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Rent controls. NIMBYs. Zoning laws. Builder skills shortage. An excuse around every corner. When can we admit something bigger is at play here? The market is be

Rent controls. NIMBYs. Zoning laws. Builder skills shortage. An excuse around every corner. When can we admit something bigger is at play here? The market is being manipulated on a grand scale. Every government seems to only pay lip service to the issue while creating policies to inflate the assets. Now why is that? Landlords have captured our policy makers. Many MPs in the UK are landlords. We're screwed

Tade0 2y ago
Hailing from a country where the population peaked in the late 90s, housing developers build what they want, where they want and where prices still increased in lockstep with the rest of the world, I can attest to that. There's no reason an apartment in a 80s commie block in eastern Europe should go for €4k per square metre. You're not getting your money's worth for that.
- lifestyleguru 2y ago
  I feel this pain. Commieblocks were designed to last around 50-70 years, yes they can stand longer but what kind of architectural monument are they? Germans in the east simply demolish them. Meantime in Poland?! "EUR 4k per square meter muthafucka!". This would be absurdly ridiculous, except it's real and I need housing.
- iggldiggl 2y ago
  > where the population peaked in the late 90s 1. Peak housing demand doesn't necessarily have to coincide exactly with peak population, because it also depends on average household sizes and living space demand per person. 2. Country-wide population figures don't account for regional population movement.
  - Tade0 2y ago
    1. Prices started going up when prospective homebuyers were already a particularly small generation who also had fewer children - they adjusted family size to their living space demand as it's not like they could suddenly afford more spacious housing. 2. The trend for the past 20+ years has been to move out of cities, with the urbanization rate actually decreasing over that period, as urban real estate was never really affordable. Yet, prices, especially in cities, went up.
tmnvix 2y ago
> When can we admit something bigger is at play here? The market is being manipulated on a grand scale. What we have is a global asset price inflation issue caused by cheap money. Works well for those with collateral but hits those without hard. All of the other issues - regulation, zoning, building costs, immigration, etc are secondary. Just check any country with this problem and look at the correlation between an expanding money supply and property prices.

Tade0 2y ago

Hailing from a country where the population peaked in the late 90s, housing developers build what they want, where they want and where prices still increased in lockstep with the rest of the world, I can attest to that. There's no reason an apartment in a 80s commie block in eastern Europe should go for €4k per square metre. You're not getting your money's worth for that.

lifestyleguru 2y ago
I feel this pain. Commieblocks were designed to last around 50-70 years, yes they can stand longer but what kind of architectural monument are they? Germans in the east simply demolish them. Meantime in Poland?! "EUR 4k per square meter muthafucka!". This would be absurdly ridiculous, except it's real and I need housing.
iggldiggl 2y ago
> where the population peaked in the late 90s 1. Peak housing demand doesn't necessarily have to coincide exactly with peak population, because it also depends on average household sizes and living space demand per person. 2. Country-wide population figures don't account for regional population movement.
- Tade0 2y ago
  1. Prices started going up when prospective homebuyers were already a particularly small generation who also had fewer children - they adjusted family size to their living space demand as it's not like they could suddenly afford more spacious housing. 2. The trend for the past 20+ years has been to move out of cities, with the urbanization rate actually decreasing over that period, as urban real estate was never really affordable. Yet, prices, especially in cities, went up.

tmnvix 2y ago

> When can we admit something bigger is at play here? The market is being manipulated on a grand scale. What we have is a global asset price inflation issue caused by cheap money. Works well for those with collateral but hits those without hard. All of the other issues - regulation, zoning, building costs, immigration, etc are secondary. Just check any country with this problem and look at the correlation between an expanding money supply and property prices.