Housing market

“ France has a growing demand for rental housing, a widening gap between demand and supply, and an acute housing shortage for middle- and low-income families. These characteristics make it an attractive destination for private equity firms who, after the interest shown in the SNCF portfolio, have turned their eyes to the French housing market. ”

“ And given that, Freddie Mac and Fannie Mae have brought stability to the housing market. When they focus on their congressional-mandated mission, they provide a very vital tool for bringing home ownership to more Americans. ”

“ For many families, the greatest concern with the economy is the downturn in the housing market. My Administration has taken action to help responsible homeowners keep their homes. In October, we helped bring together a private sector group called the HOPE NOW Alliance. HOPE NOW has helped streamline the process for refinancing and modifying mortgages, and it runs a national hotline to connect struggling homeowners with mortgage counselors. ”

“ New times bring new problems and housing is one of these. In the picture of industrial expansion, as it exists in the minds of most people, housing does not figure prominently. The need of the wage-earner for a home is assumed to care for itself in the market furnished by the local real estate interests. ”

“ And I think that most people recognize that, even if there were some poor decisions made by homebuyers, that right now our biggest incentive is to make sure that the housing market is strengthened. I do think that we have to put in place a set of rules of the road, some financial regulations that prevent the kind of speculation and leveraging that we saw in the future. ”

“ Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac have done a good job of promoting home ownership and providing liquidity to the secondary mortgage market. These GSEs have quickly grown into large financial institutions that have a major impact on the housing market and the domestic economy. We must ensure that they have competent and thorough oversight, while making certain that any action we take does not have a negative impact on access to housing. ”

“ We should say that if a couple sells their home and the increase in value is up to $500,000, they will not have to pay any tax on the gain from the sale of that home. This can help millions of American older couples selling their homes to retire; middle class families who have to move from community to community for work; residents in inner-city neighborhoods where home prices are low, but may go higher. It will spur home sales in an already strong housing market. ”

“ While the housing market is continuing to experience difficulty, the decline in home sales has leveled off recently, and sales are rising in some parts of the country. Orders for some durable goods, such as business equipment, are rising. ”

“ We'll continue to work hard to keep our housing market strong, to ensure that American families can afford the homes they buy, and to help bring the dignity and security that comes with homeownership to more of our citizens. ”

“ Housing comes in an almost infinite variety of forms from single-family detached dwellings to large urban skyscrapers. It is available for purchase or rent. It includes lovingly restored older buildings and prefabricated new ones. But whatever form it takes, good housing remains an essential part of the American Dream. The efficiency and success of free enterprise in responding to the great variety of market demands for housing deserve special notice and commendation. ”

“ So whether it is our housing goals, which we have met every year, or whether it is low and moderate income borrowers, or it is borrowers in underserved areas, or whether it is minority goals, which we set ourselves—HUD does not have the authority to set a minority goal, we set that ourselves—in all those cases we lead the market, and we are quite proud of it. ”

“ It was felt that capital, no less than labor, would deplore any reduction in the standard of living of the workers in industry, and the individuals interested in the Bayonne experiment were ready to lend a hand in placing the production of wage-earners' houses on a sounder business basis.
That the particular section of the real estate market which produces wage-earners' housing is careless of the social interest, and that it operates inefficiently, with heavy economic waste in many industrial centres of the country—this is a truth well known to housing experts. ”

“ Every year, we have met or exceeded our affordable housing goals, even as they have increased. Last year, 62 percent of our total business served low-or moderate-income families or underserved communities or both. ”

“ So that is what we, many of us on our side, will be trying to do as we proceed, to make sure that whatever the final arrangements are, the housing function is not only protected, but enhanced, and that both the ability and the obligation of these two entities to help us with affordable housing is strengthened. ”

“ Whereas formerly the small home could be financed in the real estate market at an average rate of about six or seven per cent in New York City, to-day, according to the New York State Commission of Housing and Regional Planning, the capital used in tenements in New York State at present "costs on an average of from eight and one-half to ten per cent for interest without making allowance for the initial costs of securing a loan. ”

“ Most of the houses we need will have to be built by private enterprise, without public subsidy. By producing too few rental units and too large a proportion of high-priced houses, the building industry is rapidly pricing itself out of the market. Building costs must be lowered.
The Government is now engaged in a campaign to induce all segments of the building industry to concentrate on the production of lower priced housing. Additional legislation to encourage such housing will be submitted. ”

“ So in conclusion, the members of the Housing Policy Council believe in our system of housing finance, and we want to strengthen it. We recognize that the housing GSEs have an important role to play, but there is no question that the system of housing finance would benefit from a strong, independent regulator. ”

“ But we urge Congress and HUD not to proceed with any affordable housing goal revisions without seeking the advice and assistance of a wide range of housing organizations, as it always has in the past. ”

“ It is necessary to understand the tangle of economic and human factors which has caused the existing situation in industrial housing. In dissecting the corpse of the housing industry, we soon find, as already stated, that high prices was the disease which killed the patient. Everything that enters into the cost of a home—land, site utilities, building construction, finance, taxes, municipal assessments, household furnishings, maintenance, operation of the completed home—has enormously increased in price. ”

“ But important as are these well-known factors of land, municipal and site improvements, building construction and house furnishings, it is a striking fact that they do not influence housing costs to nearly the same extent as does the cost of finance. What makes a workingman's home almost prohibitive to-day is the price paid for the capital employed in building the house. More capital is required to-day than formerly, and is paid for at a higher rate. Since the capital is usually employed in a small-scale speculative venture, the investor naturally requires a high return on his money. ”

“ The introduction of these large-scale factors, however, although they were steps in the right direction, could not correct the fundamental defects of the system. The large mortgage companies found it more profitable to make loans on large building operations; the building loan associations, although stimulating the production of small homes in many districts, did not use their financial power to influence an improvement in housing technique and architecture, nor did they promote large-scale methods of production ”

“ Economics, therefore, is fundamental in industrial housing. Housing economics is an extremely complex subject, and is involved deeply in the technique of housing architecture. It is generally misunderstood, perhaps because the housing industry is divided into many parts—into finance, real estate, city planning, architecture, contracting, house furnishings, real estate management and household operation—so that housing is usually looked upon from the point of view of one or two of these many, often conflicting, interests, and rarely is it considered as a whole. ”

“ Optimism about housing values also led to a boom in home construction. Eventually the number of new houses exceeded the number of people willing to buy them. And with supply exceeding demand, housing prices fell. ”

“ Cities that are under big pressure from rising housing prices need to increase as appropriate the supply of land for residential use, and we should better regulate housing development, marketing, and intermediary services. ”

“ The increasing complexity of the times and the steady rise in prices now bear very heavily on housing, and, in cities where industrial expansion takes place, breakdowns in housing production are occurring. It is not so much that new houses for the wage-earners are not built, but that such houses as are built are too expensive and of a low standard. Bayonne furnished one of these examples of housing breakdown. ”

“ Obviously, house-property in London will fall in rental value, and fall enormously. Slum property will sink to zero, and the whole working population will move into houses of a class quite above those which they can now afford to occupy. Families which are now compelled to huddle together in one room will be able to rent five or six, and thus will the housing problem temporarily solve itself by the simple process of a diminution in the numbers of the tenants. ”

“ The claim has been made, especially in real estate circles, that, if the wage-earner would be willing to return to the home of his forefathers, where he enjoyed plenty of space, but had less elaborate plumbing, heating and electric equipment and appliances—what are popularly known as "modern conveniences"—he could once again be economically housed. Some critics cite the fact that even to-day most American farm houses lack mechanical improvements. In other words (it is claimed) what makes wage-earners' housing expensive is the cost of luxuries, not of necessities. ”

“ To-day, if a municipality builds, it can get the whole amount at the lowest price—31⁄2 per cent. A Public Utility Society, such as a Tenant Co-partnership Society, can get two-thirds of the value. An individual who wants to buy or build a house for himself can get four-fifths under the Small Dwellings Acquisition Act; but hardly anyone takes advantage of that Act, and probably most people are ignorant of it. A private speculative builder can get half, but if he has little capital of his own he needs more than half, and he can get more on mortgage. ”

“ Sizeable industrial and commercial ratables are eagerly sought and homes and the lots on which they are situate are required to be large enough, through minimum lot sizes and minimum floor areas, to have substantial value in order to produce greater tax revenues to meet school costs. Large families who cannot afford to buy large houses and must live in cheaper rental accommodations are definitely not wanted, so we find drastic bedroom restrictions for, or complete prohibition of, multi-family or other feasible housing for those of lesser income. ”

“ Home price inflation and high interest rates threaten to put homeownership out of reach for first-time homebuyers. Lower income households, the elderly and those dependent upon rental housing face rising rents, low levels of rental housing construction by historic standards, and the threat of displacement due to conversion to condominiums and other factors. Housing will face strong competition for investment capital from the industrial sector generally and the energy industries, in particular. ”

“ Up to 4,000 leva can be borrowed for this purpose in urban areas and up to 3,000 leva in rural areas. This, however, covers less than one-half of the cost of a two-room apartment.
Although the increasing reliance on tenant-financed housing is helping to reduce the overall housing shortage, it has meant that most new housing units are built for the higher income groups. Cooperative apartments and private houses require a substantial initial investment and the assumption of a mortgage, which are beyond the means of most blue-collar and low-income white-collar workers. ”

“ The long experience of the City and Suburban Homes Company of New York City, and the results obtained in the Metropolitan Life Insurance Company's garden tenements, as well as in the Bayonne housing, are conclusive on this point. They prove that a big majority of the tenants respond to their environment, and create thus a powerful public opinion in favor of order. The few backward individuals soon come to obey public opinion, backed by the tactful reminder of the management that rents are much higher elsewhere. ”

“ People have not been tempted to invest in house property, which is always an anxiety, when they had such good alternatives in absolutely liquid securities. Next, there has been a very rapid rise in the cost of constructing a house—a rise of 10 or 12 per cent, during the last 10 years. Added to these causes which have discouraged the building of new houses, the increased activity of Sanitary Authorities, under the 1909 Housing and Town planning Act, has resulted in the closing of a large number of houses. ”