4 ms·

My friends dealing with the scourge of market rate renting are in a world of pain right now. I would have been priced out of my hometown a decade ago if this a

by crmd 4y ago

My friends dealing with the scourge of market rate renting are in a world of pain right now. I would have been priced out of my hometown a decade ago if this apartment which I found on Craigslist didn’t happen to be rent stabilized. We have learned the hard way that trickle down economic arguments sound eminently reasonable on paper but don’t deliver on their promises if implemented. I don’t believe for a second that “this time it’s different!” when we apply it to real estate.

kar5pt 4y ago
You do realize trickle down economics and avoiding rent controls are completely different things right? If you're using the failure of trickle down theory to argue for rent control, you don't know what trickle down theory is.
legitster 4y ago
How did you find said apartment? I'm assuming there was no dearth of applicants? At least with market rate renting, there is always inventory. Hoping you are in a lucky enough minority to find an apartment doesn't seem like sound policy.
- malermeister 4y ago
  The state builds them, shittons of them. See also: the City of Vienna and it's incredible housing situation. I get incredibly annoyed when I read anglo hottakes on housing these days. It's a solved problem in other parts of the world, but it doesn't fit the market ideology, so it gets ignored.
  - dominotw 4y ago
    good luck convincing property owners that city is going to build 5000 units every year in their neighborhoods. How does vienna defang homeowners from being toxic and selfish.
    - malermeister 4y ago
      As far as I know, it just ignores them. They can complain all they want, the city is within its rights to build on land it owns.
  - legitster 4y ago
    So, public housing is also a thing in the US. It has just never taken off at a large scale: - The state does not own much land in US cities. So that means buying existing properties at great expense and demolishing/rebuilding at even greater expense. - The "veto" ability for existing residents to oppose new projects in the US is incredibly strong. Even existing public housing residents will oppose new ones built near them. - Construction costs are unnaturally high in the US for a variety of factors - municipal governments can't seem to get out of their own way when it comes to zoning requirements and etc. For California, they ended up paying $1 million dollars per unit! Much more than they would have just buying existing properties for individuals. I don't think it's a problem of "market ideology". I think it's easier to prescribe it as a general policy failure. Vienna has a set of favorable circumstances that are not easily duplicated to other urban areas, and places like China can just ignore legal rights of their citizens to build whatever they want.
raymondh 4y ago
Presumably, there is even more pain in the world of rent control. By definition, a submarket rate apartment has a supply/demand imbalance. There is someone who values the apartment more than you do who can't live there, perhaps denying them the chance to be closer to their job or family. Also, you have less economic incentive to take in a roommate, thus denying another category of potential occupant. In a rent control system, there are winners and losers. I'm happy that it has worked out well for you, but the survivor bias needs to be pointed out.

by crmd 4y ago

kar5pt 4y ago

You do realize trickle down economics and avoiding rent controls are completely different things right? If you're using the failure of trickle down theory to argue for rent control, you don't know what trickle down theory is.

legitster 4y ago

How did you find said apartment? I'm assuming there was no dearth of applicants? At least with market rate renting, there is always inventory. Hoping you are in a lucky enough minority to find an apartment doesn't seem like sound policy.

malermeister 4y ago
The state builds them, shittons of them. See also: the City of Vienna and it's incredible housing situation. I get incredibly annoyed when I read anglo hottakes on housing these days. It's a solved problem in other parts of the world, but it doesn't fit the market ideology, so it gets ignored.
- dominotw 4y ago
  good luck convincing property owners that city is going to build 5000 units every year in their neighborhoods. How does vienna defang homeowners from being toxic and selfish.
  - malermeister 4y ago
    As far as I know, it just ignores them. They can complain all they want, the city is within its rights to build on land it owns.
- legitster 4y ago
  So, public housing is also a thing in the US. It has just never taken off at a large scale: - The state does not own much land in US cities. So that means buying existing properties at great expense and demolishing/rebuilding at even greater expense. - The "veto" ability for existing residents to oppose new projects in the US is incredibly strong. Even existing public housing residents will oppose new ones built near them. - Construction costs are unnaturally high in the US for a variety of factors - municipal governments can't seem to get out of their own way when it comes to zoning requirements and etc. For California, they ended up paying $1 million dollars per unit! Much more than they would have just buying existing properties for individuals. I don't think it's a problem of "market ideology". I think it's easier to prescribe it as a general policy failure. Vienna has a set of favorable circumstances that are not easily duplicated to other urban areas, and places like China can just ignore legal rights of their citizens to build whatever they want.

raymondh 4y ago

Presumably, there is even more pain in the world of rent control. By definition, a submarket rate apartment has a supply/demand imbalance. There is someone who values the apartment more than you do who can't live there, perhaps denying them the chance to be closer to their job or family. Also, you have less economic incentive to take in a roommate, thus denying another category of potential occupant. In a rent control system, there are winners and losers. I'm happy that it has worked out well for you, but the survivor bias needs to be pointed out.