ABSTRACT
This chapter describes the complete case study reports in order to show the complexity and richness of the issue of regulation and housing affordability at the community level. It deals with four case studies in New Jersey (Princeton Borough and Township, Mendham Township, Middletown, and Mount Laurel) and five in North Carolina (Chapel Hill, Cary, Jacksonville, Durham, and Concord). New Jersey’s high housing prices are partially due to high land costs that result from the relative scarcity of buildable land in the state. In the above-cited cases, the costs associated with bureaucratic delay were passed forward in the form of higher home prices. However, another developer described a project where costs associated with delay were borne by a landowner, not by a home buyer. While the approval process was unfolding, the developer had to change the original fourteen-lot plan to a twenty-seven-lot plan in order to protect a historic farm and to maintain open space.
