The housing crisis has gone national, spreading from Boston and a few other blue cities to states and markets across the country. And along the way, it is helping poison the nation’s political mood by deferring or killing the dreams of a generation.
With housing construction stalled across Boston, the Wu administration is thinking big when it comes to ways to get apartment and condominium projects moving again.
MAPC’s latest research has uncovered astounding statistics about the role investors are playing in pushing Boston home prices up. But it falls wide of the mark in recommending rent control as a solution to the problem.
Yes, we can solve the housing crisis, they say, but only if we stick with the morally pure solution – affordable housing.
As the name suggests, this is one award you don’t want to get. A “Turkey” signifies that something has either gone terribly wrong or simply defies common sense.
Gov. Maura Healey has an ambitious plan to tackle the state’s housing crisis. But some recent developments in Boston’s suburbs and exurbs should raise concerns about the willingness on part of some local communities to embrace the governor’s call to action.
Million-dollar home sales just aren’t what they used to be in Greater Boston. And that’s a major problem for Gov. Maura Healey as she forges ahead with her proposal for a local-option tax on expensive home sales.
Tom O’Brien is not shy about taking on challenging projects. Now he faces another potentially daunting endeavor, as he pushes ahead with plans for a large lab and housing complex in Roxbury’s Nubian Square.
Healey’s plan takes an important step towards zoning reform and plows $4.1 billion into new housing. But she needs to be willing to call out NIMBY selfishness as it happens and make the case for a healthier society.
Yes, unbuilt suburban lab projects are unraveling and rents are sinking, but the life science industry is built on real demand and requires in-person work. Life science real estate isn’t going anywhere in Boston.
The run-up in commercial real estate in the 1980s helped fill local tax coffers. When that source of funding dried up seemingly overnight, there was hell to pay as local and city officials were forced to boost taxes on homeowners and slash municipal and school budgets – a situation the city may soon be facing again.
There is arguably an even bigger problem when it comes to public housing in Massachusetts, one that has drawn little media attention: the huge number of public housing units on the cusp of being uninhabitable.
To save us from Beacon Hill’s vortex of petty feuds and back-room deal-making, the state auditor needs hundreds of thousands of dollars in donations to fuel a crusading ballot campaign that will force better government.
Boston’s mayor is finally keeping her pledge to rezone the city for more growth. But she’s up against forces her three predecessors couldn’t tame and some of her helpers may lack local knowledge.
Housing advocates know a supply shortage is behind our runaway rents. But their two closest groups of allies sit on either side of the issue, and each see the debate in existential terms.
To see a current example of local bureaucracy run amok, one need look no further than Somerville, where city officials are giving the run-around to a promising proposal, and giving up their power to a big, corporate developer.
One is better than none, but when only one out of 34 people running for seats on the Boston City Council appears to truly get what needs to be done to fix the housing crisis, we’ve got a problem.
Some of the last remaining escape hatches from Greater Boston’s grossly overpriced housing market – Worcester and Providence – are starting to close. And unfortunately, local NIMBYs seem determined to make the problem worse.
The end may finally be near for WeWork. To that, I say: Good riddance, and maybe we can look forward to a little less bunkum in a business world that’s been full of it.
Leave it to the local press to miss the significance of the first big management move by new T chief Phillip Eng. His new hires aren’t cronies, and they’re not “reinforcements,” either.
