Household size and the housing stock

Original Article ↗ Hacker News Discussion ↗

Average home size in the U.S. has roughly doubled since the 1950s even as household size has fallen, raising questions about why new construction skews toward large, expensive single-family houses despite widespread affordability problems. Commenters debate whether zoning and appraisal rules, investor behavior, and NIMBY politics are constraining smaller, denser, more affordable housing, or whether the core issue is geographic job and population concentration rather than an absolute national shortage of units. Proposed remedies range from loosening land-use limits and building more multi-family and “missing middle” housing to vacancy and land-value taxes aimed at discouraging speculation and large-scale investment ownership.

Trends in Home Size & Development Patterns

  • New US homes roughly doubled in size since the 1950s while housing fewer people; many see “1950s suburbs on steroids” misaligned with smaller households.
  • Some argue developers maximize house size and floor-area ratio on each legal lot because upper-market demand and appraisal rules reward square footage.
  • Others counter that size is mostly fashion and market segmentation; in many regions demand is strong for smaller, denser, or more efficient units where zoning allows.
  • Nationally, commenters note rising home size and shrinking lot size as broad trends.

Lot Design, Yards, and Density

  • Several argue that narrower lots and moving homes closer to the street could yield more units and better-used backyards.
  • Others value wide side yards as privacy, noise buffers, and fire breaks.
  • Debate over front lawns: some see them as water-wasting dead space in a housing crisis; others see visible greenery as a neighborhood amenity worth incentivizing.

Is There a Housing Shortage or a Distribution/Finance Problem?

  • One camp: there is a real shortage of dwellings in job-rich areas, with low vacancies and rising prices/rents; zoning and local opposition are key bottlenecks.
  • Another camp: nationally, housing units exceed households; the core problem is maldistribution (jobs and people concentrating in a few metros), plus vacant/underused homes and speculative ownership.
  • People highlight the difficulty of dual-earner households moving to cheaper regions and the non-fungibility of places (rights, culture, amenities).
  • Similar tensions are noted in Europe and other rich countries with high prices despite greater density.

Zoning, NIMBYism, and Regulatory Barriers

  • Many blame single-family zoning, minimum lot sizes, and bans on multi-unit configurations for preventing “the missing middle.”
  • Personal accounts describe projects for dozens of apartments blocked by local opposition, not by Airbnbs or large investors.
  • Others criticize building and planning codes that prevent very basic, low-cost housing, arguing standards are set for middle-class “luxury” and enforced even where density is low; defenders say safety rules are written in response to past disasters.

Investment Dynamics, Taxes, and Rents

  • Several see housing primarily as an investment asset; propose progressive property or land value taxes, and vacancy or land banking taxes, to push large investors to sell and depress prices.
  • Counter-arguments warn that investor capital also funds new construction; aggressive taxation might cut starts and worsen rent pressures.
  • Significant back-and-forth on causality:
    • One side: high rents and vacancies are driven by investors, financial engineering, and, in some cases, algorithmic or tacit collusion.
    • Other side: rent levels mainly follow simple supply-demand (migration vs housing starts), with evidence cited from places where net migration far exceeds new builds.
  • Some propose excluding primary residences from new taxes and phasing changes slowly to avoid mortgage/banking shocks.

Lifestyle, Space Needs, and Household Structure

  • Disagreement over what constitutes “adequate” space:
    • Some say 1200–1500 sq ft can comfortably house a family and that building ever-larger homes in a shortage is irrational.
    • Others, especially with WFH and teenagers, see that size as cramped and treat larger suburban homes as a reasonable aspiration.
  • Multi-generational and flexible two-unit houses are praised as historically effective, but modern zoning often bans fully separate secondary units.
  • Basements are discussed as a source of “hidden” square footage in older homes; prevalence varies by region and frost line.

Broader Economic/Political Framing

  • Several commenters frame the crisis as evidence of broader economic failure: regulation favoring incumbents and the wealthy, government mismanagement, and land becoming a vehicle for institutional accumulation rather than widespread ownership.
  • Others push back, emphasizing the central role of basic supply constraints and local political resistance rather than a single villain (investors, STRs, or regulators alone).