We ARE building starter homes! Conversation with Kol Peterson
In this episode, I spoke with someone who’s actually seen starter homes for sale—Kol Peterson, an author, educator, and housing advocate based in Portland, Oregon.
Thanks to Kol’s efforts, and the work of many other incredible advocates, Portland is seeing real change and real results. It’s a true success story we can all admire—and learn from.
Who Killed the Starter Home?
Have you seen any starter homes for sale lately? Neither have we.
In this podcast, we speak with experts and try to figure out why this humble first home is going extinct. We’ll be exploring if it is the politicians, wielding zoning laws like a murder weapon who killed the starter home? Or maybe the scaredy-cat planners and designers? Or the developers, armed with cookie-cutter plans and corporate indifference? Is it our convoluted tax policy that subsidies homeownership, but puts every tax penalty in the way of creation of the starter homes.
Spoiler alert: it’s probably a little of everything.
We’ll be peeling back the layers of bureaucracy, bad faith, and bad planning, with stops along the way for affordable housing scandals, ADU success stories, and a passionate plea for building code updates. Join us for a conversation that’s part policy deep-dive, part therapy session for frustrated builders, and entirely a love letter to cities that deserve better.
Where can you listen?
