WGBH interview with Mayor Wilson

[jlau...@comcast.net]

https://www.wgbh.org/news/local/2026-02-03/housing-and-transparency-at-the-top-of-agenda-for-somervilles-new-mayor

Note this quote:

"I want to [have]more two and three bedroom affordable units. It’s one thing to build a lot of studios and ones, building twos and threes allows us to keep working families in the city."

 By contrast, the Copper Mill proposal has the minimum 2-3 bedroom units required under 40B.  Studios and one -bedroom units predominate.  The one-bedrooms are projected to rent for $4250/month-- that's $51K/year plus ~$5K for utilities.  This can succeed in the current market only by tapping the "luxury" apartment segment, including bloc corporate rentals, a new departure and gentrification accelerator for Davis Square.   The risk is that this very segment is increasingly overserved in metropolitan Boston-- e.g. with office-to-resident conversions and new buildings with amenities lacking in the Copper Mill plan.  

Lee

Lee

_________________
Josiah Lee Auspitz
17 Chapel Street 

Somerville, MA 02144 

Landline phone: 617-628-6228 fax: 617-628-9441

Phones do not receive text messages

[PJ Santos]

Is this segment being over served necessarily a bad thing? Boston recently overbuilt lab space, and now that the market has crashed lab prices are very low.

Obviously the housing market is much larger and more complex, but it would be nice if we over supplied a segment of it and caused prices to go down. 

Additionally, the boundaries between segments of the housing market are porous. Many people in "B" grade housing would move to "A" grade housing if prices decreased. Similarly, some people living in "family-sized" units with roommates would move to studios or 1 bedrooms if the right apartment was available to them. 

In another email thread we looked at Somerville's "Housing Needs Assessment" (City of Somerville, Massachusetts - File #: 25-1668 https://somervillema.legistar.com/LegislationDetail.aspx?ID=7730934&GUID=316FD810-9AB7-4D17-8CF0-66A396784BF9) , one of the most striking findings to me was in the last decade we've seen a significant outflow of "under 18" and 45-55 year olds, and an influx of 25-44 year Olds (figure 5 in the HNA, also fig. 17 and commentary on page 25). 

To me, that looks like young professionals with roommates out bidding families for 3 bedroom apartments. Providing a sink for young professionals would reduce the pressure on family-sized units. 

I'd also push back on the idea that new apartments would increase gentrification (which is a bit of a loaded term). Fig. 26 of the HNA shows that with our status quo housing policy we've displaced the majority of our lower income population in the last decade, and added a bunch of $200k/year households. Fig 27 shows that Davis is one of the highest income areas of the city. If gentrification means more rich people and fewer poor people in a neighborhood, it's already happened. Adding 125 subsidized units would help add more economic diversity to our neighborhood. 

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[Mieke Citroen]

Thank you, PJ, for citing some sources. 

When I hear people using terms like "gentrification" as a reason not to do things, it sounds like they are trying to justify putting their opinions onto other people. It's a squishy term. Not easy to measure, I think, and therefore hard to disprove. 

I prefer we focus on aspects that we do have research on - rising rents, lack of housing, that sort of thing.

--Mieke.

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[JOSIAH AUSPITZ]

PJ, 

 

RESPONSE IN CAPS BELOW

 

LEE

On 02/04/2026 4:37 PM EST PJ Santos <peej...@gmail.com> wrote:

 

 

Is this segment being over served necessarily a bad thing? Boston recently overbuilt lab space, and now that the market has crashed lab prices are very low.

Obviously the housing market is much larger and more complex, but it would be nice if we over supplied a segment of it and caused prices to go down.

IF, AS YOU RIGHTLY POINT OUT, THERE IS A REALISTIC CHANCE OF A COLLAPSE IN ONE-BEDROOM RENTS IN THE $4125/MO RANGE, COPPER MILL WOULD BE WELL ADVISED TO RADICALLY RESTRUCTURE, DELAY OR WALK AWAY FROM THE 275' TOWER PROJECT.  

 

Additionally, the boundaries between segments of the housing market are porous. Many people in "B" grade housing would move to "A" grade housing if prices decreased. Similarly, some people living in "family-sized" units with roommates would move to studios or 1 bedrooms if the right apartment was available to them. 

 

POROSITY IS A TWO-WAY STREET.  IF--- A BIG IF-- LOW AMENITY SINGLE BEDROOM LUXURY HIGH RISE APARTMENTS WERE SUCCESSFULLY RENTING IN DAVIS SQ AT $51k/YR + ~$5K/UTILITIES, THIS WOULD LIKELY EXERT AN UPWARD PULL ON CONDOS AND RENTALS IN TWO AND THREE FAMILY HOMES.

 

In another email thread we looked at Somerville's "Housing Needs Assessment" (City of Somerville, Massachusetts - File #: 25-1668 https://somervillema.legistar.com/LegislationDetail.aspx?ID=7730934&GUID=316FD810-9AB7-4D17-8CF0-66A396784BF9) , one of the most striking findings to me was in the last decade we've seen a significant outflow of "under 18" and 45-55 year olds, and an influx of 25-44 year Olds (figure 5 in the HNA, also fig. 17 and commentary on page 25). 

To me, that looks like young professionals with roommates out bidding families for 3 bedroom apartments. Providing a sink for young professionals would reduce the pressure on family-sized units. 

 

YES, MAYOR BALLENTYNE REPORTED IN A WARD SIX COMMUNITY MEETING THAT THERE WAS A 60% TURNOVER IN SOMERVILLE'S POPULATION OVER  A THREE-YEAR PERIOD SINCE THE 2020 CENSUS.  SOME OF THIS IS NORMAL POST-GRADUATE MOBILITY, BUT YOU ARE CERTAINLY RIGHT TO NOTICE THE FLUSHING OUT OF THE MIDDLE OF THE MIDDLE CLASS THAT MAYOR WILSON ADDRESSES IN THE WGBH INTERVIEW.  

 

I'd also push back on the idea that new apartments would increase gentrification (which is a bit of a loaded term). Fig. 26 of the HNA shows that with our status quo housing policy we've displaced the majority of our lower income population in the last decade, and added a bunch of $200k/year households. Fig 27 shows that Davis is one of the highest income areas of the city. If gentrification means more rich people and fewer poor people in a neighborhood, it's already happened. Adding 125 subsidized units would help add more economic diversity to our neighborhood. 

 

DO YOU THINK THAT 125 (= 25%) OF AFFORDABLE UNITS IS ENOUGH TO COUNTER-BALANCE THE EFFECT OF 377 (=75%) LUXURY UNITS?  I DON'T.  THE STAR MARKET 40B PROJECT IS >45% AFFORDABLE AND INCLUDES PROVISION FOR SOME RENTERS AT 50% OF THE MEDIAN INCOME, WHEREAS THE DAVIS TOWER SERVES ONLY 80 PERCENTERS.  (AND OF COURSE THE CIAMPA MANOR ON COLLEGE AVENUE IS 100% AFFORDABLE FOR PENSIONERS.)

 

YOU MAY REMEMBER THAT AT THE LAST MEETING WITH COPPER MILL A YEAR AGO I REPORTED THAT SOMERVILLE MEDIAN RENTS FOR SINGLE BEDROOMS HAD JUMPED  AHEAD OF BOSTON IN JANUARY 2025 TO RANK THIRD IN THE STATE AFTER BROOKLINE AND CAMBRIDGE.  A LITTLE DIGGING SUGGESTS THAT THAT THE JANUARY 2025 EFFECT WAS LARGELY DUE TO THE RENTING OUT OF "THE PROSPECT" HIGH-RISE IN UNION SQUARE--  AT PRICES WELL BELOW THOSE PROJECTED BY COPPER MILL.

 

FROM A FINANCIAL POINT OF VIEW, THE COPPER MILL TOWER HAS A WELL-CUSHIONED $259M CONSTRUCTION + ACQUISITION BUDGET-- WITH $9M RESERVED FOR HARD COST OVERRUNS, $5M FOR SOFT COST OVERRUNS, AND $13M FOR PROJECT MANAGEMENT FEE, PLUS A SUBSIDIZED 4.25%  $169M LOAN THAT COVERS 89% OF THE CORE HARD AND SOFT CONSTRUCTION COSTS.  SO IT IS EMINENTLY VIABLE TO FINANCE AND BUILD.

 

BUT THE POST-CONSTRUCTION RENTAL PROJECTIONS LOOK INCREASINGLY RISKY AT A TIME WHEN 'THE PROSPECT' AND OTHERS ARE LEASING LUXURY APARTMENTS WITH LOWER RENTS,  HIGHER AMENITIES, AND MORE AMPLE FLOOR SPACE  INTO A METRO ECONOMY FRAUGHT WITH CUTBACKS IN RESEARCH, PROFESSIONAL AND MID-LEVEL MANAGERIAL JOBS. 

 

THE LAST THING WE NEED IN DAVIS SQUARE IS A FAILED OR UNDER-MAINTAINED SKYSCRAPER. 

[Alex Dehnert]

> DO YOU THINK THAT 125 (= 25%) OF AFFORDABLE UNITS IS ENOUGH TO COUNTER-BALANCE THE EFFECT OF 377 (=75%) LUXURY UNITS? I DON'T.

I don't think there's any "counter-balancing" needed. 377 market-rate
units is a positive for the area and will help with our housing crisis,
and so will 125 affordable/income-restricted units.

There's research showing new high-end market units slow (or reverse)
rent increases even (especially!) at the low end of the market. See, for
example,
https://www.pew.org/en/research-and-analysis/articles/2025/07/31/new-housing-slows-rent-growth-most-for-older-more-affordable-units
(which I think has been shared here before).

The effect:
"Pew’s analysis of the 1,654 ZIP codes tracked by Zillow throughout U.S.
metropolitan areas suggests that every 10% increase in a market’s
housing supply (using American Community Survey data) from 2017 to 2023
correlated with rents growing 5% less from 2017 to 2024, controlling for
a variety of factors."
"Looking at more than 41,000 large apartment buildings in 223 metro
areas, there was a clear trend: Class C rents decreased more, relative
to those for units in Class A buildings. In high-supply metro areas
(those that increased their housing stock by at least 10% from 2017 to
2023), rent growth was slower than in average markets. Crucially, rent
growth slowed most for Class C units, demonstrating that the additional
supply was especially helpful to people living in lower-cost apartments.
(See Figure 3.)"

The mechanism: "Even though new housing is usually expensive, the reason
for the decline in Class C rents is straightforward. Economist Evan
Mast, an assistant professor at the University of Notre Dame, has
documented that when new apartments are built in high-income
neighborhoods, they set off moving chains. The new residents of those
homes tend to move in from high-income neighborhoods, but the people who
move into the homes they vacate come from slightly less affluent
neighborhoods, and so on. The chains quickly reach communities with
below-average incomes, freeing up as many as 70 homes there for each 100
market-rate (unsubsidized) homes built in high-income neighborhoods,
according to Mast’s research."

At a more local level, while people worry about gentrification, there's
research showing that new construction tends to be a *response* to
already changing neighborhoods, and acts to slow the increase in rents
(perhaps from "very fast" to "fast", so the perception can be that it's
making matters worse). According to
https://www.lewis.ucla.edu/2021/07/07/05-market-rate-development-and-neighborhood-rents-with-evan-mast/,
"New buildings decrease nearby rents by 5 to 7 percent relative to
locations slightly farther away or developed later, and they increase
in-migration from low-income areas. Results are driven by a large supply
effect—we show that new buildings absorb many high-income
households—that overwhelms any offsetting endogenous amenity effect. The
latter may be small because most new buildings go into already-changing
areas. Contrary to common concerns, new buildings slow local rent
increases rather than initiate or accelerate them." and "suggesting that
new buildings reduce costs in lower segments of the housing market, not
just in the high-end units that are the most direct competitors of new
buildings".

~~Alex

On 2/6/26 14:41, 'JOSIAH AUSPITZ' via Davis Square Neighborhood Council
wrote:

> PJ,
> RESPONSE IN CAPS BELOW
> LEE
>> On 02/04/2026 4:37 PM EST PJ Santos <peej...@gmail.com> wrote:
>> Is this segment being over served necessarily a bad thing? Boston
>> recently overbuilt lab space, and now that the market has crashed lab
>> prices are very low.
>> Obviously the housing market is much larger and more complex, but it
>> would be nice if we over supplied a segment of it and caused prices to
>> go down.
> IF, AS YOU RIGHTLY POINT OUT, THERE IS A REALISTIC CHANCE OF A COLLAPSE
> IN ONE-BEDROOM RENTS IN THE $4125/MO RANGE, COPPER MILL WOULD BE WELL

> ADVISED TO RADICALLY RESTRUCTURE, DELAY OR WALK AWAY FROMTHE 275' TOWER

> PROJECT.
> Additionally, the boundaries between segments of the housing market are
> porous. Many people in "B" grade housing would move to "A" grade housing
> if prices decreased. Similarly, some people living in "family-sized"
> units with roommates would move to studios or 1 bedrooms if the right
> apartment was available to them.
> POROSITY IS A TWO-WAY STREET.  IF--- A BIG IF-- LOW AMENITY SINGLE
> BEDROOM LUXURY HIGH RISE APARTMENTS WERE SUCCESSFULLY RENTING IN DAVIS
> SQ AT $51k/YR + ~$5K/UTILITIES, THIS WOULD LIKELY EXERT AN UPWARD PULL
> ON CONDOS AND RENTALS IN TWO AND THREE FAMILY HOMES.
> In another email thread we looked at Somerville's "Housing Needs
> Assessment" (City of Somerville, Massachusetts - File #: 25-1668
> https://somervillema.legistar.com/LegislationDetail.aspx?

> ID=7730934&GUID=316FD810-9AB7-4D17-8CF0-66A396784BF9 <https://
> somervillema.legistar.com/LegislationDetail.aspx?
> ID=7730934&GUID=316FD810-9AB7-4D17-8CF0-66A396784BF9>) , one of the most

> <mailto:jlau...@comcast.net>' via Davis Square Neighborhood Council
> <daviss...@googlegroups.com <mailto:daviss...@googlegroups.com>>
> wrote:
> https://www.wgbh.org/news/local/2026-02-03/housing-and-transparency-at-
> the-top-of-agenda-for-somervilles-new-mayor <https://www.wgbh.org/news/
> local/2026-02-03/housing-and-transparency-at-the-top-of-agenda-for-
> somervilles-new-mayor>

> Note this quote:
> "I want to [have]more two and three bedroom affordable units. It’s one
> thing to build a lot of studios and ones, building twos and threes
> allows us to keep working families in the city."
>  By contrast, the Copper Mill proposal has the minimum 2-3 bedroom
> units required under 40B.  Studios and one -bedroom units predominate.
> The one-bedrooms are projected to rent for $4250/month-- that's $51K/
> year plus ~$5K for utilities.  This can succeed in the current market
> only by tapping the "luxury" apartment segment, including bloc corporate
> rentals, a new departure and gentrification accelerator for Davis
> Square.   The risk is that this very segment is increasingly overserved
> in metropolitan Boston-- e.g. with office-to-resident conversions and
> new buildings with amenities lacking in the Copper Mill plan.
> Lee
> Lee
> _________________
> Josiah Lee Auspitz

> 17 Chapel Street <https://www.google.com/maps/search/17+Chapel+Street+
> %0D%0A+%0D%0ASomerville,+MA+02144?entry=gmail&source=g>
> Somerville, MA 02144 <https://www.google.com/maps/
> search/17+Chapel+Street+%0D%0A+%0D%0ASomerville,+MA+02144?
> entry=gmail&source=g>
> /Landline phone: 617-628-6228 fax: 617-628-9441/
> /Phones do not receive text messages/

>
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[Jeff Byrnes]

Thanks Alex; there’s plenty more research showing the same finding, enough that it’s clearly a durable & repeatable finding that new homes help the entire market & calm down prices.

If it helps, here’s quite a few links that show and show that building more new homes, even if they’re expensive to rent or own, helps the lowest income groups the most.

I have more links that say the same thing, if you would like some more reading material 😆

To Lee’s point about rents collapsing: that would be an unalloyed good. Homes in Davis Square becoming meaningfully less expensive would be a huge boon to many folks.

I couldn’t care less about Copper Mill’s financial well-being. If they lose their shirt, that’s on them & their financiers. Worst case, their bank forecloses on them & forces a sale of the building at a loss, which just means the next landlord gets a deal on the building & has a better chance of staying in the black.

Meanwhile, we’d get cheaper rents! Sounds great to me.

-- 
Jeff Byrnes
he/him

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[PJ Santos]

Hi Lee,

Thanks for the thoughtful response!

I think others have already covered some of the evidence that new construction tends to lower rents. A big question to ask is "if a landlord could raise rents to match a new building, what stops them from raising them without the new building?". Similarly, "if we do not build this building, where do the 377 wealthy households who would have rented those units end up living?" Copper Mill is willing to bet millions of dollars there are that many wealthy households who want to live in Davis Square. Smaller landlords can make the same bet, and so if that construction doesn't end up happening, will we just see more naturally affordable housing gut-renovated and rented out to those wealthy people? 

Another point you brought up was concern about Copper Mill walking away if the market collapses, like what happened with the lab buildings. A unique aspect of labs is they are extremely specialized, so if the market collapses it's very tough to find a replacement tenant. 

For housing, Somerville's vacancy rate is under 2% (5% is "healthy", and above that rents typically begin decreasing). If the high end of the market collapses Copper Mill might take a loss (what a shame), but there's plenty of prospective tenants in the "tier two" market that their financial incentive is almost certainly to finish the building and lease it up. Other large towers like the "Bacon Building" haven't had any trouble filling. 

A few other things you mentioned:

Copper Mill does have a bit of financial cushion, which is why we can hopefully secure some community benefits! 

The Broadway Star Market project didn't need to pay as much as Copper Mill does for the land, and I believe got some additional grants and other alternative funding to get such a high level of affordability. 

I'm a bit confused by your statement " A LITTLE DIGGING SUGGESTS THAT THAT THE JANUARY 2025 EFFECT WAS LARGELY DUE TO THE RENTING OUT OF "THE PROSPECT" HIGH-RISE IN UNION SQUARE--" - by definition adding some very expensive units to the average would affect the MEAN housing price, but would have a negligible effect on the MEDIAN housing price, unless this is an average over a very short time-period where the high-end units made up a significant fraction of the total units available for rent? 

Thank you again for being such a good contributor to the email list!

PJ