The CA Supreme Court just screwed up

Am a little late to the party on the California Supreme Court’s recent decision to allow so-called inclusionary zoning, but think it’s important to comment on what I regard as a total travesty. First, some background: Five years ago, the City of San Jose passed a law requiring that 15% of units in new buildings of 20 … Continue reading “The CA Supreme Court just screwed up”

Some more thoughts about microunits

Bisnow has an interesting piece on the state of the art in microunits. For those who don’t know, “microunit” is the name given to super-small studios being developed in expensive coastal cities. The idea is to create a self-contained 220-350 sq ft apartment which, in theory, ought to be affordable for younger tenants who care … Continue reading “Some more thoughts about microunits”

A small problem with putting solar on your roof

There’s a slight problem with putting a solar system on your roof: You may be radically reducing the value of your property. Now, this doesn’t go for all homes. It’s specifically the case with home in cities where the zoning allows for denser development. So, for example, consider an old 800 sq ft single family home … Continue reading “A small problem with putting solar on your roof”

Comparing multifamily to office investing

And… we’re back. (I was at Princeton Reunions over the weekend and my flight didn’t get me back to LA until 3AM Monday morning.) Thought you might be interested in this article, which advocates that institutional investors consider allocating real estate investment dollars to multifamily instead of office. The argument should be familiar to regular … Continue reading “Comparing multifamily to office investing”

Another report from the front line of the zoning wars

Fund 3 investors know we’re in the process of adding a second story with two units to a duplex we bought a few months ago. This is a pretty straight-forward operation: There is plenty of room on the lot and the zoning allows for more than two additional units. This should be the kind of project … Continue reading “Another report from the front line of the zoning wars”

When is a re-pipe not just a re-pipe?

When you have a building with a “slab” (as opposed to a “raised”) foundation. With a raised foundation, there is a crawl-space under the bottom floor through which pipes run. This makes re-piping the building pretty easy. With a slab foundation, the building sits right on a thick concrete slab in which the original plumbing is … Continue reading “When is a re-pipe not just a re-pipe?”

Score one for density

Today we learned that the mayor over-ruled his own planning commissioners to approve a high-rise building in K-Town. Here’s the money-quote from the LA Times explaining the opposition to the project: “Such a huge project would be ‘wildly inappropriate’ for the location, said Commissioner Maria Cabildo, an affordable housing developer. “I’m probably one of the biggest advocates … Continue reading “Score one for density”