4 ms·

I’m not sure what you mean by allow. Rules and regulations preventing profits? Or outlawing financial instruments backed by mortgages? Owners have to prove all

I’m not sure what you mean by allow. Rules and regulations preventing profits? Or outlawing financial instruments backed by mortgages? Owners have to prove all the money they’ve ever spent maintaining and improving the house w/ receipts and estimates in those costs after accounting for inflation, and only then selling it at a break even price? All apartment complexes operating at mandatory break even rates? I can tell you this: if I added up all home improvements, maintenance, and property taxes I’ve paid over 20 years then I’d take a significant loss when selling at current inflated values. Maybe when you look at the total cost of ownership for typical family owned homes then in many cases it’s not actually investment, maybe more like a savings account. That’s the best I’d get out of my home and I bought cheap w/ prices, inflated as they are, roughly 150% higher than my sticker price 20 years ago. The financial model for developers is of course different but if you’re going to look at home ownership as an investment for the owner then you can’t do that going from the buying price to selling price, you have add in all the costs of ownership. (Disclaimer: my TCO loss on my home despite rising prices would be do in large part because of truly massive property taxes.) I don’t see an easy way to outlaw the abilities for housing to be an investment. Even the it wouldn’t do anything at all to actually get people into housing, it would just make it more affordable for the lucky few who got to buy in at the reduced price. We just need to build more housing and have laws/regulations/rules in place that stop the NIMBY nonsense. No reasonable development can be denied if the increase in housing supply is lagging behind local increased population growth. Incentives to developers to build more than that minimum. Tax incentives for developers to keep prices within confines bands of local median incomes, tax penalties— a luxury tax— against selling a certain amount above these limits. And I don’t know, these may be really bad ideas too. But all I see disallowing investment accomplishing is to have housing inventory stagnate and make housing access partly a game of who you know to get an inside track— similar to how some affordable housing programs work right now. Around me, apartment complexes that are part of affordable housing programs have 2+ year waiting lists, some should be condemned and closed, but I’ve seen people pretty much walk into a recently opened space when they know someone who administers the program for that complex.

rcarr 4y ago
Here are some laws that partially curtail housing as investment: - ban anyone non-resident in the country from owning property - create an exponential property tax. 0% for first home, 2% for second home, 4% for third home, 8% for fourth home etc to discourage mass renting. - to make the point above easier to enforce, make it illegal for companies to own residential property other than a few exceptions such as developer companies holding newly built property that they’re selling, banks holding repossessions etc. All property must be owned by an individual citizen. - Mandate that developers build >50% affordable housing. Earmark this housing for first time buyers only. Non compliance means the developer is shut down and loses their license. - Mandate that developers build on their land or else have it seized by the government to avoid developers land banking and waiting it out for a change of administration which would reverse all the above rules so developers can go back to raking in absurd profits.
- JumpCrisscross 4y ago
  > Mandate that developers build >50% affordable housing. Earmark this housing for first time buyers only. This is a trap. It sounds good on paper. In practice, every bureaucratic busybody wants to define affordability to deliver to their constituents. This dramatically raises construction costs. It’s a current cost adjuvant in New York and San Francisco. A simple first-time homebuyer (or single homeowner) requirement should suffice in segregating the market.
  - rcarr 4y ago
    > This is a trap. It sounds good on paper. In practice, every bureaucratic busybody wants to define affordability to deliver to their constituents. It’s a trap if you let it be a trap. You define affordability using median earnings of the area in question. The properties built are then sold for no more than 3.5x that amount.
    - JumpCrisscross 4y ago
      > You define affordability using median earnings of the area in question. The properties built are then sold for no more than 3.5x that amount. Let me introduce you to the myriad of definitions of income and area, and how dare you suggest we include public subsidies or salaries in the calculation, also, why aren’t we creating a special category for [things]. These floating variables immediately corrupt. You can fight political nature, or you can write good policy.

rcarr 4y ago

Here are some laws that partially curtail housing as investment: - ban anyone non-resident in the country from owning property - create an exponential property tax. 0% for first home, 2% for second home, 4% for third home, 8% for fourth home etc to discourage mass renting. - to make the point above easier to enforce, make it illegal for companies to own residential property other than a few exceptions such as developer companies holding newly built property that they’re selling, banks holding repossessions etc. All property must be owned by an individual citizen. - Mandate that developers build >50% affordable housing. Earmark this housing for first time buyers only. Non compliance means the developer is shut down and loses their license. - Mandate that developers build on their land or else have it seized by the government to avoid developers land banking and waiting it out for a change of administration which would reverse all the above rules so developers can go back to raking in absurd profits.

JumpCrisscross 4y ago
> Mandate that developers build >50% affordable housing. Earmark this housing for first time buyers only. This is a trap. It sounds good on paper. In practice, every bureaucratic busybody wants to define affordability to deliver to their constituents. This dramatically raises construction costs. It’s a current cost adjuvant in New York and San Francisco. A simple first-time homebuyer (or single homeowner) requirement should suffice in segregating the market.
- rcarr 4y ago
  > This is a trap. It sounds good on paper. In practice, every bureaucratic busybody wants to define affordability to deliver to their constituents. It’s a trap if you let it be a trap. You define affordability using median earnings of the area in question. The properties built are then sold for no more than 3.5x that amount.
  - JumpCrisscross 4y ago
    > You define affordability using median earnings of the area in question. The properties built are then sold for no more than 3.5x that amount. Let me introduce you to the myriad of definitions of income and area, and how dare you suggest we include public subsidies or salaries in the calculation, also, why aren’t we creating a special category for [things]. These floating variables immediately corrupt. You can fight political nature, or you can write good policy.