MARC DRAISEN
‘A balancing act’

Building homes on smaller lots could significantly boost housing production, help drive home prices down by as much as 25 percent, and cut down on land consumption, according to a study to be released today.

The study, researched and written by economist Edward Moscovitch for the Massachusetts Housing Partnership, focuses on home prices and land use in 108 communities within the Route 128/Interstate 495 corridor – an area of the state where much of the population growth and housing construction has been concentrated during the last decade.

Many of the communities in that corridor have adopted large-lot zoning. Only four communities in the region have an average single-family lot size under half an acre, according to the study, and the average lot size for all residential units built in the corridor from 1998 to 2002 was 1.08 acres – almost the size of a football field.

If homes were instead developed on a quarter of an acre, a smart-growth pattern followed across the country, it could reduce vacant land consumption almost in half, double the number of units built and reduce the average home price from $400,000 to $293,000, the study found.

Building a Way Out
The report’s findings offer quantitative support for what smart-growth and housing advocates have been pushing for years – building on smaller lots to preserve open space and temper skyrocketing home prices. It also bolsters critics who blame sprawl and high housing costs in Massachusetts on cities and towns that adopt restrictive zoning.

“Because of our antiquated zoning, we’re eating up a huge amount of open space that can remain virgin land for generations to come,” said Eleanor White, co-chairwoman of the Commonwealth Housing Task Force. “That’s not smart.”

The task force, a broad coalition of housing advocates, business leaders, environmentalists and developers, issued a report in October 2003 that was the impetus behind the state’s smart-growth zoning law known as Chapter 40R.

Passed last year, the law provides financial incentives to cities and towns that build denser housing developments in specially established zoning districts near town centers and public transportation.

“We were delighted with this report, which reinforces our message [that] we need to build more housing on smaller lots in smart-growth locations, and that’s the way we’re going to be able to build our way out of the housing crisis,” White said.

White said she hopes the report’s findings will spur lawmakers to approve a plan to reimburse cities and towns for educational expenses incurred from new housing that’s built under Chapter 40R. The measure was recently approved by the Senate, and House Speaker Salvatore F. DiMasi has indicated his support in press accounts.

The financial incentives are seen as a critical tool to persuading community leaders, who fear that growth will burden school systems with additional costs, to embrace more housing development.

In recent years, policymakers, housing specialists and business leaders have called for more housing production as a way to ease housing costs and attract and retain a diverse workforce.

The state produced 40,000 fewer units from 1993 to 2003 than was needed to meet housing demand, according to the study.

Besides showing that the state should produce more housing, the study clearly illustrates why the state must change its development patterns, said Clark L. Ziegler, executive director of the Massachusetts Housing Partnership.

“If we just build the same way we build now Â… it will kill us,” Ziegler noted. “We can’t do it. From a land-consumption view, it makes no sense.”

While laws like Chapter 40R will help, Ziegler questioned whether the incentives will be enough to address the housing crisis, particularly since cities and towns will still have the power to set their own zoning.

Given that the state’s population loss and high housing costs are affecting the state’s economic competitiveness, Ziegler said, “can we afford to wait to see if incentives are sufficient or do we have to at some point quickly rethink the balance of local autonomy [on zoning]?”

The state may have to consider regional or state oversight of local zoning, a strategy employed in other parts of the country, suggested Ziegler.

“If we can’t get a handle on this [crisis], we’re going to have to look at solutions like that to maintain our economic competitiveness,” he said.

Marc Draisen, executive director of the Metropolitan Area Planning Council, said one key message from the study is that having a home surrounded by a lot of land doesn’t “produce much in terms of value.”

The study examined home prices in Andover and Ipswich, comparing home values in those communities’ town centers – where houses are clustered closer together on smaller lots – with those in less dense and rural parts of the towns. The study found there was little difference in value between homes in the town centers and rural areas.

“Most people are interested in a house they can afford with a reasonable amount of space, and the public has a real interest in seeing that kind of housing development. Housing will be less expensive and it will preserve critical habitat and open space,” Draisen said.

Draisen said MAPC, a regional planning agency representing 101 communities in Greater Boston, has been encouraging municipal leaders to alter zoning so that development is concentrated in certain parts of their communities and land is preserved elsewhere.

“It’s a balancing act,” he said.

Titled “Open Space, Housing Construction and Home Prices: What’s the Payoff From Smart Growth?,” the study is scheduled to be discussed at a forum sponsored by the Citizens’ Housing and Planning Association this morning at the Boston Chamber of Commerce Conference Center.