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We could do with some strict rules on foreign ownership here in the US. Seems questionable when all the housing in a neighborhood is owned by Chinese investment

We could do with some strict rules on foreign ownership here in the US. Seems questionable when all the housing in a neighborhood is owned by Chinese investment firms.

Hnrobert42 5y ago
Probably the occupancy requirement would take care of the issue better.
- hellbannedguy 5y ago
  In my neighborhood, many are occupied by a non-english speaking person, or small family. (I'm not saying anything racist. I just know a few individuals whom shop at Safeway whom live in million plus homes that don't speak English. I feel we need more that a occupancy requirement. We need some hard requirements, a long with not allowing hedge funds to buy homes. This goes for American corporations too.)
  - rfrey 5y ago
    Some hard requirements that go beyond occupancy rules and forbidding hedge funds from buying houses. What are your suggestions?
csomar 5y ago
So only US persons and companies can buy in the US right? That means Chinese investment firms can still buy but dude who is on some long-term visa can't. Either way, real estate should be a free market. In the same vein you can buy any real estate you like, a seller should be able to sell to any entity that's giving him the better price.
- jimmaswell 5y ago
  I think real estate has proven to be somewhat of a market failure when so much is taken up by landlords and investment firms driving up prices without providing much or any value. The pandemic has only made this worse as big firms ride out the storms and buy even more land on the cheap to rent back out at an obscene profit. My parents used to pay $1000 a month in rent for a property that I know the taxes on amounted to maybe $3000 a year, and the landlord rarely did anything else than pay that tax. Sent a bargain basement repair guy out a few times to fix the heater maybe. That's 300% profit for nothing, pure rent seeking behavior. That's not good for society. More needs to be done to encourage individual home ownership and discourage people having no choice but to send a third to half of their income into a black hole every month.
  - csomar 5y ago
    > That's 300% profit for nothing, pure rent seeking behavior. The landlord suddenly woke up with a house in his name? He might be in the red as house prices / interest rates varies from person to person. No one knows. > That's not good for society. Let's create laws to transfer wealth from certain individuals to other individuals that fits our profile. That's good for "society".
    - oblio 5y ago
      > The landlord suddenly woke up with a house in his name? He might be in the red as house prices / interest rates varies from person to person. No one knows. Well, have you heard of that old fashioned thing called feudalism? You know, with a certain land owning class? Now, the US didn't have feudalism, but let's say that due to family, someone in your distant past managed to get lucky and buy a ton of very valuable land. Or buy very cheap properties. At this point, your family is practically a lighter version of landed gentry. You'd be making each year a ton more than the property cost to build 60-80-whatever years ago, property taxes generally aren't that high, if the location is good people will live there even if the living conditions are crap (for example from lack of maintenance), etc. > Let's create laws to transfer wealth from certain individuals to other individuals that fits our profile. That's good for "society". Ummm... that's how taxes work. We generally transfer wealth from "certain individuals" (generally the well off, that can afford to have some of their wealth transferred), to "other individuals that fit our profile" (generally poor people, those without housing, etc.). And yeah, in case that was not a rhetorical comment, yes, it's good for society. It's literally how modern societies are built. Taxes are the price we pay for civilization.
      - csomar 5y ago
        No, taxes were to be paid for war, then infrastructure. It's only recently that taxes have been diverted to social welfare. I think the jury is still early on whether that will build civilization or result in its demise.
        5y ago
- hellbannedguy 5y ago
  1. If I had it my way yes. We will revisit ownership laws in a few decades when most American citizens own their own homes, or at least the ones that want ownership.) 2. I would ban US corporations from buying homes as assets yesterday. 3. I would even put a limit on how many homes an individual could buy. Five sounds reasonable?
  - csomar 5y ago
    Yeah, messing with free markets. That has proved to work really well.
    - SirHound 5y ago
      Yeah, not messing with free markets. That has proved to work really well.

We could do with some strict rules on foreign ownership here in the US. Seems questionable when all the housing in a neighborhood is owned by Chinese investment firms.

Hnrobert42 5y ago

Probably the occupancy requirement would take care of the issue better.

hellbannedguy 5y ago
In my neighborhood, many are occupied by a non-english speaking person, or small family. (I'm not saying anything racist. I just know a few individuals whom shop at Safeway whom live in million plus homes that don't speak English. I feel we need more that a occupancy requirement. We need some hard requirements, a long with not allowing hedge funds to buy homes. This goes for American corporations too.)
- rfrey 5y ago
  Some hard requirements that go beyond occupancy rules and forbidding hedge funds from buying houses. What are your suggestions?

csomar 5y ago

So only US persons and companies can buy in the US right? That means Chinese investment firms can still buy but dude who is on some long-term visa can't. Either way, real estate should be a free market. In the same vein you can buy any real estate you like, a seller should be able to sell to any entity that's giving him the better price.

jimmaswell 5y ago
I think real estate has proven to be somewhat of a market failure when so much is taken up by landlords and investment firms driving up prices without providing much or any value. The pandemic has only made this worse as big firms ride out the storms and buy even more land on the cheap to rent back out at an obscene profit. My parents used to pay $1000 a month in rent for a property that I know the taxes on amounted to maybe $3000 a year, and the landlord rarely did anything else than pay that tax. Sent a bargain basement repair guy out a few times to fix the heater maybe. That's 300% profit for nothing, pure rent seeking behavior. That's not good for society. More needs to be done to encourage individual home ownership and discourage people having no choice but to send a third to half of their income into a black hole every month.
- csomar 5y ago
  > That's 300% profit for nothing, pure rent seeking behavior. The landlord suddenly woke up with a house in his name? He might be in the red as house prices / interest rates varies from person to person. No one knows. > That's not good for society. Let's create laws to transfer wealth from certain individuals to other individuals that fits our profile. That's good for "society".
  - oblio 5y ago
    > The landlord suddenly woke up with a house in his name? He might be in the red as house prices / interest rates varies from person to person. No one knows. Well, have you heard of that old fashioned thing called feudalism? You know, with a certain land owning class? Now, the US didn't have feudalism, but let's say that due to family, someone in your distant past managed to get lucky and buy a ton of very valuable land. Or buy very cheap properties. At this point, your family is practically a lighter version of landed gentry. You'd be making each year a ton more than the property cost to build 60-80-whatever years ago, property taxes generally aren't that high, if the location is good people will live there even if the living conditions are crap (for example from lack of maintenance), etc. > Let's create laws to transfer wealth from certain individuals to other individuals that fits our profile. That's good for "society". Ummm... that's how taxes work. We generally transfer wealth from "certain individuals" (generally the well off, that can afford to have some of their wealth transferred), to "other individuals that fit our profile" (generally poor people, those without housing, etc.). And yeah, in case that was not a rhetorical comment, yes, it's good for society. It's literally how modern societies are built. Taxes are the price we pay for civilization.
    - csomar 5y ago
      No, taxes were to be paid for war, then infrastructure. It's only recently that taxes have been diverted to social welfare. I think the jury is still early on whether that will build civilization or result in its demise.
      - 5y ago
hellbannedguy 5y ago
1. If I had it my way yes. We will revisit ownership laws in a few decades when most American citizens own their own homes, or at least the ones that want ownership.) 2. I would ban US corporations from buying homes as assets yesterday. 3. I would even put a limit on how many homes an individual could buy. Five sounds reasonable?
- csomar 5y ago
  Yeah, messing with free markets. That has proved to work really well.
  - SirHound 5y ago
    Yeah, not messing with free markets. That has proved to work really well.