it will keep the students in all those overbuilt apartments, maybe that's the thought

Sigh. What the ever living eff are they thinking?

I would ask why would they pick now, but the city is run by idiots.

Flower mound tried this a few years ago.... LULAC got it shut down.

With all the racial and economic issues happening right now, I would shy away from anything that could invite racial overtone lawsuits.

Not to mention, the issues revolving around 2 unrelated persons...
What if a couple (lets say gay) want to make extra money by renting out their spare room? Now you have the city impacting on their rights.

CoCS needs to just enforce the rules they already have on the books.
They don't, because the owners of the "Ag Shacks" that are restricked to 4 persons, but have 5-6 bedrooms and all are rented out give kickbacks.

1. This isn't going to destroy property values, it will make prices go UP. It will make rent more expensive, it will make taxes eventually go up, and it will make it more difficult for working families to afford housing.
2. I own rental real estate in College Station but live in Houston, so I don't get a vote and my opinion doesn't matter to the College Station City Council. I think that's called TAXATION WITHOUT REPRESENTATION.
3. I would think this discriminates against polyamorous people, but what do I know.

Red Pear Realty said:

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1. This isn't going to destroy property values, it will make prices go UP. It will make rent more expensive, it will make taxes eventually go up, and it will make it more difficult for working families to afford housing.
2. I own rental real estate in College Station but live in Houston, so I don't get a vote and my opinion doesn't matter to the College Station City Council. I think that's called TAXATION WITHOUT REPRESENTATION.
3. I would think this discriminates against polyamorous people, but what do I know.

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I'm eager to hear how this will make prices go up.

I own a rental. It has four students in it that pay $550 each. That's $2,200 per month. It is a cash cow.

You make it a two person limit, there is no way in the world that it brings in the same rental income. The value of this house is in it's ability to derive income, otherwise it is just a typical old house in a college town.

The apartment lobby must be twisting every arm they can find and threatening "we will have vacant, neglected properties all over town if the students are not forced to live in our buildings". Good Lord, the students have been screwed by online learning, social distancing, mask wearing , lost income, probable loss of student activities (football etc), and race issuesnow the City thinks it is a good time to make them fight ANOTHER battle concerning their ability to rent a house with friends? These people need an empathy check if nothing else. The city ABSOLUTELY does not enforce current regulations on 5-6 bedroom homes so if they start enforcing this on the small older rentals they will have a legal issue on their hands. If the tenants next door are bothering you, whether you live next to campus or in Pebble Creek, call them in for parking and noise when violations occur. It is not that hard. If you do not want to risk having annoying neighbors you best move to the country.

The short answer is that any time government sticks it's crooked nose in the free markets, the most likely outcome is inefficiency, and when the markets are not efficient, things get more expensive.

The longer answer is that if you take the available student housing stock and divide it by two (going from 4 unrelated persons to 2), then students will have to compete for less housing stock. Of course some students and landlords will disregard the ordinance, which will create a black market, so it won't be a direct cut in half. For years, California (both state and local governments) has experimented in dumb ways to make housing more expensive, but even their politicians weren't stupid enough to cut available housing stock in half overnight. This is much much worse and will be more blunt. Like the poster above said, I wonder how much these council members got when they sold their soul to the apartment lobby when the agreed to do this? There is no other explanation.

By the way, if you are a young family or a student, you should be jumping up and down screaming trying to stop this. Look at California if you want to see how this ends.

And if you are a city council member in support of this...SHAME ON YOU.

You might want to spend a some time trying to understand McGavin's points. He seems to be on the right track.

If a large number of renters are pushed out of single family residential to multi-family, the SFR is going to crash. Apartment rents might stabilize or go up, but SFR would be negatively impacted.

Sounds like a siginifiant amount of SFR would become money pits.

It also sounds like students can forget finding affordable housing if they would like to live in a single family home. That may be what angers me most. Total disregard for the fact that they are removing options and price points for students and families, many of who are struggling financially.

My wife and I own our house. We also have two roommates who have lived with us for years and who we have known for even longer. Now the city wants to tell us that that's not allowed?

Sounds like some sort of corruption at play honestly. Did they provide a reason for doing this now?

Haven't been back in years but even then it seemed like the market was way overbuilt with multi-family. I imagine a lot of multi-family holders are bleeding.

How else is Sharp supposed to fill up the Park West and White Creek Apartments? Developers paid Sharp a bunch of money to build those, and they WILL be paid back. Can't fill up overpriced apartments if there are affordable options elsewhere. And we can't have some pesky local laws getting in the way.

Red Pear was coming from a macro view of the rental market.

Shooter was coming from a micro view of the SFR market.

In a way, both are correct.

they aren't built they are converted

RafterAg223 said:

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aggiepaintrain said:

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Perhaps a worse idea is thousands of Section 8 apartments in the near future.

We're screwed either way. Nice job CoCS

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Could you enlighten me on when the most recent "section 8" complex was built in College Station? Do you realize that other than 1 age restricted senior product, it has been decades since any low income or tax credit multi family product has been approved in College Station?

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The apartments with the most crime in college station are the section 8 ones.

This is apartment developer/owner cronyism with city officials. Only way to explain it.

OldArmyBrent said:

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aggiepaintrain said:

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they aren't built they are converted

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Section 8 is a voucher type system. Landlords are free to accept it or not. The problem is that when the values go down because they can't fill vacancies and the amenities don't match the rest of the area, S8 is the easy way to increase occupancy and top line revenue. Most landlords stay away from S8 because they know the type of tenant that comes with it.

I agree it is generally a sign that the tenant population is less desirable, but it's not something you build or convert. Landlord just starts accepting the S8 vouchers.

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I have been preaching this for years as I have watched the continued saturation of apartments. Many just don't understand basic supply and demand.
More section 8 means more issues in our schools. Sure many can't believe I just said that but it is factual. And the circle continues.

When it comes to the question of whether rent goes up or down due to a law like this, the answer is "both". Instead of 4 tenants paying 550 = 2,200, you get 2 tenants paying 750 = 1,500. The students pay higher rent and the landlord receives less rent.

It's only true to the extent that people comply with the law, and everyone involved has a significant financial incentive to break the law. And there's still the question of where those other two students went. Three options: commute from outside the city, move to a landlord who ignores the law, or move to one of those new apartment complexes. Any guesses on whose idea this was?

The next step a city government will take, when people start commuting or breaking the law while rents increase, is to start putting rent controls in place. Then housing supply doesn't grow, there's illegal gaming of the system, and quality of the housing declines as landlords can barely cover the mortgage due to artificially depressed rents. Any units eligible to increase the rent increase it more than they otherwise would have to subsidize the ones that are still locked.

Now you're in spiral. Maybe the next idea is tax incentives for new construction or increased rules to crack down on the black market, but it never seems to be getting rid of the actual problem. Government officials can't seem to comprehend that the response to a problem might be doing less rather than doing more.

Certainly higher density housing becomes far more attractive for everyone. And the game goes on. It's a great little case study on why government intervention should always be carefully considered.