Alex Armlovich
@aarmlovi
Sr. Housing Analyst @niskanencenter🏗️| Urban Econ 🌐🔰🚋 | @WorksInProgMag | former @cbcny | Legalize housing. Tax land. End poverty with cash
New today: The case for relegalizing single stair buildings above America's 3-story cap! It's an intro to the reforms brought to the US by @holz_bau & popularized by @MarketUrbanism in 2021 Several US states have already acted. It's time to catch up with the developed world.
Forum: Reforming U.S. building codes to permit single-stair apartment buildings would facilitate cost-effective and higher-density housing, writes @aarmlovi. architecturalrecord.com/articles/16880…
Nice to see fair & balanced coverage on how radicalism & unpredictability in housing policy can harm lender & investor sentiment We get wall-to-wall coverage of how Mamdani's vibes are spooking lenders; WSJ notes that Trump's HUD budget vibes are just as scary👇
Expectational shocks & "bank loan committee vibes" during a spike in the politics of rent control—especially with vacancy control, a feature of "classical" Gen 1 laws—could hurt permitting But the effect size here is so large that I'd want to ask a local for more detail
If you find Maine's vacation home statistics scandalous, you're gonna lose your mind when you find out what they put on their license plates & welcome signs
One in 6 Maine homes are vacation homes—which Census defines as "vacant for seasonal, recreational, or occasional use." The lowest density of vacation homes in America is Illinois—one in 125. via @_brianpotter
Politics is politics, but I have to defend the Comptroller's office market reports These are the only free sources of sane, high-quality office market analysis providing summary access to extremely expensive private data I couldn't have written my Atlantic column without them
How you know you were a good Comptroller! (Thanks to the Manhattan Institute for the affirmation) Also, stay tuned for our FY26 pension fund returns, coming soon.
Awesome job opportunity for a YIMBY in NY 👇
We're hiring a State Legislative Manager to push pro-housing bills forward in the State Legislature! If you're an Albany expert, come join our team. open-new-york.breezy.hr/p/df1e5b0e2dec…
Fun zoning fact: it’s illegal to build a 9-story apartment building across the street from this
While in 90% of America, it’s illegal to combine a coffee shop and residential building, in NYC they’re halfway done building a combination 52-story apartment building and 1000+ foot amusement park ride in the middle of Midtown
“The Manhattan Institute but lib” (my words not the authors) is a kind of missing piece of the nonprofit/ideas firmament despite I think quite a bit of demand. Vital City kinds fills a City Journal esque role already
People support housing density if they like cities. The YIMBY movement will go farther if it evolves into a broader “livable cities” coalition. @CSElmendorf and @ProfSchleich show the way ⬇️
YIMBYs should embrace a big-tent agenda focused on making cities more liveable. Why? Becuase people will support housing density if they like cities! We're already seeing groups like @GrowSF adopt this approach.
People support housing density if they like cities. The YIMBY movement will go farther if it evolves into a broader “livable cities” coalition. @CSElmendorf and @ProfSchleich show the way ⬇️
The answer here is nuanced: -It's unfair for zoning to ban her from building homes that meet FEMA's elevation and/or flood-proofing safety rules for her floodplain status. (That means either stilts or dry-floodproofing) -It is not unfair for FEMA to set those safety standards
This woman OWNS 37 acres of land. The government STILL told her she can’t put a tiny home on it. “I said, I own the land. It's massive. What's the problem?” Even when you own the land, the government still tries to tell you what you're allowed to do with it.
The flow of new research finding that zoning makes housing expensive continues, getting broader and very detailed. A state-of-the-art paper by @vincent_rollet . 1/5 vrollet.github.io/files/city_str…