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No. Landlords became greedier. In contrast to the kind, generous landlords of just a few years ago, landlords are now greedy. Building more units won't help. Su

by woah 4y ago

No. Landlords became greedier. In contrast to the kind, generous landlords of just a few years ago, landlords are now greedy. Building more units won't help. Supply and demand is a capitalist myth.

diob 4y ago
Late game monopoly. Lots of wealth in the hands of a few, the rest meant to be content to go around the board paying them for the privilege of working for them.
- NavinF 4y ago
  You’re responding to a joke comment that’s satirizing your views lol
  - diob 4y ago
    Certainly a joke, but I don't see how it aligns with what I wrote. We're def in the late stages of a monopoly game, provided we don't magically find another board (aka leave Earth).
skrtskrt 4y ago
OK I'm not a landlord/capitalist apologist but it sure does make sense to me that rents rise in part because there are way more people that want to live in an area than available units. For example Downtown LA and Koreatown are putting up large apartment buildings like crazy, because the zoning allows them to, and rents have not increased nearly as much as other popular LA areas that are mostly single-family zoned, such as Santa Monica. This is why Minnesota and now recently California basically upzoned the entire state, because upzoning with local ordinances neighborhood by neighborhood is almost always defeated by NIMBYs, which are generally a combination of of local homeowners and local small-time landlords. Don't forget that a huge portion of US landlords are "mom and pop" landlords, which have a massive portion of their net worth wrapped up a handful of rental units and don't have the capital to build net new units. These people are more economically opposed to new housing than a large developer who can stomach the capital outlay for a new building. When they are allowed to developers can profitably build dense housing, which produces net new units into the market, which helps combat rising rent.
- olalonde 4y ago
  I believe woah was being sarcastic... Greed is pretty constant over time and isn't really responsible for rising prices.
boc 4y ago
Just like how gas stations got really greedy earlier this summer - thankfully Biden told them to knock it off and now prices are falling. Don’t let those economists tell you lies about how goods with inelastic demand will dramatically rise in price when supply can’t keep pace… they’re just covering for the greedy people.
osigurdson 4y ago
Not a landlord but doesn’t it make sense to be kind but still charge as much as your can? Everything else is priced that way.
- Jochim 4y ago
  I mean this depends on the context. In our current market that's how a lot of people operate but it isn't a requirement. See any kind of pro bono work, To be honest it feels like a really convenient excuse that people use when they're aware, on some level, that they should feel bad about their actions. From a purely practical point of view, as a landlord your tenants can cause a lot of financial damage. If you force out a good tenant by raising rents then you're gambling that the next one isn't going to be a nightmare.
  - onionisafruit 4y ago
    You need to be careful when doing this. The IRS requires you to file a gift tax form if you charge below market rents.
  - osigurdson 4y ago
    Let’s say you have a leasable asset, your choices are to maximize its net present value or to price the lease under the market in order to benefit someone else. The best thing you can do for someone else is to give them all of your assets and attempt to live in a manner that does not compete for resources with others (live in some kind of zero energy homeostasis until reaching an old age for example). Obviously, these represent two extremes of selfishness and selflessness. So, what is a rule of thumb for an asset owner to not be considered greedy? Price 10% below market for example or allow 3 missed payments per year? Greed is an easy label to assign until until you have to get concrete about it.
    - Jochim 4y ago
      Like many things in society it's not entirely objective. It depends on the situations of the parties involved. Take two hypothetical tenants. One is a young software developer earning $15k/mo, the other a retired widow on a fixed pension of $3k/mo. The social reaction to either party's rent being raised from $1k/mo to $2.5k/mo is going to be very different. > your choices are to maximize its net present value or to price the lease under the market in order to benefit someone else This leaves out the fact that in the majority of cases the lessor is benefiting either way. It's purely the extent to which they benefit that changes. > Greed is an easy label to assign until until you have to get concrete about it. All sorts of labels are difficult to assign objectively. What matters is personal opinion and societal consensus. Both of those are fluid and have changed throughout history.

by woah 4y ago

No. Landlords became greedier. In contrast to the kind, generous landlords of just a few years ago, landlords are now greedy. Building more units won't help. Supply and demand is a capitalist myth.

diob 4y ago

Late game monopoly. Lots of wealth in the hands of a few, the rest meant to be content to go around the board paying them for the privilege of working for them.

NavinF 4y ago
You’re responding to a joke comment that’s satirizing your views lol
- diob 4y ago
  Certainly a joke, but I don't see how it aligns with what I wrote. We're def in the late stages of a monopoly game, provided we don't magically find another board (aka leave Earth).

skrtskrt 4y ago

OK I'm not a landlord/capitalist apologist but it sure does make sense to me that rents rise in part because there are way more people that want to live in an area than available units. For example Downtown LA and Koreatown are putting up large apartment buildings like crazy, because the zoning allows them to, and rents have not increased nearly as much as other popular LA areas that are mostly single-family zoned, such as Santa Monica. This is why Minnesota and now recently California basically upzoned the entire state, because upzoning with local ordinances neighborhood by neighborhood is almost always defeated by NIMBYs, which are generally a combination of of local homeowners and local small-time landlords. Don't forget that a huge portion of US landlords are "mom and pop" landlords, which have a massive portion of their net worth wrapped up a handful of rental units and don't have the capital to build net new units. These people are more economically opposed to new housing than a large developer who can stomach the capital outlay for a new building. When they are allowed to developers can profitably build dense housing, which produces net new units into the market, which helps combat rising rent.

olalonde 4y ago
I believe woah was being sarcastic... Greed is pretty constant over time and isn't really responsible for rising prices.

boc 4y ago

Just like how gas stations got really greedy earlier this summer - thankfully Biden told them to knock it off and now prices are falling. Don’t let those economists tell you lies about how goods with inelastic demand will dramatically rise in price when supply can’t keep pace… they’re just covering for the greedy people.

osigurdson 4y ago

Not a landlord but doesn’t it make sense to be kind but still charge as much as your can? Everything else is priced that way.

Jochim 4y ago
I mean this depends on the context. In our current market that's how a lot of people operate but it isn't a requirement. See any kind of pro bono work, To be honest it feels like a really convenient excuse that people use when they're aware, on some level, that they should feel bad about their actions. From a purely practical point of view, as a landlord your tenants can cause a lot of financial damage. If you force out a good tenant by raising rents then you're gambling that the next one isn't going to be a nightmare.
- onionisafruit 4y ago
  You need to be careful when doing this. The IRS requires you to file a gift tax form if you charge below market rents.
- osigurdson 4y ago
  Let’s say you have a leasable asset, your choices are to maximize its net present value or to price the lease under the market in order to benefit someone else. The best thing you can do for someone else is to give them all of your assets and attempt to live in a manner that does not compete for resources with others (live in some kind of zero energy homeostasis until reaching an old age for example). Obviously, these represent two extremes of selfishness and selflessness. So, what is a rule of thumb for an asset owner to not be considered greedy? Price 10% below market for example or allow 3 missed payments per year? Greed is an easy label to assign until until you have to get concrete about it.
  - Jochim 4y ago
    Like many things in society it's not entirely objective. It depends on the situations of the parties involved. Take two hypothetical tenants. One is a young software developer earning $15k/mo, the other a retired widow on a fixed pension of $3k/mo. The social reaction to either party's rent being raised from $1k/mo to $2.5k/mo is going to be very different. > your choices are to maximize its net present value or to price the lease under the market in order to benefit someone else This leaves out the fact that in the majority of cases the lessor is benefiting either way. It's purely the extent to which they benefit that changes. > Greed is an easy label to assign until until you have to get concrete about it. All sorts of labels are difficult to assign objectively. What matters is personal opinion and societal consensus. Both of those are fluid and have changed throughout history.