5 ms·

Organizations owning multiple buildings and renting them out probably goes back beyond written history. It is not the boogeyman you think it is.

WarOnPrivacy 2y ago
It is when the owners collude to raise historically high prices even higher, maximizing pain and further reducing renters' meager resources. Because without ethics or meaningful enforcement there is nothing to stop them.
- astrange 2y ago
  Prices are set by supply and demand, not by whether the seller has decided to be evil or not that day. They cannot collude without assistance from governments restricting new construction.
  - cool_dude85 2y ago
    I think the "build more" stuff rings very hollow. I live in the sun belt where no politician has ever said no to a developer, and I assure you that rents and home prices are broadly unaffordable here too, though perhaps less so than elsewhere.
    - astrange 2y ago
      It's definitely less than elsewhere - housing is only really bad in coastal blue states esp. CA/NY. You have single family zoning and height limits like everywhere else in the US. Allowing sprawl development works for a while but eventually you just run out of sprawl. Rents are down in Austin, Berkeley and LA lately because of construction though. Funny enough, the LA one was an accident and they're trying to undo it.
      - HeatrayEnjoyer 2y ago
        > It's definitely less than elsewhere - housing is only really bad in coastal blue states esp. CA/NY. Rents in my politically purple region 900+ miles from any coast have increased 100% over the past decade. What I pay now for a 1bd exceeds what I paid for a 2bd in a nicer part of the city when I originally moved here. Rental applications no longer require 3x income, only 2x now; it's just expected that people devote half their gross income on housing. How anyone not making six digits lives in NYC is beyond me.
        astrange 2y ago
        Check the median personal and household incomes over the last decade; both have increased, while household sizes have gotten smaller. As people get richer, they have smaller households - ie, they stop living with their parents. If you don't allow smaller housing units to be built to match this, they will compete for existing ones and drive prices up.
  - nothercastle 2y ago
    Yeah that’s like saying a free market works great with perfect transparency. That’s true and also does not reflect reality of a non academic model
  - realce 2y ago
    Restrictions from government are supposed to be reflections of the voters will. This huge price-fixing case might give a clue to the seeming upset in your puritanical conception of "supply and demand"
    - astrange 2y ago
      There isn't a huge price fixing case yet. We haven't seen the case and it certainly hasn't been won. > Restrictions from government are supposed to be reflections of the voters will. Yes, those voters are called NIMBYs.
  - dragonwriter 2y ago
    > Prices are set by supply and demand, not by whether the seller has decided to be evil or not that day. Whether and to what extent the sellers in the market have decided to be evil is, in fact, an aspect of "supply", which is simply the function mapping the terms of sale (in simplest terms, price) to the number of units sellers are willing to sell on those terms. This is true even under perfect rationality, since deciding to be evil is just a way of describing someone whose utility function gives high positive value to something that the person making the description sees as a source of strongly negative value.
crmd 2y ago
In my view, corporate landlording is a relic of the past and really has no place in a progressive society. The financialization of housing stock in the USA where I live has been a disaster.
- astrange 2y ago
  You're just trying to ban apartments here. Corporate SFH housing basically doesn't exist but mom and pop large apartments don't either. Also, corporate landlords can actually afford to maintain their buildings, which is a nice improvement over small ones.
  - thereisnospork 2y ago
    I mean, is banning property rental so absurd? Drastic sure, but what about apartments couldn't be filled either by co-ops or condos with some choice carveouts for short term rentals and the like. "A month's rent less HOA fees may not translate to not less than 1/360th of an ownership share of the rented space" would be the 1 liner policy statement.
    - astrange 2y ago
      What if you want to live somewhere for less than 7 years / can't afford a mortgage and maintenance costs / the coop board doesn't personally like you / the coop board is racist and you're a minority? (All of these are real issues.)
  - wrl 2y ago
    was living in a building owned by a corporate landlord until late last year. they took two years to fix a major roof leak and in the end only fixed it because i hired a lawyer. on paper, corporate landlords should have better-maintained housing stock. in practice, i've never personally experienced it.
  - ejstronge 2y ago
    > You're just trying to ban apartments here. Corporate SFH housing basically doesn't exist but mom and pop large apartments don't either. This definitely isn't true - there are markets where apartments aren't allowed/desirable, and in which corporate actors 'build to rent' entire subdivisions.s
fouc 2y ago
REITs started booming after 1992, which probably dramatically increased the scale of corporate landlording, along with the improving rental management tooling/software that is making it increasingly easier to manipulate the rental prices and push it upwards.
- throwaway2037 2y ago
  What did you select 1992? What is particular about that year. And do you really think property managers had sophisticated software to adjust rents in 1992? Computers in 1992 were pathetic. I guess you could use Lotus 1-2-3 from DOS.
TeMPOraL 2y ago
So do wars, usury, trading people like property, and many other things we're trying to grow out of as a civilization.

WarOnPrivacy 2y ago

It is when the owners collude to raise historically high prices even higher, maximizing pain and further reducing renters' meager resources. Because without ethics or meaningful enforcement there is nothing to stop them.

astrange 2y ago
Prices are set by supply and demand, not by whether the seller has decided to be evil or not that day. They cannot collude without assistance from governments restricting new construction.
- cool_dude85 2y ago
  I think the "build more" stuff rings very hollow. I live in the sun belt where no politician has ever said no to a developer, and I assure you that rents and home prices are broadly unaffordable here too, though perhaps less so than elsewhere.
  - astrange 2y ago
    It's definitely less than elsewhere - housing is only really bad in coastal blue states esp. CA/NY. You have single family zoning and height limits like everywhere else in the US. Allowing sprawl development works for a while but eventually you just run out of sprawl. Rents are down in Austin, Berkeley and LA lately because of construction though. Funny enough, the LA one was an accident and they're trying to undo it.
    - HeatrayEnjoyer 2y ago
      > It's definitely less than elsewhere - housing is only really bad in coastal blue states esp. CA/NY. Rents in my politically purple region 900+ miles from any coast have increased 100% over the past decade. What I pay now for a 1bd exceeds what I paid for a 2bd in a nicer part of the city when I originally moved here. Rental applications no longer require 3x income, only 2x now; it's just expected that people devote half their gross income on housing. How anyone not making six digits lives in NYC is beyond me.
      - astrange 2y ago
        Check the median personal and household incomes over the last decade; both have increased, while household sizes have gotten smaller. As people get richer, they have smaller households - ie, they stop living with their parents. If you don't allow smaller housing units to be built to match this, they will compete for existing ones and drive prices up.
- nothercastle 2y ago
  Yeah that’s like saying a free market works great with perfect transparency. That’s true and also does not reflect reality of a non academic model
- realce 2y ago
  Restrictions from government are supposed to be reflections of the voters will. This huge price-fixing case might give a clue to the seeming upset in your puritanical conception of "supply and demand"
  - astrange 2y ago
    There isn't a huge price fixing case yet. We haven't seen the case and it certainly hasn't been won. > Restrictions from government are supposed to be reflections of the voters will. Yes, those voters are called NIMBYs.
- dragonwriter 2y ago
  > Prices are set by supply and demand, not by whether the seller has decided to be evil or not that day. Whether and to what extent the sellers in the market have decided to be evil is, in fact, an aspect of "supply", which is simply the function mapping the terms of sale (in simplest terms, price) to the number of units sellers are willing to sell on those terms. This is true even under perfect rationality, since deciding to be evil is just a way of describing someone whose utility function gives high positive value to something that the person making the description sees as a source of strongly negative value.

crmd 2y ago

In my view, corporate landlording is a relic of the past and really has no place in a progressive society. The financialization of housing stock in the USA where I live has been a disaster.

astrange 2y ago
You're just trying to ban apartments here. Corporate SFH housing basically doesn't exist but mom and pop large apartments don't either. Also, corporate landlords can actually afford to maintain their buildings, which is a nice improvement over small ones.
- thereisnospork 2y ago
  I mean, is banning property rental so absurd? Drastic sure, but what about apartments couldn't be filled either by co-ops or condos with some choice carveouts for short term rentals and the like. "A month's rent less HOA fees may not translate to not less than 1/360th of an ownership share of the rented space" would be the 1 liner policy statement.
  - astrange 2y ago
    What if you want to live somewhere for less than 7 years / can't afford a mortgage and maintenance costs / the coop board doesn't personally like you / the coop board is racist and you're a minority? (All of these are real issues.)
- wrl 2y ago
  was living in a building owned by a corporate landlord until late last year. they took two years to fix a major roof leak and in the end only fixed it because i hired a lawyer. on paper, corporate landlords should have better-maintained housing stock. in practice, i've never personally experienced it.
- ejstronge 2y ago
  > You're just trying to ban apartments here. Corporate SFH housing basically doesn't exist but mom and pop large apartments don't either. This definitely isn't true - there are markets where apartments aren't allowed/desirable, and in which corporate actors 'build to rent' entire subdivisions.s

fouc 2y ago

REITs started booming after 1992, which probably dramatically increased the scale of corporate landlording, along with the improving rental management tooling/software that is making it increasingly easier to manipulate the rental prices and push it upwards.

throwaway2037 2y ago
What did you select 1992? What is particular about that year. And do you really think property managers had sophisticated software to adjust rents in 1992? Computers in 1992 were pathetic. I guess you could use Lotus 1-2-3 from DOS.

TeMPOraL 2y ago

So do wars, usury, trading people like property, and many other things we're trying to grow out of as a civilization.