4 ms·

Conversely I wonder what the world would look like if it was illegal for people and businesses to rent out housing. Imagine a world where every family was allo

Conversely I wonder what the world would look like if it was illegal for people and businesses to rent out housing. Imagine a world where every family was allowed to own a single house or apartment only. All rental properties were owned by the city or whatever other local government, and housing for rental was built to be sustainable and non-profit. I wonder if more people would be able to buy a house/apartment for themselves and their family in such a world.

throwway120385 3y ago
I feel like constraining access in this way would lead to some pretty nasty second-order effects if you didn't also redistribute a bunch of wealth from the 1% to the renters. Also with all rental properties being government-owned there would be zero uniqueness and everyone would be forced to make due with whatever the government thought they needed. A good example of this is old Soviet-style tower blocks, where no matter how big your family you get the same size apartment. At least with the current system, people who want to rent detached homes are able to. Your system would suffer from the alternating cycles of austerity that seem to plague governments and the tower blocks would gradually lose all amenities and everything would become exactly the same for the same price. I'm not sure that's better than the current system. A better system would just prohibit private equity from buying real estate and renting it. I think a lot of the housing price increases are due to PE firms buying rental houses and then farming their management out to local management companies.
- malermeister 3y ago
  > Also with all rental properties being government-owned there would be zero uniqueness and everyone would be forced to make due with whatever the government thought they needed. A good example of this is old Soviet-style tower blocks, where no matter how big your family you get the same size apartment. That part is just not true. See Vienna. This is public housing: https://www.wien.info/en/sightseeing/sights/hundertwasser-house-vienna-348464 https://www.wien.info/en/sightseeing/sights/hundertwasser-ho... So is this: https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=d6DBKoWbtjE https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=d6DBKoWbtjE

throwway120385 3y ago

I feel like constraining access in this way would lead to some pretty nasty second-order effects if you didn't also redistribute a bunch of wealth from the 1% to the renters. Also with all rental properties being government-owned there would be zero uniqueness and everyone would be forced to make due with whatever the government thought they needed. A good example of this is old Soviet-style tower blocks, where no matter how big your family you get the same size apartment. At least with the current system, people who want to rent detached homes are able to. Your system would suffer from the alternating cycles of austerity that seem to plague governments and the tower blocks would gradually lose all amenities and everything would become exactly the same for the same price. I'm not sure that's better than the current system. A better system would just prohibit private equity from buying real estate and renting it. I think a lot of the housing price increases are due to PE firms buying rental houses and then farming their management out to local management companies.

malermeister 3y ago
> Also with all rental properties being government-owned there would be zero uniqueness and everyone would be forced to make due with whatever the government thought they needed. A good example of this is old Soviet-style tower blocks, where no matter how big your family you get the same size apartment. That part is just not true. See Vienna. This is public housing: https://www.wien.info/en/sightseeing/sights/hundertwasser-house-vienna-348464 https://www.wien.info/en/sightseeing/sights/hundertwasser-ho... So is this: https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=d6DBKoWbtjE https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=d6DBKoWbtjE