SACRAMENTO — As the idea of “abundance” gains traction in housing policy circles — often invoked to justify building more housing of any kind — a 2022 article from Housing Is A Human Right offers a prescient reminder: abundance without affordability is a false promise.
Long before the current buzzword took hold, advocates were warning that prioritizing luxury development over deeply affordable homes would worsen inequality, displace vulnerable tenants, and fuel homelessness — and, as the article argued then, lives were already hanging in the balance.
This message was front and center in a 2022 article from the housing justice organization Housing Is A Human Right, which criticized real estate interests and certain pro-development groups for promoting policies that prioritize high-end development over genuinely affordable solutions.
Citing a 2016 Zillow study, the article argued that the imbalance in housing construction — with the overwhelming bulk of new units being priced at the luxury level — is exacerbating the housing crisis for working families, not solving it.
“There’s a growing divide in the rental market right now,” Zillow Chief Economist Dr. Svenja Gudell warned in the study. “Very high demand at the low end of the market is being met with more supply at the high end, an imbalance that will only contribute to growing affordability concerns for all renters.”
“The push by Big Real Estate, YIMBYs, and certain politicians to build more luxury housing for the housing affordability crisis has led to more deaths. That may seem like a bold statement, but it’s the street-level reality — if there was more affordable housing for vulnerable renters, they wouldn’t be homeless, and they wouldn’t have died.” – Housing Is A Human Right
Gudell’s prediction proved prescient. Nearly a decade later, America’s housing market remains skewed toward luxury development, even as millions of renters face skyrocketing rents and stagnant wages. The consequences, housing justice advocates say, are dire: a worsening affordability crisis, rising rates of homelessness, and preventable deaths among unhoused individuals.
“We’re simply not building enough at the bottom and middle of the rental market to keep up with demand,” Gudell added. “As a result, these segments are becoming very competitive… Apartment construction at the low end needs to start ramping up, and soon, in order to see real improvement.”
Housing Is A Human Right, a Los Angeles-based advocacy group affiliated with the AIDS Healthcare Foundation, has repeatedly called on elected officials to embrace what it calls the “3 Ps”: protect tenants through rent control and other legal protections, preserve existing affordable housing from demolition or speculation, and produce more housing that’s affordable to low- and middle-income people.
Yet, as the group notes, many politicians, developers, and even some urban planning advocates — such as those in the YIMBY (Yes In My Backyard) movement — continue to push policies that overwhelmingly favor market-rate development. These trickle-down strategies, the group argues, have failed to address the root causes of housing insecurity.
“The push by Big Real Estate, YIMBYs, and certain politicians to build more luxury housing for the housing affordability crisis has led to more deaths,” the article declares. “That may seem like a bold statement, but it’s the street-level reality — if there was more affordable housing for vulnerable renters, they wouldn’t be homeless, and they wouldn’t have died.”
This critique targets what the group sees as a fundamental flaw in trickle-down housing theory: the assumption that building expensive apartments will somehow increase affordability across the board. In reality, Housing Is A Human Right and others contend, luxury housing attracts higher-income tenants and often displaces existing residents, while doing little to ease rent burdens for those most in need.
“Big Real Estate, politicians, and YIMBYs will try to make clever arguments to squirm their way out of that grim reality they helped shape,” the article continues. “But it’s the stone-cold truth.”
Recent electoral results suggest that voters across the country agree. In the November 2022 midterms, rent control and affordable housing initiatives saw significant success at the ballot box. Voters in cities such as Portland, Maine; Richmond, California; and Santa Monica, California approved new caps on rent increases. Pasadena passed a rent control ordinance, while Orange County, Florida supported tenant protections. Numerous local measures to fund affordable housing construction also won approval.
According to the Associated Press, which covered the outcomes in detail, the results reflected a broad and growing consensus among the American public: more luxury housing won’t fix the housing crisis — but targeted investment in affordable homes and tenant protections might.
“For the 2022 elections, Americans made a clear statement: they want politicians to support pro-rent control and pro-affordable housing policies,” Housing Is A Human Right wrote in an update to its original article. “The victories also showed that California YIMBY and other YIMBY groups, which routinely oppose rent control and push a trickle-down, luxury-housing agenda, are out of step with what Americans want and need.”
The advocacy group’s call for an abundance of affordable housing — rather than simply more units at any cost — is part of a broader debate within housing policy circles. While YIMBY groups emphasize increasing supply to meet demand, critics argue that the type of housing built matters profoundly, especially in cities where displacement, gentrification, and homelessness are urgent concerns.
The Zillow study at the heart of Housing Is A Human Right’s argument reinforces this point. It found that “only a small portion” of new apartment construction was affordable to moderate- and low-income renters. Instead, “most new apartment construction is at the top of the market, where luxury units command top prices from wealthy renters.”
In this context, the article argues, housing policy must shift away from subsidizing wealth-driven development and toward public and nonprofit investments in deeply affordable housing — including supportive housing for unhoused individuals, rental assistance programs, and policies that give communities more control over land use decisions.
As advocates continue to push for these changes, the stakes remain high. With rising rents fueling displacement in cities from Los Angeles to New York, and a growing number of Americans living paycheck to paycheck, housing abundance without affordability may prove hollow.
“Yes, we need more housing,” the article concludes. “But we need a certain kind of housing — and, as Zillow pointed out, it’s not luxury. What millions of Americans need is more affordable housing. Lives hang in the balance.”
Dignity . . . Unity . . . Signity !