“No society can be fully understood apart from the residences of its members.”
I’ve that quote (from “Crabgrass Frontier,” the seminal historical past of America’s suburbs) taped to a wall behind my desk. It summarizes why I like protecting housing for The New York Times and appear by no means to expire of issues to jot down about. Housing is all the pieces. It’s the place we stay and lift our households. It is most individuals’s largest retailer of wealth. Whether you personal, you hire, otherwise you sleep outdoors, the place you hold your head defines a lot of your existence.
Over the previous few many years, and particularly for the reason that pandemic, housing has gone from an emblem of American energy to an on a regular basis disaster. Aspiring owners have gotten ceaselessly renters. People stay in more and more crowded households, the provision of unlawful housing has surged and homeless camps have multiplied. People are fleeing costly states for cheaper ones — which has in flip created housing issues within the cities the place they find yourself.
There have additionally been new alternatives: The rise of at-home places of work has allowed many individuals to relocate to cheaper housing markets and prompted quite a lot of households to give up their 9 to 5s and redevelop property or turn out to be landlords. In California and elsewhere, the legalization of yard properties has impressed quite a lot of owners to turn out to be builders by creating small rental models on their properties.
For the previous a number of years, I’ve lined nearly each facet of America’s housing disaster, from the general public officers making an attempt to sort out it in statehouses to the individuals residing its penalties. I write about tenants in addition to landlords, builders in addition to environmentalists, public housing in addition to personal — even an try to construct a brand new metropolis from scratch.
My tales vary in matter and are available from across the nation, however the widespread thread is that they’re rooted within the accounts of individuals and the locations that make them. Which is why I need to hear from you. I need to know what sorts of housing pressures you might be coping with and the way they’ve affected your life, household, friendships and group. And I need to know what tales or matters you suppose want extra consideration. The articles I write are impressed by the tales individuals inform me.
I learn all submissions. I additionally at all times attain again out to ask extra questions and ensure I’ve acquired my info proper earlier than I publish something. I gained’t publish something with out your express permission, and I gained’t use your contact data for another objective or share it outdoors the newsroom. If you wish to submit data anonymously, please go to our ideas web page.
