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As a landlord, and landlording in an area with restricted rent, it makes zero difference. It's only good if you stay where you rent, but if you move, it's marke

As a landlord, and landlording in an area with restricted rent, it makes zero difference. It's only good if you stay where you rent, but if you move, it's market rent. You can't adequately control market rent because there are so so many variable on what market rent is for every individual unit, location, type, etc. I'm all for the eliminating zoning restrictions though.

nostrademons 6y ago
That's the case for rent restrictions. It's actually worse - rent control decreases housing mobility (nobody wants to give up a rent-controlled apartment, even if it no longer meets their needs) and disincentivizes development, so the prevailing market rate for non-rent-controlled apartments goes up. But eliminating zoning restrictions and building more housing actually does work. Then when you move, you have your pick of many apartments to choose from, and nobody has pricing power to charge more.
- sudosysgen 6y ago
  I live in a rent-restricted area. There is quite a bit of construction, and the average person moves almost once every two years. The effects of rent-restriction you quote are theoretical effects. In the real world, it does work, as long as the rent-restrictions are well-thought-out.
  - xapata 6y ago
    My interpretation of the evidence leads to the opposite conclusion. Here's a good summary: https://www.slowboring.com/p/induced-demand https://www.slowboring.com/p/induced-demand
    - sudosysgen 6y ago
      This article is completely orthogonal. Yes, building more pushes price down. Eventually though, you stop being able to increase density economically, and at that point the only way to prevent housing prices from increasing is rent restrictions. It's important to note that even according to your article, you need to drastically increase supply even for a modest decrease in rent. No one here is against increasing density. It is however insane to believe that increasing density is enough to fix the problem. Cities at the edge of density still have affordability issues, whereas much less dense cities with appropriate rent restrictions don't. There is not a single reference to induced demand here. As long as housing stays a profitable investment, and as long as density cannot be increased infinitely without increasing marginal costs, then rent will rise. The only long term solution is to reduce the profitability of speculation on land prices, so that only productive activities, such as building, are profitable. Rent restrictions are part of this, as rent is a large part of the profitability of land. And rent restrictions can work. There are many cases where they have been implemented without a significantly negative impact to mobility. So why oppose them?
      - xapata 6y ago
        Not completely orthogonal. Perhaps they should be, but the intersection of the two sets (advocates for rent restrictions and advocates of zoning restrictions) appears to be a large portion of the total, as far as I can tell. > enough to fix the problem I think we need to define the problem before we start arguing solutions. In my view "can't afford the rent" is a poverty problem, not a rent prices problem. So, I want anti-poverty solutions, not rent price adjustment solutions. I view "the rent is too high" as a distinct problem from "can't afford the rent." So in my mind, rent price adjustments via price regulation are inappropriate for both problems. > so that only productive activities ... are profitable I understand taxing negative externalities, but this sounds anti-democratic. Who decides what's productive? Let's put an appropriate tax on pollution (broadly defined) and let the market figure out what's most productive. That's what it's good at. > why oppose them? I don't know of any instances where rent control didn't affect mobility. Are you considering the effect on immigration and wages in other cities? If they didn't affect mobility, then almost by definition they had no effect whatsoever. They'd have to be covering such a tiny portion of the market that they can essentially be ignored, both cost and benefit. Which makes them a waste of bureaucracy.
        sudosysgen 6y ago
        There is a very simple definition for things that absolutely aren't productive. Things that produce nothing are not productive. Owning land is not productive, and should not be profitable at all. It is settled economics that the profitability of non-productive actions (often called rent-seeking) is bad. It doesn't matter what your threshold for affordability is. Rent is increasing faster than economic growth, on average. It will continue increasing at this rate until a large part of the population literally cannot afford housing. You're never going to be able to solve the issue of people not being able to afford rent once it stops being economical to increase density, because there will be no incentive for landlords not to push up rent until people can't afford it anymore and start to move out (which is what we don't want to happen). There are no cases where rent control literally did not affect mobility. There are many cases where there is rent control, and high mobility. The city in which I live has around 40% of renters move each year, which is more than enough mobility, and rent control. You do this by using the additional regulatory framework to make it easier for people to move. Your first paragraph is literally meaningless. No one here said anything about zoning except you. If you want argue against someone else, then argue against someone else. The arguments I put forth and your response were completely orthogonal. The rest is simply pure ideology. If you want to convince people or build a coalition with people that disagree with you, put your free-market absolutism aside and focus on solutions and problems.
  - ch4s3 6y ago
    > and the average person moves almost once every two years Are you sure? There's lot of research n rent control and it basically all highlights decreased housing mobility, event he pro rent control authors mention it asa downside.
    - sudosysgen 6y ago
      In my province, the rent office arranges for two measures to counterbalance and increase mobility. Firstly, most rental agreements are made to end on July 1st - legally up to 1974 but now mostly out of tradition. This allows for much less friction, as everyone can change housing without any downtime with access to the full market. Secondly, landlords are allowed to evict if they do sufficient improvements to the property, which allows a safety valve. There are so many people that move in the month of July, that over 7% of the entire population - including people who don't rent - moves out on that day. It's pretty much impossible to get a rental truck to move for the entire month of July. The statistics are that, around July 1st alone, 250 000 out of 900 000 people move. Add in people that don't move in this period, and you get almost half of renters in the entire city moving, despite strict rent control. You just need to do your rent control carefully. There will be some reduction in mobility, but if you counterbalance them, you can have minimal impacts in mobility and large impact in affordability.
      - ch4s3 6y ago
        Ahh, are you in Quebec? > landlords are allowed to evict if they do sufficient improvements to the property This is a REALLY unusual provision in rent stabilization laws in the US and as far as I know the EU which normally don't allow evictions like this and severely cap rent increases for improvements. If you are in Quebec, the RDL is really unique as a form of rent control in that it doesn't set prices or cap increases but rather acts as an arbiter for rent increase disputes. I understand that there are some local criticisms of the system, but I'm not very well versed on the subject. I think most HN comments about rent control are referring the type that exists in SF where prices are more or less locked in place or otherwise set by the government.
        6y ago
tenebrisalietum 6y ago
I was thinking of something like a cap on rent increase (e.g. max 10% rent increase or something like that), not banning rent increase entirely, if it matters. Maybe with exceptions if the landlord improves (not just maintains) the property.

nostrademons 6y ago

That's the case for rent restrictions. It's actually worse - rent control decreases housing mobility (nobody wants to give up a rent-controlled apartment, even if it no longer meets their needs) and disincentivizes development, so the prevailing market rate for non-rent-controlled apartments goes up. But eliminating zoning restrictions and building more housing actually does work. Then when you move, you have your pick of many apartments to choose from, and nobody has pricing power to charge more.

sudosysgen 6y ago
I live in a rent-restricted area. There is quite a bit of construction, and the average person moves almost once every two years. The effects of rent-restriction you quote are theoretical effects. In the real world, it does work, as long as the rent-restrictions are well-thought-out.
- xapata 6y ago
  My interpretation of the evidence leads to the opposite conclusion. Here's a good summary: https://www.slowboring.com/p/induced-demand https://www.slowboring.com/p/induced-demand
  - sudosysgen 6y ago
    This article is completely orthogonal. Yes, building more pushes price down. Eventually though, you stop being able to increase density economically, and at that point the only way to prevent housing prices from increasing is rent restrictions. It's important to note that even according to your article, you need to drastically increase supply even for a modest decrease in rent. No one here is against increasing density. It is however insane to believe that increasing density is enough to fix the problem. Cities at the edge of density still have affordability issues, whereas much less dense cities with appropriate rent restrictions don't. There is not a single reference to induced demand here. As long as housing stays a profitable investment, and as long as density cannot be increased infinitely without increasing marginal costs, then rent will rise. The only long term solution is to reduce the profitability of speculation on land prices, so that only productive activities, such as building, are profitable. Rent restrictions are part of this, as rent is a large part of the profitability of land. And rent restrictions can work. There are many cases where they have been implemented without a significantly negative impact to mobility. So why oppose them?
    - xapata 6y ago
      Not completely orthogonal. Perhaps they should be, but the intersection of the two sets (advocates for rent restrictions and advocates of zoning restrictions) appears to be a large portion of the total, as far as I can tell. > enough to fix the problem I think we need to define the problem before we start arguing solutions. In my view "can't afford the rent" is a poverty problem, not a rent prices problem. So, I want anti-poverty solutions, not rent price adjustment solutions. I view "the rent is too high" as a distinct problem from "can't afford the rent." So in my mind, rent price adjustments via price regulation are inappropriate for both problems. > so that only productive activities ... are profitable I understand taxing negative externalities, but this sounds anti-democratic. Who decides what's productive? Let's put an appropriate tax on pollution (broadly defined) and let the market figure out what's most productive. That's what it's good at. > why oppose them? I don't know of any instances where rent control didn't affect mobility. Are you considering the effect on immigration and wages in other cities? If they didn't affect mobility, then almost by definition they had no effect whatsoever. They'd have to be covering such a tiny portion of the market that they can essentially be ignored, both cost and benefit. Which makes them a waste of bureaucracy.
      - sudosysgen 6y ago
        There is a very simple definition for things that absolutely aren't productive. Things that produce nothing are not productive. Owning land is not productive, and should not be profitable at all. It is settled economics that the profitability of non-productive actions (often called rent-seeking) is bad. It doesn't matter what your threshold for affordability is. Rent is increasing faster than economic growth, on average. It will continue increasing at this rate until a large part of the population literally cannot afford housing. You're never going to be able to solve the issue of people not being able to afford rent once it stops being economical to increase density, because there will be no incentive for landlords not to push up rent until people can't afford it anymore and start to move out (which is what we don't want to happen). There are no cases where rent control literally did not affect mobility. There are many cases where there is rent control, and high mobility. The city in which I live has around 40% of renters move each year, which is more than enough mobility, and rent control. You do this by using the additional regulatory framework to make it easier for people to move. Your first paragraph is literally meaningless. No one here said anything about zoning except you. If you want argue against someone else, then argue against someone else. The arguments I put forth and your response were completely orthogonal. The rest is simply pure ideology. If you want to convince people or build a coalition with people that disagree with you, put your free-market absolutism aside and focus on solutions and problems.
- ch4s3 6y ago
  > and the average person moves almost once every two years Are you sure? There's lot of research n rent control and it basically all highlights decreased housing mobility, event he pro rent control authors mention it asa downside.
  - sudosysgen 6y ago
    In my province, the rent office arranges for two measures to counterbalance and increase mobility. Firstly, most rental agreements are made to end on July 1st - legally up to 1974 but now mostly out of tradition. This allows for much less friction, as everyone can change housing without any downtime with access to the full market. Secondly, landlords are allowed to evict if they do sufficient improvements to the property, which allows a safety valve. There are so many people that move in the month of July, that over 7% of the entire population - including people who don't rent - moves out on that day. It's pretty much impossible to get a rental truck to move for the entire month of July. The statistics are that, around July 1st alone, 250 000 out of 900 000 people move. Add in people that don't move in this period, and you get almost half of renters in the entire city moving, despite strict rent control. You just need to do your rent control carefully. There will be some reduction in mobility, but if you counterbalance them, you can have minimal impacts in mobility and large impact in affordability.
    - ch4s3 6y ago
      Ahh, are you in Quebec? > landlords are allowed to evict if they do sufficient improvements to the property This is a REALLY unusual provision in rent stabilization laws in the US and as far as I know the EU which normally don't allow evictions like this and severely cap rent increases for improvements. If you are in Quebec, the RDL is really unique as a form of rent control in that it doesn't set prices or cap increases but rather acts as an arbiter for rent increase disputes. I understand that there are some local criticisms of the system, but I'm not very well versed on the subject. I think most HN comments about rent control are referring the type that exists in SF where prices are more or less locked in place or otherwise set by the government.
      - 6y ago

tenebrisalietum 6y ago

I was thinking of something like a cap on rent increase (e.g. max 10% rent increase or something like that), not banning rent increase entirely, if it matters. Maybe with exceptions if the landlord improves (not just maintains) the property.