Between June 2019 and June 2025, the median home price in Maricopa County jumped 65% to nearly $474,000, according to one real estate company, putting home ownership out of reach for much of the working class.
Our house value jumped 50% in 20 months between late 2020 and early 2022
“We are the only land use that does meet the 100-year requirements,” since apartment, commercial and industrial development were not covered by the 1980 law
Yep, this is a problem. You stop building housing supply but allow in the new data centers.
I'd also love to see grid capacity included in development plans too, at least if commercial/industrial projects exceed a certain power consumption.
The aftereffects of the 2008 real estate crash delayed them, but they had recently been revived
One should be naturally skeptical of the reasons why people looking to make a fortune on speculative land development give for why their aspirational project hasn't moved forward. Is it water, or lack of demand, or the fact that they can't raise the capital to do it, or that it was actually a play to get acquired by a larger company?
There's a long history of trying to build subdivisions far from the urban core because developers assumed that people would buy houses far away almost no matter what (build it and they will come; see the "land fraud" he mentioned above) or that was simply the only parcel of land they could acquire, only to see a few houses and streets go up and the remainder never materialize.
Or, you see that the way for a develop to make the profit margin work is to build a big (more expensive) house but on a smaller lot, where you're only feet from your neighbor. But people are willing to live waaay outside of services only if they can get a big house with a sizeable yard—they are willing to trade convenience if it gets them something that's otherwise far outside their price range in the city, especially if they also believe (or are told) that things will fill in quickly and that they're getting in before things boom and will have a great house and eventually all the other things they want too.
runaway growth — 80,000 lots had already been approved
runaway growth = 3%
80,000 home lots approved (much different than to be built this year, or this decade, or even ever built), which sounds like a lot until you consider that there's more than 2 million already here. So, up to 3%.
Around 200 miles of earth fissures caused by this subsidence have been mapped across Arizona.
A problem across many states, but this makes it sound like a sensational issue that's unique to Phoenix and has never been seen before. Just saw an article last week that Houston was the worst in the country for this.
A sizable majority of voters favored it initially, but the effort ultimately crashed at the polls
I volunteered for this campaign a little (I was primarily working on another ballot initiative that cycle, focused on the independent redistricting commission).
This was essentially a "Don't Become LA" campaign, which resonated well, especially as the influx of Californians arrived. Tucson complains about Phoenix, Phoenix complains about LA, I'm not sure who you guys complain about.
The city’s rampant growth has transformed former agricultural fields and open desert into homes and tested the bounds of the water supply in Maricopa County, which usually ranks as one of the nation’s fastest-growing counties
It's framing like this that I find super annoying. The notion is that as Phoenix has grown, its water use has similarly skyrocketed unabated.
Waaaaay wrong. Extremely misleading.
The important context not mentioned is that overall water use today is about the same as it was in 1950. And since 1990, per capita use is down by 30-something percent.
Cities, farms and mines were at one point pulling at least 1.9 million more acre-feet a year out of the state’s aquifers than rainfall and snowmelt could replenish
Of course, this is a very much a national problem, but that context is completely missing here. Nebraska, Kansas, Arkansas, Maryland, Texas, Idaho...I mean, the list goes on and on. I'm just always frustrated when these issues are written in a way that implies they're unique to Phoenix when they're often not uncommon problems.
Also, no mention of the broader context—that the largest city, by far, in the metro area (Phoenix) doesn't need to pump much groundwater at all? Only 2% of Phoenix's water use. And no mention that 3.6 million acre feet of water have been pumped back into the ground for water banking, a rainy day water fund? Nope, instead the lack of that context makes the reader assume that groundwater pumping is emblematic of the primary municipalities as well, not just some edge communities.
Growth-related industries such as construction and real estate account for a substantially larger share of the area’s economic base than they do in the U.S. as a whole — nearly 19% compared with 14.3% nationally.
Of course, this naturally results if lots of people are moving here. Of course construction costs are going to be higher in a palce that is building lots of new houses compared to olde cities where they aren't building. If the masses slowed their migration, we'd naturally build fewer new homes and other industries would suddenly take up a larger percentage of the economy, even if they didn't at all expand during that time. But that doesn't matter to the pro-growth folks who routinely trot this out like construction is the only industry Phoenix can succeed at, or that it's especially important. Nah, it's big only because so many people want to move to Phoenix.
A slew of sensational headlines followed. The New York Times said it likely signaled the “beginning of the end to the explosive development that has made the Phoenix area the fastest growing metropolitan region in the country,” a prediction echoed by other outlets.
I found many of these articles personally frustrating.
There were two ways to view this: an indictment of Phoenix (can you believe it's gotten so bad that Phoenix had to do this??? I'm sure glad I don't live there, they must be in real trouble), or as a smart innovation (whoa, unlike most other cities in the US, Phoenix is actually taking real and meaningful action to preserve its water sources!). I think you can guess which route virtually every article took.
“The whole reason I moved out here was to get away from that.
Totally get this sentiment, but also...everyone knew that area was gunning to be developed. There are literally signs everywhere about new developments and its constantly the talk of the area. That new homes would be going in is not a surprise; the surprise here is that they haven't already gone in.
The parkway drive passes through open desert where cattle that graze on neighboring state land occasionally break through fences and stroll onto the road.
Side note: cattle don't below in creosote flats like this area. That is very much NOT a feature worth keeping in that area.
if the question is having enough water for people to drink and to bathe and to live?
Sure, new supplies would be great. But also, we can cut out some of the stupid waste we have right now. I'd love to follow Vegas's lead in banning useless grass landscaping around commercial developments, medians/street edges, and so forth. Vegas was the worlds biggest water waster for most of its history, then cut its use quickly by just stopping doing stupid shit.
“I’ll probably stay here,” she said, since anywhere else, her mortgage bill could easily double.
Not to mention the fact that you probably can't sell. Who is going to buy?
“It’s not about running out. It’s about: Are you willing to pay for what it costs?”
Yep, exactly. There's no way the nation's fifth largest city is disappearing because of water capacity, especially in a place where solar can power so much.
Desalination is costly, at least at the moment, but it primarily just requires cheap energy. Well, we have a lot of cheap energy potential here—especially if you cover those canals and pipelines with linear solar.
“They are designed from top to bottom, and everything is beautifully designed for a look, to work well together. It’s very hard to do that in an old farming town.”
Excellent point
Duane Schooley Jr. bought two houses in Tartesso to rent out at first back in 2018 and 2019 because “we figured that Arizona was going to be a hot spot.” But Schooley, a local Republican party activist, is now openly disdainful of the state’s decision to stop allowing new homes to be built on groundwater supplies. He even doubts the state’s talk of a water shortage.
A highly speculative move, that's for sure (who wants to rent houses in the middle of nowhere with a low quality of life, especially when those are already the cheapest to buy?). Sorry that you didn't do enough research and that your bet didn't pan out—but that's capitalism for ya.
can discourage lower-cost housing development
Part of this is migration from more expensive markets. Developers cater to building larger houses than you'd find elsewhere, as someone selling their LA/SF house will look for lots more space than they need since they have more buying power. Every Californian that moves here tells his new neighbor that he can afford almost twice the house for nearly half the price here—so that's what gets built.
“I like the quiet,” she said. “The only things you hear are cars going by, people talking and dogs barking, whereas in cities it was traffic, 24-7.
This is also my neighborhood, which is still IN THE DAMN CITY. You can do suburban life without moving to the middle of the desert. I'm not sure why I hear this so often from people who got a house on the edge of the city.
The downside is being marooned on a service-less island
Yup. My ex-wife moved into my Tempe apartment after one month of dating because while she was at work one day, her parents bought a cheap house even further west than the Sun Valley Parkway mentioned above. It was an untenable situation, given that she went to school at ASU almost an hour away, and worked an extra 25 minutes beyond that. I had her move in when she fell asleep driving home one night after work.
WHEN NEWS BROKE OF THE STATE’S 2023 BAN on new groundwater-based subdivisions, sparking apocalyptic national coverage, local and state officials switched into defense mode. “It seems in some ways like there’s criticism for us for doing planning and smart development,” Phoenix Mayor Kate Gallego told the Arizona Republic after the ADWR moratorium was announced. “It is a strength, not a weakness. We are planning ahead. We have a very simple principle: Water first, then development.”
Haha, yep—that was my point above.
making them the most remote developments yet
A nitpick here, but this isn't true. But saying it helps establish that frame above.