Los Angeles

There is probably no issue more requiring resolution in California than poor housing affordability. It is a threat to the preservation of the middle-class and the competitiveness of the state.  read more »

A recent article in the San Jose Mercury-News reports that transit ridership in “car crazy” Los Angeles has exceeded ridership in the “transit mecca” of the San Francisco Bay Area, a “reversal that could remake California’s mass transit landscape.” This would be a lot more interesting if the writer hadn’t done the arithmetic wrong.  read more »

For much of the 20th century, Los Angeles symbolised the future. Over the course of the century, the population grew 40-fold to nearly four million people.  read more »

Central Avenue, the historic heart of South Los Angeles, has seen better days. Once the home to leading black institutions, like the famous Dunbar Hotel, where jazz and other musical greats stayed, it was also an industrial powerhouse that promised decent work for those fleeing the Jim Crow South.  read more »

The California economy may seem healthy on the surface, with home prices soaring, Silicon Valley booming and the state government posting big multi-year state budget surpluses thanks to a massive surge in capital gains tax revenues and income tax revenues from tech stocks.  read more »

Even today amid a mounting exodus among those who can afford it, and with its appeal diminished to businesses and newcomers, California, legendary state of American dreams, continues to inspire optimism among progressive boosters.  read more »

The Census Bureau recently released data on domestic migration that took place during the COVID-19 pandemic, and their findings were heavily covered in the press with headlines such as “Cities Lost Population in 2021” and “The pandemic city exodus revealed: New York, Los Angeles, San Francisco and Chicago lost the most residents.”  read more »

That rumbling you hear in the residential real estate market is SB9—either a silver bullet or a boogeyman, depending on where you stand.

Senate Bill 9 is the latest law with the potential to reshape California.  read more »

Has the California proposition changed fundamentally? And does it matter for real estate?

The answer to the first question is yes—the state had a net population decline in 2021, the first drop since it began annual counts more than a century ago.  read more »

This newly released report examines how the California dream can be restored for California's middle- and working-class families. An excerpt follows:  read more »