I told you to “stay tuned” to read about how a community can provide more affordable housing. This is a tough one. I will divide my thoughts in two categories: cultural and governmental.
I have, for a long time, asserted that a cultural re-set was necessary. Affluence and media have established consumer expectations which have dramatically increased the cost of housing. If we expect less, costs will go down. Here are a couple examples:
Build small. A 1200 square foot (an average house size in 1960) house will cost less than a 2400 square foot house. A family of four or five can live comfortably in this smaller house. The mortgage, utilities, taxes, insurance, and maintenance will all be less.
Forsake some amenities. Somehow many generations have lived without marble countertops, dishwashers, luxury bathrooms, cathedral ceilings, three car garages…The list can go on and on.
The 19th century tradition of barn raising in the Amish and Mennonite communities is evidence of a central cultural norm: we – regular people – should take care of each other. It was recognized that a barn was essential to survival in rural communities. Church membership defined “community” and all pitched in. It’s not a huge leap to draw the same conclusion about housing. Habitat for Humanity echoes this belief on the national level and Project Neighbors does the same locally. A few years ago, a Project Neighbors volunteer commented after a day of installing vinyl siding on a duplex. “Many of my friends spend their free time playing golf. I get my exercise and social interaction doing this.” In a future blog, we will explore the nuts and bolts of this kind of effort.
We Need a Cultural Revolution
The cultural revolution necessary to get people to think differently about housing must tap issues that exist at a very deep level of the American psyche and are tied into a person’s identity and status.
Years ago, a friend of mine said that in shopping for a new car his wife informed him that this decision was not about transportation, but a statement of who they were. This was a surprise to my friend who thought vehicles had a fundamental purpose of getting you from point A to point B and doing that regularly without a good deal of service and repair. Comfort and style etc. were relevant but selection of a car was about transportation.
The debate about what automobiles are for has a similar version when it comes to housing. Housing was always first and foremost protection from the elements. Someplace where you could live and be somewhat comfortable. But now, housing has become, and probably to some extent was always, a statement of who you are. It is about identity and status. As such, it is not only necessary to have a large house in a good neighborhood filled with amenities, the effort spirals into a vicious circle of keeping up with the Jones’ who now have a pool and new granite counter tops, and they are redoing their bathrooms, their basement, their media room, exercise room, and offices.
The cultural revolution proposed to get individuals to think small and less pretentious is asking them to admit to their friends and everyone else that they are failures. You live in a non-upscale neighborhood in a small house with no media room, no pool, only two bathrooms, only a two car garage, and God forbid, vinyl siding. How can you look at yourself in the mirror in the morning? What about your kids. Think about them. They will be embarrassed and shunned by others in their school. How could you do this to yourself and your family. Most assuredly your spouse will eventually leave you if you continue to live in such squalor. Well maybe it’s not all that bad, but still no one wants to have visible signs of failure displayed prominently for all to see.
There is hope! First, simple economics may come into play here. Data indicates that the children of those persons living in the big, beautiful houses my not be able to afford similar palaces. The cost of housing is rising at such a rapid pace — and incomes are not keeping up — that it will be difficult for the younger generation to afford such luxury. Data also suggests that this younger cohort is once again making a trek back to urban areas and are willing to live in smaller apartments. At least that’s what the leadership in Valparaiso tells us.
The final cultural revolution necessary is one which leads to the clash of ideological pillars. Capitalism inevitably results in income diversity: the rich, the poor, and folks in between. The reasons for this economic diversity are many and are thoroughly debated by the left and the right. I will skip that debate. Today, because of consumer expectations, most new, market-built housing is aimed at satisfying the expectations of the upper half of the income range, leaving those folks at the bottom of the income ladder to compete for a dwindling number of “affordable” units, the price of which is climbing because of scarcity.
So, like public education, fire protection, interstate highways, oversight of the pharmaceutical industry – all needed functions which would be impossible for the individual to manage – perhaps some portion of the housing need must be assisted by government.
The federal government does have housing assistance programs, like Section 8, which assists very low-income families, the elderly, and disabled. The supply of Section 8 vouchers is limited and demand often exceeds supply.
Large cities like Chicago also have embraced some responsibility to provide housing through the creation of housing authorities, a function of local government, and the building of public housing. Large scale public housing has been a mixed bag of success and failure, but generally has a bad reputation.
However, small town governments have generally rejected any role in the creation of housing to meet the demand of the less affluent. If the experience of Valparaiso is typical – and I think it is – land scarcity, the migration of former city dwellers into smaller towns, a desire on the part of local governmental units to grow the tax base and the resultant city revenue, and a for-profit housing industry serving the upper half of the income spectrum, have led to a crisis. With competition for available lower cost housing so intense, teachers, fire fighters, retail workers and other lower wage workers struggle with the chronically poor to satisfy their housing needs. And the politics of small-town America tends to believe that “housing authority” is a dirty word.
This is the final cultural shift necessary to begin to meet the need of housing for all. The local governmental unit must acknowledge the crisis and embrace some responsibility in its solution.
Stay tuned to see how local government could partner with reformed consumer expectations, churches and not-for-profits, and perhaps the housing industry, to solve this crisis.
Paul Schreiner and Larry Baas