7 ms·

Landlords are the reason housing is unaffordable, but in a world without landlords if homeownership is out of reach for a segment of the population there should

Landlords are the reason housing is unaffordable, but in a world without landlords if homeownership is out of reach for a segment of the population there should be public housing to accommodate that need.

AnthonyMouse 3y ago
> Landlords are the reason housing is unaffordable Zoning laws are the reason housing is unaffordable. Landlords lobby for zoning laws, but if you have the political power to prohibit renting then presumably you have the political power to reform zoning. Moreover, you should do that anyway, because if all you do is prohibit renting without allowing new housing to be built, you're going to have a bad time. > if homeownership is out of reach for a segment of the population there should be public housing to accommodate that need. So if you make 110% of the median income but don't have a downpayment yet the government pays for your housing? Do you get free housing forever as long as you spend everything you make and never save anything up? What if you have plenty of money but you know you're not going to be somewhere for more than two years and don't want to buy property there?
- sharts 3y ago
  In the end it’s really supply/demand. Perhaps there need to be quotas on how much population can be in the city at any given time. Added benefit would be less traffic, congestion, and waiting in lines for anything
  - AnthonyMouse 3y ago
    Restricting demand is inhumane. Increase supply.
Duwensatzaj 3y ago
Wrong. Housing is unaffordable because demand outstrips supply. Economic illiterates who blame “greed” making public policy tend to make it even worse.
- breakyerself 3y ago
  Demand is outstripping supply because policy makers have left it up to the market to supply the need and the market has failed. The reason supply used to meet demand is that the government didn't just pray to the almighty free hand, it acted with policy to ensure there was housing for everyone. A large portion of the supply is being held by investors like landlords which restricts the supply. Removing them from the equation would increase supply and decrease prices.
  - AnimalMuppet 3y ago
    > The reason supply used to meet demand is that the government didn't just pray to the almighty free hand, it acted with policy to ensure there was housing for everyone. The free market used to work better before it got handcuffed by zoning laws everywhere. If you prohibit the free market from working, don't then mock the free market because it's not working. > A large portion of the supply is being held by investors like landlords which restricts the supply. Removing them from the equation would increase supply and decrease prices. True - if you mean landlords who hold but don't allow occupancy.
    - breakyerself 3y ago
      Landlords restrict the supply of houses available for purchase.
      - AnimalMuppet 3y ago
        Landlords restrict home ownership, yes. That's different than restricting housing. And we were mostly talking about housing.
  - AnthonyMouse 3y ago
    Demand is outstripping supply because the government prohibits high density housing from being built in existing low density areas and imposes rules that make new construction more expensive. > A large portion of the supply is being held by investors like landlords which restricts the supply. Because they expect the value tomorrow will be higher than the value today, because they expect demand to increase over time while the government continues to inhibit new construction. Stop inhibiting new construction and they'll want to sell now before the price comes down. (Which will make the price come down sooner.) The incentive to not rent existing units is also a predictable consequence of things like rent control and laws that make it hard to evict non-paying tenants. Don't increase the risk of providing a thing and expect that to lower the price.
kcplate 3y ago
Is there any place on this earth where “public housing” was anything but an unmitigated disaster that was used simply to corral “the have nots” away from “the haves”? Whatever the solution is, it’s damn sure is not public housing.
- HarryHirsch 3y ago
  Vienna is always held up as a model. Also Berlin, until recently.
  - kcplate 3y ago
    I am sure the chance for success is much greater in a society that is fairly homogenous.
    - HarryHirsch 3y ago
      There are large tracts of the US that are mostly ethnically homogeneous - most everywhere is not an urban Babel like NYC or SF. Meanwhile, the Habsburg monarchy was the prototype of a multiethnic state, and its capital was everything but uniform. Also Sanhedrin 38a: https://www.sefaria.org/Sanhedrin.38a.8 https://www.sefaria.org/Sanhedrin.38a.8
    - breakyerself 3y ago
      This is a gross way of saying we have too many minorities here to provide public services.
      - kcplate 3y ago
        No, that is not a fair characterization of what I said. Our diversity is a complexity that is not addressed for in the working model, so it’s not that we shouldn’t try…but we shouldn’t assume that a model that works well in one environment will work well in another, significantly different, environment.
- breakyerself 3y ago
rufus_foreman 3y ago
So you want the entity responsible for the DMV and civil asset forfeiture abuse to be your landlord?

AnthonyMouse 3y ago

> Landlords are the reason housing is unaffordable Zoning laws are the reason housing is unaffordable. Landlords lobby for zoning laws, but if you have the political power to prohibit renting then presumably you have the political power to reform zoning. Moreover, you should do that anyway, because if all you do is prohibit renting without allowing new housing to be built, you're going to have a bad time. > if homeownership is out of reach for a segment of the population there should be public housing to accommodate that need. So if you make 110% of the median income but don't have a downpayment yet the government pays for your housing? Do you get free housing forever as long as you spend everything you make and never save anything up? What if you have plenty of money but you know you're not going to be somewhere for more than two years and don't want to buy property there?

sharts 3y ago
In the end it’s really supply/demand. Perhaps there need to be quotas on how much population can be in the city at any given time. Added benefit would be less traffic, congestion, and waiting in lines for anything
- AnthonyMouse 3y ago
  Restricting demand is inhumane. Increase supply.

Duwensatzaj 3y ago

Wrong. Housing is unaffordable because demand outstrips supply. Economic illiterates who blame “greed” making public policy tend to make it even worse.

breakyerself 3y ago
Demand is outstripping supply because policy makers have left it up to the market to supply the need and the market has failed. The reason supply used to meet demand is that the government didn't just pray to the almighty free hand, it acted with policy to ensure there was housing for everyone. A large portion of the supply is being held by investors like landlords which restricts the supply. Removing them from the equation would increase supply and decrease prices.
- AnimalMuppet 3y ago
  > The reason supply used to meet demand is that the government didn't just pray to the almighty free hand, it acted with policy to ensure there was housing for everyone. The free market used to work better before it got handcuffed by zoning laws everywhere. If you prohibit the free market from working, don't then mock the free market because it's not working. > A large portion of the supply is being held by investors like landlords which restricts the supply. Removing them from the equation would increase supply and decrease prices. True - if you mean landlords who hold but don't allow occupancy.
  - breakyerself 3y ago
    Landlords restrict the supply of houses available for purchase.
    - AnimalMuppet 3y ago
      Landlords restrict home ownership, yes. That's different than restricting housing. And we were mostly talking about housing.
- AnthonyMouse 3y ago
  Demand is outstripping supply because the government prohibits high density housing from being built in existing low density areas and imposes rules that make new construction more expensive. > A large portion of the supply is being held by investors like landlords which restricts the supply. Because they expect the value tomorrow will be higher than the value today, because they expect demand to increase over time while the government continues to inhibit new construction. Stop inhibiting new construction and they'll want to sell now before the price comes down. (Which will make the price come down sooner.) The incentive to not rent existing units is also a predictable consequence of things like rent control and laws that make it hard to evict non-paying tenants. Don't increase the risk of providing a thing and expect that to lower the price.

kcplate 3y ago

Is there any place on this earth where “public housing” was anything but an unmitigated disaster that was used simply to corral “the have nots” away from “the haves”? Whatever the solution is, it’s damn sure is not public housing.

HarryHirsch 3y ago
Vienna is always held up as a model. Also Berlin, until recently.
- kcplate 3y ago
  I am sure the chance for success is much greater in a society that is fairly homogenous.
  - HarryHirsch 3y ago
    There are large tracts of the US that are mostly ethnically homogeneous - most everywhere is not an urban Babel like NYC or SF. Meanwhile, the Habsburg monarchy was the prototype of a multiethnic state, and its capital was everything but uniform. Also Sanhedrin 38a: https://www.sefaria.org/Sanhedrin.38a.8 https://www.sefaria.org/Sanhedrin.38a.8
  - breakyerself 3y ago
    This is a gross way of saying we have too many minorities here to provide public services.
    - kcplate 3y ago
      No, that is not a fair characterization of what I said. Our diversity is a complexity that is not addressed for in the working model, so it’s not that we shouldn’t try…but we shouldn’t assume that a model that works well in one environment will work well in another, significantly different, environment.
breakyerself 3y ago

rufus_foreman 3y ago

So you want the entity responsible for the DMV and civil asset forfeiture abuse to be your landlord?