Housing
Blog
Regulation bottlenecks impede state’s infrastructure grants
Regulation bottlenecks impede state’s infrastructure grants by Sarah Downey | June 26, 2025 Editor’s Note: While the Free Cities Center advocates for regulations that encourage market-rate construction rather than affordable-housing subsidies, it’s useful to look at the status of the myriad grant programs that the state government is offering—and the ...
Blog
Irony alert: California Dems tackle ‘cost of living’
Irony alert: California Dems tackle ‘cost of living’ Don’t expect high-priced California cities to become more affordable any time soon. By Steven Greenhut | June 13, 2025 The latest news about the California Legislature’s efforts to tackle the state’s preposterously high cost of living should cause Californians to snigger. “California ...
Blog
San Diego’s ADU program so successful it’s drawing a backlash
San Diego’s ADU program so successful it’s drawing a backlash by Sal Rodriguez | June 6, 2025 Over the past decade, California lawmakers have enacted several laws legalizing and facilitating the development of accessory dwelling units. Also known as granny flats or casitas, ADUs are typically small units built on ...
Blog
Read the latest from PRI's Free Cities Center
Dwelling on it: ADUs advance on the coasts and inland
Comedian George Carlin believed that the word “bipartisan” means a “larger-than-usual deception is being carried out.” But the comedian’s legendary cynicism might dissolve, at least a bit, if confronted by the across-the aisle progress underway with a key affordable-housing tool. Neighbor Blog’s Grant Ongstad defines an accessory dwelling unit (ADU) ...
Blog
Can San Franciscans finally overcome their fear of heights?
Like all California cities, San Francisco must comply with state mandates and has in response promised to create “more space for families, workers and the next generation of San Franciscans.” The city’s Housing Element Update is its guidebook for accommodating housing needs through 2031. To get there will require “rezoning to accommodate 36,200 additional units above ...
Blog
More Rent Control Makes Things Worse
Rent control is the bad penny legislation that keeps turning up in California. It is widely regarded as crummy economic policy by economists, it ultimately leads to rental shortages and higher rents and it is based on the faulty idea that private property is somehow public property. And yet, here ...
Blog
Read the latest from PRI's Free Cities Center
Seattle’s ‘social housing’ plan struggles to get off the ground
Two years ago, voters approved Initiative 135, which created the Seattle Social Housing Developer. Supporters of Initiative 135 argued the Seattle Social Housing Developer would be “a new, powerful tool to counter” the city’s housing crisis by empowering a governmental entity to develop and acquire properties for housing. Explained the ...
Blog
Examining the roots of California’s ongoing insurance crisis
Examining the roots of California’s ongoing insurance crisis by Rafael Perez | April 24, 2025 There are two uncomfortable truths that have settled in after the smoke cleared from the Los Angeles County fires. The first is that the public will pay for a significant share of the damage. The ...
Blog
West Coast cities need to catch up on office-to-home conversions
Some buildings are in the pipeline, just waiting for approval, but many cities need to do more improving of infrastructure, cleanliness and safety in order to thrive. In a sign of good news, more office-to-residential conversions have developed in cities as distinct as Cleveland, Houston and Washington, D.C. The West ...
Blog
New Rankings Confirm California’s Status as Too Restrictive for Homebuilding
In fact, those nine are all among the bottom 15. Los Angeles landed in the middle of the rankings, even though its “composite price levels” are 8.6 times higher than income, higher than San Jose (7.9), San Diego (7.7), San Francisco (7.6) and even New York City (6.6). California, was ...
Regulation bottlenecks impede state’s infrastructure grants
Regulation bottlenecks impede state’s infrastructure grants by Sarah Downey | June 26, 2025 Editor’s Note: While the Free Cities Center advocates for regulations that encourage market-rate construction rather than affordable-housing subsidies, it’s useful to look at the status of the myriad grant programs that the state government is offering—and the ...
Irony alert: California Dems tackle ‘cost of living’
Irony alert: California Dems tackle ‘cost of living’ Don’t expect high-priced California cities to become more affordable any time soon. By Steven Greenhut | June 13, 2025 The latest news about the California Legislature’s efforts to tackle the state’s preposterously high cost of living should cause Californians to snigger. “California ...
San Diego’s ADU program so successful it’s drawing a backlash
San Diego’s ADU program so successful it’s drawing a backlash by Sal Rodriguez | June 6, 2025 Over the past decade, California lawmakers have enacted several laws legalizing and facilitating the development of accessory dwelling units. Also known as granny flats or casitas, ADUs are typically small units built on ...
Read the latest from PRI's Free Cities Center
Dwelling on it: ADUs advance on the coasts and inland
Comedian George Carlin believed that the word “bipartisan” means a “larger-than-usual deception is being carried out.” But the comedian’s legendary cynicism might dissolve, at least a bit, if confronted by the across-the aisle progress underway with a key affordable-housing tool. Neighbor Blog’s Grant Ongstad defines an accessory dwelling unit (ADU) ...
Can San Franciscans finally overcome their fear of heights?
Like all California cities, San Francisco must comply with state mandates and has in response promised to create “more space for families, workers and the next generation of San Franciscans.” The city’s Housing Element Update is its guidebook for accommodating housing needs through 2031. To get there will require “rezoning to accommodate 36,200 additional units above ...
More Rent Control Makes Things Worse
Rent control is the bad penny legislation that keeps turning up in California. It is widely regarded as crummy economic policy by economists, it ultimately leads to rental shortages and higher rents and it is based on the faulty idea that private property is somehow public property. And yet, here ...
Read the latest from PRI's Free Cities Center
Seattle’s ‘social housing’ plan struggles to get off the ground
Two years ago, voters approved Initiative 135, which created the Seattle Social Housing Developer. Supporters of Initiative 135 argued the Seattle Social Housing Developer would be “a new, powerful tool to counter” the city’s housing crisis by empowering a governmental entity to develop and acquire properties for housing. Explained the ...
Examining the roots of California’s ongoing insurance crisis
Examining the roots of California’s ongoing insurance crisis by Rafael Perez | April 24, 2025 There are two uncomfortable truths that have settled in after the smoke cleared from the Los Angeles County fires. The first is that the public will pay for a significant share of the damage. The ...
West Coast cities need to catch up on office-to-home conversions
Some buildings are in the pipeline, just waiting for approval, but many cities need to do more improving of infrastructure, cleanliness and safety in order to thrive. In a sign of good news, more office-to-residential conversions have developed in cities as distinct as Cleveland, Houston and Washington, D.C. The West ...
New Rankings Confirm California’s Status as Too Restrictive for Homebuilding
In fact, those nine are all among the bottom 15. Los Angeles landed in the middle of the rankings, even though its “composite price levels” are 8.6 times higher than income, higher than San Jose (7.9), San Diego (7.7), San Francisco (7.6) and even New York City (6.6). California, was ...
