being idiots. If the constant verbiage is "These republicans are actively trying to defund social security and the military. Here is evidence" the response will be "Fake news. Also, maybe we should defund social security because of lazy black people. And I hear they let mexicans in the military now too, so we should fire all the gays first"

Democrats generally actually care about what their politicians are doing (or not doing). republicans are a death cult who just care about whether their orange god approves.

[–] saturnus@lemm.ee -3 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Democrats absolutely don’t give a shit about what their politicians are doing. Both sides are mindlessly tribal and partisan and it’s infuriating. Yes I usually vote D because Rs are generally worse but holy shit you both suck so fucking bad and are ruining the country with your idiocy.

[–] NuXCOM_90Percent@lemmy.zip 3 points 1 year ago (1 children)

This is not the 2000s and South Park is not the pinnacle of human intellect anymore. "Douche and a turd sandwich" stupidity only applies if you genuinely do not care about basic human rights.

republicans are actively speedrunning to turn the country, and then the world, into Gilead. They are openly attacking human rights and are openly compromised by foreign powers. And they actively want to steal elections.

Democrats... have messaging issues and are bad at prioritizing what we want.

If you don't see a difference between that: You are basically a republican and don't want to admit it. Because you clearly don't care about basic human rights.

[–] saturnus@lemm.ee 0 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago)

I literally said I vote democrat because the GOP is worse but as you conveniently proved in my point you all have brain worms and are stupidly partisan.

[–] TurtleJoe@lemmy.world 3 points 1 year ago (1 children)

There were already multiple projects like this underway in my city, with several more buildings that would be good candidates for this kind of thing. We had lost a lot of office rentals before covid, and now with even more suburban people working from home, we have the double whammy of lost city income tax from the WFH people. We also have a housing crunch in my city, with a serious lack of available units in desirable areas driving up rents.

So, my city has a looming cash flow problem, an already established housing crisis, and shitloads of square footage of real estate in pri) me locations sitting empty. Seems like a ready-made solution to all of these things is available, right?

However, as you pointed out, converting these old office buildings can be trickier and more expensive. That's where these programs come in. I suspect that the Biden admin has looked at all these factors in cities across the country and seen that giving an incentive to developers (who were already interested in such projects) to move forward.

Is it perfect? Hell no. I hate the idea of giving public funds to private developers just for them to be able to charge rents. I would also like at least some of these units be available for purchase as condos. That said, that's the kind of system the US has for solutions to every problem: put taxpayer money in the hands of private middlemen so that they can take a profit.

[–] NuXCOM_90Percent@lemmy.zip 1 points 1 year ago

Yeah. Done correctly, I think this can be really good. There are some fundamental mismatches but... whatever

My main concern is it is going to be a lot of half-assed work as money spreads out.

[–] Not_mikey@lemmy.world 5 points 1 year ago

This is more a problem with the media then the administration. Trump could blast shit like this because he could basically tell fox news what to show and how to show it. Biden doesn't have the same control over the liberal media and they'd rather focus on Mike Johnson being a religious zealot and the war in gaza right now because those scare people and drives views. Not saying that's a bad thing to focus on, just that it's hard for this relatively boring story to compete.

[–] Bipta@kbin.social 3 points 1 year ago

Biden seems to take the philosopher's approach of not touting your own accomplishments, but just accomplishing. Unfortunately people are dumb and disinterested and if you don't tout your accomplishments they assume you have none.

[–] cybersandwich@lemmy.world 3 points 1 year ago

The national media outlets are partially to blame. They have been digging Biden the entire time and ignoring huge things like you mentioned.

Biden is the most underrated president I can remember. He's done so much with what he was handed. He deserves much more credit than he gets.

[–] blazera@kbin.social 1 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Your commenting on an article of this information coming from the white house

[–] TransplantedSconie@lemm.ee 5 points 1 year ago (2 children)

How many will see this?

How many saw the train workers getting the sick days and personal days they really wanted and needed after the contract was pushed through by congress?

How many see the insulin cap and medication lowered for seniors?

How many see the administration doing what they can for student loan forgiveness after being hamstrung by Republicans and the SCOTUS?

So many good things the vast majority of the US population don't see because they aren't shoving it into their faces like they should.

[–] blazera@kbin.social 2 points 1 year ago

I have no idea how youre imagining only you saw these things, or that you'd be able to at all without the white house communicating all of it

[–] dvoraqs@lemmy.world 1 points 1 year ago

People are biased toward seeing bad things more than good and even you are susceptible to it

[–] TheDarkKnight@lemmy.world 1 points 1 year ago

Dems suck at messaging, GOP is traditionally great it (not sure right now, but historically they’re very good at getting a consistent message to their base of supporters)

[–] SinningStromgald@lemmy.world 35 points 1 year ago (3 children)

I said it elsewhere and I will say it here.

The problem though isn't a lack of housing, we actually have plenty for everyone. The problem is corporations buying up homes to rent them and in the process jacking up home prices. If these new homes are left to the tender mercies of the market there won't be any new homeowners. Just new rentals.

[–] j4k3@lemmy.world 12 points 1 year ago (1 children)

We simply need an exponential multi home tax that has no loopholes, like turning every home into its own business entity. Any home that is owned in any part by someone that already has a home should double in tax rates for both homes. If they own 3 homes all three should double again. There should not be any cap to this figure. Taxes should eventually cost more than the home itself. If you have the money to burn, good, you should be putting it back into the community you underpaid and abused when you collected it from them in the first place.

[–] quicklime@lemm.ee 5 points 1 year ago

One home for everyone before anyone gets a second one.

[–] Habahnow@sh.itjust.works 4 points 1 year ago

Unproduction is an even bigger deal, that's exasperated by corporations buying up homes. We've been behind on home production (due to lack of federal support in home production, as well as zoning) before Covid. During covid, materials prices increased and home production dropped considerably. Does that mean we shouldn't tackle the fact that in the US buying multiple homes is a good investment? no. But making an effort to deal with the housing supply issue is very helpful. https://www.businessinsider.com/us-underbuilding-housing-over-the-past-decade-2020-9?op=1 https://www.npr.org/2022/03/29/1089174630/housing-shortage-new-home-construction-supply-chain

[–] jaschen@lemm.ee 1 points 1 year ago

Yes and no. The problem isn't just these corps buying up houses and renting them out. Everything, even corporate greed must follow the supply and demand model. It DOES NOT MATTER how much landlords own the building if there is no demand.

Case in point, China overbuilt homes. There is literally 4+ homes available PER PERSON in China(calculating average sq/ft per home). The homes are literally pennies and the homes are all empty.

So while I agree that there is a problems with corporate greed, the majority of the problem is the supply. You increase supply, pricing comes down.

[–] uphillbothways@kbin.social 26 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (2 children)

Cuz people and corporations that own land in metropolitan areas desperately need government handouts. Let them take a loss or a mortgage, like anyone else.

[–] baked_tea@lemmy.world 5 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Keyword affordable

[–] uphillbothways@kbin.social 8 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Oh right. Doesn't this usually mean they'll make like 3 units "affordable" for a few years, then renovate those into a single unit they can charge market for as soon as possible? Basically the minimum they can get away with to close the grift.

[–] Habahnow@sh.itjust.works 1 points 1 year ago

Pretty certain its a percentage of the units offered. So if a landlord wants to make more money, make more units.

[–] Habahnow@sh.itjust.works 2 points 1 year ago

Yeah that aspects sucks, but if it gets more housing made in the US, this sounds like a good enough solution for now. We can work on sharing landlord and corporate profits while this gets rolled out.

[–] AlexWIWA@lemmy.ml 10 points 1 year ago (1 children)

They better not be converted to rentals if the government is paying for it.

[–] BraveSirZaphod@kbin.social 1 points 1 year ago (1 children)

I assure you, no normal person can afford to buy an apartment in a Midtown Manhattan high-rise, even if everything was done solely at cost. Rental units aren't a bad thing.

[–] AlexWIWA@lemmy.ml 4 points 1 year ago

If one can afford to rent it + pay enough extra to make the rental have a profit then they can afford to own it. The government shouldn't be subsidizing profits for already large landlords, so there needs to be strings attached relative to how much money the government gives for the renovation.

Additionally, that's fine if only e.g. a lawyer can afford to buy it. If a bunch of upper middle class people move out of other neighborhoods to move here then it frees up cheaper units elsewhere.

[–] Asafum@feddit.nl 9 points 1 year ago

There it is folks yet another bailout for corpo scum! Can't have the corpos deal with the fallout of changing times, that's for Worthless™ "people" like us! They're even selling government owned property to help landleeches make more! Oh happy day!

[–] theluddite@lemmy.ml 6 points 1 year ago

Yet another program that supposedly helps the poor by giving money to the rich.

third peg of the program will see the federal government draw up a public list of buildings it owns that could be made available for sale to help bolster development.

Jesus Christ. If the government wants to build housing, then it should build fucking housing. Selling publicly owned buildings to private developers to turn into rentals for poor people is trickle down neoliberal bullshit.

[–] Etterra@lemmy.world 4 points 1 year ago (2 children)

About time this started happening.

[–] TurtleJoe@lemmy.world 4 points 1 year ago

Yes, my city has a housing crisis, a looming income tax crisis, thanks to WFH suburbanites, and multiple empty office towers in prime downtown real estate. There were already two of these projects underway, and it would be nice to kickstart another two.