Agenda - 03-21-1990 - Laserfiche WebLink

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g1 • [20] [211 LAND USE 165 preciation on their homes. appear to be content with their new Quid homes. The S(10 market units sold for prices that, if they were , ., the adjusted for inflation, are astonishingly close to the prices pre- I vhich dicted in the market study. indicating that the builder neither hiked prices to pay for some extra costs associated with the . h the p inclusionary units nor discounted prices due to market resis- tance from the presence of the inclusionary units. The builder of con- the 1,000 units at Fairhaven appears to have prospered as a =sale- result of the undertaking. He has moved into a much larger home icular on the outskirts of Utopia, has greatly increased the size of his , t t be a organization, and has bought a luxurious condominium in the I ,. ' rice it Caribbean. Everyone associated with Fairhaven appears to have �,g ..I Itians benefited or, in the case of the market unit buyers, obtained his ii and money's worth. I s and do to . 1 . ilders • Who Paid for the 200 Low-Income and Market Units? �; .• these The professor has an interesting theory. He argues that no one these paid because Utopia was able to use an incremental value in the ue. It land which existed because the land's zoned capacity for hous- result I' ing units was much lower than the land's true physical capacity. than As demonstrated, the professor says. Fairhaven was as good a site for 1,000 units as it was for 400. Zoned for 400 units it was worth $4 million; zoned for 1,000 units it could have been worth •xam- $10 million. The only thing that was used up to build the project new was land capacity. icient Some people in Utopia feel that the original owner really paid ccept was For the 200 lower-income units and that if he had not lived out of •i. town he could have sued Utopia and won for not zoning his land .1, .1 t erns. was for ten units per acre in the first place, because clearly it had that that capacity. They argue that he should have been entitled to the full t ale. $10 million. The professor, however, vehemently disagrees t irney cause he says the original owner bought the property twenty cased. years before, according to the deed books in the county court- ' house, for about $3,000 an acre before the city of Utopia had to be turned into the kind of thriving town it is r today. At not served the ise to property was zoned for only one unit per . Sled. city water and sewers, and only had a capacity for individual , 200 septic systems of one unit per acre. The owner of Fairhaven. i even though he paid an assessment for benefits when the sewer ome-p ied and water went in, just before the property was upzoned from them one to four units per acre, has profited sufficiently, the professor them tl ap- says, from the city council's actions.