fire hazard
But the sofa right next to it is not
Bay Area man forced out of his $400 box home
Illustrator Peter Berkowitz had been forced out of his $400-a-month box home in San Francisco after officials ruled it a fire hazard. Berkowitz became a minor celebrity when he spoke to his local NBC station about his custom built pod in the living room of his friends' house in Outer Sunset. The rent is San Francisco is so …
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Thursday 14th April 2016 08:17 GMT DropBear
Re: Prevention is Better than Spontaneous Combustion
Well... your bike probably has some sort of LED light for visibility and since nobody uses actual dynamos to power those these days, it probably contains a Li-ion battery - see? Fire hazard! As for the plant of pot, well pot has a long and distinguished history of being smoked, so that's no doubt a guaranteed hazard.
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Thursday 14th April 2016 15:08 GMT Darryl
Re: fire hazard
Actually, given the latest enviro-hipster trend here in NA, it would be considered a Tiny House and there would be documentaries made about how innovative he was.
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Wednesday 13th April 2016 22:51 GMT anniemouse
Re: fire hazard
however larger more fashionable cardboard boxes which are rain or sweat dampened work fine. But technology will find a way to reduce the space between atomic particles by 90%! This will easy the shortage of resources. Some protesters express concern that humans may become food for crows but most scientists agree that a repellent will be available by then.
Next time an alien ship lands, i'm get'n on board.
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Thursday 14th April 2016 01:02 GMT John Brown (no body)
Re: fire hazard
there's the fact that it's made out of wood so if there was a fire "anybody inside it would essentially be toast."
Likewise the many wooden houses in SF too.
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Thursday 14th April 2016 01:11 GMT Malignant_Narcissism
Re: fire hazard
Maybe if you and the rest of the clowns here did any homework before commenting, you'd know that isn't what is primarily being called out via the housing codes enforcement. Almost all local building ordinances have minimum room size requirements. It makes sense on several levels to have this, including the ability to get out fast *in the event of a fire* or in the case of California, an earthquake.
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Thursday 14th April 2016 06:02 GMT Voland's right hand
Re: fire hazard
Utter bollocks.
This is all I can say when hearing this from an official a country where 95% of the residential housing is wooden (actually nowdays OSB3) panels assembled on a wooden frame. It may be violating other reqs (such as minimal size, space and amenities), but fire hazard? Give me a break.
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Wednesday 13th April 2016 20:24 GMT raving angry loony
Enclosed space?
So any enclosed space that contains a bed is illegal in that area? So much for anyone in the area getting a traditional Breton box-bed.
I think the city has somehow confused the definitions of "bedroom" and "coffin". Someone should probably fix that before some of the Bay Area bureaucrats and politicians who refuse to help out the poorer citizens get sent to bed.
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Wednesday 13th April 2016 20:25 GMT Nunyabiznes
Street Living
So the structurally sound (looking anyway) wooden box in a building that presumably meets fire codes is not allowed, but a cardboard creation in an abandoned building next to an open burn barrel is A-OK?
I think we might have found one of the causes of the SF housing market.
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Wednesday 13th April 2016 20:30 GMT Shadow Systems
The housing situation in the Bay is obscene.
A "living wage" in the area means you have to be making Seven Figures a year just to afford an apartment, or Eight Figures for a house. It will be a tiny, cramped, crappy little thing among hundreds of other crappy little things, packed together like sardines in a tin. If you want "comfortable" or "roomy" then your income needs to be at least Nine Figures, which means you're not flipping burgers, pushing a broom, or scrubbing toilets for a living. Parking? That's out on the street with all the other residents that have a parking sticker, but good luck FINDING a spot given that there's a hundred of you battling for the ~25 spaces on the block that AREN'T designated No Parking - Loading Zone or Emergency Vehicles Only. Park there & your car will be towed before you finish slipping your keys in your pocket.
The cost of living in the area is just horrible. I had considered moving there to be closer to members of my family, but they live in a two bedroom house that costs them more per month in *utilities* than I used to pay *per year* on a three bedroom home with a front & back yards, garage, & paved drive. It's not merely insane, it's disheartening to know that you can't live in the Bay area if you're not already making a few hundred thousand per year, especially not if you want such "luxuries" as food, internet service, a cellphone, or a life outside the office.
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Wednesday 13th April 2016 21:10 GMT Nate Amsden
Re: The housing situation in the Bay is obscene.
My nice 1 bedroom apartment (830 sq feet) in San Bruno(~15mi south of SF?) runs about $2900 now(around $2200 when I moved in originally). After living here for the past 5 years I am moving my shit to storage for a 3 month trip to Thailand then moving to Modesto, CA when I get back. I have been working 99% from home for a while now, and no reason to go to the office.
My CIO encouraged me to work 6 months out of the year in Thailand, I hadn't considered that before but will think about it, getting long term visa for there is difficult I am told though.
The team I support works in Seattle, the infrastructure I support is in Atlanta and Amsterdam, my manager is in New York, 3/4ths of my team is outside of California, so really no reason to stay(that wasn't the case 5 years ago).
I want to stay close to the bay area in case I want/need to come back, Modesto not too far away(about 100 miles). Rent around $1100/mo for a similar size/quality place out there.
Originally moved here to be close to my company(HQ is about 1 mile away), and for future career prospects, though I have decided I probably won't leave this company in the next year or two or three(or more), so little reason to endure the high cost of housing anymore.
The bay area offers nothing else of interest to me, and I don't want to move back to Seattle area either.
I thought I would end up building a new network down here (network in seattle is pretty big, was there for 10 years). But I am not a very social person, and being at just one company the whole time has limited my exposure to other folks, and I don't enjoy vendor events so I never go to them (or conferences). So that aspect of living here has been a bust (except for the folks that have left the company I am at over the past few years).
Seeing a bedroom costing $1300-$3k/mo in SF .. I don't have words for that. I downgraded to 830sq feet from 1000sq feet when I moved here, can't imagine being happy with something much smaller. My new apartment will be between 1000 sq feet and 1350 depending on which model is available when I move back, all for half or less than what I pay now.
Moving out next friday, yay.
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Wednesday 13th April 2016 22:38 GMT Anonymous Coward
Re: The housing situation in the Bay is obscene.
Yes, SF housing is crazy. The thing that amazes me about SF housing is that you cannot give yourself a long commute and lower your rent by much. Rent is still crazy on the east side of the bay. Anywhere within two hours of SF or SV is crazy high. Rent is equally as high in Manhattan, but you can always opt to move to a suburb and have relatively reasonable rent. There is no escape in SF. Awesome place to live though if you can afford it. You would think someone would just build dorms in one of the SF suburbs at $1,000 a month or something.
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Thursday 14th April 2016 07:35 GMT werdsmith
Re: The housing situation in the Bay is obscene.
Even back in the 1990s when I lived in the East Bay (Walnut Creek), housing costs for anywhere near a BART stations was getting interesting.
My folks out there who built their house in a nice spot with a Mt.Diablo view are sitting on a pretty pile now.
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Friday 15th April 2016 05:58 GMT Anonymous Coward
Re: The housing situation in the Bay is obscene.
I used to live in Atlanta. I probably still should live in Atlanta. The housing costs were low. I came from Minneapolis, middle of the road nationally... maybe slightly above middle, certainly nothing comparable to NY or SF, and Atlanta was still noticeably less costly.
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Wednesday 13th April 2016 22:50 GMT Anonymous Coward
Re: The housing situation in the Bay is obscene.
"It's getting bad everywhere, but SF, like all the other top 10 cities in the U.S. (and other large cities around the world), is out of control."
True enough. It seems like rents are sky rocketing in every major US city. I live a major Midwest city, traditionally a fairly low cost section of the country, and rents rise noticeably every year. It is pretty costly to rent a reasonable apartment, probably $1,200 for a decent, but not extravagant, one bedroom. It seems like another housing crash is in the works.
I like this guy's plan of moving to Modesto, CA. I thought about that myself when I was considering a Bay area move. Modesto is basically in the middle of nowhere, so it is inexpensive, but you are about a 1.5 hours to SF and probably an hour to Yosemite in the opposite direction. If you could work from home most of the time and go to SF or SV a day a week, that would probably be a great set up.
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Friday 15th April 2016 17:56 GMT War President
Re: The housing situation in the Bay is obscene.
The Bay area housing scene is insane. Clearly, the best solution would be for tech companies to include dormitories for their employees to live in, ala FoxConn (just make sure the windows don't open to cut down on possible suicide attempts). That would enable even their lowest paid employees to live in the area, rather than face a 2 hour commute. The second best solution is what this couple did.
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Wednesday 13th April 2016 20:45 GMT Nolveys
Gubment To The Rescue.
Look at the placement of the thing, it's just begging for someone to come around and start a fire right next to it. Even if a chain-linked fence or razor wire was installed to keep the fire starters away there's still the concern of spontaneous human combustion. Also, a table is sitting within arms length of the thing. That table is made of wood and could explode into flame any second.
And think of the potential effects of letting people do as they please in their own homes. Building boxes? Do you know what comes in boxes? Bombs, guns, smut and satanic literature.
They should lock that guy up along with the owners of the residence and throw away the key.
Thank goodness we have government to protect us from ourselves!
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Wednesday 13th April 2016 22:05 GMT Destroy All Monsters
The Smell of the Red Republic of California
The big issue here is that he was paying someone else. He might be able to get away with that in his own house, but not when you're paying someone else.
Control, Interdict, Verify, Tax & Squander, Deploy Eminent Domain Rulings if someone wants to "develop" a neighborhood.
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Thursday 14th April 2016 00:06 GMT Anonymous Coward
The only places that fire rated sheet rock is required is in between units. Inside the boundary of your apartment/condo/house the walls will typically be ordinary paper faced gypsum drywall (in newer construction) that is most definitely not fire rated.
There is absolutely no reason for them to claim his box is a fire hazard, as it is no different than the walls of the bedroom(s) in that apartment. I suppose he could cover the plywood with drywall, or make the box out of drywall instead of plywood, if they insist that bare wooden walls are the problem. I wonder what specious excuse they'd give then?
Him paying $400 to live in his box inside someone else's apartment is no different than answering an ad for a roommate. A lot of places (not sure about SF) have requirements about number of occupants versus number of bedrooms/beds, but that's typically in areas trying to limit the areas where college students or immigrants can live, so I doubt SF specifically addresses that as they are hardly anti-immigrant.
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Thursday 14th April 2016 01:13 GMT John Brown (no body)
"I wonder what specious excuse they'd give then?"
Because he's effectively renting a "bedroom" then they would, as per the article, use the laws brought in to stop landlords fleecing people by enforcing the regulations on room size and light access.
I could see some shonky landlord seeing this and putting multiple "boxes" per room and then screaming how it's unfair that his new "disruptive business model" is being regulated out of existence by the existing business interests.
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Thursday 14th April 2016 06:17 GMT Francis Boyle
"I could see some shonky landlord seeing this and putting multiple "boxes" per room and then screaming how it's unfair that his new "disruptive business model" is being regulated out of existence by the existing business interests."
Which is a situation that would justify making a law forbidding the practice. What people are objecting to is the misuse of a regulation designed for an entirely different purpose because one person or group with no mandate has decided they don't like it.
If you don't understand the concern just replace "box" with "gay sex" or "electronic device" or anything else authorities have tried to ban out of ignorance and prejudice.
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Thursday 14th April 2016 07:17 GMT Anonymous Coward
The guy chose to live in a box, he didn't answer an ad for living in a box. He is living at a friend's house and instead of paying him a few bucks to crash on his couch he hired a carpenter to build himself a box and made a big deal out of it by telling people.
If he'd said "I'm paying my friend $400/month to crash on his couch" no one would have batted an eye, there are countless thousands doing the same in SF, NYC, London and every other major city.
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Thursday 14th April 2016 07:18 GMT To Mars in Man Bras!
Re: Loose Lips
Spot on! If you're up to something a bit suspect, don't go broadcasting it on "Social Meeeja" and the press and then expect the humourless authorities to turn a blind eye.
The guy could probably have lived there indefinitely, if he'd kept his mouth shut. But he just had to have his five minutes of fame. Still. I'm sure the 'retweets' and 'likes' were worth becoming homeless for.
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Biting the hand that feeds IT
