Is Boulder, CO an anomaly?

There's lots of reasons Ballot Question 300 is not the solution for housing issues in Boulder.  Landlords will make a killing filling homes with rich college kids, it'll invite more home ownership for the sole purpose of renting, and likely impact neighborhoods already being trashed by wealthy kids at their current occupancy levels.  Boulder needs more affordable housing, allowing a ton of unrelated people to each pay more than 1k/month for a bedroom in the same house is likely not the answer.

Anywho, Boulder is great if you make a lot of money, sounds like Flagstaff is real nice, and Idaho is ripe for a housing crisis.

Dan COwrote:

Boulder needs more affordable housing, allowing a ton of unrelated people to each pay more than 1k/month for a bedroom in the same house is likely not the answer.

Stop spreading FUD, that's not what the measure says. It says, raise the occupancy limit to # of bedrooms in the house + 1. I live in a four bedroom house - does it make sense to only allow 3  unrelated people to live in it? No, it doesn't, for the simple fact that it can house four comfortably.

Love to discuss more but, 

I live in Boulder, PM me, we can go climb and shoot some shit and hang on some bolts - discourse is good!

Long Rangerwrote:

Stop spreading FUD, that's not what the measure says. It says, raise the occupancy limit to # of bedrooms in the house + 1. I live in a four bedroom house - does it make sense to only allow 3  unrelated people to live in it? No, it doesn't, for the simple fact that it can house four comfortably.

Is that seriously how the renting laws work in Boulder? That is dumb.  

Not from Boulder and not familiar with the local laws. But it does always seem like the NIMBYs always think that their town is so special and have some BS reason why it couldn't possibly become more dense. Works the same in every town.

JCMwrote:

Is that seriously how the renting laws work in Boulder? That is dumb.  

Not from Boulder and not familiar with the local laws. But it does always seem like the NIMBYs think that their town is so special and have some reason why it couldn't possibly become more dense.

Well, Denver was the same way until recently. There's no question these laws were put in place as a round-about way to limit density. I doubt a lot of Boulderites actually care how many people sleep in a bedroom/house as long as they keep it to themselves, but apparently many have issue with the increased noise, cars, & traffic, etc. In Melo Park, California, there's also a city ordinance prohibiting overnight street parking (yes, you've heard that right). 

The laws shouldn't have existed in principle, but it's also a bit disingenuous for the supporters of ballot 300 to claim it's just about "bedrooms". So here's the $64K question: how would you have addressed the growth concerns of the existing residents (some paid a pretty price to move away from more densely populated areas) in a more principled way or is affordability and low density inherently conflicting?

Long Rangerwrote:

Stop spreading FUD, that's not what the measure says. It says, raise the occupancy limit to # of bedrooms in the house + 1. I live in a four bedroom house - does it make sense to only allow 3  unrelated people to live in it? No, it doesn't, for the simple fact that it can house four comfortably.

if you live near the college it is very much a justified fear.  Nobody who actually lives in a 5br home in boulder is going to rent out 4 of their bedrooms to unrelated people.  So why wouldn't you end up with landlords charging prices they know college kids will pay to pack more students into homes exacerbating issues that residents are already seeing anywhere near the school.  I'm all for more affordable housing, I don't see the benefits of this specific solution outweighing the issues or really getting to the root of the problem.  My neighborhood is a mix of newish builds, affordable housing and section 8, and its really nice and allows for a diverse mix of residents, would be great to see that be the norm, i can't imagine many adults in Boulder see living in a house with more than 3 unrelated tenants as a good long term solution to housing access here.

I've read the for/against arguments and spoken to friends I trust and thats where I came out, plenty of people may disagree but to say I'm 'spreading fear' seems unfair.

patrick wild wrote:

Does the rule only applies to income properties? 

No, it applies to all properties. The occupancy limits are set forth in Boulder Muni. Code § 9-8-5:

General Occupancy Restrictions: Subject to the provisions of Chapter 10-2, "Property Maintenance Code," B.R.C. 1981, no persons except the following persons shall occupy a dwelling unit:

(1)  Members of a family plus up to two additional persons. Quarters that roomers use shall not exceed one-third of the total floor area of the dwelling unit and shall not be a separate dwelling unit;

(2) Up to three persons in P, A, RR, RE, and RL zones;

(3) Up to four persons in MU, RM, RMX, RH, BT, BC, BMS, BR, DT, IS, IG, IM, and IMS zones; or

(4) Two persons and any of their children by blood, marriage, guardianship, including foster children, or adoption.

Some properties are grandfathered to allow more than four unrelated persons, so long as occupancy isn't more than one person per bedroom. "Cooperative housing units" (as defined and permitted in Boulder Muni. Code § 10-11-3) can be denser. There are also exceptions for boarding houses, fraternities, sororities, dorms, hostels, care facilities, bed and breakfasts, etc.

I deleted a previous comment about climbing gyms for this post.

To answer a previous question, yes, I'm currently a homeowner in Boulder. I've also been a renter and a landlord here.

The ballot measure to raise occupancy limits in Boulder, known as "Bedrooms are for People," is endorsed by the Colorado Working Families Party, the Emergency Family Assistance Association, Out Boulder County (LGBTQ+ org), the Sierra Club, Boulder SURJ, the Boulder Area Labor Council, all of our major local papers (Daily Camera, Boulder Weekly, YellowScene), Boulder County Interfaith Leaders Caucus, the Boulder Chamber, and more. Having more people able to live within the city reduces in-commuting, and more people per dwelling is more energy efficient, so it's good for the environment. Increasing housing supply is good for workers, and the local employers who currently find it hard to attract and retain local workers. Increasing the ability of non-traditional families to live together is good for queer communities, the working poor, immigrants, and young professionals who want to live with friend groups (and climbers who want to live with other climbers). Currently in most of Boulder, two unmarried couples can't live in the same house no matter how big it is. Four adult roommates can't share a house (not legally, although many do). A senior couple aging in place that wants to share their large home that they bought in the 60s with a roommate and a hired live-in caregiver is out of luck.

I understand that some folks argue that this measure will lead to a bunch of investors snapping up houses and turning them into student boarding houses. I think that fear is greatly overblown. Housing regulations on what qualifies as a bedroom, and how big you can build on any given site, still apply. Health and safety codes still apply. Demolishing / rebuilding or significantly modifying existing homes in Boulder is a huge, costly, sloooooooow, regulatory nightmare that I doubt many investors will find is a better use of their capital than other opportunities outside of Boulder. Increasing housing supply tends to overall lower prices, not raise them. Having been a landlord, I know from experience that you charge what the market will bear for your property, whether you are renting to a single person, a couple, a family, or a set of roommates.

As things stand now, we have a restrictive and discriminatory occupancy limit that many landlords flout anyway. Bedrooms are for People would bring those shadow renters into legal status, with all the protections of the law that they may currently be unable or unwilling to risk exercising. And it would also increase housing supply. If it turns a few 6-bedroom single family mansions into rentals that house more people, that's not a bad thing in my view. And it would also make Boulder more welcoming to non-wealthy people and non-traditional families. I'm seeing much more win here than cause for concern.

ETA - For Dan, if allowing more people to occupy empty bedrooms is not the answer to Boulder's housing challenges, what do you think is? I can tell you that no matter what you propose, the no-growth crowd will have a reason why it's a bad idea. Change occupancy limits to better use our existing housing stock? Allow people to build accessory dwelling units on single family properties? Allow subdivision of large lots? Build more condos and townhouses on currently empty and blighted parking lots like Diagonal Plaza? Allow multi-family units like duplexes and triplexes in what are currently single family zoned neighborhoods? These are all terrible ideas according to Boulder's conservatives. Every proposal I've seen that would increase the amount of housing in Boulder is vigorously torpedoed for one reason or another. 

Seems to me that because land in Boulder is finite and very desirable the only way that you'll have affordable housing for low and middle income people is through some sort of subsidization and price or rent control. Otherwise, anything on the market will rise to market level prices, out of reach of the people you're hoping to serve. I haven't kept track of City plans to develop or approve housing, but the old hospital site on Broadway seems like a perfect place to build some affordable housing -- centrally located and right on bus lines. The Diagonal Plaza might also be a good site for a mixed use development. I think allowing people to occupy empty bedrooms will turn out to benefit a very small number of people other than students. More cars, more traffic, and marginal benefit to working people, especially families.   

L Kap I agree with basically every proposal you added there, and Wendy I think you’re spot on, in a useless attempt to bring the thread back around (I’ll share some blame for thread drift of course) it would be nice if Boulder was the anomaly as a desirable climber friendly city that actually had housing opportunities for people with the kind of ‘regular’ jobs that any functioning community needs.  

Dan, I also agree with all of those proposals. I think we need an "all of the above" approach to diversify housing opportunities, which is why I'm Yes on Bedrooms are for People. It will allow us to better utilize existing housing stock. As I'm sure you've noticed, every development project in Boulder gets fought tooth and nail by some portion of the surrounding neighbors, supported by the no-growth conservatives in general. And now they also don't want more people to be able to use the homes we already have. Basically, some folks are opposed to more people, plain and simple. They'll call it traffic, noise, or ugly buildings, but it boils down to "we're full here, thanks". 

Wendy, I think your analysis of the problem is sound. We have limited land that is very desirable, and it won't be affordable unless subsidized. Rent control was made illegal in Colorado at the state level in 1981, and that's not likely to change soon. Boulder does have an Inclusionary Housing Program that provides some below-market-rate housing. It's complicated and it has its own issues, but I support it. You can read about it here: https://bouldercolorado.gov/services/inclusionary-housing. One of the major provisions is that new multi-unit developments have to be 25% permanently affordable (deed restricted). This is a good thing, but it's not enough. The old hospital site by Sanitas will be redeveloped and will provide some affordable units. So will Diagonal Plaza, Alpine Balsam, Waterview, and a handful of other current projects. All good! But we need a more diverse housing stock than just a few luxury condos that are permanently affordable at one end, and unobtainable single family homes in a suburban street pattern on the other end....single family homes that ALWAYS get rebuilt even bigger and more expensive when they are renovated or redeveloped, because that's the only financially sound decision when you can't subdivide or build multi-family homes.

That's why I also support ADUs, ability to subdivide large lots, ability to build some level of multi-family units in what are currently single family zoned neighborhoods, raising occupancy limits, experimenting more with cooperative housing, and other reforms. The goal is to make this special place more accessible to more diverse (non-wealthy) people. I don't want Boulder to become Aspen, but that's where we're headed if we don't rethink some of this stuff.

There's a lot more to say, but it's going to be a beautiful day, and I'm headed out to enjoy some of that climbing that makes this area so special. Hope other local folks get to get out too. 

ADU's usually increase property values due to income potential, etc, which in turn increases the cost of housing. 

ADU's rarely provide secure housing and owners can easily skirt housing discrimination laws.

ADU's are a mixed bag.

Zoning regulations, easements, tax laws, land use policies, NIMBY's, etc are a real barrier to affordable housing. That's not going away.

Income inequality, selfishness, etc is not going away. 

One can make the case that if the government helps create the housing affordability problem, they should fix it. However, their track record is horrible. They could open up federal land for affordable housing but opposition will be strong.

Even the cost of higher education has put many students into financial crisis and limited their ability to move into home ownership and build wealth.

People will make poor choices. That will never change. 

Unaffordable housing is here to stay.

To circle back to the original question: 

Price, location, or quality. Choose only two at best. Sometimes you only get one. Boulder is the same as anywhere else. 

Long Rangerwrote:

Stop spreading FUD, that's not what the measure says. It says, raise the occupancy limit to # of bedrooms in the house + 1. I live in a four bedroom house - does it make sense to only allow 3  unrelated people to live in it? No, it doesn't, for the simple fact that it can house four comfortably.

Love to discuss more but, 

I live in Boulder, PM me, we can go climb and shoot some shit and hang on some bolts - discourse is good!

My house is nominally a 4 bedroom house, too. But under the definition of what constitutes a bedroom under the Boulder code (generally, 70 sf with a door, window, heat, and electricity), the living room, dining room, office, and even the laundry room are also bedrooms. And the basement has an additional bedroom, a workshop, and a family room that could easily be partitioned into three bedrooms. The master bedroom could also be partitioned into two bedrooms.

So that's a minimum of 11 bedrooms and maybe 13 if I want to put up two walls. Even crazier, the basement has a mini-kitchen, so maybe I could claim the main floor kitchen and eating area are another two--or maybe three--bedrooms.

It sure would piss off the neighbors if I rented to 17 students.

(Full disclosure: I'm in Boulder County, not City of Boulder, so 300 this doesn't affect me. But, I think the weakness of 300 is that the "bedrooms plus one" formula will allow landlords to be very creative about what counts as a bedroom).

PRRosewrote:

My house is nominally a 4 bedroom house, too. But under the definition of what constitutes a bedroom under the Boulder code (generally, 70 sf with a door, window, heat, and electricity), the living room, dining room, office, and even the laundry room are also bedrooms. And the basement has an additional bedroom, a workshop, and a family room that could easily be partitioned into three bedrooms. The master bedroom could also be partitioned into two bedrooms.

So that's a minimum of 11 bedrooms and maybe 13 if I want to put up two walls. Even crazier, the basement has a mini-kitchen, so maybe I could claim the main floor kitchen and eating area are another two--or maybe three--bedrooms.

It sure would piss off the neighbors if I rented to 17 students.

(Full disclosure: I'm in Boulder County, not City of Boulder, so 300 this doesn't affect me. But, I think the weakness of 300 is that the "bedrooms plus one" formula will allow landlords to be very creative about what counts as a bedroom).

That's not correct, although I've seen similar misinformation coming from the anti-Bedrooms campaign, including a particularly egregious cartoon. Boulder code includes every bedroom has to have access to a bathroom without passing through another bedroom, and you have to be able to access the bedroom without going through another bedroom, and it can't be a garage, kitchen, bathroom, dining room, or living room. You'd also have to get a building permit from the City of Boulder to do that extensive level of remodeling, which you would not get for your creativity. Boulder Code also includes "Quarters that roomers use shall not exceed one-third of the total floor area of the dwelling unit" which is unchanged by Bedrooms are for People.

But even if you could do all that, good luck renting out your all-bedroom, no-living-space, you-get-70-sq-feet-and-share-a-bathroom-with-7-people-and-your-kitchen-is-a-hotplate  house and juggling your 17 leases and the relationships between all your tenants. I'm sure investors are champing at the bit to get in on that action. 

plantmandanwrote:

To circle back to the original question: 

Price, location, or quality. Choose only two at best. Sometimes you only get one. Boulder is the same as anywhere else. 

Pipe down Psaki.  Let the thread take its course. 

If bedrooms really were for people wouldn’t we cal them people rooms? I say bedrooms are for beds. We need to stop infringing on the natural habitat of beds. 

Dan Cookseywrote:

Pipe down Psaki.  Let the thread take its course. 

Haha I get that reference 

L Kapwrote:

That's not correct, although I've seen similar misinformation coming from the anti-Bedrooms campaign, including a particularly egregious cartoon. Boulder code includes every bedroom has to have access to a bathroom without passing through another bedroom, and you have to be able to access the bedroom without going through another bedroom, and it can't be a garage, kitchen, bathroom, dining room, or living room . You'd also have to get a building permit from the City of Boulder to do that extensive level of remodeling, which you would not get for your creativity. Boulder Code also includes "Quarters that roomers use shall not exceed one-third of the total floor area of the dwelling unit" which is unchanged by Bedrooms are for People.

But even if you could do all that, good luck renting out your all-bedroom, no-living-space, you-get-70-sq-feet-and-share-a-bathroom-with-7-people-and-your-kitchen-is-a-hotplate  house and juggling your 17 leases and the relationships between all your tenants. I'm sure investors are champing at the bit to get in on that action. 

You are correct that the Boulder code currently says that "Quarters that roomers use shall not exceed one-third of the total floor area of the dwelling unit." But you're wrong about what Question 300 does--it actually eliminates that section. See the line out in § 9-8-5(a)(1) in documents.bouldercolorado.g…;dbid=0&repo=LF8PROD2&cr=1.

Here's the Boulder code's definition of a bedroom (found in § 11-1-2):

Bedroom means a room with seventy square feet or more of floor area that is used for sleeping or could be used for sleeping. Garages, kitchens, bathrooms and one dining room and one living room per dwelling unit are deemed not to be bedrooms for the purposes of this definition.

My house has multiple spaces that can be considered a "living room" or "dining room" so the rooms that most people would consider the living room and the dining room are bedrooms for code purposes. Every bedroom would have bathroom access without going through another bedroom. And there are plenty of bathrooms. All of the bedrooms would be quite nicely sized, except the laundry room which is barely 70 sf. But it has a very high ceiling--ideal for putting in a loft bed with desk space underneath. And it even has a closet. 

The mini-kitchen is actually fully functional. It was the family kitchen for almost a year while the main kitchen was being renovated. But I clearly indicated that converting the main kitchen was a crazy idea.

So without doing anything, I have 11 legal bedrooms. The minor amount of work required to create two more bedrooms would not be extensive, nor particularly creative, and I don't see why it would be a problem getting a permit to divide what is a large space into three rooms.

The one-third occupancy rule would have thwarted my evil plan. But, as I noted, Question 300 eliminates it, and opens the door to landlords subdividing housing in extreme ways to pack people in.

PRRosewrote:

You are correct that the Boulder code currently says that "Quarters that roomers use shall not exceed one-third of the total floor area of the dwelling unit." But you're wrong about what Question 300 does--it actually eliminates that section. See the line out in § 9-8-5(a)(1) in documents.bouldercolorado.g…;dbid=0&repo=LF8PROD2&cr=1.

Here's the Boulder code's definition of a bedroom (found in § 11-1-2):

My house has multiple spaces that can be considered a "living room" or "dining room" so the rooms that most people would consider the living room and the dining room are bedrooms for code purposes. Every bedroom would have bathroom access without going through another bedroom. And there are plenty of bathrooms. All of the bedrooms would be quite nicely sized, except the laundry room which is barely 70 sf. But it has a very high ceiling--ideal for putting in a loft bed with desk space underneath. And it even has a closet. 

The mini-kitchen is actually fully functional. It was the family kitchen for almost a year while the main kitchen was being renovated. But I clearly indicated that converting the main kitchen was a crazy idea.

So without doing anything, I have 11 legal bedrooms. The minor amount of work required to create two more bedrooms would not be extensive, nor particularly creative, and I don't see why it would be a problem getting a permit to divide what is a large space into three rooms.

The one-third occupancy rule would have thwarted my evil plan. But, as I noted, Question 300 eliminates it, and opens the door to landlords subdividing housing in extreme ways to pack people in.

Ah, you're right, I missed that the Bedrooms proposition strikes that language about 1/3 of the total floor area. Today I learned! I suspect there may be other provisions of the Boulder building code (and international building code upon which it's based), or parking issues/requirements etc., that prevent packing in a bunch of subdivided bedrooms, but I am not an expert in the municipal code. It would be interesting to get City Planning to weigh in.

For the sake of argument, let's assume you're right and you could get 11 or 13 legal bedrooms into your house. How many square feet is this house, and how much common space would all your tenants be sharing? You're not going to get $1000/bedroom for people to share a house with few amenities with a dozen other people. The extra income you'd get from bedroom-packing would be substantially offset by the reduced value of each bedroom and upkeep/turnover costs. Few investors are going to think it's worthwhile to convert a house into what's basically a boarding house and deal with all those tenants, leases, turnover costs, accumulated wear and tear, and potential substantial property damage and headaches that come with every tenant. It takes a lot of upkeep between tenants to keep everything in decent condition, especially if you have an eye toward your property's eventual resale value...and appreciation is the real value of property in Boulder, not rental income. Might a few people try it? Maybe. It's not likely to be a substantial problem that takes over Boulder's housing market. And if, improbably, that started to happen, I have faith in us as a community to revisit this issue. Conversations like this are also good fodder if the Bedrooms initiative does not pass, so that it can be modified to be stronger next time. 

I've lived in college towns that didn't have strong occupancy limits (or, if there were, they weren't enforced), and landlords will absolutely pack students into homes. Boulder is both a college town and an attractive place for affluent people to live, so there is even more incentive for landlords to do that here.

Most Boulder homes are nominally three or four bedrooms. So when we think that Question 300 would allow four or five unrelated people to occupy the dwelling, that sounds reasonable. But the BR plus 1 rule isn't very reasonable if the definition of a bedroom is flexible enough that instead of four or five people in the three or four bedroom house, there are actually eight or ten people.

Keep in mind that the BR plus 1 rule determines how many unrelated people can live in a house, but it doesn't mean they have to actually use the quasi-bedrooms for sleeping since they can double up in the "real" bedrooms.

I described my house--and how it would be treated under Question 300--to illustrate the issue, not because I have any intention of renting. But it is big enough, with plenty of of amenities. If five can live comfortably in a typical Boulder house--which is common (if not always legal), then 12 would be fine in my house. Not all the "real" bedrooms are ideal for sharing but enough are that, even though the living room and dining room would count as bedrooms for purposes of determining maximum occupancy, they would not have to actually be used as bedrooms. Even without them, there is at least 1,000 sf of common area.

Obviously, you thought that the one-third rule was a backstop. It's not. Hoping that there is something else in the code is wishful thinking.

As it is, Question 300 looks like a Trojan horse brought to you by Boulder landlords.