Logan Penfield was tapped 2 months ago according to his profile. He does have educational and professional government experience (unlike some of Paul’s past appointments) but I found it interesting that the circles Mr. Penfield runs in probably contributed to his appointment.
When I think of affordable and accessible housing advocacy, the Republican Party usually doesn’t rank high on that list. (FF 9:40 to hear is introduction);
He has appropriate qualifications that are hard to find locally. When it comes to affordable housing the elephant in the room is 7% mortgage interest versus 3% six months ago. It makes house payments double. The new low income (yet unaffordable) 250k subdivision has become an upper class luxury. Apartment rent equates to house payments and will become out of reach for even the middle class. The future could very well be tents.
It sounds to me like a supply side answer and we do need the supply, but since the suppliers have not been supplying then why should we expect them to start supplying now? And if we do receive a new supply, however, won’t they have bad plumbing given their trickle-down nature? #LafferSubdivision
“‘Logan Penfield’?”… “That sounds like a character in a book who plays a lot of golf and thinks he runs his Dad’s old company”…
Marie
City, county, state and the federal governments compound the lack of affordable housing by “guaranteeing a profit” and subsidizing builders and developers with TIF’s (Tax Increment Financing Districts) and long term water, sewer, and street infrastructure financing and maintenance.
But these governments do not require–through planning or permitting processes–that builders build housing that matches the affordability demographics of citizens. These costs are shifted to citizens though higher rents, property taxes and utility bills.
Increasingly, developers and builders have a seat at local government housing largesse tables, but average citizens and the unhoused do not.
https://www.nytimes.com/2022/09/25/upshot/starter-home-prices.html?searchResultPosition=1