Now's not the time to be flip about housing

A show of hands, please. How many of us, without a blush for a guilty pleasure, watch HGTV on cable? You know, house porn.

At the height of our collective madness over real estate, the channel was heavy with fortunes made by flipping houses — a fast, lucrative sale after superficial improvements.

As regional housing markets collapsed, credit evaporated and lenders went into detox, HGTV leaned toward remodeling on a budget, ferreting out an affordable condo or finding your dream house abroad.

OK, so maybe I picked up on the importance of staging a home for sale, removing clutter and the pitfalls of color choices.

Back on Earth, the housing crunch is taking its human toll. Economists are still trying to explain exactly what Wall Street brokers and Main Street bankers were thinking when they repackaged really risky mortgages as colossally risky securities.

Seems to me, housing prices right now and six years ago were equally unaffordable. The surge in homeownership was a contrivance. Too many people facing foreclosure and the financial and emotional chaos of losing their homes would never have qualified for mortgages with an honest assessment of their capacity to carry the debt.

Combine the burst of the housing bubble with a weakening economy, and bystanders who played by the rules are collateral damage. As all the cotton candy in the economy dissolves, regular mortgage-paying folks who did not turn their home equity into a cash machine suffer.

Regional policymakers are devising triage plans to deal with the levels of trauma.

The Snohomish County Housing Action Plan is an example of good work in progress toward a spectrum of options, from the immediate needs of the homeless stranded on the street, through vulnerable renters, to the aspirations of close-but-not-quite homeowners.

Guided by the nonprofit Housing Consortium of Everett and Snohomish County, a committee organized by County Executive Aaron Reardon is looking at an array of strategies, mindful of the incentives and funding options need to make them happen.

Climbing population figures show Snohomish County continues to be a desirable place to live and raise a family. The February unemployment rate was an enviable 4.4 percent. But number crunchers estimate the 2008 "housing wage" to afford a two-bedroom apartment is $18 an hour. The typical renter makes $14 an hour, and the minimum wage is $8.

Typically, help can be found for renters and homeowners ensnared by short-term troubles with unexpected housing costs. The goal is to increase the supply of rental housing for very-low-income individuals and families, and help low- and moderate-income households get into homeowner units or to maintain and keep what they have.

The numbers are big, and so are the gaps between supply and demand. Some money and units are available, but over the next 10 years, an additional $246 million will be needed to cover the nearly 12,000 households that need help. Remember, this is just in Snohomish County.

These same kinds of discussions are going on in Seattle and King County. The Seattle Housing Authority is trying to imagine the future for 30 acres of prime real estate better known as Yesler Terrace. The housing project is 69 years old. Could more people be helped if the land beneath the scheduled teardown were sold and the proceeds were reinvested in public housing elsewhere?

Resources are scarce, and I found myself reacting oddly to a King County e-mail message that Seattle and the county had received $20 million in federal funds and most of it would help sustain 61 existing housing programs. A commendable list but it looks diffuse and subject to lots of nibbling overhead.

The need is real. Competition for funds is intense, and even the vocabulary is under tension. Homeless is a bombshell word. Even affordable is emotionally charged. Some think attainable housing has less baggage. Are teachers and firefighters who are on the edge of homeownership suddenly in competition for help with lower-income families? Yikes.

Planners talk of revolving-loan funds, zoning and density incentives, and sales-tax abatement on construction to enlist the goodwill and creativity of the private sector in building and mixing housing units.

Homes as shelter, not to be flipped.

Lance Dickie's column appears regularly on editorial pages of The Times. His e-mail address is ldickie@seattletimes.com; for a podcast Q&A with the author, go to Opinion at seattletimes.com