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Every analysis, breakdown and explainer, newest first.
Interest Rates
A one-point rise in the loan rate adds about $93 a month to the rent our illustrative 120-unit project requires, before investors and construction lenders reprice. We show the arithmetic and the second-order effects.
Regulation
Nothing about the building changes when construction start slips a year. The land loan, the taxes, the consultants and the contractor's price keep moving. We add it up and convert it into rent.
Development
Is rent high because developers take too much? We trace every dollar of "developer profit" in a $30,000,000 apartment building and find the fee explains $68 of a $2,415 rent, while the cost of capital explains far more.
Public Finance
Tax-exempt bonds, public land, patient equity, revolving loans, grants and tax abatements each lower required rent on a modeled 120-unit building. Each also has a payer. Here is what every model is worth per month.
Affordability
Housing affordability is usually argued as a question of blame. It is better understood as arithmetic: land, construction, money, rules, operations and returns, added up and divided by units.
