> But the dramatic rise in rents also coincides with national developers starting to eye the areas around public universities as a growth market. Real estate companies bulldoze aging buildings to put up the kinds of amenity-rich, luxury apartments that might appeal to upper-middle-class parents looking for a safe, comfortable place for their student to live but which students from lower-income families such as Martinez’s couldn’t possibly afford.

This fundamentally misunderstands how the market works. Consider the counter-factual: had the developers not come in and redeveloped aging structures into modern buildings, those old structures would be just as expensive as the new ones due to a shortage. Yet another piece that demonizes people who actually build homes while not considering what happens when we _dont_ build homes. Just look at SF for what the reality of not building looks like.