3 ms·

Would you sell in their place? They have no reason to sell. They are acting as rational participants of the market.

nkassis 9y ago
The market is also skewed in their favor as the article point out by keeping property taxes really low for long time owners: "Property-tax exemptions for longtime residents keep older Americans from moving. Zoning rules make it harder to build affordable apartments attractive to senior citizens." Ex: "Under the almost-40-year-old ballot measure Proposition 13, they are tied to the property’s value when the house was purchased in the 1970s." It's debatable if they should be pushed out of their homes due to property taxes but probably needs to be balanced with the impact on the overall market and availability of housing.
tomswartz07 9y ago
It's my personal opinion, but if I had 6 properties, I'd sell them. Why would I need more than one place to live?
- richardknop 9y ago
  Because you can live in 1 house and rent out other 5 for a lot of stress free passive income. Plus houses are a very safe investment, the price will go up over time. There is no reason to sell unless you need cash for something else (startup, for example). What would you do with cash after selling those extra 5 houses? Put it into stock market? Right now when it's mega inflated from cheap money? Too risky, safer to keep those houses.
lmm 9y ago
I'd have a price I'd sell at - maybe a high price, but a price. "If you gave me a bag of money, I wouldn't sell" speaks to some deeper market disfunction.
- richardknop 9y ago
  But those millennials don't have bags of money. So you would just sell to some foreign investor or domestic wealthy person who probably already owns dozens of properties. "If you gave me a bag of money, I wouldn't sell" shouldn't be taken literally. If you offered 10 million dollars for 1 million dollar property I'm sure many of those baby boomers would sell.
  - lmm 9y ago
    > "If you gave me a bag of money, I wouldn't sell" shouldn't be taken literally. If you offered 10 million dollars for 1 million dollar property I'm sure many of those baby boomers would sell. The context seems to imply something deeper than that, a complete non-interest in selling: > “Give me $2 million,” the homeowner replies. “I don’t want no low number.” > It turns out the price is for the whole block. Even then, the potential seller has second thoughts. > “I wouldn’t sell even if you gave me $2 million — this is my retirement,” he says. “If you gave me a bag of money, I wouldn’t sell.”
    - richardknop 9y ago
      What if he values his property at more than $2 million? So he said "I wouldn’t sell even if you gave me $2 million" because he was insulted by low ball offer of 200k.
      - lmm 9y ago
        > What if he values his property at more than $2 million? Then surely he'd've said so - he could've said "no, 3 million". Instead he says his price is 2 million, then decides he wouldn't sell even for that. There's something else going on there.
        richardknop 9y ago
        Maybe. But what if the something else is he just likes his house and doesn't want to sell. He has enough money to cover his retired lifestyle cost and he enjoys living in his house. There's nothing wrong with that. In free market you are free not to sell your property even if somebody offers you 100x it's market value. Nobody can force you to sell if you want to keep it. And besides the millennial guy from the article couldn't afford $2 million anyways (he wants to spend 200k) so that question was pointless anyways because even if the old person said yes he doesn't have the cash.

The market is also skewed in their favor as the article point out by keeping property taxes really low for long time owners: "Property-tax exemptions for longtime residents keep older Americans from moving. Zoning rules make it harder to build affordable apartments attractive to senior citizens." Ex: "Under the almost-40-year-old ballot measure Proposition 13, they are tied to the property’s value when the house was purchased in the 1970s." It's debatable if they should be pushed out of their homes due to property taxes but probably needs to be balanced with the impact on the overall market and availability of housing.

tomswartz07 9y ago

It's my personal opinion, but if I had 6 properties, I'd sell them. Why would I need more than one place to live?

richardknop 9y ago
Because you can live in 1 house and rent out other 5 for a lot of stress free passive income. Plus houses are a very safe investment, the price will go up over time. There is no reason to sell unless you need cash for something else (startup, for example). What would you do with cash after selling those extra 5 houses? Put it into stock market? Right now when it's mega inflated from cheap money? Too risky, safer to keep those houses.

lmm 9y ago

I'd have a price I'd sell at - maybe a high price, but a price. "If you gave me a bag of money, I wouldn't sell" speaks to some deeper market disfunction.

richardknop 9y ago
But those millennials don't have bags of money. So you would just sell to some foreign investor or domestic wealthy person who probably already owns dozens of properties. "If you gave me a bag of money, I wouldn't sell" shouldn't be taken literally. If you offered 10 million dollars for 1 million dollar property I'm sure many of those baby boomers would sell.
- lmm 9y ago
  > "If you gave me a bag of money, I wouldn't sell" shouldn't be taken literally. If you offered 10 million dollars for 1 million dollar property I'm sure many of those baby boomers would sell. The context seems to imply something deeper than that, a complete non-interest in selling: > “Give me $2 million,” the homeowner replies. “I don’t want no low number.” > It turns out the price is for the whole block. Even then, the potential seller has second thoughts. > “I wouldn’t sell even if you gave me $2 million — this is my retirement,” he says. “If you gave me a bag of money, I wouldn’t sell.”
  - richardknop 9y ago
    What if he values his property at more than $2 million? So he said "I wouldn’t sell even if you gave me $2 million" because he was insulted by low ball offer of 200k.
    - lmm 9y ago
      > What if he values his property at more than $2 million? Then surely he'd've said so - he could've said "no, 3 million". Instead he says his price is 2 million, then decides he wouldn't sell even for that. There's something else going on there.
      - richardknop 9y ago
        Maybe. But what if the something else is he just likes his house and doesn't want to sell. He has enough money to cover his retired lifestyle cost and he enjoys living in his house. There's nothing wrong with that. In free market you are free not to sell your property even if somebody offers you 100x it's market value. Nobody can force you to sell if you want to keep it. And besides the millennial guy from the article couldn't afford $2 million anyways (he wants to spend 200k) so that question was pointless anyways because even if the old person said yes he doesn't have the cash.