Loading...

PODCAST

Who Killed the Starter Home?

Have you seen any starter homes for sale lately? Neither have we. In this podcast, we speak with experts and try to figure out why this humble first home is going extinct. We’ll be exploring if it is the politicians, wielding zoning laws like a murder weapon who killed the starter home? Or maybe the scaredy-cat planners and designers? Or the developers, armed with cookie-cutter plans and corporate indifference? Is it our convoluted tax policy that subsidies homeownership, but puts every tax

arts design

All Episodes

51:56

The Income of Homeowners: The Rent You Don't Pay....

Who Killed the Starter Home? ·

2026/10/02

In this episode, Professor Richard Green joins us. He's the Director and Chair of the University of Southern California Lusk Center for Real Estate, and he's been obsessed with data and cities since he was about nine years old. He's here with a counterintuitive finding. If you bought a house in the Detroit metropolitan area back in 1987, you did better financially than if you'd bought one in San Francisco and even beat the stock market. Not because Detroit went up more in value. It didn't. But

en

59:24

The Toolbox We Haven't Used Yet. Conversation with...

Who Killed the Starter Home? ·

2026/09/25

In this episode, Steve Goldin joins us with a rare perspective of the housing system from all angles. He's been a developer, a municipal planning director, a real estate head at a public university, and even started a proptech company, so he's sat at every side of the table.His take is that our fear of change drove the death of the starter home, but from there, we get into some genuinely creative ideas most developers or towns have never tried. For example, to get approvals it may not be enough

en

53:57

Small Lots, Big Difference. Townhomes Work...

Who Killed the Starter Home? ·

2026/09/18

In this episode, Dominic Behrens joins us from Sydney, Australia where he is a senior economist with The Centre for International Economics. He is also the co-founder of Sydney YIMBY. Dominic walks us through a real-world experiment most places never get to see. In 2013, a suburban municipality in Australia allowed property owners to subdivide lots down to just 150 square meters, about 1,600 square feet, small enough for townhouses. Construction went up by two-thirds right away. Then in 2019, the

en

53:27

Homelessness Is Solvable. We Have Proof. Conversation...

Who Killed the Starter Home? ·

2026/09/11

In this episode, Raisa Rubin-Stankiewicz joins us. She is the policy director of the New Jersey Coalition to End Homelessness. And she's here with some hard numbers. Unsheltered homelessness in New Jersey is up 61 percent from last year. For every one person who gets housed, almost three people become homeless. Yet Raisa has good news: in under two years, New Jersey got veterans' homelessness to what's called "functional zero." More veterans are getting housed than are becoming homeless. It took

en

68:17

Fear of Others Moving In. Conversation with Tara Paxton

Who Killed the Starter Home? ·

2026/09/04

In this episode, Tara Paxton joins us at the start of what she calls her "Act Two." She spent nearly thirty years on the municipal side of planning, most recently as planning director in Brick Township here in New Jersey where this past June, she finished working on Brick’s state's fourth round of affordable housing compliance. Now Tara is stepping away from municipal government to create something new: an educational and private practice (https://paxtonplanninggroup.com/) built around the gaps

en

65:28

The Regulations Are a Smashing Success, Yet New...

Who Killed the Starter Home? ·

2026/08/28

In this episode, David Kinsey joins us — the planner who, more than almost anyone else in New Jersey, has shaped the math behind the Mount Laurel doctrine and helped determine the numbers of deed-restricted residential units each town is required to build. It was not housing policy, not economics, but a language assignment that set David on his career path when during a study abroad in college he wrote a paper in French about a new town.Decades later, he was the expert witness in court, spending

en

57:07

We Built New Towns Before. Why Not Again?...

Who Killed the Starter Home? ·

2026/08/21

In this episode, Justin Hollander, professor of urban & environmental policy and planning at Tufts University, joins us — and yes, he's also planned a new town on Mars, underground bike tunnels included.Back on Earth, He shares that planners are usually taught to contain and densify existing places and by any means block expansion. The reality is that economic forces make development ooze out anyway, and it ends up as a sprawling suburbs that delivers somewhat affordable homes while making no

en

45:41

A Thousand Small Fixes That Might Actually Work....

Who Killed the Starter Home? ·

2026/08/14

In this episode, research attorney with YIMBY Law Jack Farrell came back to the podcast to walk us through the newly passed Road to Housing Act.This sprawling, three hundred eighty-one-page bill is made up of small technical fixes. For Jack, that's a good sign: the sheer number of granular changes suggests that the authors understand how housing programs work on the ground. We cover the highlights: grant programs that now prioritize ADUs, missing middle housing, and single-stair reform; a fix that

en

50:45

Spanish Colonial Meets State Pro-Housing Laws in...

Who Killed the Starter Home? ·

2026/08/07

For decades, local zoning rules kept towns like Santa Barbara completely stuck, resulting in virtually zero new housing production. Then, the state of California stepped in.In this episode, architect and housing advocate Ellen Bildsten joins us to share firsthand insights from the frontlines of California's housing revolution. We walk through how a massive wave of statewide legislation bypassed restrictive local zoning to unlock unprecedented housing opportunities—from the initial accessory

en

58:36

Zoning Is Theft. The Set-Aside Is the Windfall Tax....

Who Killed the Starter Home? ·

2026/07/31

It is a common story of high-demand towns using zoning to keep housing supply from meeting demand with low- and moderate-income families being pushed out.In this episode, New Jersey's preeminent housing planner Creigh Rahenkamp does a deep dive on our state's half-century attempt to overcome exclusionary zoning. After hearing my recent conversation with Jason Sorens, whose research found no measurable increase in overall housing production, Creigh was furious at what he saw as a mischaracterization

en

50:16

The YIMBY Recipe: Clarity and Carrots. Conversation...

Who Killed the Starter Home? ·

2026/07/24

You have probably heard of the "Yes In My Back Yard" movement, but you may be less familiar with YIMBY Law — a nonprofit organization that helps research policy solutions, offer legal support, and streamline the arbitrary and delaying tactics stalling new home construction.In this episode, research attorney with YIMBY law, Jack Farrell joins us to describe the housing doctrines in New Jersey, Pennsylvania, and New York. He discusses why simply making "local housing plans" is great in theory, but

en

52:23

Claiming the Designer's Seat at the Developer's...

Who Killed the Starter Home? ·

2026/07/17

"Design is the easy part. I get to sit in my secret magic studio, come up with a great design, and draw it up. I can do that all day long. But getting that design to work with the budget, the zoning, the neighbors, and the construction—that’s the hard part." According to Christopher Calott, Chair and Program Founder of the Master of Real Estate Development + Design Program at UC Berkeley. In this episode, we discuss how designers can stop complaining from the sidelines and actually regain control of

en

52:49

Calibrating Caution and Unlocking Housing Choices....

Who Killed the Starter Home? ·

2026/07/10

"If you try to keep anything from changing in the buildings, then what has to change is the people," shared Andrew Burleson, Board Chair of Strong Towns, as he walked me through the way out-of-proportion regulations that lead to our analysis-paralysis. Are we sure that a simple backyard cottage or a neighborhood triplex need to face a multi-year legal gridlock as if it's an airport or a nuclear power plant? In this episode, we dive deep into Denver’s promising new "Unlocking Housing Choices"

en

56:50

The Data is In: Inclusionary Zoning is Killing...

Who Killed the Starter Home? ·

2026/07/03

As someone who advocates for affordable housing, I am having a hard time processing this data—but it is officially in, and it’s a massive reality check. Economist Jason Sorens has done extensive modeling on New Jersey’s housing landscape and found that Mount Laurel and inclusionary zoning mandates have had a 0% net impact on increasing overall housing supply or lowering housing costs. While the policy successfully produces a small number of deed-restricted units, it also creates an overwhelming

en

49:00

Dating like an Architect: Will You Design a House...

Who Killed the Starter Home? ·

2026/06/26

When Erick and Carolina were recent architecture grads navigating a long-distance relationship between Houston and McAllen, Texas, Erick dropped a question that would completely rewrite their futures: "Will You Design a House with Me?" While standard relationship advice warns against co-managing massive financial and design projects, this single speculative starter home on Orange Avenue became the literal blueprint for their marriage, their family, and their entire business. Today, as the founders

en

64:45

Why is Post-Disaster Money the Only Tool That Works?...

Who Killed the Starter Home? ·

2026/06/19

Our latest episode was recorded live at the NJ Planning and Redevelopment Conference with Randi Moore, CEO of the Affordable Housing Alliance. We dove into a frustrating paradox: under normal circumstances the standard funding, rigid compliance rules, and hyper-fragmented municipal zoning completely freeze the pipeline for modest starter homes. But when a catastrophe strikes—like Hurricane Sandy—emergency recovery funds with more flexible rules suddenly act as a regulatory bypass cutting through the

en

47:41

Housing Boards:The Helpful, the Unhelpful, and the fun!

Who Killed the Starter Home? ·

2026/06/12

If we "just fix zoning" all our housing problems will be solved, right? Not exactly. In this episode, Professional Planner Gabby Hart joins us from Colorado to share her experience working with municipalities on master plans and zoning regulations. She explains the unexpected friction between the public process and private restrictions and how sometimes it’s deed restrictions and private covenants that kill starter homes.Another surprise could be to planners that steering committees could be

en

47:38

Stitching the Sprawl: Reclaiming Our Streets....

Who Killed the Starter Home? ·

2026/06/05

Potholes need fixing: no argument there! But while the "universal pothole consensus" keeps our eyes glued to the asphalt, it can make us miss the grander, more exciting evolution waiting to happen in our towns.In this episode, urban journalist and researcher John Surico (https://www.johnsurico.com/) challenges us to look way beyond basic maintenance. He shares his firsthand experiences bringing beautiful, community-grown temporary public spaces to life right in his own neighborhood. These

en

56:07

You Can’t Afford NOT Having Community Engagement....

Who Killed the Starter Home? ·

2026/05/29

Developers are often terrified of community engagement because they cannot control it. But in a world where projects face years of gridlock, should we admit that it is far riskier financially and socially to skip it?In this week's podcast, I spoke with architect and urban planner Merilee Meacock, partner at KSS Architects, about her experience working alongside visionary developers, planners, and organizations to create transformational projects that truly work. These developments are deeply

en

53:48

A Tangled Mess of Rules: Is the time right for...

Who Killed the Starter Home? ·

2026/05/22

In this week's podcast, I spoke with urban planner Silvia Del Fava, who shares findings from her extensive research in New York State. They interviewed municipal officials, land use professionals, engineers, and developers to understand what is contributing to our current housing gridlock. Similar stories of technical, unpredictable, and unexplainable regulations that vary wildly across 1,600 different municipalities kept coming up. This fragmentation creates a compounding nightmare of repetitive

en

84 results

Similar Podcasts

Voice of the Arts

WQED Multimedia

Relic Radio Sci-Fi (old time radio)

RelicRadio.com

Wild West Tales - Old Time Radio Westerns

theaterofthemind-otr.com

Podcast Patapoe

0d0a

Play On Podcasts

Next Chapter Podcasts