phantom tollbooths in Davis Sq. ...

[an-art-worker.livejournal.com]

apropos of nothing and not a serious proposal but I was thinking about sales taxes last night, the discussion of tolls on 93 south and something to do with all the border violence going on in the world these days. Suddenly I had this image of tollbooths/checkpoints on the roads entering Davis Sq. Weird but interesting to speculate on.

The growth in popularity of the sq. has brought higher rents and housing prices, higher prices in stores and bars and general gentrification. The city of Somerville and the property owners benefit but the residents don't. Would be interesting to have a toll that went to offset the costs of gentrification to people who actually live here.

Comments

Re: You can't eat market value!

[rmd.livejournal.com]

for most people, "owning" real estate actually means "owning a small piece of it and then paying the bank over 30 years for the rest of it"

real estate doesn't have to drop by half to screw you up. it just has to drop by enough that those folks who have loans outstanding on properties can't pay off the loan with the money they'd make selling the house.

if you can't afford to keep it and you can't afford to sell it... what do you do?

Re: You can't eat market value!

[miss-chance.livejournal.com]

rmd (unsurprisingly) nails it on the head.

Re: You can't eat market value!

[komos.livejournal.com]

Which would be great, except that the scenario described doesn't apply at all to yours. The value of your properties has gone up, not down, and you've indicated that you don't want to sell, not that you can't.

Re: You can't eat market value!

[artic-monkeys.livejournal.com]

you rent out half of it. And then pay for the other half yourself. With the hopes of restoring it back to a single family one day. Unfortunately that would mean less rentals.