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Key Characteristics Of Gentrification

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Gentrification is the process of renovating and revitalizing undervalued and dilapidated residential and commercial areas by the middle or upper class. It is driven by the notion called the “rent gap”. The “rent gap” is the difference between current rent and potential rental income. People will invest in these deteriorated urban areas to obtain potential rent in the future. Consequently, once new money flows in these areas, it forces rent to surge. High rents force low income residents to relocate from the area. This is one of the key characteristics of gentrification, the displacement of local residents. Gentrification is driven by both private investment and government policies.

Gentrification is a growing concern in New York. It causes …show more content…

The fundamental idea behind this program is that developers build subsidized housing for a designated period of time to lower and middle income families, and in return the government gives financial assistance and tax abatements to developers. This program has been implemented before in New York in 1955 it was referred to as the Mitchell-Lama Housing project. The success of the program was unprecedented. According to an article called the “Mitchell-Lama Revival” which says “the program created 66,000 subsidized rental apartments and 69,000 coop apartments in New York City and throughout the state” …show more content…

The Nation publication writes “Miguel Robles-Durán…..makes a convincing case that among the most useful tools are limited-equity cooperatives of the kind established under New York’s 1955 Limited-Profit Housing Companies Act, better known as Mitchell-Lama. Under these programs, households own shares in a building, but the price at which they can sell their shares is limited for a certain period of time, usually twenty years. These arrangements offer stability of ownership without the skyrocketing prices that accompany real estate speculation.” There are numerous benefits of this program. Mitchell-Lama Housing projects promote economic and social integration in their communities. They have become stable and burgeoning communities. The integral components in ensuring the success of this program are maintaining the quality of the cooperatives and making sure housing units over time are slowly pushed to market values. As the designated time for subsidized rent ends, the surge in rents forces some households to leave the area. However, if there was a more gradual increase in rent prices over time, then this would not be the case. Oversight of these cooperatives is pivotal to their success. State Sen. Jeff Klein said that “The Mitchell-Lama program, I believe, was probably the greatest housing program we ever created in New York State because it was based on a very simple premise: that various

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