In fairness, while discussing Gibran Rivera’s gripes about the lack of affordable housing, I neglected to point out that there’s an overwhelming reason that increasing supply will not likely bring down housing costs for West Roxbury or most Boston neighborhoods: demand does not stay static but in fact increases as cultural and demographic trends lead more people to want to live in the city and in specific neighborhoods.
A rudimentary supply-demand curve (apologies!) shows:
On the left, both demand and supply are fairly inelastic: at a given moment in time, the number of people in the market doesn’t increase or decrease too much because of price, and suppliers find the same obstacles to creating new housing stock no matter what market conditions. But over time, demand increases because of people moving or wanting to move into the city, shifting demand curve up. Since supply curve is relatively flat, housing supply goes up quite modestly, but price goes up considerably. Shifting supply curve slightly will reduce the price from Equilibrium B, but it would take a large supply increase to offset increased demand.
In short, increased supply does decrease price, but only relative to what it would be without the decreased supply. As long as demand increases, the price likely will too. You’re only going to affect the rate. In the meantime, obstructionist measures - while pretty much guaranteeing maximum price increases for those without govenment-mandated "affordable housing" - do appeal to citizens who experience the market primarily as a displacement mechanism that pushes them (or pulls them) out of the city neighborhood they currently live in.
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