This hungriness for real estate seems to be a fairly recent phenomenon, going by anecdotal evidence, namely my grandfather and his brothers.
They were poor, when they came to Bombay, but grew decently rich from running small businesses. My grandfather had a restaurant. One of his brothers had a transport business. Another had a couple of pharmacy shops. All of them were quite well off in the early sixties. But not one of them thought of getting a larger house or an extra house. My father's generation made some small steps towards acquiring more real estate but its only now that I'm seeing serious real estate obsession. The richer people in my family have been buying real estate maniacally, and, to my eyes, foolishly. One of my cousins has two houses in Mumbai, one in Pune, one in Goa, a monstrously ugly bungalow in Lonavala, one home in Silvassa and recently was gushing about how beautiful Mysore was (my wife is from there) and could I put him on to a good real estate broker in Mysore. This leads me to one slightly tangential point. Recently, we had a discussion on whether inequality is bad and whether it is desirable to reduce it even at the expense of slowing down growth. Amit Varma pointed out that India's greater problem is poverty and increase in prosperity, while reducing poverty, would necessarily increase inequality. His argument was that reducing inequality was a problem poor countries should not really bother about. Poverty is the more serious one. I was broadly convinced but housing is one area where inequality seems to skew things the most. Houses are the Indian rich person's favorite way to store excess money, for some unfathomable reason, and this ends up pushing up prices. Add to this the vested interest that these people now have in the continuing appreciation of real estate and you have an active lobby that doesn't want any change in policy that might reduce the prices of housing. Every analyst worth her salt has been predicting a real estate crash for the last decade or more but it hasn't happened yet. Thanks and regards Narendra Shenoy On Sun, 28 Apr 2019 at 13:01, Pooja Sastry <[email protected]> wrote: > > > > I really don't think it's all THAT difficult to find land. Let us say we > > wanted to house 1 crore people - 10 million - or about 50% of the metro > > population in the Mumbai area. If you assume 200 sq ft per person, we'll > > need about 200 sq km. The current density in slums, by the way, is about > 20 > > sq ft per person. How much of a strain is 200 km on the city? Well, the > > metro area is about 4500 sq km. > > > > I completely agree. I don't buy the idea of scarce land + high density = > high land prices. I've lived in (Navi) Mumbai for less than two years, but > it's clear that there's enough serviced land available in the Mumbai region > for any incoming population for the next 50 years, at comfortable non-slum > densities - the kind that Navi Mumbai hasn't even reached yet. And rail, > road and basic services to these as-yet-undeveloped areas is already being > rapidly built. By contrast, Bangalore isn't creating serviced land with > transport and infrastructure accessibility the way that Mumbai is, but it > certainly has pretty much unlimited land. > > Theoretically, it may be possible to buy a house or even rent one within > > one's budget but it might be entirely useless because it is so far away > > from one's workplace, the other costs would make it unaffordable > > > > This is the part I struggle with. We are forced to take these > distance/budget payoffs as given, but to me, affordability means that > workplaces are equitably distributed across the city, that (public) > transport to them is easily available, AND that housing at a reasonable > commuting time from any given workplace is easily found. For everyone. I > admit that this does expand the problem beyond housing availability alone. > > But should we define affordable housing necessarily as "home ownership"? If > > we are, then we are talking about something far more complex than simply > > shelter/housing because then we'll have to talk about property rights, > > legacy ownership of urban land, et al > > > > I do think we have a collective imagination of housing and land as an > asset, as owned, as acquired - and hence the opacity and intrigue of land > transactions. Is part of it a colonial hangover, or does it go back much > farther, to the shaping of terrain for agriculture? I've been trying to > trace this, although not very successfully, I'd be so grateful if anyone > could point me to some related reading. It shapes so much of what we > consider valuable, even in a time when more of us than before, perhaps, > move cities and countries for work and family. > > Me, too, I would love to hear about a framework to think more about this > issue. > > On Sun, Apr 28, 2019 at 11:35 AM Alok Prasanna Kumar < > [email protected]> > wrote: > > > To be quite honest, I'm not even sure how to think about affordable > > housing. Theoretically, it may be possible to buy a house or even rent > one > > within one's budget but it might be entirely useless because it is so far > > away from one's workplace, the other costs would make it unaffordable. > > > > But should we define affordable housing necessarily as "home ownership"? > If > > we are, then we are talking about something far more complex than simply > > shelter/housing because then we'll have to talk about property rights, > > legacy ownership of urban land, et al. > > > > But if we define too broadly, there's no affordable housing problem at > all > > except for those who are homeless and living on the streets. > > > > I'd love to know if there is a good framework someone has come up with to > > think of this issue. > > > > > > > > > > On Sun, Apr 28, 2019 at 9:18 AM Shenoy N <[email protected]> wrote: > > > > > One question I've always had is, Why is it so hard to have decent > > > affordable housing? > > > > > > To amplify. Technological progress has made virtually all essentials > more > > > abundant, cheaper and better,such as food, clothes, vehicles, > appliances, > > > air travel, everything. Curiously, housing in urban areas has simply > > grown > > > more expensive. This is clearly an anomaly and I have no idea why it is > > so. > > > The biggest culprit, everyone says, is land cost, because land is > > scarce. I > > > really don't think it's all THAT difficult to find land. Let us say we > > > wanted to house 1 crore people - 10 million - or about 50% of the metro > > > population in the Mumbai area. If you assume 200 sq ft per person, > we'll > > > need about 200 sq km. The current density in slums, by the way, is > about > > 20 > > > sq ft per person. > > > > > > How much of a strain is 200 km on the city? Well, the metro area is > about > > > 4500 sq km. I don't think it would be very difficult to squeeze out 200 > > km > > > out of that . It's less than 5%. And it would house everybody. With > > labour > > > and material efficient building technology, even the cost should be > less > > > than what developers incur, if you standardized things. And if you > assume > > > the cost of construction to be Rs. 1000 per sq foot, the entire project > > > would be 200,000 crore rupees. That's not a large number at Indian > > Economy > > > scale. Plus, its an investment, not a hand out. > > > > > > Also, the fact that such housing developments will have to be far away > > from > > > the city center shouldn't be a deal breaker. There is enough mass > transit > > > technology available. > > > > > > What might be the reasons why this isn't happening? > > > > > > > > > Thanks and regards > > > > > > Narendra Shenoy > > > > > > > > > > > > On Sat, 27 Apr 2019 at 10:38, Pooja Sastry <[email protected]> > > wrote: > > > > > > > Hello all! > > > > > > > > I would love to hear what the members of this list think of > affordable > > > > housing - certainly from architects (hi Naresh!) and urban > > policymakers, > > > > but also everyone here. > > > > > > > > In my work as an urban planner, we throw around ideas like > > affordability > > > as > > > > a function of land prices, minuscule floor areas, five times annual > > > income, > > > > construction quality and technique - but these, for me, completely > miss > > > the > > > > mark. I'm a "millennial", renter, and likely never-homebuyer myself, > > and > > > I > > > > don't think it should be a stretch to see housing as an essential, > > > > accessible (not to mention flexible and time-based) infrastructure > > > instead > > > > of a luxury. > > > > > > > > Thoughts? > > > > > > > > Pooja > > > > > > > > > > > > > -- > > Alok Prasanna Kumar > > Advocate > > Ph: +919560065577 > > >
