alt Hacker News> I've never understood this: If I replace a single home with 20 apartment homes, I've raised the value of the whole property at purchase time no?
It's a commons problem. In your scenario, you have absolutely increased the value of your property. 20 apartments is more valuable than a single family home. However, you have also reduced aggregate demand by housing 20 people. That reduced the value of your neighbors' properties (or at least reduced the rate at which their value increased).
NIMBYism posits that values will continue to increase without forcing any property owners to invest in improvements so long as they collectively block any efforts to increase supply.
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It's not a common problems in Austin at least. You (a property developer) buy a single home in bad shape on a big lot in the city. Then you redevelop the single home into 20 apartments, greasing the wheel appropriately (of the local government) to get the needed rezoning and permits. No one else can do this because they don't have the connections and monetary resources you do. You pocket the increase in value of that property (minus the cost of grease) by selling it off as "condos" which have dubious maintainability going forward. You never lived here anyways, you have a ranch in Bastrop.
Are there any real examples of this actually happening?
Local to me, Arlington and Reston VA have both seen massive building sprees over the past 20ish years (mostly adjacent to the Metro). Home values have never been higher in either location.
My own personal example... I live ~1 mile from the Metro, so just outside the building boom zone. There was next to zero housing in that zone - it was all office parks - and now it's a mix of $1+ million townhomes, $1+ million luxury high-rise condos, and dining/retail. My own home value is up 50% since COVID and that's true for just about any house in my zip code.
And without the redevelopment/infill, I posit the whole area would be less desirable. NIMBYism feels more about "change is bad" than property values.