A group of Latin American scholars, practitioners and government officials who monitor urban market information systems and publish statistical reports on market behavior met in Chile in April to share their experiences and explore plans for future cooperation. Representatives came from Mexico City; San Salvador, El Salvador; Sao Paulo and Porto Alegre, Brazil; Montevideo, Uruguay; Santiago, Chile; Quito, Ecuador; and Bogota, Colombia. Specialists from the World Bank, the Inter-American Development Bank and the United Nations Development Program (UNDP) also participated.

Most of the cities’ initiatives originated from small ventures to obtain information for project evaluation, research requirements or market analysis, and later expanded into larger-scale systems to monitor different types of markets and broader geographic regions.

Newly constructed housing and office and commercial buildings are the most frequently studied markets; price, location and product type are the basic variables being computed. Other variables are used in specific cases to obtain more precise information about each product being supplied to the market or each transaction. In all cases, statistics are gathered from the formal market, even though an estimate from Bogota indicates that this market represents only about one third of all transactions.

Newspapers, magazines or specialized publications are the major sources of market data, but building permits or visits to construction sites also provide useful information. In San Salvador, the main source is data from the banking system on credit loans for the acquisition of real estate property.

The geographical area and the time period for which statistics are computed vary from case to case. Yet, all systems face the same dilemma of losing statistical validity when reducing the size of the unit of analysis or shortening the time period. On the other hand, broadening the geographic area means a loss of homogeneity of well-defined neighborhoods, and broadening the time frame limits fine tuning of the phenomena.

General statistics and market trends are disseminated through newspapers and specialized publications, while more detailed statistics are sold through periodical bulletins and reports. Published listings of new construction provide an open and useful mechanism for correcting information, because when a case is not listed the supplier is the first one to make it known.

At present, only Brazil and Mexico are operating their information systems on a profit basis. In other countries, income from the sale of market data covers only operating expenses, but dissemination of the data provides opportunities for professional consultants to use it for related profitable activities. Thus, this information aids the private sector by making markets more transparent and helping entrepreneurs evaluate urban projects and define geographic and economic trends. For the public sector, the market data assists in the public valuation of properties and in planning purposes.

Many challenges remain to improve the coverage of urban market transactions, the quality of the information, the analysis of the data, and the debate this information can stimulate regarding urban land policy. From an academic perspective, the challenge is to improve the understanding of the phenomena being observed. From a professional perspective, it is to use the available information for better project analysis and to adjust valuation maps to establish more accurate records for property tax purposes.

Since many Latin American cities lack any type of urban market monitoring systems, the special challenge facing the participants in this ongoing project is to find ways to share their experiences to improve the efficiency of market operations and urban planning throughout the region.

Pablo Trivelli is regional coordinator of the Urban Management Program, United Nations Development Program, Santiago, Chile. The seminar was cosponsored by the Lincoln Institute with the GTZ-MINVU project, the Urban Studies Institute of the Catholic University of Chile, and Chile’s Ministry of Housing and Urban Development.

As delegates to the World Social Forum (WSF) in Porto Alegre, Brazil, in January 2003, the authors examined alternatives to the neoliberal approach to urban development, to escape the negative results that are too often ignored by the media and even academia. Broad-scale, national-level alternatives to neoliberalism have been rare, but alternatives at the municipal level are more common. The authors draw from lessons in Brazil and from their home countries of Mexico, South Africa and the United States. Their lectures and seminars at the World Social Forum, and related programs at the University of São Paulo and the Federal University of Rio de Janeiro, have been supported in part by the Lincoln Institute.

Residents of enormous districts in some of the world’s largest cities suffer with miserable housing, difficult access to work, inadequate water supplies and sewerage, poor public services and exposure to violence. In many cases, conditions grew worse during the “lost decades” of the 1980s and 1990s, due to recession and cutbacks in planning and public investment. Those with faith in trickle-down improvements waited in vain for private markets to increase household incomes. Instead, in many countries the poorest three-quarters of the population suffered absolute losses.

Forced to respond to these kinds of problems, city governments contemplate new approaches to such questions as local versus national authority, productive efficiency versus neighborhood-based redistribution of services, and conflicts between plans and markets. At the municipal level the complications become painfully clear. Popular advocates of redistributive reforms struggle to survive in a hostile environment, often against strong private business interests, a privileged middle class, and conservative provincial and central governments. The problems in cities are immediate and concrete, requiring negotiation, concessions, compliance with an often-biased legal framework, and high degree of professional competence and leadership. Municipal planners and activists cannot overturn the whole system, but for success they must look to exploit cracks and find institutional openings. In spite of the manifest failures of the neoliberal regimes, reformers will find no simple return to an earlier age.

This brief discussion highlights complex issues, perhaps raising questions more than answering them. How does one deal with land issues underlying most urban problems: ownership, regulation, taxation and value? How much scope is available to municipal governments to pursue economic development or to redistribute basic needs, including household income and access to land? How much difference does it make at the municipal level whether or not the national regime is moving in progressive, redistributive directions? Complicating these issues, globalization may be intensifying, challenging cities with low-cost competition, increased transnational corporate reach, and ever-broader powers concentrated in multilateral institutions.

Land Values and Markets

The benefits of urbanization require public and private access to land, yet urban land values reflect differing degrees of access to a city’s benefits. Low bidders are excluded from more desirable land in most land markets, whether formal or irregular. The poor are pushed to the city margins or crammed into the deteriorated inner core. Weakly regulated land markets do not even guarantee economically efficient use of urban land, let alone ensure land use patterns vital to environmental survival. Local governments intervene with land use controls and taxation, or facilitate access to cheap urbanized land, in the best of cases pursuing equity, fiscal efficiency and environmental viability. Performance on all these counts is highly variable.

In Mexico, at least 60 percent of the urban population lives in areas developed by the illegal occupation of land that subsequently receives services and supports self-built (or rather, self-financed) housing. Thanks to historically ingrained traditions about the people’s right to land, informal settlements have been supported by infrastructure and service provision, regularization programs, and even credits for home improvements. Otherwise, the urban housing situation in Mexico would be much worse. During the 1980s, public institutions accrued significant land reserves, which were applied successfully in low-cost sites and services, core housing and mutual aid projects as alternatives to irregular development. But Mexico eliminated land banking, under World Bank influence, hampering the scope of planning to ensure equitable and sustainable urban development.

In recent years, mass-produced formal housing in cities has increased. In line with World Bank advice, the subsidized finance system for the salaried working classes and middle-income sectors has been restructured, enabling commercial developers to operate on a very large scale, acquiring vast tracts of cheap greenfield sites (and some inner-city sites), and then designing, constructing and marketing industrialized housing. The initial advantages are the provision of services and the seemingly spacious suburban atmosphere. The disadvantages are inaccessibility, lack of urban amenities, reduced space standards, and lack of space for future growth. The gigantic scale of this type of development may deplete irregular settlements of middle-income residents, thus increasing social segregation.

In Brazil, municipal governments have begun to experiment with ways to regulate land use, such as property tax increases linked with progressive taxation, including broad-scale exemptions for as many as half the property owners, and popular participation in decision making for regulatory changes (planning and zoning) and for investments in urban infrastructure. Many changes were first implemented by Workers Party (PT) mayors, operating in opposition to the federal and state governments, with the aid of fiscal and regulatory changes introduced in the 1988 Constitution. Now, with the PT government holding national power under President Luis Inacio (Lula) da Silva, left or center-left municipal governments may find themselves able to experiment more. Nevertheless, the obstacles are very great. Even in the relatively rich city of Porto Alegre a third of the population lives in irregular settlements.

The South African experience since democracy was won in 1994 shows that tremendous difficulties confront those who would use public agencies to assist the poor to gain access to land. The government did succeed in subsidizing over a million families previously living in shacks and shared rooms, but almost all new houses were located at the extreme peripheries of the cities. A key progressive gain is that many large metropolitan areas are now consolidated in single municipal governments. But economic growth concerns and fiscal crises have limited the ability of the new jurisdictions to redistribute resources in favor of the poor. Planners intended to raise ample funds through taxation of high-value central land, to pay for subsidies for developments in poorer districts, but values did not follow predictions, and receipts were grossly inadequate. Land markets continue, by and large, to exclude the disadvantaged, and they haven’t yielded sufficient tax revenue. A continuing lack of coordination in the formulation of policy has seen programs in land, housing, services, public works and employment working against each other in some cases.

In the United States, nearly all land and housing development is “regular,” market-driven and dominated by private banking, real estate and development firms, and better-off households. The results are starkly unequal, pitting suburbs against much poorer central cities. Efforts to right the imbalance have generally been frustrated, because land markets do not deliver great efficiencies or fairness. The process is highly regulated, so that inequalities are generated not only by (land) markets themselves, but also by political groups such as “growth coalitions” and by fierce regulatory manipulation on behalf of privileged middle-class and wealthy districts.

The regulation of land markets through planning, land banking and taxation constitutes a broad arena for municipal intervention in land policy. Local governments have extensive potential authority, and they typically have constitutional prerogatives for planning and taxation (although in practice they are still constrained by powerful national forces). They may act to support economic growth or to redistribute it, even in a conservative provincial or national climate. Local planning does constrain land markets, but often without redistributive effects, since city governments must contend with strong financial interests, patterns of privilege, and entrenched power. Professional competency and consistency are required to exploit the full potential of property registration and taxation systems, and financial decentralization limits the possibility of cross subsidies and redistributive measures.

Progressive Local Government

In spite of claims about the conservative nature of powerful constraints on the redistributive capacity of local governments, evidence from the four countries cited here suggests that municipalities may indeed find ways to redistribute public goods and services on behalf of their less well-off residents. Municipalities also may serve as laboratories for social experimentation and as sources of progressive ideological change.

In Mexico, the role of municipal and state governments in achieving more equitable cities is undisputed and constitutionally sanctioned, yet fraught with obstacles. In the 1990s, the first electoral defeats of the Revolutionary Institutional Party (the PRI, which dominated the political arena from the 1920s) were at municipal and then state levels. Throughout the country there are genuine examples of successful innovative and socially redistributive programs run by municipal governments, such as participatory budgeting and planning, and community recycling. Mexico City’s Federal District is now governed by the left-of-center Democratic Revolution Party, which also controls most of the poorer and more populous jurisdictions of the metropolitan area. In 2001, this government introduced a social investment program targeting the poorer districts, providing monthly cash payments of US $70 in 2002 to people over seventy years, interest-free loans for home improvements in irregular settlements, and traditional public services and social assistance. Criticized from the left and right as populist and electioneering, this program is now emulated on a smaller scale by the center-right federal government and in local electoral platforms by the PRI. Despite initial positive evaluations, however, questions remain about costs for universal coverage and viability in poorer municipalities, and about reinforcing clientilism.

Brazilian experience with redistribution by municipal government has been documented in many notable cases, from giant cities such as São Paulo, to large cities such as Porto Alegre, Santo Andre and Belem, to the hundreds of smaller municipalities that have elected left-of-center administrations over the past 15 years. The case most often discussed is participatory budgeting, the innovation that has involved more than 10 percent of Porto Alegre’s residents in decisions to allocate more than one billion dollars of public expenditures on infrastructure and services. Other innovations include improvements in transit services and expansion of bus lanes to challenge the hegemony of the automobile, which serves a privileged minority. Some progress has been made in housing, but local government capacity is limited.

South African municipal government has emerged only in the last two years from its long history of apartheid division and the turmoil of reform since 1994. But, new trends demonstrate innovation at the municipal scale. Although many aspects of municipal government have been “corporatized” in Johannesburg, the city is beginning to make substantial progress on the regeneration of decayed inner city areas, using a wholly owned company (the Johannesburg Development Agency) as the instrument of change. Agencies of this kind seem to be able to solve some of the problems of intricate relationships between different spheres of government—local, provincial (or state) and national—and to attract greater private interest in supporting municipal initiative.

New approaches to planning in South Africa are also starting to show signs of success. These participatory approaches bring public utility agencies and big-budget government departments, as well as citizens, into framing municipal action over the short- to medium-term. Such developments indicate that working on the linkages between different agencies is crucial for increasing effectiveness and reducing frustration during the early democratic period. Some municipalities are beginning to find ways of sharing experiences and shaping new forms of cooperation. An example is the new national Cities Network, which brings together nine of the largest municipalities in the country as a means of stimulating innovation and expanding impact.

Social and political innovation has also been documented at the municipal level in cities of various sizes throughout the U.S., often in situations that require resisting politically conservative national trends. Very large cities such as Cleveland and Chicago developed city plans aimed explicitly at redistribution to provide assistance to needy households and deprived neighborhoods. Chicago also developed solid programs to support smaller and more local business enterprises, versus the usual beneficiaries among large firms and downtown interests. Smaller cities such as Burlington, Vermont, and Santa Monica, California, developed aggressive programs in housing and rent control aimed at helping needy constituents. As in the heralded examples of participatory budgeting in Brazil, these progressive municipal programs typically have strict limitations, because they can do little to improve the labor market and thus can offer only small improvements to household cash incomes.

Municipal efforts on land use and housing in the U.S. are often constrained by local control or “home rule,” which isolates the more numerous, wealthier suburbs that literally surround poorer central cities. The wealth and significant taxing power of these separate jurisdictions combines with a U.S. peculiarity—local financing of public schools—to burden city residents with powerful disadvantages. Since about 90 percent of U.S. children attend public schools, local control of schools is a hot-button issue in U.S. politics. Scholars construe de jure public suburban control as de facto privatization: by purchasing homes in suburbs, households are purchasing control of local schools, thereby excluding others, such as new immigrants and ethnic groups, especially African Americans.

One hears echoes of such U.S. suburban privatization and division in the rigidly separated districts and gated communities of Rio de Janeiro, São Paulo and other Brazilian cities; in the huge separations of privileged central districts and the unserviced periphery in Mexico City; and in the surviving apartheid spatial structure of Johannesburg. We find that municipal governments do act against these inequities, at least in part because of an ideological commitment and because the resulting problems threaten their capacity to govern. Some localities may turn their limited victories into building blocks for larger progressive structures at the national scale, as evidenced in Brazil.

National-level Urban Reform

Urban affairs is a hot issue in Brazil, and various laws, administrative practices, budgets and regulations have been brewing since the new Constitution of 1988 promised an improved status for cities. After more than a decade of extensive public debate, new legislation was enacted in the 2001 City Statute, a federal law on urban policy. The new left-of-center government led by President da Silva is betting on a new national ministry to integrate different activities and to find more effective approaches to persistent urban problems. This Ministry of Cities (Ministerio das Cidades) was established in early 2003 to improve housing, transit and neighborhood services for poor majorities, preserve and renovate historic centers, promote economic development, and drastically increase participation. National leaders aim to emphasize the concerns of mayors, city councils and the neediest citizens in the federal agenda. Other countries are generally a long way from such an urban policy, and the Brazilian experiment will be closely watched.

Mexico is a clear example of how constitutional rights to such things as decent housing, health and education may be considered important, but are not valued enough to guarantee their fulfillment; nor are all those good intentions laid out in the highly complex planning legislation. Even municipal-friendly constitutional amendments of the 1980s have not fully undermined the high degree of centralization of all public policy, including social spending and virtually all environmental regulation. As a result, the urban and social agendas of different levels of government are often competing rather than complementary, and are always insufficient to meet demand.

South Africa has tried to develop a new national policy in the urban field, starting with a national Urban Development Strategy after the 1994 democratic elections. But relatively little has been accomplished since the strategy has tended to remain a paper commitment to good outcomes rather than a concrete program or a real obligation on different departments and levels of government to work together toward common goals. Part of the problem has been competition between different agencies over who should set the agenda. Diverse centers of power, from the president’s office to the finance ministry, the local government department of the national government, some of the provincial governments, and the national municipal association, are vying for position in shaping urban policy.

The lack of coherent urban policy in South Africa also must be placed in the context of the central agenda of government, which stresses not only economic growth but also the continuing empowerment of the previously disadvantaged black majority. There is by no means consensus over the roles of the cities in accomplishing either of these objectives. A single ministry addressing urban issues would seem like a dream to many observers, but other ways of achieving similar objectives by reorganizing relationships between parts of government suggest that progress can be made.

In the United States, the federal agenda for urban policy has been weak since the late 1970s, and general fiscal constraints have combined with suburban voters’ indifference to cities. These problems have been greatly exacerbated by the consequences of the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001, by demands of the U.S. war economy, and by the conservative nature of redistribution pursued by the Bush Administration.

This range of international experience suggests that profound national changes and legislation can have immense local effects. A national government can provide fiscal, regulatory and administrative support for a whole series of municipal improvements, many of which would be eagerly implemented by local governments. National governments (and even international agreements, as in the earlier European common market) can inhibit or even prohibit such things as municipal tax-cutting competition in pursuit of relocated private investment, thus eliminating a lose-lose situation for public budgets. But, even in the best of cases, such opportunities are limited, politically difficult and technically complicated.

Conclusions

In the context of the globalizing economy, city politicians and officials face remarkably similar uncertainties in Brazil, South Africa, Mexico and the United States. As economies have become more open, some industrial sectors have been hammered, while others have been able to take up new opportunities (such as motor vehicle exporting in South Africa) and new niches have emerged. The current geopolitical context poses challenges for city administrations; how they think about their role in this period of imported instability is significant. There is a tension between those who think that the role of city government is to frame competition with other cities, and those who see more cooperative roles.

Cities themselves need to develop capacity to formulate and implement plans. They cannot simply rely on the panoply of outside professionals and agencies that have increasingly defined urban agendas. Some of the needed sharing can fruitfully take place in an academic environment, especially where long-term research helps to inform choices. It is particularly important to widen opportunities for sharing between the city officials and scholars of the global South and the North, to the mutual benefit of both.

Priscilla Connolly teaches urban sociology and planning at the Autonomous Metropolitan University in Azcapotzalco, Mexico. William W. Goldsmith directs the Program on Urban and Regional Studies at Cornell University. Alan Mabin is associate professor in the Graduate School of Development Management at Witwatersrand University in Johannesburg, South Africa.

Hoy en día, cerca de un millón de personas vive en apartamentos subterráneos en Beijing, donde, para los 23 millones de habitantes de la gran ciudad, las viviendas sociales cercanas a los lugares de trabajo son muy escasas (Xing 2011). Estas unidades habitacionales por lo general son subdivisiones sin ventanas en sótanos y en refugios antiaéreos, cuyo tamaño promedio es de 9,75 metros cuadrados.

En agosto de 2010, Beijing estableció un plan de tres años para evacuar a los inquilinos de estas viviendas subterráneas. Los desalojos comenzaron en 2011, especialmente en los distritos urbanos más céntricos con valores de suelo caros, pero la demanda continúa siendo alta. En algunas áreas de la ciudad, particularmente en los distritos periféricos, pueden verse en la calle anuncios de alquileres subterráneos y, en Internet, también existen miles de avisos de alquiler de unidades subterráneas.

El presente artículo está basado en el análisis de este fenómeno llevado a cabo por la autora en los años 2012 y 2013, cuando los avisos en Internet de apartamentos subterráneos eran una actividad dinámica y creciente. Los listados de alquiler analizados contienen suficiente información sobre las unidades en particular, tales como ubicación, precio, tamaño, comodidades y nivel de subsuelo, para evaluar la dinámica de este submercado de alquiler de viviendas para personas de bajos recursos.

Escasez de viviendas de alquiler accesible

Tal como ocurre en la mayoría de las ciudades chinas, Beijing sufre una grave escasez de viviendas de alquiler accesible, a consecuencia de la migración masiva hacia los centros urbanos (Liu y otros 2013; Xie y Zhou 2012). La ciudad también tiene una gran cantidad de espacio subterráneo, derivada de una política del año 1950 que establece que todos los edificios nuevos deben tener un subsuelo común y refugios antiaéreos. Los códigos de edificación especifican las pautas de construcción, inclusive la provisión de infraestructura, como electricidad, agua y alcantarillado. Esta disponibilidad de espacio subterráneo ha crecido de forma exponencial en medio del extraordinario boom de la construcción que se ha producido en China en las últimas décadas. Algunos complejos constan de hasta 600 unidades por debajo del nivel del suelo.

Como forma de abordar el déficit de vivienda, las políticas oficiales promovieron, durante 24 años en época de paz, la utilización “económica” de este espacio subterráneo, y uno de los usos establecidos por dicha política fue el residencial (BMBCAD 1986). Sin embargo, en 2010 Beijing cesó de otorgar nuevos permisos de uso de apartamentos subterráneos e instituyó el plan de tres años mencionado anteriormente con el fin de evacuar a los residentes. En vista de la cantidad de personas involucradas y la falta de alternativas de vivienda social, este proceso ha presentado diferentes desafíos, como el hecho de que los propietarios de estas unidades están demandando una compensación por derechos de ocupación que habían adquirido cuando las unidades eran legales.

Viviendas financiadas por el Estado

Desde que China hizo la transición a un mercado privado desde una economía de planificación centralizada, en la que el estado proporcionaba todas las viviendas, el sector inmobiliario ha crecido de forma explosiva. Consideradas principalmente como un vehículo de inversión, las nuevas unidades privadas son accesibles únicamente a aquellos que poseen suficientes ahorros para comprar una vivienda con poco financiamiento.

Las restricciones en la oferta de terrenos constituyen otro obstáculo para la provisión privada de vivienda. Debido a que la intención del Estado, propietario de todos los terrenos del país, es proteger el suelo agrícola fértil, ha prohibido el desarrollo en las áreas rurales de la periferia urbana. Aun así, dichas zonas han experimentado una rápida construcción de proyectos de vivienda por parte de personas que se asientan informalmente. Estos “pueblos urbanos” proporcionan viviendas privadas a una cantidad de entre 5 y 6 millones de personas de bajos ingresos que no pueden acceder a viviendas cercanas al centro de la ciudad, pero el gobierno ha estado intentando demoler estas viviendas.

El Estado chino ofrece cuatro tipos de proyectos de vivienda social, especialmente para empleados públicos con bajos ingresos (ver tabla 1). Los primeros tipos de asistencia fueron el programa lian zu fang, que ofrecía viviendas de alquiler a las familias más pobres, y el programa jing ji shi yong fang, que proporcionaba oportunidades de acceder a la propiedad de una vivienda con subsidio.

En 2011, el gobierno lanzó un programa para construir más viviendas de alquiler (gong zu fang) para personas recientemente graduadas de la universidad y trabajadores cualificados en sectores clave, como la industria de alta tecnología. No obstante, debido a que este programa es algo reciente, la cantidad de unidades de alquiler accesible todavía es relativamente baja. Por otro lado, los proyectos de vivienda xian jia fang están dirigidos a la población desplazada. A pesar de la gran cantidad de unidades que se han construido para residentes de bajos ingresos a lo largo de los años, la demanda supera con creces la oferta, produciéndose una larga lista de espera.

La barrera del hukou

En Beijing, el hukou o permiso de registro de familias, es un requisito previo para acceder a cualquiera de los cuatro tipos de viviendas sociales mencionados. A modo de una retención de la planificación central, el hukou otorga a las familias el derecho a los servicios públicos en el lugar de residencia que el gobierno les ha asignado, pero les restringe recibir dichos servicios en otros lugares. Las personas que nacieron dentro de un hukou en grandes ciudades son elegibles para recibir mejores servicios educativos, de salud y de infraestructura. A no ser que un empleador patrocinado por el Estado solicite un cambio en el hukou de un trabajador, las personas que no poseen un hukou en las principales ciudades siguen enfrentándose a una barrera importante para acceder a las oportunidades económicas.

La figura 1 muestra la ubicación actual de los programas públicos de vivienda para las personas que poseen un hukou en Beijing. Al igual que ocurre en otros lugares del mundo, los proyectos de vivienda social se encuentran, como ya se ha mencionado, en las áreas más apartadas de la ciudad, donde los terrenos son menos caros pero, también, menos demandados. El subalquiler, otra de las características típicas de los proyectos de vivienda social, se encuentra muy difundido, pues los beneficiarios del programa cobran un alquiler a sus inquilinos por los apartamentos que les proporcionó el Estado.

Análisis del mercado subterráneo

En nuestro estudio hicimos uso de los listados detallados de viviendas subterráneas en alquiler que se encuentran disponibles en Ganji.com. Estos listados resultaron muy útiles para llevar a cabo el análisis, ya que el sitio estaba bien organizado y tenía la mayor cantidad de avisos. Utilizamos el término de búsqueda “地下室” o “unidad subterránea”, con lo que obtuvimos el alquiler mensual, la superficie en metros cuadrados, la ubicación específica, las comodidades y otras características de los apartamentos subterráneos, tales como el nivel de subsuelo. De los 7.312 anuncios que recabamos desde octubre de 2012 hasta septiembre de 2013, seleccionamos 3.677 entradas singulares con información completa. Tal como muestra la figura 1, estas unidades se encuentran bien distribuidas por toda la ciudad, lo que refleja el requisito de que todos los edificios de nueva construcción en Beijing posean un espacio subterráneo.

Resulta importante destacar que estos anuncios representan lo que probablemente es el sector de mayor poder adquisitivo del mercado inmobiliario subterráneo. Los propietarios que publican sus anuncios en Internet suelen tener un mayor nivel de educación y más recursos. Los anuncios normalmente vienen acompañados de fotografías, para demostrar la calidad relativamente alta de la vivienda. Además, la intención de los propietarios de publicar los anuncios sugiere que se sienten relativamente seguros en cuanto a la tenencia de las unidades.

La tabla 2 contiene estadísticas descriptivas de las 3.677 unidades habitacionales subterráneas estudiadas. La mediana de tamaño de las unidades es de 9,75 metros cuadrados, levemente menor que el mínimo de 10 metros cuadrados de Beijing y que la superficie habitacional general promedio per cápita (28,8 metros cuadrados por persona). Aun así, los apartamentos son por lo general más grandes que un dormitorio promedio para trabajadores, que sólo llega a 6,2 metros cuadrados (Xie y Zhou 2012).

El alquiler promedio mensual de 436 RMB (US$70) confirma que los apartamentos se encuentran en el sector de mayor poder adquisitivo de las viviendas para trabajadores migrantes. Según un estudio llevado a cabo por el gobierno en 2012, cerca del 48 por ciento de los trabajadores migrantes en Beijing paga menos de 300 RMB (US$48) por mes, un 27 por ciento paga entre 301 RMB y 500 RMB (US$48–US$80) y un 17 por ciento paga más de 1.000 RMB (US$160) (Xie y Zhou 2012). Es decir que estas unidades subterráneas en alquiler representan, por lo general, un tipo de vivienda con más valor para los trabajadores migrantes que los dormitorios comunes para trabajadores o las viviendas en pueblos urbanos.

En promedio, las unidades subterráneas se encuentran a menos de 11 kilómetros del centro de la ciudad, con una desviación estándar de 6,2 kilómetros, lo que las ubica definitivamente dentro de la Quinta Autopista de Circunvalación. Con estas ventajas de ubicación, los apartamentos ofrecen potencialmente costos más bajos de traslado ida y vuelta al trabajo, así como mejores oportunidades económicas. De manera similar, la distancia promedio a la estación de metro más cercana es de poco más de 1 kilómetro, lo que se considera una distancia caminable.

Cerca de un 50 por ciento de las unidades anunciadas se encuentran a uno o dos pisos por debajo del nivel del suelo. El 50 por ciento restante son semisubterráneas, como los denominados “apartamentos jardín” de los Estados Unidos, que tienen una pequeña ventana cerca del cielorraso de la habitación. Según nuestro análisis preliminar, el hecho de que la unidad estuviera a uno o dos niveles por debajo del suelo no presentaba ninguna diferencia estadística en cuanto al precio, habiendo considerado otras variables. Con respecto a las comodidades, cerca del 25 por ciento de los anuncios de las unidades indicaba que tenían calefacción, más de la mitad mencionaba la conectividad a Internet, aproximadamente el 25 por ciento señalaba la presencia de cámaras de vigilancia y menos de un 12,5 por ciento indicaba la existencia de guardias de seguridad.

Análisis de la dinámica de mercado

En nuestro estudio analizamos si la demanda en este submercado inusual de viviendas subterráneas es similar al mercado convencional sobre el suelo. En particular, la desventaja de vivir por debajo del nivel del suelo puede ser muy grande; además, este tipo de viviendas es, por lo general, tan pequeña que las demás variables estándar en los modelos de precios hedónicos pueden llegar a ser más pronunciadas o diferenciarse de alguna otra manera.

Nuestro análisis estadístico consistió en una progresión escalonada en la que se intentó ajustar las variables de la prueba a un modelo base que incluye las variables que la bibliografía ya considera significativas. Los resultados del análisis resultaron ser los previstos, ya que todas las variables fueron significativas y apuntaban en la misma dirección. Por ejemplo, el alquiler aumenta cerca del 3,3 por ciento por cada metro cuadrado en que se incrementa el tamaño de la unidad, y un 3,6 por ciento por cada kilómetro en que se reduce la distancia hasta el centro de la ciudad. El acceso al transporte también es significativo. La cercanía a una estación de metro aumenta el alquiler en 1,8 por ciento por kilómetro; y para cada estación de línea de metro en un radio de 800 metros, el alquiler aumenta un 2,8 por ciento.

Debido a que el desempeño de nuestro modelo de precios hedónicos fue el mismo que el de otros modelos, con las mismas variables principales significativas y en la misma dirección, el fenómeno de la vivienda subterránea es, evidentemente, un mercado. El surgimiento de este mercado sugiere que existe una fuerte demanda de viviendas en alquiler –especialmente entre las familias de bajos ingresos– que ni el mercado formal ni los programas públicos de vivienda pueden satisfacer. Este es un hecho evidente, en vista de que las normas sobre hukou no permiten a los trabajadores migrantes presentar solicitudes a los programas públicos de vivienda, y que se sabe que incluso los residentes de bajos ingresos de Beijing que poseen un hukou ocupan viviendas subterráneas.

Los resultados de nuestro análisis sugieren que la máxima prioridad de la población de bajos ingresos y a menudo migrante de Beijing es la proximidad al lugar de trabajo y al transporte. Vivir en habitaciones subterráneas merece la pena cuando la contrapartida es su ubicación céntrica. Además, al comparar los alquileres de estas unidades con los de las viviendas públicas, tal como muestra la tabla 1, observamos que, aunque los costos por metro cuadrado sean mayores, el alquiler total de la unidad subterránea es mucho menor (Hu y Hu 2012). Así, el mercado subterráneo satisface la demanda de aquellas personas con ingresos por debajo de los niveles a los que apuntan los programas de vivienda social.

Conclusiones

Las viviendas subterráneas representan un fenómeno de grandes proporciones en Beijing. En Internet encontramos miles de avisos de alquiler de apartamentos subterráneos, y esa cantidad seguía creciendo en el año 2013, a pesar de los desalojos. No obstante, el tamaño de este submercado no significa que deba ser incorporado a las políticas públicas.

Existen historias extraordinarias de personas que habitaban en tejados y en pozos de alcantarillado para poder vivir en el área central de Beijing. Las viviendas subterráneas son, con frecuencia, sólo otra alternativa desesperada a la que recurren los pobres en los centros urbanos para poder vivir y trabajar en las áreas urbanas donde no poseen hukou y, por ende, no tienen acceso a los servicios.

¿Cuánto puede una sociedad reducir el espacio habitable para que las ubicaciones urbanas sean accesibles? Esta pregunta ejercerá una presión cada vez mayor a medida que las densidades de las megaciudades asiáticas excedan los niveles aceptables de dignidad humana, lo que obligará a los responsables de elaborar políticas y a los diseñadores a pensar de manera más creativa sobre las reformas urbanas. Aunque las unidades subterráneas son, de hecho, más espaciosas que los dormitorios para trabajadores o estudiantes, el extraordinario desarrollo económico de China ha elevado las aspiraciones y expectativas de sus ciudadanos para obtener mejores condiciones de habitabilidad.

Debido a que la mayoría de los inquilinos son solteros o parejas sin hijos, y a que la tenencia es temporal (ya que no se prolonga por muchos años), en las políticas de vivienda debería tenerse en cuenta la necesidad de tener una vivienda para toda la vida, tanto para las personas que recién comienzan a desarrollarse en esta ciudad tan cara como para aquellas que sólo requieren una estancia temporal por motivos de salud, educación y otros.

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Únase a la conversación. Deje sus comentarios en www.lincolninst.edu/news-events/at-lincoln-house-blog.

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Sobre el autor

Annette M. Kim, Ph.D., es profesora asociada en la Escuela de Políticas Públicas Sol Price de la Universidad del Sur de California. Además, es directora de SLAB, el laboratorio de análisis espacial de la Escuela Price recientemente creado, dedicado a promover la visualización de las ciencias sociales para el servicio público por medio de la enseñanza, la investigación y la participación pública.

Referencias

BMBCAD (Oficina Municipal de Defensa Civil Aérea de Beijing). 15 de mayo de 1986. “关于改变结合民用建筑修建防空地下室规定的通知》的实施细则” (Cambios en las normas de implementación para construir refugios antiaéreos mediante su combinación con edificios civiles).

Hu, Hai-feng y Ji-ya Hu. 2012. “Overall Evaluation and Future Development Planning of Beijing Affordable Housing System During the Eleventh Five-Year Plan”. Beijing Social Science 1: 7–14.

Liu, Xiang, Maojun Wang, Jiabin Cai y Mengchen He. 2013. “An Analysis on the Spatial Structure of Non-Native Permanent Population of Beijing Metropolitan Area in 2000–2010”. Urban Development Studies 20(10): 86–93.

Xie, Xinmei y Le Zhou. 2012. “Study on Housing Demands of Migrant Workers in Key Industries in Beijing”. Documento presentado en las ponencias de la Conferencia Anual de Planificación Urbana de China, Beijing.

Xing, Fan. 2011. “北京清理地下空间提速 百万北漂可能无处寄居” (Beijing limpiará el espacio subterráneo. Un millón de personas tal vez no tengan adónde ir). Beijing Times, 14 de enero. http://news.qq.com/a/20110114/000529.htm

St. Petersburg was the host city for an international conference on “Land Reform and the Emerging Property Market in Russia,” organized by the Leontief Centre for Social and Economic Research and the Lincoln Institute in May 2001. Experts from government agencies, commercial entities and academic institutions in Russia, the U.S. and Europe convened to assess the progress of Russian land reforms and discuss future implementation. The conference focused on two key points: the principal obstacles to be targeted by various land reform actions and the triggers that are needed to set a series of decisive steps in motion.

From an academic and historical perspective, the unfolding story of Russian land privatization is intellectually engaging and, from a practical point of view, the process and its implications have far-reaching implications for the Russian people. The Lincoln Institute’s interest in convening the conference and its continuing involvement in Russia allow us to learn from local experts, to share Institute experience and perspectives from other countries, and to provide support for ongoing land reform efforts. The conference revealed the need for professional training for Russians working in the emerging land market, and the Lincoln Institute and the Leontief Centre are developing curriculum and training courses to be offered in St. Petersburg later this year. For example, many private business owners now find themselves in the new role of property manager, and sometimes their land and buildings are a more valuable asset to the enterprise than the business itself. However, they lack knowledge and experience regarding property rights, leases, appraisal, zoning, regulation, planning and a range of other topics.

In the post-Soviet period, privatization of the real estate sector in Russia has been most advanced in its urban centers, and St. Petersburg was one of the first cities to start selling land plots occupied by either privatized (i.e., former state) or new businesses. Yet even there, by 2000 only about 5 percent of urban land had been privatized. The main problems with regard to the land market in Russia arise from the lack of clear definitions provided by Russian law; the failure of the law to develop fundamental provisions contained in the Russian Constitution regarding private ownership of land; and the consequent lack of firm guarantees for private property and inadequate protections through the courts. A brief history of land policies in Russia will help to provide a context for the current situation.

Land in Russian History

Land has been a central social and economic force throughout Russian history, although Russia has never had private ownership of land for any length of time or in any full sense of the term. Until the beginning of the twentieth century, state property was the predominant form of property ownership. Moreover, a considerable part of that property, including land, was unregistered and unconnected to the broader economy. It was only in 1906 that the Stolypin reforms began destroying the obshchina (the existing feudal-like peasant communities) as the main structure upon which allotment-based land use depended, while extending private land ownership through land tenure regulations, a peasants’ land bank and a resettlement policy. In this pre-Soviet period, Russia’s towns and cities experienced a growing market in urban land plots that were already built upon or earmarked for further development.

Following the revolutions of 1917, private ownership of land was abolished, civil transactions involving land were forbidden, and land was transferred to the use of all who worked on it. A 1918 decree abolished private ownership of real estate in cities and towns, and the process of nationalizing land was completed with the adoption of the Land Code of the Russian Socialist Federation of Soviet Republics in 1922. During the New Economic Policy (NEP) of the 1920s, land could be leased for periods of not more than six years (although subletting was not allowed) and tenants involved in working the land could use additional hired labor. However, by 1929 large-scale collectivization was under way, resulting in the creation of so-called cooperative-collective property. Leasing of land was abolished, and hiring labor on small peasant holdings was forbidden. Under socialism land was neither sold nor bought, and all land transactions were prosecutable under the law.

The situation today is reminiscent of that at the end of the nineteenth century, prior to the Stolypin reforms, when land law consisted of piecemeal legislation applying to ownership of different types of land. Private ownership of land was introduced in 1990 by the Constitution of the Russian Socialist Federation of Soviet Republics, beginning a gradual liquidation of the state monopoly on land ownership. The 1990 laws “Regarding Peasant Smallholdings” and “Regarding Land Reform” permitted citizens to hold in private ownership plots of land for use as smallholdings for horticultural purposes, the construction of houses and other personal uses. The terminology of these laws included “the right of use of land,” “life-long possession with the right to pass on as an inheritance,” “rent” and “property.” This wide variety of bases for property rights necessitated subsequent amendments of existing legislation, a development that was also stimulated by the collapse of the USSR.

Over the past decade, land relations continued to evolve. In December 1991 the president of the Russian Federation issued a decree and the Duma passed a resolution that allowed for the privatization of land in a two-step process. First the decree granted collective ownership of land and other assets to collective and soviet farms. Subsequently, shares of farms could be owned by the individuals who worked on them. Only at the end of 2001 was the right to own land, which is inseparable from the right to buy and sell land, ratified in Russia, and this right applied only to urban lands. However, the prohibition on the sale of agricultural land has no absolute force; laws introduced since 1991 permit the sale of land that is to be used as a private subsidiary smallholding for construction of a one-family residential building, or by members of stock-rearing and garage cooperatives.

According to a former minister for agriculture, there is a flourishing black market in land, which denies the general public access to information on the market values of land and negatively affects economic development. The absence of shared information on land market values means the absence of an objective criteria against which to measure land use efficiency. The extensive black market in leasing also deprives governmental budgets of property tax income since real estate cannot be properly taxed without accurate information on levels of ground rent. Under the current Civil Code of the Russian Federation (RF), land plots are considered to be objects of real estate and rights to these plots are categorized as property rights. The land privatization process was initiated in 1997 but then stalled because the RF government overruled buyout prices established by local administrations that were perceived as too low. The RF government indexed prices at a rate higher than locally established lease rates, thus undermining the transition to a private market in real estate. At the same time, under certain conditions (such as stable lease rates or minimal investment conditions), long-term leasing may turn out to be an acceptable substitute for title ownership. On the issue of real estate registration, the existing Russian system does not protect bona fide purchasers, nor does it provide adequate reimbursement when a purchaser’s title is contested. Furthermore, purchasers are normally unable to get a comprehensive review to determine whether their title is clear in the first place.

Obstacles to Land Reform

While the evolution of a private market in land is encumbered by history and politics, the participants at the St. Petersburg conference were interested in changes and adjustments in practice that land professionals might make to facilitate the transition. Zoning and surveying, as well as investment decisions, are among the areas where changes in practice might be made at the level of local government to address some of the following obstacles to land reform.

Slow implementation of legal zoning

Legal zoning, though mandatory according to the RF Urban Planning Code, is being introduced slowly in Russian cities. Some speakers attributed this situation to reluctant municipalities that cling to the “operative space” currently under their direct control, for fear of losing that land. Others maintained that key municipal officials have a number of more specific concerns: (1) their professional image and the stability of their administration depend on the actions they take to attract investment; (2) the arrival of new investors automatically expands the amount of “operative space;” and (3) the realization that even a perfect system of urban planning regulations will leave out a sufficient number of special cases that will have to be considered separately. Further, municipal officers are citizens, too, and they sincerely wish to raise more funds for their cities’ renovations. The problem is that their attention is too often distracted by more immediate economic and political challenges. Nevertheless, an increasing number of Russian cities are introducing legal zoning regulation systems, including Novgorod Veliky, Ufa, Kazan, Irkutsk, Khabarovsk, Tver, Chelyabinsk and Nizhni Novgorod. St. Petersburg’s recent practice of issuing “by-plot urban planning regulations” raised questions about whether or not they conform to the RF Urban Planning Code, which defines urban planning regulations as a set of requirements and restrictions applicable to zones, not to individual units or parcels. The practice of issuing plot-specific regulations was found dramatically inefficient for a number of reasons. First, it precludes making investment decisions from a representative sample of properties, since each property in the city is subject to different regulations. Second, it is more labor intensive than applying regulations to an entire zone. Finally, it is laden with higher developer risks, thus impairing the city’s overall investment profile. Participants from other cities noted that these delays in introducing zonal urban planning regulations evidently clashes with St. Petersburg’s image as the frontrunner of Russia’s reforms in legal and institutional real estate market development.

Inferior surveying

Many land-related problems in Russian cities stem from inferior surveying. Some plots are limited by the uncertainty of the parcel and/or building boundaries, and others suffer from poor siting. That is, many properties that are new to the market have no direct access to transport, communications, storm water collection systems, or other infrastructure networks. The result is a host of deficient properties that in turn inhibit the development of adjacent properties, and can bring down the value of an entire urban area. The conference discussions emphasized the importance (or even inevitability) of conducting an extensive urban land survey, which could provide more certainty to both investors and developers, reduce the time needed to prepare investment proposals, and help to expand property ownership.

Confusion over privatization of apartments

Most urban residents have not taken advantage of the recent privatization of apartments. Not only did this initiative fail to produce a new class of motivated and effective property owners capable of acting as responsible customers for housing maintenance agencies, but it created baffling new legal challenges as well. No one in St. Petersburg, where the privatization of apartments is most advanced, understands who (and on what legal basis) should be in charge of issuing permits to reconstruct general-purpose premises or reassign residential apartments for nonresidential use. As a result, apartment owners can exercise only a limited set of property rights, which in turn hampers the extension of the private real estate market. The conference participants discussed to what extent a law requiring apartment owners to purchase condominiums could help address the situation. Moreover, given an environment where apartment owners have limited experience with such ownership arrangements, discussion centered around whether economic stimulation or economic sanctions would be most successful in dealing with those who fail to meet their ownership obligations.

Investment in infrastructure

The complicated issues of engineering and infrastructure support for construction and renovation projects are evident in St. Petersburg. When determining title payments, the city takes into account the developer’s contributions to urban infrastructure development and actively mediates between the developer and the resource supplier. Provision of full, authentic and timely information is the principal factor behind the attractiveness of real estate investments, since this information allows for the quick and safe selection of investment opportunities. St. Petersburg has made progress in this direction, but its database will remain inadequate until the city fully adopts urban planning regulations (i.e., legal zoning), formulates clear heritage protection standards for its many historic properties, undertakes an overall land survey, allocates areas for municipal developments, and maps at least the contours of infrastructure networks.

Intergovernmental taxation systems

A reform of intergovernmental budget relations is necessary to improve the current taxation system. Most cities receive budget support from their oblasts (similar to U.S. states). Thus, they are not interested in reporting increased property tax revenues, because those revenues would then be subject to redistribution to the oblast. For example, to simplify its taxation system and stimulate investment in real estate, the city of Novgorod Veliky replaced its two-part land and property tax with a single real estate tax. For legal persons, as opposed to business establishments, the tax is charged on full title owners only. Despite a certain dip in the tax proceeds from the unified tax (compared to revenues from the former two taxes), the city’s overall tax revenues increased because of a higher profit-tax yield due to enhanced business activities.

Lessons from Russia and around the World

The RF government’s meetings and decisions on the notorious electric supply failures in the Far East and floods in Yakutia during the late spring of 2001 show that, unfortunately, only large-scale catastrophic events seem to be able to galvanize public administrators to change their old ways. One would like to believe that less destructive developments could stimulate action as well. For example, it would be worthwhile comparing investment activities in different Russian cities to see if such activity varies with the development levels of their local regulatory bases, the amount and types of information provided to developers, and the time required to develop project applications and the time it takes for local government bureaucrats to make project decisions. The case of recent German urban planning history is instructive to the situation in Russia. Beginning in 1990, the German system lost some of its characteristically strict reliance on municipal plans and initiatives for development and moved toward more reliance on private-sector initiatives. Now it is more common for private developers, rather than municipalities, to prepare detailed zoning plans, and then to purchase and develop the site. However, a direct borrowing of this German method is not recommended for Russian cities, since any system must take into account specific local challenges and cultural traditions. American participants had a similar view on the risks of borrowing planning methods from other countries. Although the general guidelines and principles may seem to be similar across countries or jurisdictions, local regulations, procedures and techniques can vary significantly due to different historical precedents and the specificity of current challenges. Some principles to consider include the following:

• balancing of municipal and private interests;
• minimization of risks by preliminary establishment of all major planning and regulatory requirements;
• transparency and public discussion of planning and development decisions by the municipality;
• accessibility and reliability of information;
• minimization of costs involved with engineering services due to the monopoly that municipalities often hold on the provision of these services; and
• creation of a mechanism for appealing administrative decisions.

This opinion was supported by Russian speakers who referred to urban planning regulations in Russia before 1917 or to the current situation that compels cities to illegally hide their revenue growth and thus evidently hamper economic development. In closing, H. James Brown, president of the Lincoln Institute, reminded the participants that it is important to build mutually acceptable decisions rather than to continue disputes and quests for the ultimate (and not always absolute) truth. He called on those present to listen to their opponents’ arguments in order to arrive at fruitful agreements, not to waste time and effort on trying to prove one’s own case.

Leonid Limonov is the research director of the Leontief Centre for Social and Economic Research in St. Petersburg.

References

Limonov, Leonid E., Nina Y. Oding and Tatyana V. Vlasova. 2000. Land Market Development in St. Petersburg: Conditions and Peculiarities. Cambridge, MA: Lincoln Institute of Land Policy Working Paper. Malme, Jane H., and Joan M. Youngman. 2001. The Development of Property Taxation in Economies in Transition: Case Studies from Central and Eastern Europe. Washington, DC: World Bank Institute.

Smart growth has moved from the domain of policy analysts into more general acceptance. It is championed by national leaders such as Vice President Al Gore, governors (Parris Glendening of Maryland), urban mayors (William A. Johnson of Rochester, New York), non-governmental organizations (National Trust for Historic Preservation), and the private sector (Urban Land Institute). Voters in many California cities, including Sacramento, Santa Barbara, Irvine and Davis, and in numerous suburbs around San Francisco have approved urban growth boundaries (UGB) as one type of intervention to contain sprawl development.

Urban containment policies are not limited to environmentally active communities in California, Oregon or Colorado, or booming economies in states such as Florida, however. Lexington, Kentucky, observed the 40th anniversary of its urban growth boundary last year, and Sioux Falls, South Dakota, has had a containment boundary for many years. This kind of broad-based popular support for smart growth policies is more than simply a growth management fad and is likely to increase, particularly as long as the national economic expansion continues. Indeed, urban containment appears to be building a kind of momentum as a land use policy that has not been seen since the Supreme Court’s sanctioning of zoning in Ambler Realty Co. vs. Euclid, Ohio.

Urban containment planning has two basic purposes: (1) to promote compact, contiguous, and accessible development provided with efficient public services; and (2) to preserve open space, agricultural land and environmentally sensitive areas that are not currently suitable for development. Urban containment consists of drawing a line around an urban area within which development is encouraged, often with density bonuses or minimum density requirements, to accommodate projected growth over a specified future time period, typically ten to twenty years. Land outside the boundary is generally restricted to resource uses and to very low-density residential development by limiting the extension of utilities, wastewater services and other infrastructure.

Intuitively, however, this sort of land regulation appears to be a double-edged sword. On the one hand, measures aimed at reducing traffic congestion or infrastructure costs, or improving the aesthetic quality of urban areas, are appealing. On the other hand, measures that are seen to limit land supply and potentially cause housing prices to increase are unappealing, particularly to those seeking to expand the stock of affordable housing.

To explore the implications of these two faces of urban containment as smart growth policy, the Lincoln Institute and the Fannie Mae Foundation convened a group of scholars and practitioners for a symposium in Cambridge last February. The economists, planners and other researchers in attendance discussed the existing literature on urban containment and identified questions for future research that could inform policy making in this dynamic area of land regulation.

Housing Price Effects

Housing costs reflect the price of land, the price of the house and the value of amenities. Urban containment policies change housing costs for two reasons. First, land prices change when land supply is altered. Second, if urban containment increases the value of the amenity package associated with a house, then that, too, will cause a change in house prices. Much of the discussion at the symposium centered around these two theoretically distinct aspects of the housing price problem.

Most economic literature assessing urban containment argues that it raises land and housing prices principally by constraining the supply of land and/or by failing to accommodate new demand for serviced land. But, others argue that urban containment systems, when coupled with increased densities within the growth boundary, should not adversely affect supply and, indeed, should generate benefits to residents. This latter view shifts the focus away from the microeconomic theory of price determination to housing economics, which introduces the concept that house prices capitalize the value of neighborhood amenities.

For example, the increased densities within an urban growth boundary can make it practical to extend or enhance existing public transit, thus yielding greater accessibility. In addition, increases in densities can result in lower costs to provide urban services by the public sector. Similarly, higher neighborhood densities can lead to more interactions with neighbors and more “eyes on the streets,” which, in turn, can translate into lower crime rates. Finally, if urban containment is successful in preserving open spaces, house values in neighborhoods near the preserved open space should also rise.

All of these benefits can be counted among the amenities that give value to a house and are ultimately capitalized in its value, even while the land supply restriction can also put pressure on house prices. In truth, both factors may be at work, and we still have much to learn about their impacts. Furthermore, some of these internalized benefits may have different values for households at different income levels.

A comparison of Atlanta, Georgia, and Portland, Oregon, both suggests of these sorts of benefits and points to areas for future research to answer these questions more comprehensively (see Table 1). During the first half of the 1990s, Portland experienced a large increase in housing prices (approximately 60 percent compared to almost 20 percent in Atlanta, in nominal terms). Between the mid-1980s and the mid-1990s, homeownership rates in Portland increased by nearly 5 percent while Atlanta’s rate remained virtually unchanged. Finally, perceptions of improved house quality were greater among Portland residents than those in Atlanta. In both metropolitan areas and in both time periods, the proportion of household income spent on housing was virtually the same, suggesting that income growth in Portland exceeded that in Atlanta. However, it is difficult to conclude definitively that increases in house quality in Portland were due to enhanced amenities conferred on households by changes in land regulation, rather than to rising incomes.

Although urban containment policies may stabilize the supply of land, they usually increase the supply of development opportunities. Such policies are typically accompanied by “upzoning” whereby land zoned formerly at one level of development intensity is changed to allow for a higher density. One strategy to increase densities is to infill and redevelop (or “refill”) urban areas at higher than extant levels through the adoption of “minimum intensity” zoning. We do not know the subsequent effect of such policies on house prices, and we know even less about their effect on household budgets and disposable income. For example, higher housing prices may simply reflect capitalization of more efficient development patterns that reduce expenditures in other parts of the household budget.

It is possible, however, that current and future homeowners will benefit directly from these sorts of capitalized savings. For example, location-efficient mortgages, a lending instrument being tested in a few markets, allow lenders to extend mortgages to households based on a higher mortgage-to-income ratio. The rationale for altering the income eligibility is that, in comparison to suburban households, urban households can substitute walking and public transit for automobile payments, including both capital costs and operating expenses. Thus, disposable income is effectively increased as non-housing expenditures decline. Current experiments with the location-efficient mortgage are underway in Chicago’s northside neighborhoods and in central Seattle. If default rates for these loans are similar to those for traditional mortgages, we may see greater adoption of this instrument in appropriate submarkets.

Other savings that may accrue to urban homeowners as a result of containment policies are lower taxes due to lower capital costs or increases in supplemental income if higher densities are achieved through the addition of accessory apartments in existing houses.

Landowner Behavior Implications

The imposition of urban containment policies and changes in density are also likely to result in changed expectations of landowners. Therefore, an additional consideration for researchers, which the symposium participants confronted, is the role of containment in affecting the nature of landowner behavior with respect to land acquisition and land development.

In an environment of a relatively inexhaustible supply of land, speculation can be reasonably efficient while the competition to sell land keeps prices low. The end result may be that housing prices will not be affected materially. However, when supply is constrained, even if upzoning increases development capacity, the number of players in the land market can fall and cartels may form. Furthermore, an assumption of urban containment policies is that undeveloped land inside the boundary will come on-line in sufficient amounts and at appropriate times to sustain development. There is no research into this, however. Will owners of land, knowing they hold an oligopolistic position in the land market, delay its sale to get a higher price?

Until now, in our studies of urban land markets, we have lived with the assumption of relatively inexhaustible (i.e., elastic) land supply. Urban containment policies can change that premise by making land an exhaustible commodity, resulting in the problem of dual predictability. On one hand, developers are given more certainty in whether and how they develop land; on the other hand, landowners know that land supply will become exhaustible and therefore they may be enticed to become speculators, in their own right. Will local governments reward those willing to develop vacant or underused parcels with higher densities to offset others who delay sale? Certainly, a land tax is expected to limit this sort of behavior. Can other changes in the tax regime encourage development within the UGB? For all of these reasons, we have much to learn about the effect of urban containment on landowner and speculative behavior.

Summary Observations

The symposium participants spent more time on the economic issues related to urban containment than on environmental concerns. However, some material was presented that suggested significant environmental benefits as a result of urban containment. Table 2 presents additional comparisons of Portland and Atlanta between the mid-1980s and the mid-1990s. While vehicle miles traveled increased in both places, Portland experienced little change (2 percent) whereas Atlanta experienced a significant increase (17 percent). At the same time, Portland’s average commute times fell, air quality improved, and per capita energy consumption declined.

All of these indicators suggest that Portland is different from Atlanta in meaningful ways. Furthermore, typical behavior by individuals in each of these metropolitan areas is presumed to be different. We should attempt to find out the degree to which growth containment policies account for these behavioral differences and whether there are other policies that may also play important roles in affecting the economic and environmental dynamics of metropolitan regions. For example, the problem of housing affordability remains a serious concern in most cities, whether with or without urban containment boundaries.

Urban containment creates an entirely new regime in urban planning and development decision making, offering research challenges because of the difficulties in developing methodologies that can tease out complex interactions and frame the results in a manner that can advance both public and private interests. The Lincoln Institute, the Fannie Mae Foundation and the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development are among a growing number of research entities interested in pursuing these challenges.

Arthur C. Nelson is professor of city planning, urban design and public policy at the Georgia Institute of Technology in Atlanta. He organized the seminar referenced in this article and has researched and written extensively on this topic.

Una versión más actualizada de este artículo está disponible como parte del capítulo 5 del libro Perspectivas urbanas: Temas críticos en políticas de suelo de América Latina.

Los cambios en la economía global, las telecomunicaciones y los sistemas de transporte obligan a las ciudades de todo el mundo a pensar en proyectos de desarrollo urbano a gran escala como una manera de reestructurar el uso de la tierra y de estimular la economía local. Por ejemplo, extensas áreas con buena ubicación que anteriormente han estado ocupadas por instalaciones ferroviarias y otros usos industriales o relacionados con el transporte han quedado abandonadas en muchas ciudades de medianas dimensiones a medida que el transporte de bienes se hace cada vez más en contenedores desde un número reducido de puertos principales y terminales.

Las restricciones reglamentarias sobre las empresas del estado han limitado las opciones para abrir estas tierras subutilizadas al mercado privado o para desarrollarlas como proyectos públicos. Con una mayor privatización y la eliminación de restricciones, estas propiedades se convertirían en la ubicación ideal para exitosas asociaciones públicas y privadas de desarrollo urbano. Sin embargo, aunque los desarrollos urbanos monumentales tal vez parezcan una panacea, también plantean numerosas inquietudes sobre la implementación y los efectos imprevistos en otros barrios de la ciudad, así como la competencia con otras ciudades.

Córdoba es un ejemplo representativo de las ciudades que han adoptado la planificación estratégica a fin de reestructurar los usos de las tierras locales en un contexto macroeconómico e institucional cambiante. Una de las preguntas clave que se hacen estas ciudades es hasta qué punto puede un nuevo desarrollo de gran magnitud, en este caso un telepuerto, estimular efectivamente la diversidad económica y reactivar una zona marginada.

Condiciones en Córdoba

La ciudad de Córdoba, con una población aproximada de 1,3 millones de habitantes, está estratégicamente ubicada en el centro geográfico de Argentina y tiene vínculos bien establecidos con la capital Buenos Aires y ciudades importantes de Chile, Brasil y Uruguay. Por mucho tiempo Córdoba ha sido un centro industrial donde se concentraba la producción de automóviles, aviones, trenes y maquinaria, al igual que de bienes de consumo como alimentos, calzado, ropa y artículos de cuero. Más recientemente, la ciudad ha extendido su sector de servicios para cubrir necesidades locales y regionales.

Puesto que Argentina ha pasado por una estabilización y reestructuración de su economía, Córdoba ha adquirido un mayor potencial para convertirse en un núcleo floreciente del Mercosur, el distrito de negocios de la región centro-sur de Suramérica. No obstante, uno de los obstáculos más perturbadores para la ciudad sigue siendo la competencia con Buenos Aires.

Al igual que muchas otras ciudades de América Latina, Córdoba está atravesando por un período de mayor descentralización, de transición hacia una estructura urbana multipolar y de otros problemas socioeconómicos. Hace varios años la ciudad emprendió un proceso de planificación estratégica que incorporaba un grupo muy representativo de circunscripciones y que desembocó en un plan en 1996 en el cual se identificaban algunas necesidades inmediatas de desarrollo económico y otros aspectos que exigían mayor análisis e implementación.

Como parte de la colaboración continua entre los funcionarios municipales y el Instituto Lincoln, en un seminario realizado en Córdoba en abril de 1997 se examinó la regulación y promoción del mercado inmobiliario. (1) Una idea de gran prioridad que surgió de aquellas discusiones se refería al desarrollo de un telepuerto en terrenos urbanos subutilizados en el centro de la ciudad. Se creó un comité para abordar la planificación y la implementación de dicha obra, el cual estaba integrado por funcionarios municipales, representantes del sector empresarial privado y miembros de la comunidad universitaria local.

El telepuerto concebido para Córdoba es una obra para usos combinados que ofrecerá edificios de oficinas, centros de convenciones y hoteles, además de otros usos secundarios de la tierra. La oferta de edificios de oficinas con tecnología de punta es considerada un objetivo clave para satisfacer las necesidades que tiene la ciudad como centro regional y sede nacional para algunas empresas. Estas instalaciones tendrán una sofisticada infraestructura de telecomunicaciones y se construirán con una inversión combinada de los sectores público y privado. Uno de los primeros proyectos es un hotel que la municipalidad construirá dentro de una edificación histórica.

La ubicación propuesta para el telepuerto es un terreno de 40 hectáreas en el centro de la ciudad, en las márgenes del río Suquía. El terreno incluye antiguas líneas ferroviarias y tiene buen acceso a las principales carreteras que comunican la región de Mercosur. Actualmente los predios están en manos de propietarios públicos y privados y se prevé que serán necesarios algunos traspasos de tierras para poder emprender el proyecto.

Observaciones y recomendaciones

Para ayudar al comité a terminar sus planes del telepuerto, la ciudad de Córdoba y el Instituto Lincoln organizaron un segundo seminario en abril de 1998 para discutir las inquietudes acerca de la implementación del proyecto. Los estudios comparativos de casos de proyectos de desarrollo a gran escala de entidades públicas y privadas en Toronto, Canadá y en Sao Paulo, Brasil sirvieron como valiosas referencias de los problemas y desafíos enfrentados por esas ciudades y aportaron una base para analizar el diseño y las posibles perspectivas para la propuesta del telepuerto.

Una consideración fundamental es la dimensión a gran escala del telepuerto en relación con el mercado local existente, lo que supone que, como mínimo, el proyecto debe realizarse por etapas para garantizar que el desarrollo urbano sea ordenado. Igualmente tienen que ver con la dimensión los efectos que tendrá el proyecto sobre otros terrenos de la ciudad, entre los que se encuentran predios con un potencial para obras de desarrollo de carácter similar. El atractivo relativo de los terrenos escogidos puede traer consecuencias negativas para el desarrollo de tierras no residenciales en otras zonas específicas de crecimiento de la ciudad. Paralelamente es importante entender la intensidad y fuerza del mercado para los usos específicos que tendría el terreno propuesto para el telepuerto.

Otra preocupación es el posible efecto negativo del proyecto sobre los barrios residenciales existentes y en crecimiento de la zona. Por otra parte, el éxito del telepuerto podría beneficiar a los barrios si los residentes se integran al proceso de planificación e implementación.

Entre las lecciones que faltan por aprender de la experiencia que han tenido otras ciudades está la importancia de fijar objetivos manejables; algunos participantes del seminario expresaron su temor de que el comité de Córdoba estuviese siendo demasiado ambicioso. Una segunda lección se refiere a la necesidad de actuar con sumo cuidado al seleccionar la ubicación de una nueva obra de desarrollo de gran magnitud. Si bien la ubicación propuesta para el telepuerto no se consideraba desfavorable en ningún sentido, su selección no había sido el resultado de un análisis sistemático. Más bien se trata de un caso en que la ciudad busca aprovechar una oportunidad para llevar a cabo un plan de desarrollo en un terreno disponible que urge reutilizar.

Una tercera observación la hizo el sector privado, que tiene necesidades especiales en cuanto al acceso, infraestructura y costos. Mediante un estudio de mercado idóneo se podrá identificar un sinnúmero de aspectos por considerar, incluida la capacidad que tendría Córdoba para competir con Buenos Aires como sede local o regional de empresas nacionales e internacionales. Está claro que los supuestos beneficiarios del sector privado deben participar directamente en el desarrollo conceptual y la planificación del proyecto.

Varias semanas después del seminario, la ciudad encargó un estudio para facilitar la estrategia de implementación del telepuerto con base en estas inquietudes y recomendaciones. El estudio también investigará posibles instrumentos para efectuar la captura de plusvalías que permitan obtener el financiamiento necesario para la infraestructura y los mecanismos para formular los tipos de asociaciones entre los sectores público y privado que parecen indispensables para el éxito del proyecto del telepuerto.

Como observación general de cierre hay que agregar que los funcionarios de Córdoba, o cualquier otra ciudad que esté considerando obras de desarrollo urbano a gran escala, precisan actuar con celeridad más allá de la fase de estudio y brindar capacitación y otros mecanismos de apoyo para que los dirigentes locales y los profesionales puedan mejorar su capacidad para manejar el proyecto. Se requieren destrezas y experiencia para evaluar el funcionamiento de los mercados inmobiliarios, definir la competencia técnica requerida, negociar con el sector privado y vigilar la gestión financiera, la regulación de los servicios públicos, el impuesto a la propiedad, las regulaciones de la tierra y la compleja interacción de todos estos elementos. El desafío de una tarea así es lograr el equilibrio entre una cuota suficiente de planificación e investigación y la necesidad de aprovechar las oportunidades de desarrollo a medida que surgen y de aprender con la evolución del proceso.

David Amborski es profesor de la Escuela de Planificación Urbana y Regional en la Universidad Politécnica de Ryerson en Toronto. Douglas Keare, miembro principal del Instituto Lincoln, cuenta con experiencia en planificación estratégica en grandes ciudades de países en vías de desarrollo.

The introduction of a market-oriented economic policy in Estonia after independence in 1991 set the stage for a plethora of reforms to restore property rights and establish a price system for goods, labor, capital and land. Land and ownership reforms had two goals: the restoration to former owners of land “unlawfully expropriated” during the Soviet regime, and the treatment of land as a valuable and scarce economic resource. As one might expect, these tasks have not been easy to accomplish, and frequent revisions in the laws and methods governing restitution and valuations have been made.

Historical Overview

Despite the far-reaching reforms taking place in Estonia today, the transformation of land ownership and the patterns of land use still reflect 55 years of history, including wars, occupation and annexation. In the first of three working papers I analyze the impact of these historical developments on land use, population structure and farm wealth in pre-Soviet Estonia. Prior to annexation to the Soviet Union in 1940, Estonia had a flourishing farm sector. Land was used mostly for agriculture, with the majority of the population residing in rural communes or municipalities.

Research also shows that a market for land was well established and reflected site specific characteristics. A distinguishing feature of this market was the coexistence of a sale-purchase price determined by the forces of supply and demand and other prices reflecting the “social” character of land use. For example, land acquisition for use by landless farmers (communal land) had a much lower price than the market price. This feature, although it may have served a social purpose, impacted the value of land for compensating former owners.

Another significant finding relates to the taxation of farms in pre-Soviet Estonia. Land and improvements on land (fixed assets) were subject to taxation, although the effective rate of taxation was quite small. This tax was a local tax with the receipts allocated to local government budgets.

Land Reform

The second paper provides a framework for the analysis of valuation formulae used by the Estonian Land and Tax Boards for the valuation of land for tax purposes. It includes a brief overview of the current land stock and land use, a discussion of land and ownership reforms, including valuation laws and methods, and a statistical analysis of the valuation model used by the Land Board.

Estonia’s experience with privatizing its economy is without a doubt at the forefront of liberalization efforts undertaken by the new independent states. The transformation of collective rights to land into individual rights took place in Estonia by means of legislation. First, the new Constitution in 1992 restored to citizens the rights of ownership of productive assets, including land, and property and land reform laws established a system for the restitution of land to former owners. Second, principles for establishing land value for compensation and privatization were spelled out by the valuation law(s).

A land market, especially for urban land, is likely to develop quickly, offering the Land Board useful information for adjusting their valuation models. Once a sufficient number of observations on land transactions becomes available, a hedonic price model or present value model can be developed to provide information on the marginal valuation of each land attribute, as well as the significance of other land characteristics not included in the current model. Using the Estonia Base Map, the spatial aspect of land and other amenities (GIS variables) may be incorporated in the model to yield good estimates of the marginal product of land in both urban and rural municipalities.

Given that land value is used as a tax base, it is incumbent upon public sector officials to assess it fairly and accurately. A land tax yield hinges on the size and distribution of the base. If the tax model neglects this, revenue will suffer and land use will be suboptimal. Economies in transition can ill afford this road.

Land Taxation and Tax Reform

The third paper integrates the two aspects of land reform, valuation and taxation, beginning with an historical overview of land taxation in Estonia leading up to the current (1995) land tax. It addresses the assignment of tax sources between the state and local governments, and the significance of land taxation as a revenue source for local governments. The paper also offers a statistical model for estimating land tax revenues based on the Estonian Land Board valuation maps, the land cadastre and tax rates selected by local municipalities and then contrasts the estimates with actual data obtained from the Estonian National Tax Board.

After independence in 1991, the Estonian government introduced a new tax system that replaced the Soviet system, and the state budget was completely “decoupled” from the USSR’s All-Union budget. On May 10, 1993, the Estonian parliament passed the Law on Land Tax as part of a reform agenda dealing with budgetary reform in general and land reform in particular. The path followed by Estonia is similar to that prescribed by the World Bank for many former Soviet republics. Guided by “western” principles of taxation, the Estonian tax system was designed to achieve efficiency in resource use as well as to meet national and local budgetary needs.

The land tax is one of several revenue sources collected from people and enterprises in Estonia. Although the land tax was established as a state tax with shared revenues between the state and local governments, it was quickly designated as a local tax with its proceeds dedicated for local budgets. Estonia also recognizes the efficiency of a special tax on land value, even though at the time of this study it accounted for only seven percent of local revenues.

Several conclusions emerge from this part of the study. First, a tax on land offers special efficiency benefits, although its implementation needs to be considered carefully. Second, for land to be a viable tax source serious attempts should be made to enhance the efficiency of financial and insurance markets, especially in rural areas. Third, land valuation should reflect two elements: the value of present attributes and the value of these attributes in the future, because a parcel of land valued at the best use of these attributes today may not capture their full value in the future.

Finally and perhaps most importantly for economies in transition, valuation and taxation of land should be viewed in the context of a “learning curve.” With the progress of the economy in general and land markets in particular, land taxation should be strengthened through annual valuation to enhance the tax capacity of municipal governments and to encourage the optimal development of land use over time.

Attiat F. Ott is professor of economics and director of the Institute for Economic Studies at Clark University in Worcester, MA. This article is adapted from three new working papers resulting from research supported by the Lincoln Institute.

Una versión más actualizada de este artículo está disponible como parte del capítulo 4 del libro Perspectivas urbanas: Temas críticos en políticas de suelo de América Latina.

La recuperación de plusvalías es un concepto que tiene mayor aceptación día a día y cuyo propósito es recuperar, parcial o totalmente, para el beneficio público, los incrementos en el valor de bienes raíces provenientes de aquellas inversiones o acciones que emergen de la comunidad más que del sector privado. Sin embargo, sobre la base de la experiencia que tiene el Instituto Lincoln en el patrocinio de muchos programas educativos y de investigación relacionados con las políticas de recuperación de plusvalías en América Latina, está claro que el concepto también despierta bastante controversia.

Este artículo aborda algunos de los temas polémicos y constantes que han involucrado a los participantes en un continuo debate sobre la recuperación de plusvalías, que va desde las preocupaciones básicas, tales como la comprensión adecuada de los fundamentos legales para los derechos en bienes raíces, hasta las cuestiones políticas de mayor envergadura que surgen de nuevos o mayores gravámenes sobre los bienes raíces. Asimismo, hay aspectos técnicos involucrados, tales como la distinción entre los incrementos en el valor de los bienes raíces (o plusvalías) que se atribuyen a inversiones públicas específicas o la toma de decisiones a partir de fuentes o factores más generales que influyen en el mercado inmobiliario, así como los desafíos pragmáticos que surgen de la selección de los instrumentos adecuados para las circunstancias apropiadas en el momento justo.

Para comprender mejor el concepto de recuperación de plusvalías, no basta con recurrir solamente a los argumentos técnicos o a la opinión de especialistas o peritos. De igual manera, tampoco se puede desestimar la cuestión meramente con fundamentos políticos atribuyendo los obstáculos principales a la implementación de políticas sobre la recuperación de plusvalías a grupos de interés con una posición privilegiada. Más bien, una parte considerable de la “discrepancia inexplicable” en la aplicación de la recuperación de plusvalías parece deberse a falta de información o a un concepto erróneo por parte de los actores fundamentales del debate.

La Figura 1 resume 10 problemas contenciosos de la recuperación de plusvalías; los puntos 1, 2 y 3 se comentan brevemente a continuación.

Gravámenes Injustos para Personas de Escasos Recursos

Aunque en América Latina está disminuyendo el apoyo a los subsidios directos o subvenciones para personas de escasos recursos, muchos siguen sosteniendo que estas personas no deben pagar los servicios municipales, o deben ser exonerados del pago de impuestos y demás gravámenes sobre su propiedad, tal como lo estipulan varias políticas y leyes más progresistas sobre la recuperación de plusvalías.

Uno de los argumentos más comunes a favor de exceptuar a las personas de escasos recursos de dichos gravámenes genera un dilema entre generaciones: dado que los ciudadanos con mayor poder adquisitivo han disfrutado durante muchos años de los servicios municipales en forma gratuita, ¿por qué los menos privilegiados deben pagar ahora los servicios que necesitan y merecen? Otro argumento se centra en la idea de que la mayoría de los incrementos sobre bienes raíces en áreas humildes de hecho han sido generados por los mismos pobres, mediante la aportación de mano de obra propia o proyectos particulares para tener acceso a los servicios básicos en su área, y no mediante la intervención pública. Algunos reconocen que los programas de mejoramiento urbano simplemente conducen a los asentamientos humildes a la primera etapa del proceso de urbanización, lo cual constituye sólo un requisito mínimo indispensable para participar en los mercados inmobiliarios comunes. Otros creen que hasta un instrumento de recuperación de plusvalías socialmente neutral puede producir un resultado regresivo, lo que entonces perpetuaría la diferencia entre ricos y pobres en el contexto de acceso injusto a las instalaciones y servicios urbanos, como es el caso en la mayoría de las ciudades de América Latina (Furtado 2000).

En el otro extremo están aquellos que piensan que los pagos por recuperación de plusvalías forman parte de los reclamos que hace el sector de escasos recursos por una ciudadanía de pleno derecho, que incluya el derecho de exigirle al gobierno que le preste atención. Son muchos los ejemplos de sectores menos privilegiados que han estado verdaderamente dispuestos a pagar por los servicios recibidos (tales como sistemas de suministro de agua, alumbrado público y control de inundaciones), dado que el costo de no tener acceso a los mismos es mayor que el pago por tenerlos. Esto fue lo que ocurrió en Lima, Perú, a principios de los años noventa, en donde más de 30 comunidades humildes participaron en un programa de servicios públicos que incluía el pago del costo de los servicios suministrados.

Un argumento más teórico y tal vez menos intuitivo considera el efecto de capitalización de todo gravamen en los precios de los bienes raíces. Dicho efecto es la reducción (o incremento) del precio actual de los bienes raíces en el mercado debido a la suma capitalizada o descontada de los costos (o beneficios) que afecta las ganancias previstas que las propiedades podrían generar en el futuro. En la medida en que los gravámenes sobre la recuperación de plusvalías para áreas regularizadas o mejoradas (reclasificadas) se incluyan en las expectativas relacionadas con los futuros impuestos sobre tierras sin servicios compradas a parceladores ilegales o piratas, se tendería a capitalizar dichos gravámenes en el precio que los compradores estarían dispuestos a pagar o el que el parcelador pudo cobrar (Smolka 2003). Si bien los pobres al final terminarían pagando el mismo monto, el dinero sería destinado al tesoro público local en vez de al bolsillo del parcelador.

Incidentemente, una opinión muy común pero errónea sostiene que dichos gravámenes (recuperación de plusvalías o impuesto inmobiliario) son inflacionarios o incrementan el precio de los bienes raíces en el mercado. Si bien el efecto de capitalización es complicado, la mayoría de las personas podrán comprender el ejemplo en el que se comparan dos departamentos que, en otras circunstancias, serían idénticos: el que está ubicado en un edificio con gastos comunes más altos tendría un alquiler más bajo en el mercado que el departamento con gastos comunes más bajos. El mismo razonamiento puede aplicarse para explicar por qué no existe la doble tributación entre la recuperación de plusvalías y el impuesto inmobiliario. El incremento significativo sobre el valor de los bienes raíces que resulta de una intervención pública se acumula o se agrega al precio mínimo observado en el mercado actual, que ya es un neto del efecto capitalizado de todo beneficio o pago futuro previsto, incluido el impuesto inmobiliario.

Derechos Adquiridos Cuando Cambia el Uso del Inmueble

A pesar de que pocos argumentarían que las expectativas son un factor crucial en la determinación de los precios de los inmuebles, se considera ampliamente injusto si la compensación de precio se ubica por debajo de los precios del mercado actual. Esta idea está comenzando a cambiar, tal como se refleja en la legislación reciente. Por ejemplo, la Ley 338 de 1997 en Colombia permite la adquisición pública de bienes raíces a precios justos del mercado, pero sin incluir el incremento del valor del inmueble resultante de inversiones públicas previas o de cambios en los usos normativos de la tierra (ver el artículo de Maldonado y Smolka, página 15). El mismo principio se establece en el nuevo Estatuto Municipal de Brasil (Ley 10.257 de 2001) cuando la expropiación de la tierra se usa como sanción contra un propietario que no cumple con los usos sociales de la tierra. Muchos abogados están de acuerdo en que las expectativas no crean derechos; por lo tanto, las expectativas no materializadas no deberían ser compensadas. La preocupación social acerca de la adquisición pública de bienes raíces que llevó a la postergación del nuevo megaproyecto propuesto para el aeropuerto de la Ciudad de México ilustra vívidamente este problema.

Es difícil para el típico propietario, que en buena fe compró una parcela de tierra con la expectativa de usar su potencial de desarrollo, entender por qué no debería ser compensado por la pérdida de esa tierra al precio vigente del mercado o al menos al precio de adquisición, aunque los derechos de desarrollo no hayan sido ejercidos. Sin embargo, a menudo el resultado depende del grado en que la nueva política haya sido efectivamente implementada. En la práctica, los precios reflejan las expectativas relacionadas con el cumplimiento (usualmente insatisfactorio) de la legislación existente, incluidas las discrepancias legales o lagunas impositivas en el contexto normativo y fiscal correspondiente. Éste ha sido el caso en la mayoría de las decisiones de la corte referidas a la justa compensación en los procesos de adquisición pública de bienes raíces y en las demandas de los propietarios (o de promotores inmobiliarios) sobre quienes los administradores locales imponen gravámenes de plusvalía. Un argumento más pragmático es que los derechos pueden en efecto estar restringidos por una nueva legislación o normativa de zonificación, siempre y cuando esté acompañada por reglas de transición adecuadas para proteger los derechos de aquellos que tenían demandas legítimas previas. Otros defienden el proceso de transición como un paso indispensable para permitir que el mercado absorba gradualmente tales cambios.

Los economistas luchan para transmitir la importancia de las expectativas al determinar la estructura de los precios actuales observados de los bienes raíces. La manera en que el futuro afecta los precios actuales de los inmuebles es de hecho más difícil de expresar al público en general que la noción de que los precios actuales reflejan derechos, como se hacía en propiedades comparables en el pasado. En América Latina las expectativas asociadas con los usos de la tierra no siempre están relacionadas con los códigos de zonificación o edificación, sino más bien con la especulación inmobiliaria. Sería de interés señalar que mientras la especulación en América Latina está asociada con la retención a largo plazo de los bienes raíces, en América del Norte, en cambio, está más asociada con la rapidez en la compra y venta de las propiedades. El fenómeno de la retención del inmueble para su desarrollo futuro, con la consiguiente apropiación privada de la plusvalía en los valores de los bienes raíces, ha obstaculizado el planeamiento y el desarrollo urbano desde que las ciudades comenzaron a expandirse rápidamente hace varias décadas.

Compensación Asimétrica para las Minusvalías

El debate acerca de la recuperación de plusvalías (es decir, recuperar los incrementos en el valor de los bienes raíces, las ganancias o las plusvalías) hace surgir inevitablemente esta pregunta: ¿qué pasa con las minusvalías? La percepción corriente es que los gobiernos están más ansiosos por aprobar la legislación para recuperar las plusvalías que por brindar protección legal a los ciudadanos contra expropiaciones o compensaciones arbitrarias en los casos de pérdidas igualmente predecibles (minusvalías). El informe de América Latina ha demostrado, sin embargo, que el balance entre las plusvalías recuperadas y las minusvalías pagadas es claramente negativo. La suma pagada en compensación a los propietarios sobrepasa en mucho a las ganancias pequeñas y esporádicas que el sector público ha logrado recuperar de los beneficios directos que genera para las propiedades privadas.

Todos los alquileres, y precios de los bienes raíces en este sentido, no son en esencia más que plusvalías acumuladas, o incrementos en el valor de los bienes raíces, a lo largo del tiempo, lo que hace eco del argumento de Henry George para la confiscación total de los alquileres inmobiliarios. Así, las minusvalías alegadas son consideradas incidentales y sólo parte de un valor con respecto al cual los derechos individuales no son (o no deberían ser) absolutos. El debate acerca de esta asimetría con lleva directamente a la definición correcta de las minusvalías y a la manera en que son entendidas estas pérdidas, lo cual hace surgir la cuestión de los derechos de desarrollo. Mientras que algunos desean restringir la compensación por las mejoras en la tierra y en los inmuebles que el propietario podría perder, otros argumentan que los derechos de desarrollo son un atributo inherente e incuestionable de los bienes raíces.

En la práctica no es fácil justificar estos argumentos. Lo que puede ser válido para la totalidad no lo es necesariamente para cada parte, ya que los propietarios individuales consideran como una pérdida en el valor de los bienes raíces cuando, por ejemplo, una autopista amurallada pasa a través de su terreno o un viaducto bloquea la vista y produce ruido y contaminación. El ciudadano promedio no se convence fácilmente con los argumentos antedichos. El reclamo por un tratamiento equitativo y simétrico es social y culturalmente demasiado delicado como para ser ignorado.

La transferencia de los derechos de desarrollo (TDD) –un instrumento concebido originalmente para compensar las minusvalías provenientes de ordenanzas históricas, arquitectónicas, culturales y de protección del medio ambiente para las plusvalías de otro sector– ahora se ha ampliado para mitigar otros reclamos legítimos de compensación de minusvalías. Algunos argumentan que la compensación ordinaria para las minusvalías es una garantía, lo que hace así más fácil aceptar pagos por pérdidas. Según el principio de la equidad, las decisiones de planeamiento, incluidos los esquemas de zonificación, están reconocidas como potencialmente injustas con respecto a la distribución de los valores en los mercados inmobiliarios. Por más ingenioso que pueda parecer el instrumento de la TDD, no permite aclarar las cuestiones en juego. Por el contrario, acentúa el debate, pues reconoce el derecho de que las minusvalías sean compensadas a la vez que sanciona el derecho de los individuos a las plusvalías, por lo que replantea la cuestión de las apropiaciones privadas de los valores comunitarios.

Comentarios Finales

El complejo debate sobre las políticas e instrumentos de recuperación de plusvalías en América Latina indica que queda mucho por investigar y aprender. Si bien la cuestión no tiene necesariamente una única respuesta, los argumentos presentados aquí demuestran que una parte significativa de la resistencia a tales ideas puede ser atribuida a prejuicios y falta de información. A pesar de que las posiciones mantenidas por los diferentes grupos no son tan claras ni tan coherentes como sería de esperar, las percepciones y las actitudes sí cambian, como lo demuestra el artículo adjunto.

Martim O. Smolka es Senior Fellow y Director del Programa del Instituto Lincoln para América Latina y el Caribe. Fernanda Furtado es Fellow del Instituto y profesora del Departamento de Urbanismo de la Universidad Fluminense Federal en Niteroi, Brasil.

Sally Powers has been a visiting fellow in the Department of Valuation and Taxation at the Lincoln Institute of Land Policy since 2009. She was director of assessment for the City of Cambridge for thirteen years until 2001, when she became an international consultant. That work has taken her to Kosovo, Montenegro, South Africa, the Kyrgyz Republic, and Turkmenistan, among other countries, where she has participated in projects on property taxation, market value revaluations, and establishment of a valuation profession for a transition economy.

Her career as an assessment administrator and consultant has involved all aspects of property taxation: legal framework, property appraisal, value defense, local government finance, tax policy, project planning and execution, public information, software specification and testing, cadastral/GIS (geographic information systems) mapping and analysis platforms, and tax collection and enforcement. Her research interests focus on mass appraisal, specifically the application of econometric techniques to analyze market activity and develop models to estimate the market value of properties that have not sold. She has written on topics as diverse as appraisal modeling, implementation of the local property tax in Kosovo, and property tax collection strategies.

Powers received her bachelor’s degree in anthropology from the University of Chicago, and she holds a Master of Science degree from the Boston College Carroll School of Management.

LAND LINES: How does your work fit within the research and education program of the Lincoln Institute?

SALLY POWERS: The Lincoln Institute is a leader in property tax policy, and its work influences the local government officials responsible for the property tax in thousands of jurisdictions across the United States and internationally. The Department of Valuation and Taxation presents a variety of conferences, seminars, and courses for property tax professionals, and I have served as faculty for a number of these programs since the 1990s. I’m also involved in working directly with local tax practitioners and in research projects that will continue to challenge the conventional wisdom about the property tax.

LAND LINES: What are some of your current projects?

SALLY POWERS: One major project deals with a joint venture between the Lincoln Institute and the George Washington Institute of Public Policy to create a free, downloadable property tax database for all 50 U.S. states and the District of Columbia. The Significant Features of the Property Tax Web site was launched in June 2009, and the information is updated every year to keep current with changes in the legislation that regulates the property tax in each state.

We regularly expand the subject matter to be included, and have made the site a central access point for information about the property tax from a variety of federal, state, and scholarly sources. For example, the only nationwide study of effective tax rates is published by the Minnesota Taxpayers Association, and this publication is now available for downloading from the Significant Features site. The next topic we plan to organize for presentation on the Web site is the various forms of property classification for tax purposes.

LAND LINES: Can you clarify what an effective tax rate and classification mean, and why they are important aspects of this database?

SALLY POWERS: The property tax rate by itself does not explain much about the property tax burden in a particular community or provide any basis for comparison across jurisdictions. A high tax rate may simply reflect low property values, and a low tax rate may reflect very high values. Effective tax rates are calculated by comparing the amount of the property tax bill for a property to its market value, which may or may not be the same or even close to its assessed value. Effective tax rates, where they are available, thus make it possible to understand the impact of a tax bill intuitively and to make better informed cross-jurisdictional comparisons.

Classification of property is undertaken by many states, either legislatively or in the state’s constitution, to identify property categories based on use, the most common uses being residential, commercial, and industrial. In some states the classifications are applied for identification and reporting purposes only. However, it is employed more frequently to tax favored classes at lower rates than other classes. The most favored classes are generally residential and agricultural uses.

LAND LINES: Based on your research, how well is the property tax holding up as a primary local revenue source during the current recession?

SALLY POWERS: There are two major components to a property tax bill: the property value and the tax rate, as discussed above. In states where local tax jurisdictions are not encumbered with extreme limits on tax rates, the property tax can be quite resilient, because when values decrease the tax rate may be increased. In addition, the value always represents an assessment as of a specific date prior to the issuance of the tax bill. It is not unusual for this assessment date to be a year and a half or more before the date of issuance of tax bills. This “assessment lag” gives local jurisdictions a cushion in times of rapidly changing markets, with time to plan for the eventual change in the level of assessed values and to investigate other local revenue sources. To date, research on property tax revenues during the current down-turn has borne out these features of the property tax.

LAND LINES: It’s clear that the American property tax is a complex affair. How does this compare to your experience in other countries?

SALLY POWERS: International experience with the property tax varies greatly, depending on the maturity of the property tax system, the culture, and the legal underpinnings for the tax. The projects I worked on in Eastern Europe were introducing a market value based property tax. Political leaders and central and local public officials had no difficulty with the concept of market value. Valuation methods were uncomplicated and directly related to sales. A common theme in the U.S. and many other countries, however, is the desire to make the burden of the property tax smaller for residences than for businesses. Some of the proposed formulas to provide tax relief are extremely complicated, such as relating property value to household size and ages of household members.

LAND LINES: How widespread is the property tax?

SALLY POWERS: It is quite surprising how many countries assess some form of tax or fee on property or property rights. Another Lincoln Institute project I am working on is the African Tax Institute (ATI), a joint venture with the University of South Africa at Pretoria. More than ten research fellows at ATI have visited one or more of 38 countries to develop in-depth reports on the various forms of tax on property (Franzsen and Youngman 2009). Most of those reports and supplemental appendices are posted on the Lincoln Institute Web site as working papers. In every country studied the researchers found some sort of tax or fee on ownership or use of property. In many countries all land is owned by the government, but the rights to use the land are owned by individuals and companies that pay fees and taxes on their use rights.

In countries of the former Yugoslavia, for example, the property tax is a familiar concept. In the early 1990s, the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia established a privatization program that transferred ownership of government-owned apartment flats to individual owners. An annual tax was assessed on the owners, based on the characteristics of the property.

LAND LINES: Can you describe more about your interest and experience in econometrics applied to property market data.

SALLY POWERS: I was plunged into multiple regression analysis on my very first property tax job for the City of Boston in 1982. I was part of the team hired to use statistical analysis to develop models (formulas) that could be applied to property data to estimate market value. I was fortunate because the city hired some of the top experts in this emerging field to train us in these methods. Since then, both as an assessor and later as a consultant, I have continued to use econometric tools to estimate market value for property tax application.

It has been fascinating to participate in the increasing sophistication and effectiveness of CAMA (computer assisted mass appraisal) to generate AVMs (automated valuation models). The biggest leap in this technology takes advantage of GIS capabilities to analyze location and property value. I am looking into an econometric tool for CAMA application that analyzes data around median values rather than the mean. This is interesting because the current statistical standards for value accuracy and uniformity are calculated around the median because, compared to the mean, it measures average value with less bias from extremely high or low values.

LAND LINES: Do you have any other observations about the Institute’s work in the current volatile realm of property taxation?

SALLY POWERS: As a visiting fellow at the Lincoln Institute, I have found it especially gratifying to see the increasing public interest in the Significant Features of the Property Tax database. The Web site has been cited by many scholars in the field of local public finance, and the authors of two papers presented at recent Institute seminars used data from the site for their analyses.

Adding to its Web-based resources, the Lincoln Institute has produced more than 10 online courses on such diverse topics as property tax policy, modern valuation technologies, property tax reform in Massachusetts, and introduction of the property tax in transition economies. The IAAO (International Association of Assessing Officers), the leading membership organization for tax assessors and other property tax professionals, has recognized the value of these courses, and now its members can receive continuing education credit for taking them.

Finally, the Institute has inspired more economists to become interested in property tax valuation and equity issues. For example, economists from the University of Illinois and Florida State University are conducting studies of assessment equity that introduce contemporary econometric tools to both display and analyze patterns of overvaluation and undervaluation of property in assessing jurisdictions.

Visiting fellow Dan McMillen (2011), working with a rich data-set that includes the City of Chicago, will present his analysis and conclusions at the next annual conference of the IAAO. I will be on hand to help make his innovative findings accessible not only to the statistical analysts in the audience, but also to property tax assessors who are interested in improving values in their own jurisdictions.

References

Franzsen, Riel C. D., and Joan M. Youngman. 2009. Mapping property taxes in Africa. Land Lines 21(3): 8-13.

McMillen, Daniel P. 2011. Assessment regressivity: A tale of two Illinois counties. Land Lines 23(1): 9-15.

Significant Features of the Property Tax. www.lincolninst.edu/subcenters/significant-features-property-tax