Facebook’s Answer to Silicon Valley Housing Crunch: Build Apartments
I know this comment will get downvoted, but I&#x27;m going to say it anyway because I think it&#x27;s true.<p>I see in the article how 10-15% of the units will be reserved for &quot;low income&quot;.  I understand why they do this.  If they didn&#x27;t, it would never get approval from the necessary zoning authority.  However, I think it&#x27;s a mistake.<p>When people think &quot;low income&quot; they usually think of poignant cases of single mothers trying to raise kids, but in my experience that&#x27;s not as common as we think.<p>I live in an SF building where I&#x27;d estimate at least 10% of the residents are retired.  I think most are on Social Security and using Section 8.  I know my neighbor is because she doesn&#x27;t speak much English (she&#x27;s Russian) and she brings me her mail to read.  I&#x27;m guessing the other retirees (almost all Russian immigrants) are in the same boat.<p>In my opinion, if retirees need public assistance, they should live in a lower-cost area like Livermore, Gilroy, or Santa Rosa, not one of the most expensive neighborhoods in one of the most expensive cities in the world. Heck, I&#x27;d love to live in those areas if my job didn&#x27;t require me to be in downtown SF every day.<p>But that would make too much sense.  Instead, every new housing unit has to have some portion reserved for &quot;low income&quot; so the local politicians can have some currency to spread around among their supporters - and if you don&#x27;t think they do this you are kidding yourself.<p>Constantly taking 10-15% of supply and restricting it to low income just raises housing costs for everyone else - and it&#x27;s a double-whammy too because it&#x27;s our tax dollars funding this unnecessarily lavish lifestyle (and $3K&#x2F;month for a studio is lavish - there&#x27;s no getting around it.)<p>If you can&#x27;t afford to live in a certain level of housing in a certain area at market prices, then you shouldn&#x27;t live there, you should live somewhere cheaper.  If the people companies want to hire can&#x27;t afford to live within a reasonable distance then companies should pay more.  If they can&#x27;t pay more they should leave.<p>Companies and jobs leaving will be the only way to lower demand and prices - and probably the only way to wake leaders up and get them to address our poor housing policies.