3 ms·

The expense of housing comes from the people outside buying up all the open supply at high prices, so it's hard to afford a house. Also the supply of houses is

The expense of housing comes from the people outside buying up all the open supply at high prices, so it's hard to afford a house. Also the supply of houses is lower, making apartments even more dear. Next many of the houses aren't lived in, so local area businesses don't have enough customers and close (grocery, clothing, restaurants).

mcny 8y ago
> Also the supply of houses is lower, making apartments even more dear. Please don't buy into this nonsense. Your sibling comment brought in some actual numbers: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=18269257 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=18269257 BC has relatively low property taxes for the area. But you can't raise them now or all the current homeowners would revolt as their taxes goes to unsustainable levels. Nearby seattle's king county has a tax rate of %1, texas has rates around %2, while saanich is %0.4. The UK doesn't even really have property taxes, just council taxes which charge flat rates for things like garbage collection AFAIK. http://www.saanich.ca/assets/Community/Documents/Property~Tax/Tax%20Rate%20Chart%20-%202018.pdf http://www.saanich.ca/assets/Community/Documents/Property~Ta... The property taxes are too low to be sustainable. Progress always causes some problem for some people but we must go forward with it. Raise property taxes for everyone. > Also the supply of houses is lower, making apartments even more dear. Next many of the houses aren't lived in, so local area businesses don't have enough customers and close (grocery, clothing, restaurants). What kind of hot garbage is this? Isn't the whole point of a market economy that we don't have to centrally manage grocery stores (and indeed that it asserts we cannot do this efficiently in the long run)? Of course, planning has its place. Higher taxes in itself does not solve any problem. We still need to plan city expansion and not just build new suburbs because "ZOMG the Chinese will pay for it". That's not what I am saying but I am saying that existing home owners have been benefiting in a manner that I consider unsustainable and we should thank the Chinese elite for exposing our double standards. We live in a democracy and as such we have an obligation to think beyond our immediate short term benefit when we vote. Vote for sustainable tax structures. I am not saying property taxes should be 50% of appraisal value. In fact, I think we should aggressively cut salaries and wages in the public sector (especially at the top). But lets not delude ourselves by pretending we can think "smart". The extra money raised from increased property taxes (which should damper home prices somewhat already) must be spent in a very disciplined and planned way to increase capacity (which will further decrease home prices). I think we can do it but we can only do it if we want to do it. There will be a little pain but there's simply no way around it I can think of that leaves our moral fiber not too frayed.
- Latteland 8y ago
  I think it's basic economics that when there is increasing demand and an increasing shortage, that the cost of the decreasing housing will go up in price, and I think that is what happened in Vancouver. This article suggests that it's very likely decreasing house prices has been pushing apartment prices down, because housing is more available b/c it's cheaper [1] "he's willing to suggest that declining property sales could be leading many real estate speculators to rent their properties out rather than put them up for sale." which is connected to more houses available and thus less demand on apartment. That seems pretty clear. I'm not pushing an agenda for the government to intervene, I'm just reporting on the basic economics - demand went up, supply went down (more people moving there, and also houses bought but not on the market) led to higher prices. Also, on my second point about neighborhoods losing their commercial infrastructure because of empty houses, isn't that obvious too? I honestly feel like you were replying to another post and accidentally used mine. [1] https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/british-columbia/are-vancouver-s-sky-high-rents-finally-falling-1.4735345 https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/british-columbia/are-vancouve...

mcny 8y ago

> Also the supply of houses is lower, making apartments even more dear. Please don't buy into this nonsense. Your sibling comment brought in some actual numbers: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=18269257 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=18269257 BC has relatively low property taxes for the area. But you can't raise them now or all the current homeowners would revolt as their taxes goes to unsustainable levels. Nearby seattle's king county has a tax rate of %1, texas has rates around %2, while saanich is %0.4. The UK doesn't even really have property taxes, just council taxes which charge flat rates for things like garbage collection AFAIK. http://www.saanich.ca/assets/Community/Documents/Property~Tax/Tax%20Rate%20Chart%20-%202018.pdf http://www.saanich.ca/assets/Community/Documents/Property~Ta... The property taxes are too low to be sustainable. Progress always causes some problem for some people but we must go forward with it. Raise property taxes for everyone. > Also the supply of houses is lower, making apartments even more dear. Next many of the houses aren't lived in, so local area businesses don't have enough customers and close (grocery, clothing, restaurants). What kind of hot garbage is this? Isn't the whole point of a market economy that we don't have to centrally manage grocery stores (and indeed that it asserts we cannot do this efficiently in the long run)? Of course, planning has its place. Higher taxes in itself does not solve any problem. We still need to plan city expansion and not just build new suburbs because "ZOMG the Chinese will pay for it". That's not what I am saying but I am saying that existing home owners have been benefiting in a manner that I consider unsustainable and we should thank the Chinese elite for exposing our double standards. We live in a democracy and as such we have an obligation to think beyond our immediate short term benefit when we vote. Vote for sustainable tax structures. I am not saying property taxes should be 50% of appraisal value. In fact, I think we should aggressively cut salaries and wages in the public sector (especially at the top). But lets not delude ourselves by pretending we can think "smart". The extra money raised from increased property taxes (which should damper home prices somewhat already) must be spent in a very disciplined and planned way to increase capacity (which will further decrease home prices). I think we can do it but we can only do it if we want to do it. There will be a little pain but there's simply no way around it I can think of that leaves our moral fiber not too frayed.

Latteland 8y ago
I think it's basic economics that when there is increasing demand and an increasing shortage, that the cost of the decreasing housing will go up in price, and I think that is what happened in Vancouver. This article suggests that it's very likely decreasing house prices has been pushing apartment prices down, because housing is more available b/c it's cheaper [1] "he's willing to suggest that declining property sales could be leading many real estate speculators to rent their properties out rather than put them up for sale." which is connected to more houses available and thus less demand on apartment. That seems pretty clear. I'm not pushing an agenda for the government to intervene, I'm just reporting on the basic economics - demand went up, supply went down (more people moving there, and also houses bought but not on the market) led to higher prices. Also, on my second point about neighborhoods losing their commercial infrastructure because of empty houses, isn't that obvious too? I honestly feel like you were replying to another post and accidentally used mine. [1] https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/british-columbia/are-vancouver-s-sky-high-rents-finally-falling-1.4735345 https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/british-columbia/are-vancouve...