Brandon Donnelly — Daily insights for city builders. Published since 2013 by Toronto-based real estate developer Brandon Donnelly. — Page 421

Charlie Bilello shared this interesting housing chart in his weekly newsletter:

Shelter is one of the largest components of the CPI index (about a third). And at 7.9% (see above), this is the highest rate of housing inflation since 1982. However, the shelter component -- which is largely a combination of rent on a primary residences and the implicit rent that owner occupants would pay if they were renting their homes -- has historically been a lagging indicator. Apparently it has something to do with the way that it's calculated. So for this reason, the shelter CPI has only increased 14.9% since the start of 2020, whereas home prices nationally increased by about 40% and rents increased by about 20%. It's also why there appears to be a disconnect (in the above chart) with rents. All of this is to say that we might see shelter jump up a bit further as it continues to record what happened over the last few years.

Today we went skiing and snowboarding at Brighton, which is in Big Cottonwood Canyon. It was cool seeing the landscape transform and the temperature drop as we went from 4,300 feet (in Salt Lake City) to 8,755 feet (at the base of the mountain). Here are a few snaps from the road.

Shot on iPhone

We have spoken before about how the average wait time for public housing in Hong Kong is now over 6 years. This is a problem for the quarter million people who are on this list, and so the city has decided to start building modular housing as a kind of stopgap :

The city has embarked on a $3.3 billion plan to build about 30,000 temporary apartments over the next five years, which Housing Secretary Winnie Ho has said is a “very important social project.” The aim of the program is to give people an option to move out of cramped quarters while waiting for public housing. Critics say it only shows the government’s inability to deliver enough permanent homes.

I think many would agree that "light public housing", which is what this is being called, is probably better than no public housing. But is this really the most effective move? According to some sources , this light varietal may actually cost more to build than their typical public housing.

So why even bother? Is it just speed? I'm not sure.

Also, it is interesting to note that even in a city as dense, built out, and in need of housing as Hong Kong, finding support for new development can be a challenge :

“We understand that Hong Kong needs land to build public housing for people in need, so we never objected until this time,” said Andy Ng, an accountant who bought an apartment in the  Upper RiverBank  project early last year. The government is squeezing thousands of people on a single plot of land without planning or consultation, he added. “The district simply can’t stomach so many people.”