Housing Roundup #13: More Dakka
TL;DR
The core thesis never changes: build more housing where people want to live — Zvi opens by insisting that supply is the main lever, arguing that “the rest is commentary” and that more housing of any kind improves affordability across the market.
Trump said the quiet part out loud on housing — the video highlights Trump explicitly opposing cheaper homebuilding because lower prices would hurt existing homeowners, which Zvi frames as a blunt admission that policy is protecting boomer wealth over younger buyers and renters.
Even modest supply growth moves prices, and the real takeaway is we need more of it, not less — citing a San Francisco example, Zvi notes that 1.5% annual housing-stock growth might cut prices about 4% a year, and mocks critics who treat “it would take 18 years” as an objection rather than evidence that current building levels are far too low.
Austin is the live-fire proof that overbuilding beats rent inflation — with rents down roughly 18% from their 2022 peak and construction far above peers, Austin stands out as the metro that absorbed huge population growth without the same rent surge, because it kept adding apartments.
The anti-monopoly theory of housing scarcity gets demolished on its own terms — leaning on Derek Thompson’s reporting, Zvi argues Dallas is plainly not a homebuilder oligopoly, with the top two firms building only 30% of new homes in 2023 and the top six about 50%, far from the cited danger thresholds.
A lot of housing politics is really about blocking better allocation of existing homes — in the closing section, Zvi argues that rising property taxes and fewer tax breaks for older owners would push empty nesters to downsize, free up family-sized homes, and reduce the system’s bias toward seniors sitting on underused housing.
The Breakdown
“Build more housing” and the quiet part out loud
Zvi starts with his usual mantra: build more housing where people want to live, because if there is enough housing, it will be affordable. Then he zeroes in on Trump openly saying he doesn’t want housing prices to fall because that would hurt current owners, which Zvi treats as unusually honest politics: yes, more housing lowers prices, and some politicians explicitly dislike that.
The weird anti-supply objection: “it only helps partially”
He then dunks on supply skeptics who cite studies saying that even 1.5% annual housing-stock growth in places like San Francisco would only reduce prices modestly, maybe around 4% per year. Zvi’s reaction is basically: how is that an objection? If the complaint is that it would still take 18 years to make a median one-bedroom affordable to a median non-college worker, then the obvious answer is to build way more than 27% total, not to give up.
Austin as the abundance case study
The video’s strongest empirical section is Austin. Zvi points to charts showing that markets with above-average apartment supply growth saw the biggest Class C rent declines, and Austin is the standout: huge population growth, yet rents fell about 18% from their 2022 peak because construction kept going. His line is almost tauntingly simple: all you have to do is build even more housing.
The South is winning because it’s actually building
From there he broadens out to geography and politics. The South is building more apartments than every other US region combined — about 265,613 units versus 125,629 in the West and around 56,000 to 58,000 in the Northeast and Midwest — which helps explain why population and electoral power keep moving south. He also notes how lopsided local output is: Austin at 15,195 units versus Brooklyn at 7,189, Manhattan at 4,662, and Queens at 2,630.
Minneapolis’s strange result: prices fell before supply arrived
A new paper by Helen Guo and David Moonro claims Minneapolis’s 2040 reform lowered home prices by 16% to 34% and rents by 17.5% to 34% relative to a counterfactual, with p = 0.012. Zvi wants to believe it, but he’s skeptical because the paper says the effect came not from a construction boom but from softened demand and changed expectations, and he flatly says rents falling in line with sale prices before new supply arrives “seems like it has to be wrong.”
Derek Thompson versus the anti-monopoly housing story
The longest segment is a gleeful autopsy of the claim that big homebuilders are withholding supply cartel-style. Quoting Derek Thompson’s reporting, Zvi notes that in Dallas the top two firms built just 30% of new homes in 2023 and the top six barely 50%, while the researcher cited in the anti-monopoly case said Dallas was “100% not an oligopoly.” Zvi’s blunt summary: if builders are constantly fighting to build more and reliably do so when allowed, then the theory that they are the main ones restricting supply is obvious nonsense.
Median homebuyer age panic and why the 59 claim collapses
Late in the video he swats down the viral claim that the median homebuyer is now 59 years old. Pulling from the American Community Survey, American Housing Survey, New York Fed, Federal Reserve SHED, and Zillow, he says the real figure is much closer to 39 to 42, with first-time buyers still roughly in their mid-30s. Young people are behind prior generations on homeownership, yes, but not in the apocalyptic way that statistic suggested.
Property taxes, empty nesters, and “stealing from young people”
The closer is less about new supply and more about allocation. Zvi argues that rising property taxes on appreciated homes are good because they pressure older empty nesters to downsize, freeing larger homes for younger families; if they truly value staying, they can pay. He’s especially scornful of policies like New Jersey’s 50% property-tax credit up to $6,500 for anyone 65+ with income under $500,000, calling it another example of older homeowners being subsidized at the expense of the young.