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to increase. Eliminating parking minimums continues to be the best way to positively increase not only the number of homes constructed but also positively influence the outcomes of small and large businesses alike. Now considered inefficient and undesirable, including in the corporate development world, establishing "parking minimums" or government rules that mandate specific minimum amounts of parking in new or changing buildings. These minimums have produced areas where more land is often devoted to parking than to the primary purpose of the buildings on the site. Off-street parking requirements reduce density because each building has its own parking that's typically unavailable to the general public. Further, parking minimums have broken the link between using parking and paying for parking, while the prices of goods, including housing, continue to rise. When the parking and the housing are "unbundled" the developer can use their robust knowledge of the target market to determine how to right size the parking. This is true for single-family homes, multi -family complexes, and retail and office uses. For example, a condo association could own parking spaces as common property and lease them to the residents at a price that equates supply and demand. The rent from commonly owned parking spaces could then replace all or part of the fees residents pay to maintain their association. Parking wouldn't be free, but those who own fewer cars would pay less. After unbundling, developers would likely find they could build condominiums more cheaply. If cities didn't require parking, the market would supply it only when profitable. There would be fewer spaces, and spots that were frequently empty would be redeveloped. This is as true in large cities with transit options as it is for smaller cities with limited transit opportunities yet strong connections for people who walk or roll to parks, schools, businesses, services, and jobs. Density: The cost of building housing has two components: how much does the land cost and how much does it cost to build whatever is allowed by the zoning code. The two concepts taken separately look like this: A piece of land on the market for $K has n units constructed on it and the cost of the land per unit is K/n. There is a point at which the cost savings start to slow down. For example, one can easily argue that building six units instead of one unit offers cost savings to the developer. However, there is also a point at which the savings start to level out. Further, in reality, land cost is partially dependent upon how much housing is allowed by the zoning code. For example, a piece of land upon which one can legally build 300 homes is going to cost a lot more than a piece of identically sized land where you can legally build six. Construction costs for a given site also vary based on what can be built on it because the cost to build things vary greatly based on the size and complexity of the building and what is required by building codes. For example, above six stories you need steel -frame construction: that costs more than wood -frame construction. The Americans with Disabilities Act requires elevators in a building of six of more stories and, in most U.S. building codes, most apartment buildings must have two stairwells. Only one of these two expensive additions to the construction cost is truly necessary, and, in fact, most of the rest of the world does not have this prohibition on "single -stair" buildings in part because there are a lot of other negative consequences for energy efficiency and other factors. And here is where local regulation can counter the goal of abundant and affordable housing: the mismatch between the physical requirements of construction and the regulatory requirements. This happens everywhere: three -unit buildings get stuck with the international commercial building code (IBC), which means costly features like sprinklers. Duplexes? They can use simpler residential code (IRC). The result is that three- to six -unit buildings become financially Page 3 of 6