6 ms·

1. if you want inexpensive housing then you need to find enough voters that would take a X% haircut on their investment in their own home. good luck with that.

by kmlx 7y ago

1. if you want inexpensive housing then you need to find enough voters that would take a X% haircut on their investment in their own home. good luck with that. 2. i don't think you realise just how small oulu actually is. mega-cities like tokyo, sydney, london or nyc are hugely complex machines.

MagnumOpus 7y ago
> then you need to find enough voters that would take a X% haircut on their investment in their own home Or build entire new cities. This is what the UK did after WW2 [0], building dozens of new cities of 100k to 250k people, most notably Milton Keynes, Peterborough and Northampton. [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_towns_in_the_United_Kingdom https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_towns_in_the_United_Kingdo...
- kmlx 7y ago
  for the UK in particular that would not bring the housing costs down. you can build as many houses as you want, the prices in the UK will still be high.
  - Jonnax 7y ago
    Supply and demand doesn't work in the UK?
    - rumanator 7y ago
      Not all demand comes from potential home owners. Real estate has been a magnet for institutional investors for years, particularly in Europe after ECB's quantitative easing policy.
RugnirViking 7y ago
One wonders how many voters in cities own any property, even their own house. I'm going to go out on a limb and say it's at least less than half. Possibly much less, but I'd like to see data if its out there. Obviously the sort that own property are more likely to vote, but there are many many more people who rent.
- chrischen 7y ago
  In America it is free speech, as in propaganda. So it matters less the individual voter and more the ads.
- fauigerzigerk 7y ago
  The homeownership rate in the US as well as in the UK is 65%. What it means is that 65% of homes are occupied by their owners. It doesn't mean that 65% of people live in their own homes, but I suspect it is not too far off the share of people living in their own home or in a home owned by a family member or partner. I guess the difference is people renting a room in a house occupied by its owner. Did I forget anyone? It may not be the same at all in big cities though. I know that homeownership rates in London have collapsed far below 50% in recent years. https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/RHORUSQ156N https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/RHORUSQ156N https://tradingeconomics.com/united-kingdom/home-ownership-rate https://tradingeconomics.com/united-kingdom/home-ownership-r... https://www.ethnicity-facts-figures.service.gov.uk/housing/owning-and-renting/home-ownership/latest https://www.ethnicity-facts-figures.service.gov.uk/housing/o...
  - RugnirViking 7y ago
    Yeah the cities thing was what I was thinking about mostly - in the countryside home ownership is higher as prices are less, less apartments and there are less big property owners. Theres also the question of what it means to own ones house. A lot of people have a mortgage for their house, but the relationship between this and benefitting from the value appreciating is different for different people.
- ljcn 7y ago
  > at least less than half "Households in London were fairly evenly distributed across the tenures, with half in owner occupation and half in the rented sectors." Section 1.10 in https://www.gov.uk/government/statistics/english-housing-survey-2015-to-2016-headline-report https://www.gov.uk/government/statistics/english-housing-sur... To get the number of voters you could weight by average occupancies but I don't know what those numbers are.
i_am_proteus 7y ago
Or just pass laws enshrining property owners' rights to build at a higher level of government-- Oregon has recently done this.
frobozz 7y ago
> find enough voters that would take a X% haircut Or enact laws that don't have a negative effect on most voters - e.g. block non-resident ownership like in NZ and give owner-occupiers the same tax breaks as landlords. I would gladly see the value of my house drop by 60%, if it meant that all the bigger/nicer houses in the area also dropped by 60%. For most homeowners, the absolute value of their house is broadly irrelevant. What matters most is the difference between their current house and the next one they want to move to. People looking to stay put for the foreseeable future are unaffected by changes in house prices. Empty nest downshifters benefit from prices remaining high and rising, as do flippers, landlords, and those with a very high LTV who wish to move. People looking to move to a bigger/better house would benefit (e.g. renters saving up to buy, a young family currently outgrowing the house that was perfect when the parents were just a couple).
- CodeCube 7y ago
  > What matters most is the difference between their current house and the next one they want to move to. Thank you!! Exactly this
  - NovemberWhiskey 7y ago
    I feel that's a bit naive: many people do not own their homes outright and are leveraged as a result of their mortgage loans. Say I own 50% of the equity in a home valued at $1M today, and I want to move into a new home valued at $1.5M. I sell my current home, and I realize enough cash ($0.5M) to cover a 33% down-payment on the new home. Assuming I have the cash flow to satisfy the lender I can pay the mortgage, I can make the move. But assume all property decreases in value by half. Now when I come to sell my home I only get back enough to repay the mortgage and I have nothing to fund a down-payment on the new home. Even though the difference in price between the homes halved, I can no longer afford the move.
    - CodeCube 7y ago
      That's a good point ... the original argument only holds water when the mortgage isn't underwater ;)
davidw 7y ago
> investment in their own home Housing cannot be both 1) "a good investment" in that it grows more than the economy 2) and affordable. Ideally, prices would be fairly stable, so that people can swap out of different housing depending on their needs at different stages of life without stressing too much about 'the market'.
dredmorbius 7y ago
Not just the homeowners, the banks / current mortgage holders. Real estate is a backstop on equity. Leveraged real estate is (as with homeowners) a tremendous risk to financing firms. They will (and have) fought tooth and nail to resist any depreciation of assets. This is one of the resistances to technological innovations that Bernhard J. Stern wrote of in 1937. The commonality with the other examples he gives is striking. https://archive.org/details/technologicaltre1937unitrich/page/39 https://archive.org/details/technologicaltre1937unitrich/pag... Retyped Markdown: https://pastebin.com/raw/Bapu75is https://pastebin.com/raw/Bapu75is
jotm 7y ago
~200K residents... Same as most cities in Romania. Come to Romania, lol, there's gigabit fiber and good food everywhere, great all-round weather. Buy a house 5-10km from the city for ~60K.

by kmlx 7y ago

MagnumOpus 7y ago

> then you need to find enough voters that would take a X% haircut on their investment in their own home Or build entire new cities. This is what the UK did after WW2 [0], building dozens of new cities of 100k to 250k people, most notably Milton Keynes, Peterborough and Northampton. [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_towns_in_the_United_Kingdom https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_towns_in_the_United_Kingdo...

kmlx 7y ago
for the UK in particular that would not bring the housing costs down. you can build as many houses as you want, the prices in the UK will still be high.
- Jonnax 7y ago
  Supply and demand doesn't work in the UK?
  - rumanator 7y ago
    Not all demand comes from potential home owners. Real estate has been a magnet for institutional investors for years, particularly in Europe after ECB's quantitative easing policy.

RugnirViking 7y ago

One wonders how many voters in cities own any property, even their own house. I'm going to go out on a limb and say it's at least less than half. Possibly much less, but I'd like to see data if its out there. Obviously the sort that own property are more likely to vote, but there are many many more people who rent.

chrischen 7y ago
In America it is free speech, as in propaganda. So it matters less the individual voter and more the ads.
fauigerzigerk 7y ago
The homeownership rate in the US as well as in the UK is 65%. What it means is that 65% of homes are occupied by their owners. It doesn't mean that 65% of people live in their own homes, but I suspect it is not too far off the share of people living in their own home or in a home owned by a family member or partner. I guess the difference is people renting a room in a house occupied by its owner. Did I forget anyone? It may not be the same at all in big cities though. I know that homeownership rates in London have collapsed far below 50% in recent years. https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/RHORUSQ156N https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/RHORUSQ156N https://tradingeconomics.com/united-kingdom/home-ownership-rate https://tradingeconomics.com/united-kingdom/home-ownership-r... https://www.ethnicity-facts-figures.service.gov.uk/housing/owning-and-renting/home-ownership/latest https://www.ethnicity-facts-figures.service.gov.uk/housing/o...
- RugnirViking 7y ago
  Yeah the cities thing was what I was thinking about mostly - in the countryside home ownership is higher as prices are less, less apartments and there are less big property owners. Theres also the question of what it means to own ones house. A lot of people have a mortgage for their house, but the relationship between this and benefitting from the value appreciating is different for different people.
ljcn 7y ago
> at least less than half "Households in London were fairly evenly distributed across the tenures, with half in owner occupation and half in the rented sectors." Section 1.10 in https://www.gov.uk/government/statistics/english-housing-survey-2015-to-2016-headline-report https://www.gov.uk/government/statistics/english-housing-sur... To get the number of voters you could weight by average occupancies but I don't know what those numbers are.

i_am_proteus 7y ago

Or just pass laws enshrining property owners' rights to build at a higher level of government-- Oregon has recently done this.

frobozz 7y ago

> find enough voters that would take a X% haircut Or enact laws that don't have a negative effect on most voters - e.g. block non-resident ownership like in NZ and give owner-occupiers the same tax breaks as landlords. I would gladly see the value of my house drop by 60%, if it meant that all the bigger/nicer houses in the area also dropped by 60%. For most homeowners, the absolute value of their house is broadly irrelevant. What matters most is the difference between their current house and the next one they want to move to. People looking to stay put for the foreseeable future are unaffected by changes in house prices. Empty nest downshifters benefit from prices remaining high and rising, as do flippers, landlords, and those with a very high LTV who wish to move. People looking to move to a bigger/better house would benefit (e.g. renters saving up to buy, a young family currently outgrowing the house that was perfect when the parents were just a couple).

CodeCube 7y ago
> What matters most is the difference between their current house and the next one they want to move to. Thank you!! Exactly this
- NovemberWhiskey 7y ago
  I feel that's a bit naive: many people do not own their homes outright and are leveraged as a result of their mortgage loans. Say I own 50% of the equity in a home valued at $1M today, and I want to move into a new home valued at $1.5M. I sell my current home, and I realize enough cash ($0.5M) to cover a 33% down-payment on the new home. Assuming I have the cash flow to satisfy the lender I can pay the mortgage, I can make the move. But assume all property decreases in value by half. Now when I come to sell my home I only get back enough to repay the mortgage and I have nothing to fund a down-payment on the new home. Even though the difference in price between the homes halved, I can no longer afford the move.
  - CodeCube 7y ago
    That's a good point ... the original argument only holds water when the mortgage isn't underwater ;)

davidw 7y ago

> investment in their own home Housing cannot be both 1) "a good investment" in that it grows more than the economy 2) and affordable. Ideally, prices would be fairly stable, so that people can swap out of different housing depending on their needs at different stages of life without stressing too much about 'the market'.

dredmorbius 7y ago

Not just the homeowners, the banks / current mortgage holders. Real estate is a backstop on equity. Leveraged real estate is (as with homeowners) a tremendous risk to financing firms. They will (and have) fought tooth and nail to resist any depreciation of assets. This is one of the resistances to technological innovations that Bernhard J. Stern wrote of in 1937. The commonality with the other examples he gives is striking. https://archive.org/details/technologicaltre1937unitrich/page/39 https://archive.org/details/technologicaltre1937unitrich/pag... Retyped Markdown: https://pastebin.com/raw/Bapu75is https://pastebin.com/raw/Bapu75is

jotm 7y ago

~200K residents... Same as most cities in Romania. Come to Romania, lol, there's gigabit fiber and good food everywhere, great all-round weather. Buy a house 5-10km from the city for ~60K.