For the past six months, I’ve been following a story that threads through every conversation we have about housing in America. It’s the story behind the “housing crisis” — that nebulous phrase we all use to describe something everyone can feel, yet no one can quite define.
My reporting started with one tech-powered landlord and the ways their model fails tenants at scale. But the story quickly grew into something larger: a system reshaped by federal policies, financial incentives, and decades of decisions that turned homes into investment vehicles and neighborhoods into portfolios.
Stacked Against Us became a way to trace how that system came to be and how communities, small developers, and local leaders are reclaiming agency in its wake. It’s a companion of sorts to Escaping the Housing Trap by Charles Marohn and Daniel Herriges, putting the systemic forces they describe into real-world context.
Across four episodes, the series explores how we got here and how some communities are charting a different path:
Episode 1: When Your Landlord Is an App
Turning housing into a tech product promised speed and scale. What it delivered instead were broken homes, frustrated tenants, and a widening gap between the people who own property and the people who live in it.
Episode 2: Building the Housing Trap
After the 2008 crash, federal policies fueled the financialization of housing, turning shelter into an investment vehicle. The result: a new breed of landlords and investors moving into markets once dominated by local ownership.
Episode 3: A New Generation of Corporate Ownership
A new wave of investors is targeting struggling cities, betting they can profit regardless of local conditions. This episode explores how financial incentives keep the model alive—and what that means for communities trying to resist.
Episode 4: Escaping the Housing Trap
How can communities rebuild stability in a system designed for speculation? This episode highlights bottom-up efforts where neighbors, small developers, and local leaders are charting a different path.
Working on this project has been equal parts exhilarating and humbling. I’ve spoken to people who’ve spent years fighting for housing justice, to those burned by the system, and to those quietly building something better in its place. I’m as nervous to share it as I am excited for the conversations it will start, because this story isn’t over. In many ways, it’s just beginning.
The first episode is officially live. Listen wherever you get podcasts, or visit strongtowns.org/stacked-against-us to access show notes, curated resources, and Strong Towns’ toolkits that dive deeper into the episode topics.
