Perhaps housing shouldn't be market determined, but considered essential habitat. I didn't get any further with this train of thought, but i thought of smarmy

Perhaps housing shouldn't be market determined, but considered essential habitat. I didn't get any further with this train of thought, but i thought of smarmy shiny-clothed grifty realtor types worrying about the placement of a fridge in a mcmansions kitchen, and how so much of interior design has become ikea airbnb style for flipping rather than living in. Perhaps turning houses into status symbols instead of shelter has a down side. I suspect mortages are a relatively recent invention, and that this is why moneyed families had grand houses and poorer folk had self-built hovels a century ago.