Lacking self-awareness, Lawson-Remer condemns institutional investors for “buying up [San Diego’s] scarce supply of homes” and driving up costs for first-time homebuyers.
California’s housing crisis is well-documented. Recent data suggests as few as 15% of Californians can afford to buy a home in the Golden State. It’s even worse for Southern Californians—San Diego was recently ranked the most expensive place to live in the United States.
Despite exhaustive (but often misguided) efforts by elected officials, San Diego County continues to grapple with exuberant costs for limited real estate. When surveyed, 71% of San Diegans say it’s a “big problem,” and another 18% say it’s “somewhat of a problem.” San Diego County Board of Supervisors Vice Chair Terra Lawson-Remer knows San Diegans have been feeling this burn for years—hence her near-constant posturing about affordable housing.
Last month, Lawson-Remer spoke before the Board of Supervisors about her plan to crack down on “corporate raiders” and institutional investors who are “increasingly buying up the nation’s scarce supply of homes.” This process of “[scooping] up available properties” “reduces the already-slim inventory in the marketplace and creates a more acute affordability crunch for first-time homebuyers,” according to a recent release penned by Lawson-Remer.
Ironically, Lawson-Remer is very much guilty of this same practice. According to mortgage deeds and transaction history reports from the San Diego County Recorder, Lawson-Remer purchased two San Diego County properties only 27 miles away from one another in November 2021. These acquisitions were made only two days apart while their respective mortgages (which totaled nearly $1.4 million) were filed within one day of the other.
These purchases came right after Lawson-Remer was first elected to public office.
For reference, Lawson-Remer is an unmarried single mother with one daughter. Almost as soon as she began her crusade against corporations that snatch homes away from would-be San Diego homeowners, constituents were quick to allege hypocrisy.
“Corporate mega-investors like Blackstone are driving up the costs of buying homes for first-time homebuyers, and engaging in price-fixing to drive up rents,” wrote Lawson-Remer on Twitter/X earlier this week. “But now we are taking on the Wall Street private equity firms that are squeezing our housing stock to maximize profits.”
“How about being priced out of housing by your illegal immigrants?” one constituent asks in response.
“Deporting illegal aliens would help too BTW,” responds another.
Indeed, San Diegans are also in competition for housing with immigrants—now more than ever, as San Ysidro has recently become the nation’s busiest corridor for illegal crossings. It’s not a subject Lawson-Remer likes to talk about, unless it involves finding ways to incentivize mass immigration, such as when she voted to allocate $20 million taxpayer dollars to a migrant transition center.
It is interesting that Lawson-Remer mentions Blackstone by name given that Lawson-Remer’s sister, Alexa, worked as Special Counsel for Sullivan & Cromwell LLP for twelve years—during which, the law firm aided AIG in its $5.1 billion sale of affordable housing assets to Blackstone Real Estate Income Trust. While Alexa Lawson-Remer was, as far as can be told, not directly involved in the massive acquisition, it remains a wild connection.
As a public official who speaks frequently about increasing the availability of affordable housing units, one might expect Vice Chair Lawson-Remer to embody a more modest lifestyle. Critics wonder why she doesn’t instead support measures aimed at reducing financial burdens for San Diegans so that they can afford their rent or mortgages in the present, rather than embarking on long-term projects that pack them into high-density units like sardines.
One such strategy was the “Government Land Action Strategy,” a plan that she and then-Board of Supervisors Chair Nathan Fletcher proposed “to identify government-owned land to build 10,000 affordable homes” in partnership with The San Diego Foundation. “We want to use public land for the public good, and right now the greatest public good is to build homes that the public can afford,” Lawson-Remer said at the time. She also actively backed the conversion of state-owned land like the Del Mar Fairgrounds into 85 units. At a news conference in April, Lawson-Remer said that the county would fight to ensure the Del Mar Fairground affordable housing units “get built as quickly as possible and they get built in a way that really centers the needs of families in our region.” But, estimates suggest these units won’t be completed until 2030. That’s hardly a viable solution for the families that need a place to live right now in 2024.
Until then, perhaps the compassionate Lawson-Remer will consider opening up one of her multiple San Diego homes for rent.
Lawson-Remer has served as the District 3 representative on the San Diego County Board of Supervisors since 2020. She won the election after beating incumbent Republican Kristin Gaspar, thereby flipping a previously conservative seat to Democrat and contributing to the board’s current 3-2 Democratic majority. In January 2023, Lawson-Remer was elected as Vice-Chair.
This upcoming November, Lawson-Remer faces a competitive battle for her seat. Though the coastal district spanning Coronado to Carlsbad has a left-leaning voter registration advantage, Lawson-Remer’s primary opponent, former San Diego Mayor Kevin Faulconer, is a formidable challenger who boasts both a willingness to call out Lawson-Remer directly and a track record of tackling the homelessness issue––a top concern of San Diego voters.
