All affordable housing is a scam in term of taxes. As an example, a senior living in an one bedroom apartment pays one third of his/her rent which might be several hundreds dollars. But that apartment actually pays $2,200 based on federal programs in rent. Yet that development gets an abatement. There are places in JC that pays full taxes and do not receive $2,200 a month in rent. This is one of the reasons why I am against these programs. This city needs taxes so what is not paid from a senior housing or another similar place, is transferred to the small homeowner who can lose their home in tax liens.

Maybe Fulop can find someone to build an Arcology on the property next to Rt. 440.

Make it with the 'ideal mix of housing' that certain social engineers love so much.

brand1130

We already tried that in the 60s. Many residents call it The Projects.



Concentrating poverty to a single building or area of the city doesn't work so well.

Now, I'm not arguing we should have affordable housing at 99 Hudson either, but the city should be doing more to allow the creation of housing that is naturally affordable. There has been many discussions over the years about the negative effects of R1 zoning. Allowing tri and quad-plexes to be built in R1 zoning would bring many thousands of naturally affordable online, scattered throughout the city, at a cost that is much cheaper than a high-rise building.

Instead, all the new housing constructed is just one or two units sold two a couple relocating from Brooklyn.

I'll even take it a step further and say that it's a pity that our current zoning doesn't allow development like this to line it. Instead, all we get are more bland Bayonne Boxes, brought to you courtesy of the xenophobes and free parking brigade.

So you are recommending a slum?

I understand affordable housing. I understand requiring say, 1 affordable housing unit built for every 5 non-affordable ones. I don't understand why they have to be in the same complex / take away prime real estate from major projects. If the city designated a part of the city to be strictly for affordable housing, and developers would be required to contribute to these affordable developments, we could build a lot more affordable housing units for a lot cheaper, than say, cramming in affordable units into 99 Hudson Street. It doesn't seem to make economic sense to require it to be a part of the same complex. The city needs an "Affordable Housing" zone with a master plan. They would get a lot more bang for the buck, a lot less pushback from developers, and probably a lot more development. Seems like everybody wins.

Lots of people are trying to use the current Cover-19 situation to argue for a rollback of the reval, or a reduction in property taxes across the board, conveniently ignoring the fact that the city is just as impacted by this and will need every penny it can collect, and that rolling back the reval would be asking the poorer residents to (once again) subsidize the richer residents through exorbitantly higher tax rates.

I would imagine taxes will have to go up to pay for the response efforts. The pension fund must be dismal after recent stock market losses and a savings interest rate near zero. I can see takes being hiked to make up the pension shortfall.

Commercial real estate valuations might drop, so it will fall on the residential ratable base to pick up the slack.

Lots of stuff still unknown.

Why do you think the virus will affect taxes? Is there another reval coming?

Any insights on the real estate market or taxes in JC?
How will this Corona Virus situation affect them ?

Quote:

Only true in a regulated market that interferes with supply meeting demand. In cities without regs that limit supply, there is no cage match between landlords and tenants. There's enough vacancies that tenants can vote with their feet.

In the end the only ones making out are the landlords--large or small. House always wins.

Quote:

Exactly this. When the zoning requires low density, you cannot build the density required to meet market demand. 70 years ago 100k more people lived in JC when the Waterfront was all railyards and docks. They lived more densely than the 2 people in 1500 sq ft that our zoning encourages. I have couples living in 500 ft units, but those could not be built today.

Now, every time someone wants to build densely, hysteria ensues. There's a modest 4 floor 21 unit development being designed for 36-42 Waverly that has the NA all in a twist, even though it looks like it has parking and is a floor shorter than the adjacent building on the corner.

In 2018, taxpayers forked over $909 million to the city, school and county. The only way to have affordable housing is the push the responsibility of taxes from one group on to another group. The other way is to cut spending, but that is not going to happened. The city should be honest and tell taxpayers what it would cost residents on their next tax bill what affordable housing will cost them. Nothing is free, someone will pay the expense.

how can I get one of these affordable apartments

That chart you referenced is what I figured the incomes to be. However I was about to rent an apartment to someone who backed out at the last min. She told me that making $125k per yr qualified her for moderate housing in a new tower opening in JSQ. She got a reduction making her rent $1700 for a 1 bed.

The STATE OF NJ decides what qualifies as affordable. Not Fulop. So yes, if you have a 6-person household you can, under certain limits, qualify for affordable housing if you make $100k. This article neglected to mention that 6-person requirement. A more likely downtown family is going to be 2 or 3 people, with limits in the $70-$80k range, which - let's be real - a two person household in NJ making $70k isn't destitute but certainly isn't on the high end of the income spectrum.

Here's the chart:
https://www.nj.gov/dca/affiliates/coah/reports/incomelimits.pdf

With most of city zoned for R-1 Bayonne Boxes, where will the "affordable" housing go?

Headline alone says it all.

"Jersey City mayor would build more housing for gentrifiers, call it ?affordable? | Editor's"

https://www.nj.com/opinion/2019/05/jer ... affordable-editorial.html