A lot of people prefer living in financially affordable environments, and in a functioning market, dense towns/cities will always be more affordable unless you literally work on a farm.

Everyone prefers to live in a giant sprawling mansion (with personal private forest) in the middle of the CBD. But preference is useless data unless it includes their pricetag preference too.

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criddell 4 hours ago | parent | next [-]

> dense towns/cities will always be more affordable

In my experience, that isn't true. At the very least, it depends on what your preferences are. If I moved my home from outside Austin to inside the city, I couldn't afford it.

	▲	lkbm 3 hours ago \| parent [-]
		Densifying a city will make it cheaper than if we don't densify, but we usually densify because of high prices, so high density correlates with high prices despite being a counter-force against it. And, yeah, living in a dense city definitely tends to cost more than the suburbs, especially per-square-foot. There might be exceptions (high crime urban areas with wealthy suburbs), but you're usually getting a pretty nice house in that suburb.

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bluGill 3 hours ago | parent | prev [-]

Density is more expensive. Not just because of demand for the area (though that doesn't help), but because density requires different building methods. Your single family house can be built so cheaply because it doesn't have to support the weight of many floors above; nor does it need to be fireproof because in the rare fire you can evacuate. (density means more people are displaced, fires are more likely, and longer distances to get away)

Density is also more expensive because higher costs are worth it. A rural area cannot afford things like library in walking distance of every farmer (every farmer would have to pay for a personal librarian), but in a dense area it is only a couple bucks for each one - but that all adds up to hundreds of dollars in extra costs that less dense areas do without. (you decide if it is worth the cost)