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The government on Tuesday proposed a <keyword id="20789519" type="General" weightage="20" keywordseo="transit-oriented-development" source="keywords">transit-oriented development</keyword> plan for 14 large cities with a population of over 30 lakh in its budget for 2024-25 and said it will formulate a framework for the creative redevelopment of cities. Presenting the Budget in the Lok Sabha, Finance Minister <keyword id="19916618" type="General" weightage="20" keywordseo="nirmala-sitharaman" source="keywords">Nirmala Sitharaman</keyword> underscored that the Union government will work with states to facilitate the development of cities as "growth hubs". "This will be achieved through economic and transit planning, and orderly development of peri-urban areas utilising <keyword id="22517779" type="General" weightage="20" keywordseo="town-planning-schemes" source="keywords">town planning schemes</keyword>", the minister said. "Transit-oriented development plans for 14 large cities with a population above 30 lakh will be formulated, along with an implementation and financing strategy," Sitharaman said in her budget speech. The minister also announced Central assistance of Rs 2.2 lakh crore for <keyword id="20957520" type="General" weightage="20" keywordseo="urban-housing" source="keywords">urban housing</keyword> over the next five years as well as an <keyword id="22517780" type="General" weightage="20" keywordseo="interest-subsidy-scheme" source="keywords">interest subsidy scheme</keyword> to facilitate loans at affordable rates for urban housing works. She said the Central government will put in place measures for an efficient and transparent <keyword id="20071228" type="General" weightage="20" keywordseo="rental-housing" source="keywords">rental housing</keyword> market with enhanced availability. The minister proposed a scheme to support the development of 100 weekly haats or street food hubs in select cities. Sitharaman added that rental housing with dormitory type accommodation for industrial workers will be facilitated in PPP (public-private partnership) mode with VGF (viability gap funding) support and commitment from anchor industries." Enabling policies and regulations for efficient and transparent rental housing markets with enhanced availability will also be put in place, she said. About <keyword id="19939560" type="General" weightage="20" keywordseo="water-supply" source="keywords">water supply</keyword> and <keyword id="20082835" type="General" weightage="20" keywordseo="sanitation" source="keywords">sanitation</keyword>, the minister announced that the Centre in partnership with state governments and multilateral development banks will promote water supply, sewage treatment and <keyword id="19973309" type="General" weightage="20" keywordseo="solid-waste-management" source="keywords">solid waste management</keyword> projects and services for 100 large cities through bankable projects. According to her, these projects will also envisage use of treated water for irrigation and filling up of tanks in nearby areas. The minister stressed that the Central government will encourage states, which continue to charge high stamp duty, to moderate the rates for all, and also consider further lowering duties for properties purchased by women. This reform will be made an essential component of urban development schemes, she added.

Budget 2024-25: Govt announces transit-oriented development plan for large cities

As Mumbai, India's financial capital, witnessed vertical growth over the years with highrises dotting its skyline, some 'gaothans' (villages) have held onto their heritage and legacy. Ranwar, in the heart of Bandra, is one such village that has resisted the urge to make way for towering structures. Dwarfed by highrises, the East Indian-majority village has narrow streets lined with old quaint bungalows and crosses outside homes. With jazz music streaming in the air, walking around the area can transport you to a simpler time. While Bandra developed rapidly and became home to Bollywood's elite and a burgeoning street shopping hub, residents of Ranwar maintained their old bungalows. The coexistence, however, has come at a price, causing traffic issues and crowding. And now, plans are afoot to give the 300-year-old village a facelift while preserving the past. Talking to PTI, <keyword id="23283968" type="General" weightage="20" keywordseo="Johan-Dharmai" source="Orion">Johan Dharmai</keyword>, BJP secretary and a member of the East Indian community, said, "Locals want to preserve the heritage. One of the steps in the facelift plan is to close vehicle movement and build a walkway so that tourists can take a stroll and enjoy the architecture." Though many houses in Ranwar are now being redeveloped, Veronica Street has maintained its old-world charm. It has a square erected in 1866. However, honking rents the air on this street, as motorists see it as a shortcut to Bandra Reclamation and other areas. Mehboob Studio is just a stone's throw away, and senior citizens living on Veronica Street recall seeing actors Helen and Zeenat Aman around Ranwar. A beautification, restoration and conservation project is being initiated to improve safety, regulate traffic and create awareness about the centuries-old village. Mumbai BJP president and <keyword id="20238930" type="General" weightage="20" keywordseo="Bandra-West" source="keywords">Bandra West</keyword> MLA Ashish Shelar recently met locals to discuss ways to move the project forward. "The beauty of Bandra West is its 'gaothans'. The heritage needs to be protected and showcased. I have asked the government to allocate funds from the District Planning Development Committee (DPDC). <keyword id="23283965" type="General" weightage="20" keywordseo="Ranwar-Village" source="keywords">Ranwar village</keyword> will get a facelift. The work has begun on roads, CCTV cameras, street light illumination, parking and traffic plan will be in place with the help of locals and architects," Shelar told PTI. <keyword id="23283967" type="General" weightage="20" keywordseo="Architect-Samir-DMonte" source="keywords">Architect Samir D'Monte</keyword> has been working with the Ranwar Veronica Street Residents' Association since 2009, and they identified a range of problems that the area faced. D'Monte said improvements were made to open spaces and common areas, roads, sewage and drainage systems, street signage, street lighting and traffic and parking management. Apart from this, individual houses were restored, and an innovative fire system was also introduced. Locals say most residents are senior citizens and want to live peacefully without disturbances by motorists. Kaevan Umrigar of Khaki Tours, who works to create awareness about Mumbai's heritage, said Bandra comprised 23 gaothans that housed fisher folk, Kunbis (a farming community) and the agris community who had salt pans. "Ranwar was a farming village, and the area had paddy fields. Later, these paddy fields made way for urban settlements. These little villages are now trapped in the city. Now, only 10 to 15 gaothans in Bandra have survived," he said. But preserving heritage comes at a cost, and if a 'gaothan' comes under heritage guidelines, it becomes difficult to upgrade a home in the area or live a modern life, Umigar said, adding that heritage should be made attractive by tapping the tourism potential of these areas. 'Gaothans' in Mumbai and the larger Mumbai metropolitan region (MMR) are urban villages that house the city's original inhabitants. The Mumbai suburban district collector and Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation (BMC) have been roped in for Ranwar's facelift plan. Umigar calls land scarcity a threat to 'gaothans', with only 100 left in the city. "When someone wants to develop gaothans, they want to do it vertically. There is a constant battle between heritage and development. They (villages) survive because the houses are tightly packed and on narrow lanes. So individual houses are not attractive for redevelopment, and parking becomes an issue," he said.

300-year-old Bandra village to get facelift to conserve its glorious past

The <keyword id="19899810" type="General" weightage="20" keywordseo="Reserve-Bank-of-India" source="keywords">Reserve Bank of India</keyword> has imposed <keyword id="21834852" type="General" weightage="20" keywordseo="monetary-penalties" source="keywords">monetary penalties</keyword> on three Non-Banking Financial Companies for <keyword id="20170050" type="General" weightage="20" keywordseo="non-compliance" source="keywords">non-compliance</keyword> with directions of <keyword id="19899808" type="General" weightage="20" keywordseo="RBI" source="keywords">RBI</keyword> on <keyword id="20200326" type="General" weightage="100" keywordseo="housing-finance-companies" source="keywords">housing finance companies</keyword>. As per the official statement from RBI on Friday, it has imposed a monetary <keyword id="19899183" type="General" weightage="20" keywordseo="penalty" source="keywords">penalty</keyword> of Rs 5 lakh on <keyword id="23068625" type="General" weightage="20" keywordseo="Godrej-Housing-Finance" source="keywords">Godrej Housing Finance</keyword> Limited, Rs 5 lakh on <keyword id="20389260" type="General" weightage="20" keywordseo="Aadhar-Housing-Finance" source="keywords">Aadhar Housing Finance</keyword> Limited, and Rs 3.5 lakh on Housing and Urban Development Corporation Limited. These penalties by the regulator have been imposed in the exercise of powers conferred on RBI under the provisions of Section 52A of the <keyword id="20200606" type="General" weightage="20" keywordseo="National-Housing-Bank" source="keywords">National Housing Bank</keyword> Act, 1987. As per RBI, the statutory inspection of these companies was conducted by the National Housing Bank (NHB) with reference to their financial positions as of March 31, 2022. The RBI stated that based on the supervisory findings of non-compliance with RBI directions and related correspondence in that regard, a notice was issued to the companies advising them to show cause as to why a penalty should not be imposed on them for their failure to comply with the RBI directions. After considering the companies' replies to the notice, oral submissions during the personal hearing, and additional submissions made by them, the RBI found that Godrej Housing Finance Limited failed to obtain two independent valuation reports before sanctioning certain loans of Rs 75 lakh and above. For Aadhar Housing Finance Limited, the RBI stated that the company charged interest on loans for a period prior to the date of the actual disbursement of the loan/issuance of the check to certain borrowers, in contravention of RBI directions on the 'Fair Practices Code.' The penalty on Housing and Urban Development Corporation Limited has been imposed because the company failed to undertake risk categorization of its customers during the financial year 2021-22, did not put in place a system for periodic review of risk categorization of accounts, and did not create a floating charge on the assets invested by it in terms of Section 29B of the NHB Act, in favor of its depositors, and register the same with the Registrar of Companies.

RBI imposes penalties on three housing finance companies for non-compliance with directions

<ul class="summary-list"><li>Affordable housing is one of America's top economic concerns heading into the election.</li><li>Detailed below is what Harris and Trump have proposed in order to address these worries.</li></ul><a target="_blank" href="https://www.businessinsider.com/harris-trump-presidential-election-swing-state-polls-sun-belt-2024-10">Election Day</a> is around the corner and some Americans are already casting their ballots in early voting. For many, affordable housing is a <a target="_blank" class="" href="https://www.bankrate.com/personal-finance/2024-election-and-the-economy-survey/">top</a> concern.In the third of Business Insider's five-part series for the final stretch before the election, BI is looking at the ways each candidate and their associated policies will impact the price of housing. (Read <a target="_blank" class="" href="https://www.businessinsider.com/market-impact-presidential-election-scenarios-trump-harris-stocks-bonds-crypto-2024-10">part 1</a> about investments, and <a target="_blank" class="" href="https://www.businessinsider.com/cost-expensive-goods-price-impact-presidential-election-scenarios-trump-harris-2024-10">part 2</a> about costs.)Vice President Kamala Harris and former President Donald Trump have both pledged to address high prices by <a target="_blank" class="" href="https://www.businessinsider.com/homes-free-government-land-real-estate-housing-prices-harris-trump-2024-8">boosting the supply of homes</a>. They've also floated plans to increase affordable housing while offering different viewpoints on home construction in rural and urban areas.Detailed below are four elements of the housing-price equation, and what both the Harris and Trump camps have either proposed or already done.<h2 id="1827e262-8518-4344-bd61-fda006799bbc">Increasing housing supply</h2>Harris has said she will work with the private sector and homebuilders to construct <a target="_blank" href="https://www.businessinsider.com/how-kamala-harris-plans-to-build-3-million-new-homes-2024-8">3 million more homes</a> by the end of her first term. She also plans to create a <a target="_blank" href="https://www.businessinsider.com/kamala-harris-economy-proposal-25k-first-time-homebuyers-down-payent-2024-8">$40 billion federal innovation fund</a> that encourages local governments to build housing.This is in response to an ongoing US housing shortage. The US was short about <a target="_blank" class="" href="https://zillow.mediaroom.com/2024-06-18-The-U-S-is-now-short-4-5-million-homes-as-the-housing-deficit-grows">4.5 million homes</a> in 2022, a recent Zillow report found. And that same year the number of US families increased by 1.8 million, but just 1.4 million housing units were built.The Democratic candidate also said she plans to expand the existing <a target="_blank" href="https://www.huduser.gov/portal/datasets/lihtc.html">low-income housing tax credit</a>, which incentivizes the rehabilitation or building of housing targeted at lower-income households."Harris is trying to increase the supply of townhomes, duplexes, and condos, so that people can have an easier step onto the housing ladder than what they currently have," Daryl Fairweather, chief economist at the real estate firm Redfin, told BI.Fairweather added that Trump has talked a little bit about cutting red tape, referring to building permits and zoning laws that prevent new housing developments, but that he hasn't provided details. He also said he would <a target="_blank" class="" href="https://www.eenews.net/articles/trump-vows-hell-cut-regs-to-build-housing-on-federal-land/">designate more federal land</a> for housing.Some experts have concerns that Trump's <a target="_blank" class="" href="https://www.businessinsider.com/trumps-tariff-outlook-trade-policy-income-tax-consequences-fiscal-crisis-2024-7">high tariff proposals</a> on materials like steel would make it harder to build housing. <a target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" class="c-link" href="https://www.piie.com/sites/default/files/2024-05/pb24-1.pdf">A report</a> published in May from the nonpartisan think tank Peterson Institute for International Economics predicts they will make construction more expensive. High construction costs have been a major factor in the US' <a target="_blank" class="" href="https://www.businessinsider.com/why-theres-a-housing-shortage-not-enough-homes-high-prices-2022-5">underbuilding of homes</a>.On the campaign trail, the former president has remarked that the housing supply will improve once <a target="_blank" class="" href="https://www.businessinsider.com/jd-vance-deport-20-million-immigrants-reduce-home-prices-rents-2024-7">millions of people are deported</a> from the country. Builders have argued that such an effort would only <a target="_blank" class="" href="https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/2024-election/trump-immigration-deportations-home-building-costs-rcna172886">drive up costs</a>, as immigrant labor makes up a vital part of the construction industry.Trump has also said he would <a target="_blank" href="https://www.cnn.com/2024/09/06/business/undocumented-immigrants-trump-mortgage-ban/index.html">ban mortgages for undocumented immigrants</a> to decrease demand on the housing market. <a target="_blank" class="" href="https://www.cnn.com/2024/09/06/business/undocumented-immigrants-trump-mortgage-ban/index.html">Experts have said</a> this group makes up a small portion of the US mortgage market.<h2 id="6cfbfb8d-3edd-447a-a479-1e8d09b5bb3b">First-time homebuyer assistance</h2>Harris has proposed offering up to <a target="_blank" href="https://www.businessinsider.com/harris-down-payment-assistance-plan-25000-housing-crisis-affordability-zillow-2024-8">$25,000 in down-payment assistance</a> for first-time homebuyers who have paid their rent on time for at least two years.Harris has also said she would offer tax incentives to homebuilders who prioritize "starter homes." Experts have said Harris' down-payment assistance plan would boost overall home prices because it would increase demand for mortgages <a target="_blank" class="" href="https://www.aei.org/research-products/report/determining-the-price-impact-of-harris-down-payment-assistance-proposal/">without solving supply issues</a>.Although Trump has said that he <a target="_blank" href="https://www.businessinsider.com/trump-biden-housing-crisis-policy-rising-home-prices-apartment-rents-2024-6">would offer tax incentives</a> to first-time homebuyers, his campaign has not released details about the amount of aid.As president, Trump proposed <a target="_blank" class="" href="https://www.businessinsider.com/trump-biden-housing-crisis-policy-rising-home-prices-apartment-rents-2024-6">major cuts</a> to the federal Department of Housing and Urban Development's budget, including slashing housing assistance and community development aid."Qualifying income for a household to be able to afford the typical price of a home right now is six figures," Jessica Lautz, the deputy chief economist and vice president of research at the National Association of Realtors, said. "That can be really impossible to imagine for someone who is a school teacher."<h2 id="622bc6c7-b5ce-4d83-9740-314714da24ed">Urban vs. rural housing</h2>In dense urban areas, Harris hopes her plan can usher in new construction by <a target="_blank" class="" href="https://www.businessinsider.com/yimbys-harris-housing-policy-walz-lower-home-prices-affordability-2024-8">removing some zoning restrictions</a> that prevent multifamily townhomes, condos, and duplexes from being built.Harris has emphasized her desire to expand housing in rural America in recent weeks. In a <a target="_blank" href="https://static.politico.com/6c/c1/6cc380c24392aef810eaf3ae648f/harris-campaign-rural-plan.pdf">memo</a> released in September, she said her plan would include $7.2 billion in infrastructure investments and potentially boost economic growth.While in the White House, Trump <a target="_blank" href="https://www.wsj.com/articles/well-protect-americas-suburbs-11597608133">opposed</a> the construction of high-density housing in single-family zoned areas, arguing that he would "save" the suburbs from the Democratic Party. It's unclear if Trump still wants to pursue similar policies.While in office in 2017, Trump proposed a budget for the 2018 fiscal year that <a target="_blank" href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/post-nation/wp/2017/05/23/heavy-cuts-to-rural-development-and-infrastructure-in-latest-trump-budget/">would have significantly cut</a> rural housing subsidies. The bulk of these proposals never came to fruition.<h2 id="e4a11dbe-840d-4cd2-960e-91b271fa111b">Action against big landlords</h2>Harris has said she will take action against "<a target="_blank" href="https://www.businessinsider.com/kamala-harris-ban-landlords-raising-rent-algorithms-realpage-2024-8">corporate landlords</a>," and call on Congress to remove tax benefits from investors who acquire 50 or more single-family rental homes. Her planned investment in a federal innovation fund would also incentivize cities to build more rental options.This is in response to <a target="_blank" href="https://www.census.gov/newsroom/press-releases/2024/renter-households-cost-burdened-race.html">nearly half</a> of America's renters in 2024 being considered "cost-burdened," meaning at least 30% of their income goes to housing. In some cities, <a target="_blank" href="https://www.businessinsider.com/cities-wage-growth-rent-increases-texas-housing-costs-florida-nyc-2024-5">higher rents are also outpacing wages</a>.While Trump has called for the construction of more housing — which would include rental units and homes — he has not provided details about how his plan would specifically impact renters. While in office, Trump <a target="_blank" href="https://www.presidency.ucsb.edu/documents/executive-order-13945-fighting-the-spread-covid-19-providing-assistance-renters-and#:~:text=Prior%20to%20passage%20of%20the%20Coronavirus%20Aid,">implemented</a> a temporary eviction moratorium to keep Americans housed during the pandemic.

How the cost of housing is expected to change under Trump or Harris

<ul class="summary-list"><li>The Fed's interest rate cut will ease financing conditions for homebuilders, analysts told BI.</li><li>But other issues will keep supply constrained, from material costs to labor shortages.</li></ul>The Federal Reserve's rate cut will surely impact the housing market, but its effect likely won't affect arguably the most important part of the equation: keeping affordability tight. To be sure, elevated borrowing costs are partially to blame for the affordability crisis plaguing US home buyers, and lowering them will offer relief.Rates soared to multi-decade highs a year ago, and further reductions in the Fed's benchmark rate should help bring borrowing costs down over time. However, it'll also add to the supply-demand imbalance, as more buyers are lured off the sidelines by cheaper mortgages. Pressures will rise for <a target="_blank" class="" href="https://www.businessinsider.com/us-housing-affordability-home-shortage-market-construction-population-cities-zillow-2024-6">new housing construction to meet demand</a>, but financing is still tight for home builders, stifling momentum to bring more housing online.According to the National Association of Home Builders, manufacturing loans climbed from near 5% lows to 13% since March 2022."The more immediate effect for housing from the rate cut is going to be seen in the builder and the land developer loan conditions," Danushka Nanayakkara-Skillington, NAHB's associate vice president of forecasting, told Business Insider.But how this translates into a much-needed supply boost is a different story, and there are factors the Fed cut won't fix.Lingering uncertaintiesFor instance, Nanayakkara-Skillington noted that material pricing, from drywall to steel mill products, has weighed heavily on homebuilders since the pandemic.While <a target="_blank" href="https://markets.businessinsider.com/news/commodities/lumber-prices-plunge-home-building-season-demand-falls-flat-2024-6">lumber costs</a> have normalized, she expects a <a target="_blank" href="https://www.nahb.org/blog/2024/08/canadian-lumber-tariffs">recent tariff hike</a> on Canadian wood to increase prices in the coming months.Tariffs on Chinese transformers — which NAHB considers a "<a target="_blank" href="https://www.nahb.org/advocacy/top-priorities/material-costs/transformers">sorely</a>" needed component delaying housing projects — have caused prices to jump 73% in the last four years, she said.There are also shortages to consider. Nanayakkara-Skillington cited that 57% of surveyed homebuilders say there are not enough lots to build on, adding pricing pressure to the available supply.Urban Institute senior fellow Michael Neal told BI that local regulation is needed to remedy this issue. Zoning challenges should be addressed to unleash lot availability, he said, while inspection costs and timelines should be reduced.But the biggest issue is a lack of skilled workers, Nanayakkara-Skillington said. "Because we lost about a million construction workers during the Great Recession, we still lack that. So we need people desperately to come into the trades," she said, citing that there are about 250,000 open jobs right now.Nonetheless, the Fed cuts should improve homebuilder sentiment in the coming months after a period of declines amid high borrowing costs, both analysts said. Dim views on existing homesWhile it's difficult to forecast when the housing market will come back into balance, much depends on whether lower rates entice homeowners to start selling.According to Fitch Ratings, that's unlikely for now.Since most owners hold a mortgage rate well below the current 6% level, mortgage rates will need to fall significantly lower to boost supply, which will only happen if the Fed keeps cutting. The rating agency noted that about 24% of outstanding mortgages are priced above 5%, meaning that homeowners will stay put until rates hit that level. This won't happen until 2027, Fitch said."While new home inventory has grown by 29% since the start of the pandemic, improving the supply of existing homes, which are approximately 80% housing sales, is necessary to improve prices and housing market activity," the agency said.At the same time, easing Fed policy might not stir housing activity for another reason, Neal said."Part of the Fed's decision, I think, reflected concerns about whether or not people will have jobs," he noted. "At the same time, if you think rates are going to fall today, do you think rates are going to fall tomorrow?"This thinking might cause people to delay further, he said.Wherever supply comes to stand, a knock-on effect of lower rates and higher builder sentiment may be felt in the stock market. In the past three of five rate cutting cycles, the bank noted that homebuilder shares outperformed the S&amp;P 500 in the three-months following the first cut.

Rate cuts might make it cheaper to buy a house, but they won't fix the US housing market's biggest problem 

<ul class="summary-list"><li>Some American workers are encountering an unpleasant surprise when they reach <keyword id="25452" type="General" weightage="20" keywordseo="retirement" source="Orion">retirement</keyword>.</li><li>Murky provisions slash <keyword id="19966945" type="General" weightage="100" keywordseo="social-security" source="keywords">Social Security</keyword> for people who work in both the government and private sector throughout their careers.</li></ul>Patrice Earnest, 66, expected to have much more money for retirement. But after her husband died, she checked her <a target="_blank" class="" href="https://www.businessinsider.com/retirement-savings-social-security-baby-boomers-without-savings-401k-poverty-2024-8">Social Security survivor benefits</a>. The total: $0. "It's absolutely stunning," Earnest said. "My husband worked all his life since he was 16 bagging groceries, and that Social Security was something we had planned to have in our retirement." Earnest won't see a penny of the benefits her husband worked for — and it's due to her work history, not his. She's one of a few million Americans who see cuts to either their own Social Security benefits or to their <keyword id="44080" type="General" weightage="20" keywordseo="survivor" source="Orion">survivor</keyword> benefits when a spouse dies because they have a career history that includes both government and private sector jobs. The idea is to ensure public servants with pensions don't get overly generous retirement benefits, keeping people like Earnest from receiving full benefits from both a government pension and Social Security. But like many people affected by this, Earnest was caught by surprise — throwing her retirement budget for a loop. The two provisions at play here are the Windfall Elimination Provision and the Government Pension Offset, or <keyword id="19921812" type="General" weightage="20" keywordseo="wep" source="keywords">WEP</keyword> and GPO for short. They typically affect middle-class workers in select states who spent some time in a public-sector job, such as teachers, firefighters, and police officers, with government pensions and no Social Security taxes. The measures reduce Social Security benefits accrued during private-sector work to compensate for the state or local government pension benefits. Even a short time with a pension can trigger cuts to Social Security that workers might have earned in a private sector role. WEP reduces a worker's own Social Security benefits, while GPO applies to spousal or widower benefits like those Earnest expected to collect. "Certainly, I could use the extra money owed to me to pay the bills that I thought we could with a two-income household," she said. Right now, the provisions are part of a political firestorm over how the US should care for its older workers, with Social Security <a target="_blank" class="" href="https://www.businessinsider.com/when-will-social-security-benefits-run-out-retirement-crisis-boomers-2024-5">already imperiled</a> and many retirees struggling to pay their bills. On September 19, a bipartisan bill to eliminate WEP and GPO received the number of signatures needed for a vote in the <keyword id="19910021" type="General" weightage="20" keywordseo="house" source="keywords">House</keyword>. While supporters of WEP and GPO say they're necessary for ensuring equity, critics say they're applied unevenly across states and professions, sometimes resulting in benefit calculation mistakes. Those advocating for eliminating the provisions say they also hurt middle-class government workers the most. <h2>Unpredictable cuts to Social Security benefits make it impossible to plan for retirement</h2>The provisions can end up slashing your Social Security payments by up to half if you have a government pension, whether you were planning on survivor and spousal payouts or your own checks from time spent in the private sector. Workers with a private-sector 401(k), on the other hand, are not barred from collecting full Social Security. <keyword id="23551078" type="General" weightage="20" keywordseo="jane-roth" source="keywords">Jane Roth</keyword>, 74, a widow in New Haven, said she may have reconsidered becoming an educator if she had known about the provisions. <keyword id="20163067" type="General" weightage="20" keywordseo="roth" source="keywords">Roth</keyword> worked in the private sector before becoming a teacher. Because she pulled money out of her teacher retirement fund after six years of teaching to help finance life with a child, she said she has to work six extra years before cashing out her full pension. She's still teaching and has another 14 years before she can receive her full pension. In the meantime, she can't afford to live off the $32,000 she gets annually through her late husband's Social Security survivor benefits. If she retired now and started receiving her partial pension, she'd get even less because the GPO would kick in and zero out her survivor benefits. "What are my choices? Do I retire with a partial pension and lose 100% of my Social Security survivor benefits, or do I work until I am 88?" Roth said. "We are not asking for a handout. This is our money. They took our money and said this will be waiting for you upon retirement, and it's not." WEP and GPO were instituted in the 1980s to make retirement income more equitable, as many believed <a target="_blank" class="" href="https://www.businessinsider.com/how-retirement-of-peak-boomers-could-affect-economy-social-security-2024-4">workers with governmentpensions</a> had an advantage over Social Security recipients. But even pensions have become less of a sure economic bet, with <a target="_blank" class="" href="https://www.brookings.edu/articles/teacher-pensions-systems-are-increasingly-underfunded-making-teachers-vulnerable-and-salaries-less-attractive/">returns less funded</a> and many states <a target="_blank" class="" href="https://www.urban.org/sites/default/files/publication/101700/how_have_teacher_pensions_changed_since_the_great_recession_0.pdf">cutting back the benefits</a> they offer to teachers. "Essentially, it's a substitute," <keyword id="23551077" type="General" weightage="20" keywordseo="karen-smith" source="keywords">Karen Smith</keyword>, a senior fellow at the Income and Benefits Policy Center at the Urban Institute, said. "The reason they don't pay Social Security is because they have this alternate pension." Today, however, major criticisms center on the uneven application, <a target="_blank" class="" href="https://oig.ssa.gov/assets/uploads/a-13-20-50970.pdf">rampant errors</a>, and <a target="_blank" class="" href="https://www.aft.org/news/retirees-advocate-fairness-retirement-benefits">poor communication</a> with those impacted. WEP and GPO impact teachers in 15 states, while state, county, and municipal employees are penalized in 26 states. An audit by the Office of the Inspector General for the Social Security Administration <a target="_blank" class="" href="https://oig.ssa.gov/assets/uploads/a-13-20-50970.pdf">found</a> that WEP and GPO were two of the "leading causes of improper payments" in the system. According to <a target="_blank" class="" href="https://scottweisbenner.web.illinois.edu/RESEARCH/PAPERS/JPEF_Brown_Weisbenner.pdf">a 2013 paper,</a> the WEP reduces benefits disproportionately for lower-earning households in some<a target="_blank" href="https://scottweisbenner.web.illinois.edu/RESEARCH/PAPERS/JPEF_Brown_Weisbenner.pdf"> cases</a>. The Bipartisan Policy Center wrote in a July paper that limitations to WEP calculations resulted in "an imprecise approach to adjusting Social Security benefits." Many who support WEP and GPO, whether in their current or modified forms, say the math still has merit, as those affected by the provisions tend to be better off. The Social Security Administration reported the average monthly check as of July 2024 is about $1,783. Meanwhile, <a target="_blank" href="https://crsreports.congress.gov/product/pdf/RS/98-35/60">nearly half</a> of WEP-affected Social Security beneficiaries had pensions above $3,000 a month in 2023. Proponents of the provisions argue that because of how Social Security <a target="_blank" class="" href="https://www.businessinsider.com/personal-finance/investing/what-is-social-security">calculates benefits</a>, a worker who spent a short period of time in the private sector and the rest of their career working toward a public pension <a target="_blank" class="" href="https://www.urban.org/urban-wire/getting-rid-social-security-offsets-teachers-flunks-equity-test">could end up</a> getting a proportionally larger Social Security benefit than a worker making the same amount of money in the private sector for their whole career. Additionally, canceling WEP and GPO could worsen Social Security's financing, moving the depletion date for funds from 2035 to <a target="_blank" class="" href="https://www.businessinsider.com/when-will-social-security-run-out-pay-full-benefits-plan-2023-3">2034 or sooner</a>. According to the Urban Institute, this could disproportionately benefit those with higher incomes who have 401(k)s or other private retirement accounts. But some of those workers on the other end of the provision disagree. "I had a 76-year-old lady call me up. She taught for 40 years and retired, but recently her husband passed away. She lost all his earned benefits, and she's going to wind up either selling her house or lookfor a part-time job," said Janis Hernandez, a retired teacher in Louisiana, who sits on the communications committee for The National Task Force to Repeal the WEP and GPO. <h2>The future of WEP and GPO</h2>The Task Force <a target="_blank" href="https://ssfairness.org/gpo-wep-faq/">notes</a> that 83% of those penalized by the GPO are women, many of whom took time away from their careers to raise children and thus have less in Social Security than their spouses. Many impacted by the GPO also can't fully calculate their reductions until their spouse dies, like Earnest. Critics of the programs also note that there is no similar means testing for private-sector retirement plans. "If somebody is in the private sector and they've got a good 401(k), you don't tell them, 'Oh, we're not going to give you your Social Security,'" Louisiana Sen. Bill Cassidy, a Republican who's focused on Social Security solvency, told BI. WEP and GPO are front and center in Congress this month when the House of Representatives votes on the bipartisan <a target="_blank" href="https://www.congress.gov/bill/118th-congress/house-bill/82">Social Security Fairness Act</a>, which aims to eliminate both provisions. An alternative to eliminating the provisions completely is simplifying the formula for calculating Social Security benefits, which the Bipartisan Policy Center found would be less costly over time. As the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities finds, there's "widespread support" for a more proportional formula to calculate the amount these provisions shave off. But right now, any action on Social Security or altering those provisions may be a long shot, especially with the presidential election looming. Anne <keyword id="20223028" type="General" weightage="20" keywordseo="mcleod" source="keywords">McLeod</keyword>, 68, said the provisions can be punitive. In her 20s, McLeod worked various part-time and lower-paying clerical roles, all of which paid into Social Security. She then taught in New Orleans for 28 years and worked part-time jobs after school hours. She's retired now and gets $67 monthly in Social Security — $500 less than she would've gotten sans WEP. She gets $2,910 monthly in state retirement, and she creates and sells artwork for extra income. While she and her husband are up to date on their bills, they simplified their lives by selling their house and renting because it's cheaper. "It's almost like a punishment in a way because we chose to be educators or firemen or policemen," McLeod said. "They said you get a good enough retirement from the state, so you'll be OK not getting all your Social Security." Correction: October 1, 2024 — An earlier version of this article provided the wrong figure for Jane Roth's Social Security survivor benefits.

The Social Security curveballs making retirement even more confusing

Our homes should make us feel safe. A decent home is a refuge from the outside world, a relatively fixed point where people can drop their vigilance. Most of us need the security of home to stay balanced in the face of an unstable, sometimes frightening world.But Americans are increasingly less safe in their own homes. This isn't because of a sudden surge in crime (<a target="_blank" class="" href="https://www.businessinsider.com/us-murder-rate-dropped-by-13-percent-in-2023">which is actually declining in most places</a>) but because of climate and geography.Compared with much of the rest of the country, many of America's cities are well situated to weather the coming decades of the climate crisis. Their density makes them <a target="_blank" class="" href="https://www.businessinsider.com/passive-house-energy-efficient-lower-utility-bills-2023-7">more energy-efficient</a> — partly because residents tend to drive less and apartments are easier to keep cool than single-family homes. They also have more robust emergency-services infrastructure than rural areas and are situated further from fire-prone wooded areas.But as <a target="_blank" class="" href="https://www.businessinsider.com/yimbys-winning-lower-house-prices-rents-build-more-homes-neighborhoods-2023-9">local zoning and resident opposition</a> have made it nearly impossible to build housing in these cities, would-be residents are pushed into more treacherous areas. In some parts of the country, the only affordable homes for middle-class households are in areas prone to disasters. The people who move to those high-risk areas are being robbed of the security that everyone should be able to enjoy in their homes. Because of our collective refusal to build more housing where it is most needed, millions of people live with elevated climate risk.Until we act, more of those people are fated to lose their homes — or their lives.<h2>The heat is on</h2>As is increasingly routine, extreme heat has been roasting much of the United States this summer. <a target="_blank" href="https://www.azfamily.com/2024/07/05/heatwave-hell-phoenix-high-temp-soars-118-shattering-previous-record/">Phoenix hit a daily high of 118 degrees</a> in June, breaking a 40-year-old record. In Texas, a broiling July heat wave caused power outages for millions of people and clogged hospitals with patients who could not be safely discharged to homes that lacked air conditioning. These heat waves have deadly consequences: <a target="_blank" class="" href="https://www.businessinsider.com/dangers-extreme-summer-heat-united-states-poverty-air-conditioning-access-2023-8">Extreme heat killed 2,302 Americans</a> in 2023 alone.While many parts of the country have faced high temperatures this year, the danger has not been evenly distributed. Where I live, across the bay from San Francisco, thermometers climbed into the mid-80s — not exactly pleasant for perspiration-prone Ashkenazi men such as myself, but tolerable. Further-inland locales like California's fast-growing Central Valley, on the other hand, have been getting positively scorched. On the West Coast, the safest place to be in a heat wave tends to be near the Pacific Ocean. But that's not where people are moving. Thanks to the city's anemic new-housing growth, the population of San Francisco (average daily high in July: 66 degrees) has stagnated for years while home prices have soared. Growth has been faster and more consistent in white-hot cities like Fresno (98 degrees), Sacramento (93 degrees), and Bakersfield (98 degrees), where housing is more abundant but deadly heat is far more common. The Golden State's land-use patterns are putting middle-class and working-class households at a higher risk of exposure to extreme, possibly fatal, heat. This split is a miniature version of the trend playing out across the US: Migration is pushing more people into harm's way. The fastest-growing states in the country are in the Sun Belt: Texas, Florida, Georgia, and the Carolinas. The Sun Belt also happens to be the part of the country <a target="_blank" class="" href="https://www.businessinsider.com/real-estate-housing-market-prediction-sun-belt-climate-change-zelman-2024-7">most at risk of extreme heat</a> as the climate crisis gets worse. There were <a target="_blank" href="https://www.texastribune.org/2024/01/12/texas-heat-deaths-2023-record-climate-change/">more than 300 heat-related deaths in Texas</a> last year. And that's to say nothing of the risk Gulf states face from hurricanes, which climate change has similarly exacerbated.The shift to the Sun Belt isn't part of some sublimated death drive or a desire to test the limits of modern sunscreen. The reason for the mass movement is pretty simple: People are going where they can afford housing. Compare homebuilding in Houston (average daily July high of 95 degrees) with homebuilding in San Francisco. I've found that <a target="_blank" href="https://cayimby.org/reports/housing-first/">Houston had roughly three times as many housing starts per capita in 2021 as San Francisco</a>, and even in parts of the past decade where Houston's housing starts dipped a bit, <a target="_blank" class="" href="https://www.businessinsider.com/houston-building-cheap-new-starter-homes-real-estate-construction-lots-2024-1">they were still significantly higher than San Francisco's</a>. No wonder, then, that a one-bedroom apartment in <a target="_blank" class="" href="https://www.businessinsider.com/austin-real-estate-housing-market-prices-houston-zoning-affordable-2023-8">Houston costs half as much</a> as one in San Francisco, even though Houston has increased its population by more than 200,000 residents since 2010. Houston's ability to build more housing than San Francisco comes down to the rules the two cities impose on the construction of new housing. The same could be said of much of the rest of the Sun Belt. Houston is an extreme example because it literally does not have a zoning code, but in general, Sun Belt cities tend to have much looser zoning and permitting rules than high-cost California cities.Even within many states, new housing tends to get built in the areas most vulnerable to climate disasters. Once again, take California: San Francisco and other exclusionary coastal towns block new housing, so much of the state's homebuilding takes the form of single-family sprawl deep into extremely hot inland, low-lying areas or into what's called the <a target="_blank" href="https://affiliate.insider.com?h=92a86309da8af9c28c10ca5b6aa5757a3e91f2f44f8b02e2d254a15f222499c9&amp;postID=66c33fc47d61a86c186c52d0&amp;postSlug=affordable-home-house-prices-americans-danger-death-climate-change-2024-8&amp;site=bi&amp;u=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.nature.com%2Farticles%2Fs41598-022-09707-7">wildland-urban interface</a>: the part of the state where forest fires crash up against human habitation, with deadly results. Ironically, some of this allocation is done under the cover of environmentalism. The California Environmental Quality Act requires developers to go through a convoluted environmental-review process to get their projects approved. While California's legislature has spent the past few years expanding the types of projects that are exempt from the law, it's still a powerful tool that not-in-my-backyarders, or NIMBYs, can use to block development in their neighborhoods. Unsurprisingly, the threat of CEQA litigation tends to loom largest in affluent, exclusive communities; the risk of litigation is lowest in sparsely populated areas, where there are few residents to complain about new housing. Thus the law actually creates an incentive to concentrate development in the wildland-urban interface, away from the more densely populated areas that also happen to be more fire-resistant.To be sure, income and climate risk are not perfectly correlated; <a target="_blank" class="" href="https://www.businessinsider.com/million-nantucket-beach-house-sold-200k-after-erosion-swallows-land-2024-7">several wealthy enclaves</a> are at <a target="_blank" class="" href="https://www.businessinsider.com/nantucket-homes-wealthy-falling-into-ocean-erosion-climate-2024-5">risk of coastal erosion</a>. And a fair amount of high-value real estate is nestled in the wildland-urban interface, as the San Francisco Bay Area learned during the 1991 Oakland Hills fires and as Los Angeles learned during the 2018 Woolsey fire that chewed up Malibu. But America's housing shortage tends to distribute climate-related suffering along class lines. Even if they manage to avoid sudden catastrophes, people who have been pushed out to the urban periphery may well face subtler long-term consequences. If living in a wildfire-prone area doesn't kill you or destroy your house, it can still increase your exposure to toxic smoke, <a target="_blank" class="" href="https://www.businessinsider.com/symptoms-poor-air-quality-exposure-harms-health-wildfire-smoke">which can lead to serious respiratory and cardiovascular conditions</a>. Beyond the risks from heat, fire, and smoke inhalation are the more quotidian harms of being geographically cut off from the center of a metropolitan area. In 2010, nearly 10% of Americans lived in areas where it would take them more than an hour to reach a trauma-care center in the event of an emergency. For those who work in the central city, even the long commute from the exurbs can be dangerous. <a target="_blank" class="" href="https://www.businessinsider.com/public-transportation-commuting-health-driving-2015-2">Long car commutes</a> have been <a target="_blank" class="" href="https://www.businessinsider.com/commuting-by-car-is-hurting-peoples-mental-health-2023-7">associated with higher blood pressure</a>, and that's to <a target="_blank" class="" href="https://www.businessinsider.com/ways-your-commute-is-slowly-killing-you-2016-2">say nothing of the other risks</a> associated with a long ride in a country where traffic collisions <a target="_blank" class="" href="https://www.businessinsider.com/vehicle-related-deaths-increase-car-safety-pedestrians-cyclists-2023-9">kill more than 40,000 people each year</a>. If we could somehow wish away the large and growing risk of climate disasters, sprawl would still be bad for American public health.<h2>What makes a home</h2>In his book about Hurricane Katrina, the historian Andy Horowitz writes that "disasters are less discrete events than they are contingent processes." The true disaster is not the hurricane on its own but how the hurricane collides with society, politics, and infrastructure. A hurricane of a certain strength, speed, and rainfall can have drastically different effects depending on whether it makes landfall in an uninhabited area, a thoroughly prepared city, or a city with inadequate levees, entrenched patterns of residential segregation, and an ill-equipped emergency-response system.Similarly, the safety of our communities is directly tied to choices about where, how, and why we build them. Sure, small things like doing controlled burns, making air conditioning more widely available, and building better evacuation routes can reduce some of the dangers created by pushing people out to the periphery. But we have a moral imperative to allow more homebuilding in the parts of the country that are already well positioned to accept more people. While NIMBYs have cleverly cited environmental concerns to block housing development in these areas, making it possible for more people to live in them is essential to sustainably and safely growing our country for the next generation.<a target="_blank" rel="" href="https://www.businessinsider.com/author/ned-resnikoff">Ned Resnikoff</a> is the policy director of California YIMBY and co-leader of the Metropolitan Abundance Project.

The deadly cost of America's housing crisis

From the moment Wende Zomnir answers my call, it's like I can feel rays of California sun beaming through the phone.While I'm settled in a New Jersey suburb, she's enjoying Newport Beach, California. It's where the beauty mogul runs her latest cosmetics venture out of a Zomnir-described "surf shack" that sits in front of the ocean.Natural light filters through every window, and a mix of beauty products, succulents, and driftwood decorates seafoam-green shelves beyond the rainbow-painted entryway."I was just lifting in my garage gym before this interview," she told me. "You can see the beach from here."<div type="image" title="Wende Zomnir using a Caliray lip gloss." height="3000" width="2001" msid="111713106" hostid="261" sizebytes="305274"></div>If you're unfamiliar with Zomnir's name, you're certainly acquainted with her work. She cofounded Urban Decay in 1996 and created the brand's most iconic products. Remember the beloved <a target="_blank" href="https://www.businessinsider.com/urban-decay-naked-palette-discontinued-sale-2018-8">Naked eyeshadow palette</a>? Yeah, it was her idea.She led the brand to reach $1 billion in annual sales and sold the company to <a target="_blank" href="https://www.businessinsider.com/meet-richest-woman-world-francoise-bettencourt-meyers-loreal-2023-9">L'Oréal</a> in 2012. Less than a decade later, Zomnir launched a sustainability-focused beauty venture called Caliray.But she's not starting over. Zomnir is simply expanding on something she's been doing for years."I tried making eyeshadow compacts out of corn plastic 15 years ago. And Urban Decay was the first brand to have all recycled paper cartons," she told BI. "So it's not like Caliray's wellness and sustainability is a 180 departure from Urban Decay. It wasn't part of the brand's messaging, but it was always part of my personal vision."<h2 id="1045af10-9a97-4402-95e7-5a9d6aa71f63">'Makeup is in my blood'</h2>Zomnir grew up in Texas, where blush was bold, and hair was sky-high.Her beauty memories start early. She recalls sneaking into her mom's bathroom, the smell of her makeup drawer, and the eyeshadow brush that seemed like the "biggest, fluffiest in the world."Zomnir has also never forgotten the massive Calvin Klein makeup kit her mom gifted her around age 13."It was probably the best Christmas gift I've ever gotten, other than this giant diamond ring my husband bought me a few years ago," she added with a laugh.Despite her innate love for makeup — and a college job selling Elizabeth Arden skincare at a department store — Zomnir didn't envision a career in beauty."My customers were all in their 70s and 80s, and the women I worked with were in their 50s and 60s," she said. "They were amazing, like moms to me, but that had been their career. They'd talk to me about progressing mine, and I would think: 'Oh no no, I'm not doing this.'"Zomnir went into advertising, working an internship at Leo Burnett Worldwide that turned into a job working on cosmetic advertising accounts. Her career took her to California in the mid-'90s, where her life changed forever.Zomnir's friend was engaged to a man who worked as an asset manager for Sandy Lerner, the cofounder of Cisco Systems. When Lerner told him she'd set her sights on makeup and wanted to create a brand, he called Zomnir and asked if she'd like to meet with the tech entrepreneur."I was thinking, 'How can we possibly break this giant beauty industry?' She looked at me and said: 'Well, I broke tech. Why can't we break beauty?'" Zomnir recalled. "So I quit my job and jumped in. Sandy and I started Urban Decay." <h2 id="8cfd8094-66ee-4e6e-a8a4-a84a608cac56">No regrets; just makeup</h2>Urban Decay is famously known as one of the first indie beauty brands to make it big. At its peak, Zomnir said the company was selling at least one Naked palette every few seconds and had gone global, largely thanks to help from L'Oréal.<div type="image" title="Wende Zomnir at an Urban Decay party in 2018." height="2000" width="3000" msid="111713103" hostid="261" sizebytes="515674"></div>Zomnir left in 2022, a decision she made when she felt Urban Decay needed a "fresh perspective," she told <a target="_blank" href="https://www.beautyindependent.com/caliray-founder-wende-zomnir-urban-decay-today-clean-beauty-shoppers/">Beauty Independent,</a> and a chance to fully acclimate to L'Oréal's branding. The founder told BI she's at peace with the brand now being out of her control."Are you ever going to completely align with someone else's creative vision for your brand? Nope. You're not," she said, pointing to the brand's Moon Dust eyeshadows as an example."I don't love the new package they put them in, but it's the same formula," Zomnir said of the powder products, now encased in see-through acrylic squares rather than small, silver spheres."But I get a lot of satisfaction from the fact that many of the things I created are still the top sellers and top of the industry," she added. "Moon Dust shadows, the Naked palettes, the 24/7 pencils — all of those are things I cooked up."She's still close with many people who brought the brand to the top with her. Zomnir said she attended a "mini-reunion" with ex-Urban Decay employees at the Caliray office the night before our call. Attendees included L'Oréal group president Carol Hamilton, beauty veteran Tara Simon, and, in true Urban Decay fashion, lots of pets."This is very emotional and top of mind for me," Zomnir said, reflecting on her past role. "While I was there, I'd look around and see a couple hundred people spread across a few buildings, all working toward a really unique and amazing mission."<div type="image" title="Wende Zomnir." height="1620" width="1080" msid="111713101" hostid="261" sizebytes="67356"></div><h2 id="079e9c71-3d92-4a1b-b006-e6b5aab60763">Starting fresh with Caliray</h2>Conceptualizing a new makeup brand with a California aesthetic was a no-brainer for Zomnir.While on the road promoting Urban Decay, she noticed that people asked her the same questions: What's California like? Does she surf and do yoga? Does she eat kale for breakfast, lunch, and dinner?Then Zomnir took a surfing trip with her family and noticed a surplus of plastic trash across the island.Sustainability was always important to her. She introduced a biodynamic garden to the Urban Decay office so that employees could harvest their meals and ensured that eco-friendly materials like cork and bamboo were used throughout its office furniture and supplies.But she knew she could make even bigger changes."I thought about all the Naked palettes that are probably in landfills right now, and I was like, 'We have to do a better job,'" she said.So, she officially launched Caliray in 2021. Its makeup, made with skin-friendly ingredients, is meant to be effortlessly applied. Its packaging, however, utilizes recycled plastic, sugarcane barrels, algae and vegetable ink, and other eco-friendly components."What we're trying to do is get the most recycled plastic we can into everything," Zomnir said. "We're trying to use glass and not coat it with materials that render it unrecyclable."Those shiny, plastic lipstick tubes that look like metal? They're a no-go for Caliray."They're beautiful, but it takes a <a target="_blank" href="https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0160412021002476">highly toxic process</a> that really pollutes the air environment to make them," she said. "We're trying to be cognizant, not only of the materials we use but how we treat those materials."A Caliray press representative cites the brand's <a target="_blank" href="https://caliraybeauty.com/shop/product/come-hell-or-high-water-clean-mascara">Come Hell or High Water mascara</a> as its most popular product. It's followed by its <a target="_blank" href="https://caliraybeauty.com/shop/product/so-blown?variant=42815579881661">So Blown primer</a>, which the brand says has sold out seven times at Sephora.Both products are also extremely popular on TikTok. Caliray's mascara first <a target="_blank" href="https://www.tiktok.com/@katie.org/video/7182695170972863786?is_from_webapp=1&amp;sender_device=pc&amp;web_id=7381479116761663022">went viral in 2022</a> and is still regularly discussed <a target="_blank" href="https://www.tiktok.com/discover/mascara-caliray">on the platform</a> today.The representative also said Caliray is expected to reach $18 million in sales this year and was named one of the most innovative brands by <a target="_blank" href="https://www.fastcompany.com/91034298/caliray-most-innovative-companies-2024">Fast Company</a> in March. BI couldn't independently confirm that estimate. <h2 id="1567da92-d2d7-4f46-8dcb-3cfc99fb3f4e">Doing things the Zomnir way</h2>Zomnir's Caliray surf shack doesn't run like a typical office.<div type="image" title="Inside the Caliray surf shack." height="4032" width="3024" msid="111713105" hostid="261" sizebytes="729420"></div>"Deliveries come, and we all basically get up out of our chairs and haul boxes into the product closet," Zomnir said. "It's scrappy, but it's fun. I love having my hands dirty and understanding every little aspect of the business."Starting a new venture is difficult, even for a beauty veteran. The days of beauty consumers being loyal to one specific brand are long gone."There's not even loyalty to favorite products anymore, which is OK. That's the customer's choice," Zomnir said. "But as a brand, it's your job to make products so good, and the packaging and the branding so compelling, that even if they stray, they do come back to you."That's why she's stuck with her tried-and-true business method: starting from the bottom and naturally working her way up."You can throw $20 million at something, get it launched, drive the awareness, and make it successful," she said. "But I do think there's something to be said for starting really, really granular. I started with almost no employees."And in doing so, Zomnir can finally take a step back and enjoy everything she's created — so far, of course."I just graduated my youngest child from high school, so I really want to take the time he's out of the house to experience more and spend some more time with friends. And to be super honest, to keep myself from crying every day," she said.She's also booked a ticket for a vacation with friends and is slowly but surely passing on some of her workload to Caliray colleagues."Hopefully, I can be an even better visionary for them now that I'm able to take my hands off the reins," she said.

Wende Zomnir revolutionized makeup with Urban Decay. She's not done building her empire.

<ul class="summary-list"><li>Nevada is facing skyrocketing housing costs.</li><li>Reno Mayor Hillary Schieve says city leaders should cut regulations that stymie construction.</li></ul>The mayor of Reno, Nevada, argues that the single best thing city leaders can do to help solve one of the country's worst housing shortages is to loosen regulations on housing construction.In recent years, Mayor Hillary Schieve has launched a multi-pronged approach to do just that."Sometimes government needs to get out of the way," she told Business Insider in a recent interview. There's no quick solution, said Schieve, who isn't a member of either major party and has made housing and homelessness a top priority.With the election approaching, Nevada voters <a target="_blank" class="" href="https://www.nytimes.com/2024/09/16/business/economy/nevada-economy-unemployment-election.html">cite the economy</a> as among their top concerns. Rising home prices and rents, which have hit the Sunbelt state particularly hard, are a big part of that. Since January 2017, home prices have risen 90% and rents are up 53% in Nevada, far outstripping national growth rates, Alex Horowitz, the director of Pew's housing-policy project, told Business Insider.<h2 id="401ef500-7df2-405a-b9eb-f7ead571dd5b">Greasing the wheels for housing</h2>Nevada had one of the highest rates of home foreclosures in the country after the 2008 financial crisis slammed <a target="_blank" class="" href="https://knpr.org/show/knprs-state-of-nevada/2018-09-10/its-been-a-decade-since-nevada-fell-into-an-economic-abyss">its tourism-reliant economy</a> and burst its severe housing bubble. In the years since, the state has leveraged low taxes and other business-friendly policies to attract major employers like Amazon, Apple, and Tesla. The new jobs have helped attract hundreds of thousands of new residents.The pandemic and the rise of remote work supercharged that trend. With an <a target="_blank" class="" href="https://www.reviewjournal.com/business/housing/how-many-californians-have-moved-to-nevada-since-2020-3032074/">influx of new residents</a>, demand for housing — and subsequently its cost — has soared. In Reno, the median price of a single-family home has increased <a target="_blank" class="" href="https://www.washoecounty.gov/assessor/real_property/SalesHistoryChart.php">more than 40% since 2019</a>.As mayor, Schieve has celebrated the new jobs and the growth of arts and culture in Reno and its surroundings. But she's also concerned with the housing shortage and <a target="_blank" class="" href="https://www.rgj.com/story/news/local/2024/05/07/homeless-population-washoe-county/73605507007/">rising homelessness</a>. When it comes to boosting affordable housing, she pointed to cutting red tape and making building easier, including by loosening zoning laws and burdensome environmental regulations.Under Schieve, Reno has loosened some of its regulations by allowing for more density, reducing parking requirements, and cutting fees. Since 2019, the city says it has waived $11 million in sewer hookup fees and $700,00 in building permit fees to help bring more than 2,000 units of affordable housing to the market.Through a program called "1,000 homes in 120 days," the city deferred sewer and permit fees for five years for market-rate housing construction, which the city says helped create more than 500 new homes between its implementation in late 2019 and earlier this year.Schieve, the former chairwoman of the US Conference of Mayors, said Reno's rules regarding affordable housing construction are relatively lenient. However, she argued that some county and state regulations slow down home building, inflating costs and deterring new construction.She took particular issue with county health department regulations that impose lengthy review processes. "Most developers are borrowing money," she said. "So time is money." Schieve's chief of staff noted that swimming pool construction, including in housing developments and hotels, "takes an incredible amount of time and an incredible amount of money" to get approved by the department.Reno has also made some progress on emergency and transitional housing. Schieve received <a target="_blank" class="" href="https://www.wsj.com/us-news/reno-nevada-homelessness-solution-674cee2d">national attention</a> for reducing the number of unhoused people living on Reno's streets by nearly 60% between 2022 and 2023. The reduction was largely due to the construction of a Nevada Cares Campus, an emergency shelter that can house up to 600 people in sleeping pods and a large tent.<h2 id="b9ff010c-649b-4677-a22b-3b02162f6584">Nevada's housing issues take center stage in the presidential election</h2>President Joe Biden has visited Nevada multiple times <a target="_blank" class="" href="https://nevadacurrent.com/2024/03/19/in-las-vegas-campaign-stop-biden-details-plans-to-make-housing-more-affordable/">to talk about housing</a>, and his administration's policies have <a target="_blank" class="" href="https://mynews4.com/news/local/reno-receiving-35-million-in-federal-funds-to-tackle-affordable-housing-and-homelessness">helped bolster</a> the state's housing efforts.Schieve called the housing funding Reno received through the 2021 American Rescue Plan a "godsend." And she praised the Biden administration for being accessible and responsive to her city's housing needs. "We can pick up the phone and I can call my HUD secretary, I can call someone at the White House," Schieve said. The acting HUD secretary, Adrianne Todman, has visited Reno twice in the last year.Former President Donald Trump's campaign has also emphasized housing issues in Nevada, focusing largely on its proposal to deport millions of immigrants to free up housing. "We've got to build more houses and we've got to deport the illegal aliens so that American homes go to American citizens," vice presidential candidate JD Vance <a target="_blank" class="" href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9pPCCh_t4h8">told a crowd in Las Vegas in October</a>.Schieve dismissed this proposal. "We've got to be realistic about how we approach housing," she said. "That's not going to solve anything."There are aspects of housing policy that Trump and Vice President Kamala Harris appear to agree on, including <a target="_blank" class="" href="https://www.businessinsider.com/homes-free-government-land-real-estate-housing-prices-harris-trump-2024-8">opening up federal land for additional homes</a>. Nevada has become a focus of this particular solution as 85% of the state's land area is owned by the federal government.Schieve says the issue of opening up government-owned land is complex. It depends on factors like the cost of new infrastructure, including roads and water hookups, the expansion of services like law enforcement, and environmental concerns. She supports restricting home construction in environmentally fragile areas, including wetlands and flood-prone regions.In general, she wants to see cities like Reno invest in rebuilding their urban cores and boosting density rather than sprawl."There's still a lot of blight," she said. "There's still a lot of work for cities to build up and not out."

A Nevada mayor is battling one of the worst housing shortages in the US. Her solution: looser construction regulation.

<ul class="summary-list"><li><a target="_blank" class="" href="https://www.businessinsider.com/kamala-harris">Vice President Kamala Harris</a> shared a plan to build 3 million new homes in her first policy speech.</li><li>Housing experts told Business Insider that targeting America's housing supply shortage is critical.</li></ul>Vice President Kamala Harris' <a target="_blank" class="" href="https://www.businessinsider.com/kamala-harris-economy-proposal-25k-first-time-homebuyers-down-payent-2024-8">newest housing proposal</a> is giving YIMBY — and that's great news for the housing market, where supply has been unable to keep pace with demand, forcing prices up and buyers out.The Democratic presidential candidate revealed the first details of her new economic agenda on Friday, which she hopes to implement during her first 100 days in office. A key part of her proposal involves building 3 million new homes over a four-year period.It slots neatly into the <a target="_blank" class="" href="https://www.businessinsider.com/yimbys-winning-lower-house-prices-rents-build-more-homes-neighborhoods-2023-9">YIMBY movement</a>, which stands for "Yes, In My BackYard," and is a pro-development movement focusing on increasing high-density and affordable housing supply by targeting barriers to new building. (It's a counter to the NIMBY, or "Not In My BackYard" movement.)Harris said Friday that her administration plans to build 3 million units by working in partnership with workers and the private sector to go after obstacles in the way of new construction at both the state and local level."There's a serious <a target="_blank" class="" href="https://www.businessinsider.com/us-housing-affordability-home-shortage-market-construction-population-cities-zillow-2024-6">housing shortage</a>," Harris said on Friday. "In many places, it's too difficult to build, and it's driving prices up. As president, I will work in partnership with industry to build the housing we need both to rent and to buy."Housing policy experts say that's the most crucial aspect of her multi-pronged plan, because what the market needs most right now is <a target="_blank" class="" href="https://www.businessinsider.com/buying-a-home-new-construction-shortage-supply-mortgage-rates-housing-2024-6">greater supply</a>.Jung Hyun Choi, principal research associate at the Urban Institute's Housing Finance Policy Center, said the lack of supply "is the root cause of the current problem" with the housing market, adding that Harris' proposal to build more homes is "really the key solution of the housing market problem."Four housing policy experts Business Insider talked to all agreed."The strongest aspect I see in this proposal is that it recognizes the key issues with housing right now and that it is very explicit on trying to improve the number of homes being built — and not just the number of homes but the <a target="_blank" class="" href="https://www.businessinsider.com/us-housing-market-home-prices-wages-mortgage-rates-affordability-crisis-2024-7">number of affordable homes</a>," John Walsh, a research analyst at the Urban Institute's Housing Finance Policy Center, told Business Insider.Homeownership is one of the most reliable ways to create <a target="_blank" class="" href="https://www.businessinsider.com/how-americans-build-wealth-changing-stocks-homes-people-missed-out-2024-8">stability in Americans' economic lives</a> and should be a priority, according to Christopher Mayer, a professor of real estate at Columbia Business School who praised Harris' emphasis on supply."I think most people should be homeowners," Mayer said, noting the falling homeownership rate among young people. "Owning a home is a proven way of building wealth. It creates stability for households."<div type="image" title="Rows of identical homes with uniform driveways and streets stretch towards the desert" height="2348" width="3131" msid="112579953" hostid="261" sizebytes="637540"></div><h2 id="4e83522f-24d6-4242-ba18-9043bcae7584">Addressing the housing shortage</h2>However, with the low supply of starter homes, those making the jump from renting to owning often have to contend with both high prices and steep mortgage rates.America is facing a significant housing shortage, with the country between 4 and 7 million homes short, <a target="_blank" href="https://www.npr.org/2024/04/23/1246623204/housing-experts-say-there-just-arent-enough-homes-in-the-u-s">NPR reported in the spring of this year</a>. Builders have cited supply chain issues, among other reasons building has stalled. Zoning also remains a large barrier to homes being built.COVID-19 only exacerbated the issue, Mayer said, as more people started working remotely. With her proposal to build 3 million new starter homes, Harris is aiming to address that critical gap.Harris' housing proposals expand on policies President Joe <a target="_blank" href="https://www.businessinsider.com/trump-biden-housing-crisis-policy-rising-home-prices-apartment-rents-2024-6">Biden has attempted to implement </a>since taking office, including loosening regulations that restrict construction. Former President Donald Trump also urged states and cities to <a target="_blank" href="https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2019-06-26/trump-s-housing-order-could-worsen-affordability">pursue some zoning reform</a> while he was in office.The vice president's plan to build millions of new housing units depends on several novel methods. She intends to provide the nation's first tax incentive for builders who construct starter homes and sell them to first-time buyers. Harris also intends to create a $40 billion federal fund to incentivize local housing construction, an expansion of <a target="_blank" class="" href="https://www.businessinsider.com/biden-lower-cost-homeownership-hopeful-homebuyers-2024-3">Biden's proposed $20 billion fund</a>. To top it off, she vowed to expand existing tax incentives for businesses that construct affordable rental housing."The answer is more supply, and also the answer is more supply at the sweet spot, which is first-time ownership," said Susan Wachter, a professor of real estate and finance at the Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania.She thinks Harris' commitment to building 3 million homes is the strongest part of her plan, as it will address what she called a "generational crisis" of rent and housing prices. The increase in home supply needs to correspond with an increase in available land, Wachter added.Part of Harris' proposed federal fund to encourage housing construction would make some federal lands eligible to be repurposed for new, affordable developments — something Trump recently promised to do as well.Both Choi and Walsh were quick to caution that while Harris' proposal is a great start to <a target="_blank" class="" href="https://www.businessinsider.com/homes-real-estate-how-to-fix-housing-crisis-factors-construction-2024-3">alleviating housing burdens</a> and reducing wealth disparity, more details are needed to determine its ultimate effectiveness."The devil is really in the detail of where these homes would actually be used," Walsh said.<div type="image" title="Kamala Harris onstage at a rally" height="3652" width="4869" msid="112579951" hostid="261" sizebytes="1685526"></div><h2 id="1a035518-d170-45f5-8192-5fec303416b6">Targeting down payments and Wall Street</h2>Harris' other flagship proposals — offering $25,000 in down-payment assistance to new homeowners and <a target="_blank" class="" href="https://www.businessinsider.com/home-equity-investments-heloc-refinance-loan-investors-homeownership-housing-market-2024-2#:~:text=Between%20the%20beginning%20of%202020,according%20to%20the%20Federal%20Reserve.">preventing investors on Wall Street</a> from buying up starter homes — drew more mixed reactions from the experts that spoke to Business Insider.In Mayer's view, the <a target="_blank" class="" href="https://www.businessinsider.com/personal-finance/mortgages/tips-for-saving-for-a-down-payment#:~:text=Some%20loan%20programs%20allow%20for,get%20a%20better%20interest%20rate.">down-payment</a> policy is rooted in good intentions but may not be particularly cost-effective. Many first-time homeowners traditionally rely on their families for help with a downpayment, Mayer said, meaning lower-income buyers often don't have access to generational wealth, and the $25,000 could significantly help them. Yet, he would rather find ways to lower down payments across the board than distribute money as Harris is proposing.Wachter, meanwhile, said she supports the effort to aid potential homeowners with their down payments but is not confident the proposal would garner broad political support.While Wachter declined to comment on Harris' proposal to limit Wall Street's ability to buy single-family homes, Mayer is less enthusiastic about it."The vast amount of single-family rentals are not owned by people on Wall Street, they are owned by people who own small numbers of houses," he said of the plan. "Institutional investors bring efficiencies to management of that, and those efficiencies generally result in better opportunities for renters."Despite lingering doubts about some aspects of Harris' proposal, the experts agreed that the basic premise of building more affordable, first-time homes is what the country needs."This would be a huge impact," Wachter said. "Right now, what's threatened is the ability to get onto that ladder to achieve housing security. And housing security where there are markets, where there are jobs, is the key issue for young Americans today."

Kamala Harris is going full YIMBY — and housing experts are optimistic

<ul class="summary-list"><li>The US is facing a nationwide housing shortage.</li><li>VP Kamala Harris and former President Donald Trump have both proposed building homes on federal land.</li></ul>America is facing a <a target="_blank" class="" href="https://www.businessinsider.com/buying-home-not-easier-interest-rate-cuts-prices-rent-crisis-2024-8">severe housing shortage</a>. That's one thing the Democratic and Republican presidential candidates agree on.They also agree that the federal government should be a landlord — by opening up more of its property for housing.However, their proposals differ. While former President Donald Trump has proposed <a target="_blank" class="" href="https://www.businessinsider.com/trump-freedom-cities-build-housing-conservatives-scoff-at-leftist-plan-2023-3">building entirely new cities</a> on federal land, Vice President Kamala Harris would likely continue the Biden <a target="_blank" class="" href="https://www.huduser.gov/portal/sites/default/files/pdf/policy-and-practice-publication-2024-july.pdf">administration's efforts</a> to open up certain parcels for dense affordable housing.Building homes on government-owned land isn't new. State and local governments often lease or sell land to builders, including affordable housing developers, particularly in areas with high demand for homes. And out West, the federal government is the major landowner. The feds <a target="_blank" class="" href="https://www.hcn.org/articles/could-building-on-public-land-address-the-housing-crisis/">own about half of the land</a> in 13 Western states. Many of these states, from <a target="_blank" class="" href="https://www.reviewjournal.com/business/housing/welcome-to-las-vegas-housing-crisis-in-2024-3075247/">Nevada</a> to <a target="_blank" class="" href="https://www.sltrib.com/news/2024/03/08/5-numbers-that-show-just-how-bad/">Utah</a>, are experiencing severe housing affordability crises.In a rare overlap of goals between the two campaigns, Harris and Trump have both proposed building housing on federal land."It speaks to the underlying agreement over there being a housing supply issue," Matthew Murphy, executive director of NYU's Furman Center, told Business Insider. "And then the following logical question being, what can the government do about it? What are the ways it can intervene?"<h2 id="761aedd1-7cbe-4215-960a-54c25c346d79">Low-hanging fruit in the nation's hottest housing markets</h2>The Lincoln Institute of Land Policy's Center for Geospatial Solutions <a target="_blank" class="" href="https://cgsearth.org/cgs-who-owns-america-government-land-report">found in a new study</a> that there are about 276,000 acres of underused government-owned land in urban, transit-accessible areas that could be used to build 1.9 million additional homes.The vast majority of buildable public land in dense, urban areas is owned by city and county governments. While the federal government doesn't have much prime, vacant land in cities to devote to housing, it has a role to play in providing financial and regulatory support to incentivize state and local governments to make their land available, McCarthy said.The report found that Massachusetts and Florida have the most buildable square acreage of any state in the country."What surprised us the most is that actually that land is in some of the hottest housing markets in the country," McCarthy said.<div type="image" title="A map of buildable public land in Massachusetts." height="628" width="1200" msid="112948644" hostid="261" sizebytes="25600"></div>Local governments tend to be cautious in selling, leasing, or otherwise repurposing the land they own, in part because of anti-development pushback from local communities. But in some states, city, county, and state governments regularly team up with developers to build housing.In one case, San Mateo County, just south of San Francisco, leased a parcel of land in Half Moon Bay to an affordable housing developer, MidPen Housing, for $1 a year for 99 years. MidPen used it to build 160 units of new affordable senior housing, now known as <a target="_blank" class="" href="https://www.huduser.gov/portal/casestudies/study-122419.html">Half Moon Village</a>.Because the area has extremely high land values and demand for housing, the fact that the county government owns the land made the project financially feasible. Privately owned land in the city would likely be too expensive for affordable housing to pencil out. And because the county owns the land it has some control over what's on it. In this case, that means ensuring the housing remains affordable."It's effectively a land donation, which helps make the project more feasible, allows us to move more quickly, build the housing more quickly," said Abby Goldware Potluri, a senior vice president and co-head of housing development at MidPen.<div type="image" title="A map of underused government-owned land in urban areas." height="912" width="1817" msid="112948638" hostid="261" sizebytes="52930"></div><h2 id="90e58408-27c6-4990-95d7-f7ca2e83d8e5">'Freedom cities' versus affordable housing near transit</h2>Trump and Harris couldn't be farther apart on most issues, including the bulk of their housing agendas.Harris wants to funnel a lot more federal money into subsidizing first-time homebuyers and affordable home construction, while Trump wants to <a target="_blank" class="" href="https://www.nytimes.com/2024/08/01/business/economy/trump-interest-rates-fed.html">lower interest rates</a>, which presidents don't historically have control over, and <a target="_blank" class="" href="https://www.nytimes.com/2020/07/29/us/politics/trump-suburbs-housing-white-voters.html">protect restrictive zoning</a>.While Harris has put forth a plan to construct <a target="_blank" class="" href="https://www.businessinsider.com/how-kamala-harris-plans-to-build-3-million-new-homes-2024-8">3 million additional homes</a> by slashing red tape, Trump has said he'll <a target="_blank" class="" href="https://www.businessinsider.com/jd-vance-deport-20-million-immigrants-reduce-home-prices-rents-2024-7">deport millions of immigrants</a> to free up housing.Last year, Trump floated a proposal to build 10 so-called "freedom cities" on federal land in the style of a futuristic <a target="_blank" class="" href="https://www.businessinsider.com/saudi-neom-first-eco-city-experts-design-architecture-2024-7">Saudi desert city-building project</a> with plentiful single-family housing. Economists and housing experts — and <a target="_blank" class="" href="https://www.businessinsider.com/trump-freedom-cities-build-housing-conservatives-scoff-at-leftist-plan-2023-3">even some conservatives</a> — have generally dismissed the plan as unworkable or undesirable for political, economic, and environmental reasons.Some Republican lawmakers agree that more federal land should be used for homes. Republican Sen. Mike Lee of Utah has introduced <a target="_blank" class="" href="https://www.lee.senate.gov/services/files/1581B75E-3A53-44A2-9F1D-E516702DBB9D">a bill</a> to allow state and local governments to buy land from the federal Bureau of Land Management to use for new housing.Housing experts generally advocate for denser housing construction, particularly in areas near mass transit. When it comes to federal land, this would mean repurposing property in transit-rich urban areas that happens to be owned by the feds. Think new apartments above post offices, homes where parking lots used to be, and new condos in former federal office buildings.In that vein, the Biden-Harris administration has pushed to free up government-owned property for housing. The current administration has <a target="_blank" class="" href="https://www.whitehouse.gov/briefing-room/statements-releases/2024/07/16/fact-sheet-president-biden-announces-major-new-actions-to-lower-housing-costs-by-limiting-rent-increases-and-building-more-homes/">urged state and local governments and other entities</a> — including healthcare institutions and faith-based organizations — to look into whether they could also become landlords. As part of that effort, the US Postal Service is supposed to "pilot the repurposing of certain surplus properties for housing.""Depending on which side of the aisle you're on, the nature of the housing you're going to build is going to be quite different," George McCarthy, who heads the Lincoln Institute, told Business Insider. "But finding the land is, of course, issue number one."Trump has attacked Democrats for pushing for more affordable, multi-family housing. He's framed the Republican Party as <a target="_blank" class="" href="https://trumpwhitehouse.archives.gov/briefings-statements/president-donald-j-trump-protecting-suburbs-preserving-american-dream-americans/">protectors of single-family zoning</a>.Democrats' plan also addresses challenges governments face when trying to <a target="_blank" class="" href="https://www.nytimes.com/2021/09/14/business/sale-surplus-federal-buildings.html">sell or transform</a> underused old buildings or unique structures. It's sitting on <a target="_blank" class="" href="https://www.route-fifty.com/management/2023/07/federal-government-has-more-8000-vacant-properties-why-arent-they-being-used-house-homeless/388312/">nearly 8,000 unused properties</a>, according to congressional lawmakers. The General Services Administration — the federal government's landlord — has <a target="_blank" class="" href="https://federalnewsnetwork.com/facilities-construction/2023/11/gsa-accelerates-plans-to-offload-federal-buildings-it-no-longer-needs/">listed for sale many buildings</a> it no longer uses nationwide, from a courthouse in Fort Lauderdale to <a target="_blank" class="" href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/dc-md-va/2023/11/29/dc-downtown-webster-school/">a historic school building</a> in downtown DC.Buyers are hard to find. Sometimes, the costs of repairing the property, particularly those protected by historic preservation laws, are too high. In other cases, it's more expensive for the government to move workers out of a building and prep it for sale than to keep operating a half-empty property. But with the right government incentives, developers could turn property that sucks value out of a community into a boon for residents.<h2 id="aac76a0d-817b-4bd1-96a5-0ccbd458c8d5">Boosting housing in a swing state</h2>One state with lots of immediate potential also happens to be a key swing state with a particularly severe housing shortage. Nevada is a national outlier when it comes to its government-owned land: <a target="_blank" class="" href="https://www.reviewjournal.com/local/local-nevada/how-much-of-nevadas-land-is-owned-by-the-feds-more-than-you-might-think-3050451/">more than 80% of the state's land</a> is owned and controlled by the federal government.The Biden administration has proposed <a target="_blank" class="" href="https://www.blm.gov/programs/lands-and-realty/regional-information/nevada/snplma/affordable-housing-reservations">selling hundreds of acres</a> of land in Nevada controlled by the Bureau of Land Management to local governments to build thousands of new homes. In <a target="_blank" class="" href="https://www.blm.gov/press-release/blm-seeks-input-proposed-sale-public-lands-affordable-housing">one proposal</a>, it wants to sell 20 acres of BLM land just outside Las Vegas — priced at $100 an acre — to the county government to use for about 150 units of housing for those who make up to 80% of the area median income."Building towards affordable housing on these lands could have a transformative impact, especially because land costs are a major barrier," Maurice Page, executive director of the nonpartisan Nevada Housing Coalition, told Business Insider.But repurposing federal land for new residential communities in Nevada would likely mean more sprawl, which comes with both environmental and economic concerns. The farther people live from their workplaces and other amenities, the more they need to drive, which is expensive and polluting. When building new housing means sprawl, developers have to factor in infrastructure and other costs — and that could start to look more like Trump's desert cities than a climate-friendly urbanist vision."If we build housing, we have to make sure that it can be affordable with the right transportation and other infrastructure pieces being aligned with it, so education, law enforcement, hospitals," Page said.

Thousands of homes on $1 land: The new housing crisis solution sweeping the country

<ul class="summary-list"><li>Homebuyers are paying more for smaller homes, per Realtor.com data.</li><li>The median US home size has shrunk by 128 square feet over the last five years.</li></ul>The housing market hasn't been spared from shrinkflation, the unfortunate phenomenon of paying more for less.Similar to other <a target="_blank" href="https://www.businessinsider.com/shrinkflation-grocery-stores-pringles-cereal-candy-bars-chocolate-toilet-paper-cadbury-2021-7">items purchased by US consumers in recent years</a>, homes are rising in price while shrinking in square footage. The median-sizes US home has shrunk from 1,996 square feet to 1,868 square feet in the last five years, according to <a target="_blank" href="http://Realtor.com">Realtor.com</a> data. Yet, the median price for a US home has climbed to $429,990 as of August, up 36% from August five years ago, when the median price of a home stood at $315,791.Home prices have climbed largely due to a demand outpacing the supply of homes for sale. <a target="_blank" href="https://www.businessinsider.com/housing-market-home-prices-falling-buying-a-home-outlook-supply-2024-9">Active listings surged 36% last month</a>, but home prices are expected to remain elevated in the near term as easing mortgage rates bring buyers back to market and stoke fresh demand. "The specifics will vary from market to market, but the data suggest ongoing opportunity for many sellers," Danielle Hale, Realtor.com's chief economist, said in a <a target="_blank" class="" href="https://mediaroom.realtor.com/2024-06-04-Realtor-com-R-May-Housing-Report-Median-Price-Per-Square-Foot-Experiences-Monumental-Rise-Growing-52-7-Since-2019">June</a> note, referring to the rising price-per-square foot of homes for sale. "Though with mortgage rates still much higher than many existing homeowners enjoy, this opportunity favors sellers who don't have to replace a mortgage, such as investors or second homeowners looking for an exit, or equity-rich homeowners looking to downsize in their current area or to a lower-cost region, as well as those planning to rent their next home."Here are the five housing markets in the US seeing the worst case of housing shrinkage coupled with rising prices, according to data from the real estate listings site:<h3 id="a60ebdce-aa36-460d-a454-b8f62f0c04da">1. Colorado Springs, CO</h3><div type="image" title="Colorado Springs downtown buildings" height="1060" width="2120" msid="113203355" hostid="261" sizebytes="364244"></div>Median square footage: 2,351 (-21.19% from 2019)Median price: $525,000 (+25.3%)Price per square foot: $223.30<h3 id="dc3ff7d8-2ad1-43af-9eab-06dd8da6f16b">2. Charlotte–Concord–Gastonia, NC–SC</h3><div type="image" title="Charlotte, North Carolina skyline" height="1061" width="2121" msid="113203357" hostid="261" sizebytes="269560"></div>Median square footage: 2,031 (-20.26% from 2019)Median price: $441,170 (+23.06)Price per square foot: $217.21<h3 id="58c50b5b-793b-4173-a31c-3129afe34b09">3. New York–Newark–Jersey City, NY–NY–PA</h3><div type="image" title="New York City, New York skyline" height="1060" width="2120" msid="113203354" hostid="261" sizebytes="389804"></div>Median square footage: 1,556 (-19.38%)Median price: $789,000 (+34.87%)Price per square foot: $507.06<h3 id="936eabbb-6e29-4bd8-bb5c-821e0868b2b9">4. Urban Honolulu, Hawaii</h3><div type="image" title="Honolulu, Oahu, Hawaii beach" height="1061" width="2121" msid="113203360" hostid="261" sizebytes="295020"></div>Median square footage: 1,010 (-18.81%)Median price: $725,000 (+3.79%)Price per square foot: $717.82<h3 id="f44230cc-76f7-4880-a9e1-1ce39b0b3143">5. Hickory—Lenoir—Morganton, NC</h3><div type="image" title="Union Square in Hickory, North Carolina" height="1061" width="2121" msid="113203358" hostid="261" sizebytes="345284"></div>Median square footage: 1,920 (-17.67%)Median price: $375,420 (+25.56%)Price per square foot: $195.53

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