Experts: Detroit's real estate options appealing

[erikd]

Nevertheless, Black said, major barriers to residential and population growth in Detroit are the lack of services and high costs that discourage the middle class from moving back or remaining in the city.

Those issues include high insurance rates, the lack of retail such as grocery stores and a dysfunctional school system.

“We need to bring that middle class back,” Black said. “And the only way to do that is to remove all of those barriers.”

This is a common statement about what Detroit needs to do to attract the middle class back to the city, but it isn't possible to fix all of the problems first, and then attract the people.

It will be virtually impossible for Detroit to offer a high quality school district, low insurance rates, and a plethora of retail options BEFORE the upper/middle class population moves back into the city, because these are symptoms that have been created by the lack of a significant upper/middle class population in the city.

The largest barrier, which is also the one that the city has the most ability to fix, is the substandard city services, especially police/public safety.

There is a very large percentage of the upper/middle class population without school age children who will live in a city with substandard schools. There are many upper/middle class people who will live in a city with a shortage of retail, especially if is offset by proximity to cultural institutions/events and entertainment. There are many upper/middle class people who will pay higher insurance and tax rates if it is offset by lower prices for real estate and/or rental rates.

However, there are very few upper/middle class people who will live in a city where they feel unsafe. As long as the DPD remains unresponsive and useless, there will be no significant influx of upper/middle class people into the city.

The only way Detroit can make a true turnaround is by focusing on the very basic, core city services. Everything else is secondary.

[daddeeo]

Amen Brother!!!

[rhythmc]

This is a common statement about what Detroit needs to do to attract the middle class back to the city, but it isn't possible to fix all of the problems first, and then attract the people.

It will be virtually impossible for Detroit to offer a high quality school district, low insurance rates, and a plethora of retail options BEFORE the upper/middle class population moves back into the city, because these are symptoms that have been created by the lack of a significant upper/middle class population in the city.

The largest barrier, which is also the one that the city has the most ability to fix, is the substandard city services, especially police/public safety.

There is a very large percentage of the upper/middle class population without school age children who will live in a city with substandard schools. There are many upper/middle class people who will live in a city with a shortage of retail, especially if is offset by proximity to cultural institutions/events and entertainment. There are many upper/middle class people who will pay higher insurance and tax rates if it is offset by lower prices for real estate and/or rental rates.

However, there are very few upper/middle class people who will live in a city where they feel unsafe. As long as the DPD remains unresponsive and useless, there will be no significant influx of upper/middle class people into the city.

The only way Detroit can make a true turnaround is by focusing on the very basic, core city services. Everything else is secondary.

Very true.

[English]

This is a common statement about what Detroit needs to do to attract the middle class back to the city, but it isn't possible to fix all of the problems first, and then attract the people.

It will be virtually impossible for Detroit to offer a high quality school district, low insurance rates, and a plethora of retail options BEFORE the upper/middle class population moves back into the city, because these are symptoms that have been created by the lack of a significant upper/middle class population in the city.

The largest barrier, which is also the one that the city has the most ability to fix, is the substandard city services, especially police/public safety.

There is a very large percentage of the upper/middle class population without school age children who will live in a city with substandard schools. There are many upper/middle class people who will live in a city with a shortage of retail, especially if is offset by proximity to cultural institutions/events and entertainment. There are many upper/middle class people who will pay higher insurance and tax rates if it is offset by lower prices for real estate and/or rental rates.

However, there are very few upper/middle class people who will live in a city where they feel unsafe. As long as the DPD remains unresponsive and useless, there will be no significant influx of upper/middle class people into the city.

The only way Detroit can make a true turnaround is by focusing on the very basic, core city services. Everything else is secondary.

Nailed it exactly. The safety issue is the ONLY reason I chose to wait a year before committing to a place, and the places that I've narrowed it down to all have on-site security, gates, and alarms. But what we really need is more effective policing AND ways to disincentivize "broken windows" crime like scrapping/stripping homes.

[DetroitDad]

Erik,

With all do respect, we must do the impossible. Detroit as a whole probably cannot fix everything at once, that is why we need to concentrate on one to three individual neighborhoods, fixing everything on the micro scale, as well as having a strong business and mixed use district, serving as destinations people want to live near right now, today. That neighborhood's success can then be duplicated.

In countless other cities, this has been the way it was done. I'll compare the process to Dr. Frankenstein's Monster. You know, how he made a living being from various odds and ends borrowed from the dead? you have to get vital operations [[safety) and organs [[Downtown) functioning in order to make anything happen at all. After that, you can start dealing with the diseased limbs and discolored skin by injecting a self replicating vacine into the right cell [[neighborhood/set of urban blocks) and it will take over the virus [[blight, crime, etc.). But, all the organs have to be present and functioning on some level. You can't inject the vacine into a dead organism, nothing will happen.

And yet another way of looking at this is through a barrell. No, not a gun barrel, but Liebig's Barrel Minimum to be exact. Liebig's law of the minimum applies here. View Detroit as a stand alone ecosystem. How can she sustain herself?

This is a common statement about what Detroit needs to do to attract the middle class back to the city, but it isn't possible to fix all of the problems first, and then attract the people.

It will be virtually impossible for Detroit to offer a high quality school district, low insurance rates, and a plethora of retail options BEFORE the upper/middle class population moves back into the city, because these are symptoms that have been created by the lack of a significant upper/middle class population in the city.

The largest barrier, which is also the one that the city has the most ability to fix, is the substandard city services, especially police/public safety.

There is a very large percentage of the upper/middle class population without school age children who will live in a city with substandard schools. There are many upper/middle class people who will live in a city with a shortage of retail, especially if is offset by proximity to cultural institutions/events and entertainment. There are many upper/middle class people who will pay higher insurance and tax rates if it is offset by lower prices for real estate and/or rental rates.

However, there are very few upper/middle class people who will live in a city where they feel unsafe. As long as the DPD remains unresponsive and useless, there will be no significant influx of upper/middle class people into the city.

The only way Detroit can make a true turnaround is by focusing on the very basic, core city services. Everything else is secondary.

[citylover]

Erik,

With all do respect, we must do the impossible. Detroit as a whole probably cannot fix everything at once, that is why we need to concentrate on one to three individual neighborhoods, fixing everything on the micro scale, as well as having a strong business and mixed use district, serving as destinations people want to live near right now, today. That neighborhood's success can then be duplicated.

In countless other cities, this has been the way it was done. I'll compare the process to Dr. Frankenstein's Monster. You know, how he made a living being from various odds and ends borrowed from the dead? you have to get vital operations [[safety) and organs [[Downtown) functioning in order to make anything happen at all. After that, you can start dealing with the diseased limbs and discolored skin by injecting a self replicating vacine into the right cell [[neighborhood/set of urban blocks) and it will take over the virus [[blight, crime, etc.). But, all the organs have to be present and functioning on some level. You can't inject the vacine into a dead organism, nothing will happen.

And yet another way of looking at this is through a barrell. No, not a gun barrel, but Liebig's Barrel Minimum to be exact. Liebig's law of the minimum applies here. View Detroit as a stand alone ecosystem. How can she sustain herself?

DetroitDad, are you using the same "caregiver" to get your medical marijuana as Gannon?

[DetroitDad]

Well, I know my posts are pretty sick, but no, I can't say that I do.

DetroitDad, are you using the same "caregiver" to get your medical marijuana as Gannon?