KOZMA: Zoning laws must be amended for sake of middle class
Column: With Liberty and Justice for All
Where is it illegal to build a duplex in New Jersey? What about triplexes or fourplexes? These may seem like simple questions, but there are no simple answers.
Zoning here is a fragmented mess, divided between 565 unique municipalities under the principle of "home rule." This fragmentation obscures the current housing crisis in New Jersey while making it difficult to implement systemic solutions.
To fix it, we need a statewide preemption law that would legalize the development of missing middle housing — the range of options between single-family homes and apartment towers, including duplexes, triplexes and fourplexes — on all residential land in New Jersey.
Not a single state could definitively answer the questions in the last paragraph until last month when the nonprofit Desegregate Connecticut released a Zoning Atlas for Connecticut. It was not encouraging.
Building single-family homes without a public hearing was legal on 90.5 percent of land, but only 27.5 percent for duplexes. Only 2.5 percent and 2.2 percent permitted triplexes and fourplexes, respectively.
Getting that information meant surveying 180 zoning jurisdictions with a total 32,378 pages of land use regulations establishing a whopping 2,620 distinct zoning districts. It is not unreasonable to suspect that our similarly suburbanized state is similarly unfriendly to anything denser than duplexes. A quick glance at zoning maps in places like East Brunswick, Edison, Old Bridge, Woodbridge and so on would confirm that suspicion.
Why does that matter?
Basically, the de facto criminalization of any alternatives to single-family homes in much of the state is a key driver of our affordability crisis. Missing middle-homes are more cost-efficient to build, as they share walls and utilities while taking up less land, with one recent paper estimating that multifamily homes of two to four units are 6.8 percent cheaper than similarly situated single-family homes.
But when zoning codes reserve so much residential land for expensive single-family homes on large lots, developers end up cramming multifamily development into a handful of dense downtowns where a scarcity of land drives up the prices. The people suffer as a result.
Our rental market is the seventh most expensive in the nation, with even a simple studio apartment costing an average monthly rent of $1,030, more than $200 higher than the national average.
Still, we could be worse. At $1,240 a month, California has one of the few rental markets more expensive than ours. Local opposition, expensive permitting and regulatory requirements, and single-family zoning have all helped drive average rents to $1,240 and created the largest homeless population in America, making California one of the few states even worse than us.
As a 2015 report from California's nonpartisan Legislative Analyst's Office said, "A shortage of housing along California's coast means households wishing to live there compete for limited housing. This competition bids up home prices and rents."
Tackling this crisis requires systemic and statewide solutions. Oregon adopted a first-in-the-nation preemption law in 2019 legalizing the development of duplexes, triplexes and fourplexes in single-family neighborhoods in most municipalities.
The law is not perfect, as it exempts the smallest municipalities from reform, but it vastly improves on the status quo. We need an even stronger preemption law, including financial incentives for towns to allow even greater density around train stations and main streets.
Too many homeowners confuse the abolition of single-family zoning with the abolition of single-family homes. "The Density Bolsheviks are coming to town, and they're gonna burn your single-family house to the ground," rapped one concerned Seattle resident during a town hall about zoning reform.
But there are, of course, no "Density Bolsheviks." Lenin's goals were slightly more ambitious than building townhomes. Zoning reform is simply about giving more options to people who would like to live in a suburb but cannot afford it or simply do not enjoy the whole McMansion vibe. We want opportunity, not oppression.
The typical concerns homeowners use to keep out new neighbors — higher crime, higher taxes, more traffic, overcrowded public schools, lower property values — have little empirical justification.
A Harvard analysis found residents of multi-family homes are less likely to own a car, commit crimes or have school-age children than residents of single-family homes. Literally any increase in the human population can impact schools and traffic, but nobody proposes banning residents from having babies.
The impact on property values is also minimal for existing owners. Building more missing middle homes provides a less expensive option for new neighbors without hurting existing ones. If anything, the existing community benefits from higher property tax revenue and more demand for local businesses.
This is not just theory. When Houston liberalized land-use constraints in 1999 to allow up to three homes on land which once allowed only one, middle class suburbs added many townhomes.
Zoning reform is no panacea. It would function better if paired with a massive expansion of housing vouchers for low- and moderate-income people. Still, it is a necessary step to digging our state out of its affordability crisis and unlocking the American Dream for everyone.
Thomas Kozma is a Edward J. Bloustein School of Planning and Public Policy junior majoring in planning and public policy. His column, “With Liberty and Justice for All,” runs on alternate Thursdays.
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