Zoning the non-rich out in the St.Louis Area

The St.Louis Dispatch reports on the non-rich being zoned out:

Nearly 20,000 households in St. Charles County, constituting 19 percent of the population, have almost no chance of buying a home, according to housing consultant Paul Dribin, who headed the St. Charles County task force.

A family with little or no equity in another house would need an income of at least $70,500 to buy the median-priced new home in St. Charles County, he said.

Many homebuilders say they would like to build less expensive housing, but they say that often local zoning ordinances stand in their way.

"Without question, the largest unmet segment of the housing industry is at the lower end of the economic spectrum," says Pat Sullivan, executive vice president of the Home Builders Association of Greater St. Louis.

Sullivan has fond memories of the house he and his wife built in 1977, a three-bedroom ranch house in St. Peters of slightly more than 1,000 square feet. In their 15 years in the house, they reared two children there.

"Today it would be illegal to build that house there," he said. Zoning ordinances that require larger houses and larger lot sizes prevent building the sort of homes that the workforce needs, Sullivan said.

See what happens when there's no free market in property.