6 ms·

About 2 miles from my house, a housing development recently went up. No homes for sale. Rent only. Stuff like that is becoming a big problem.

tptacek 9mo ago
Why? Why should I care what the balance of rental and owner-occupied is? Owned is not strictly better than rented!
- Eddy_Viscosity2 9mo ago
  And neither is rented strictly better than owned. You would care if you wanted to own but couldn't.
  - tptacek 9mo ago
    I agree, in the same way I'd care the other direction if I wanted to rent, which is why I don't understand the concern about inventory shifting to rentals.
    - epistasis 9mo ago
      In my experience, there are a lot of people who don't consider renters as people that deserve consideration in governmental decision making. So if rental supply becomes available, it doesn't matter, not only because the person doesn't want to rent, but more so because renters are not considered permanent citizens of the local city and therefore they don't matter. This is a recurring theme k see among both right wing and left wing people when it comes to looking at single family homes.
      - tptacek 9mo ago
        Yes, it's a real problem. A surprising number of politically-well-connected people in my muni believe that renters don't even pay property tax.
      - PaulDavisThe1st 9mo ago
        Can you point to any municipality anywhere in the USA (or anywhere else, if you like) that prevents renters from voting, attending public meetings, donating to candidates and otherwise participating in local decision making?
        epistasis 9mo ago
        No but that is not what my comment was talking about.
        PaulDavisThe1st 9mo ago
        > there are a lot of people who don't consider renters as people that deserve consideration in governmental decision making How does it matter whether "a lot of people don't consider" something if there are no laws or enforcement actions that make their opinions actually effective in the world?
        epistasis 9mo ago
        > no laws or enforcement actions that make their opinions actually effective in the world? How do you come to that conclusion? The people who show up to local planning meetings are clearly very effective at enacting their opinions in the world, and local planning is the place where a tiny number, perhaps 3-5 people, can drastically change the results for an entire area.
        PaulDavisThe1st 9mo ago
        The line I quoted from you concerned people who don't consider that renters should be involved in local decision making. I'm asking you what difference it makes what they consider, when they are not actually able to enact any barriers to participating in local decision making? I mean, sure, they make think that renters should stay out of the planning meetings, but if they do not stop them, what difference does it make what they think? Renters vote too ....
    - immibis 9mo ago
      Are you concerned about physical DVD purchases shifting to subscription-based websites?
      - tptacek 9mo ago
        Not remotely. As someone who came of age in the 1990s, I can say with complete confidence that it has never, ever, in the whole of human history, been easier for ordinary people to access more film content than it is today. If I had to pay every single time I watched a film, as opposed to opting to "buy" (say) Big Night, I'd still take that in preference to going to a fucking video store. But either way this has nothing at all to do with housing affordability.
        immibis 9mo ago
        My point is that the rent vs own model is taking over every industry and it's never good long-term. If you had to watch the same movie every day, and you knew that fact in advance, and your only option was pay-per-view, wouldn't that suck?
        tptacek 9mo ago
        You're doing my job on this thread for me by trying to set rental up as some kind of second-class residency we should be skeptical of. I agree, that's the subtext of this corporate investment stuff: that renters are bad.
        immibis 9mo ago
        > renters are bad Uh, no, don't equivocate "forced rent" with "renters". That's bad faith.
        tptacek 9mo ago
        No, it isn't. This is literally the subtext behind the policy. You see it all over this thread: the idea that converting an owner-occupied unit to a rental, even though it lowers area median rent, is a bad thing. There's no other interpretation. If reading that makes you uncomfortable, recheck your priors on the policy itself!
- brightball 9mo ago
  At scale, it limits the supply of available homes to buy which increases the prices. When we constantly read stories about people not being able to afford homes today, it’s all driven by pure supply and demand. When a firehose of money gets aimed at any aspect of the economy everything gets more expensive. This is from institutional investors. Sometimes it’s government when we are talking about the price of education or healthcare for example.
  - tptacek 9mo ago
    None of this is happening "at scale", but either way, you're talking about the price of deeds on houses, and affordable housing isn't about home ownership; in fact, the urge people have to drive this issue towards "starter homes" is a big part of the problem, because the highest-opportunity areas have strictly limited carrying capacity for single-family homes in the first place, and what we desperately need to do is upzone and diversify the housing stock.
  - kgwgk 9mo ago
    > it limits the supply of available homes to buy It also lowers the demand (it increases the supply of an alternative).
  - sokoloff 9mo ago
    It’s literally a new development. Someone went out and turned some raw land into rental houses. If they had left it as raw land, there also would have been no change in supply of houses to buy. Instead, now they’ve created a slight reduction in demand for houses to buy by offering a housing alternative that didn’t exist before.
- lupusyndrby9 9mo ago
  Isn’t manipulation of zoning an example of why it’s important and how even with a small share they can have an outsized influence on the market? Also I seriously doubt the return to work directives are driven by anything more then the projected drop in property values.
  - tptacek 9mo ago
    No. I actually don't give a shit whether corporations can buy single-family houses, by which I mean, I don't care if that's banned. My problem is that high-opportunity high-value residential areas are deeply resistant to upzoning and are actively using this "corporate investor" narrative as a reason why they should wait. Corporate investors are not why the inner ring suburbs with the good schools in major metros are expensive; zoning is. This is literally a distraction from affordability work.
    - paulryanrogers 9mo ago
      There can be more than one problem at once. Two different solutions can be tried at the same time.
      - tptacek 9mo ago
        This doesn't acknowledge anything I just wrote.
        paulryanrogers 9mo ago
        You said blaming corp buyers is a distraction from NIMBYISM. I'd argue corp buyers are a problem as well as NIMBYISM. Both should get blamed and be addressed.
        tptacek 9mo ago
        In fact, it's the opposite: corp buyers are associated with declining rents. I don't care what happens with them either way, they're a second-order factor, but most of what people are saying about this phenomenon is just wrong.
reop2whiskey 9mo ago
[dead]
renewiltord 9mo ago
My wife and I prefer to rent. Greater flexibility. This is not a big problem any more than the fact that Costco replaced stock of Spiceology rubs with Bang Bang Sichuan seasoning.
edoceo 9mo ago
Example of large buyer in thin market - just as up-thread described.
kelnos 9mo ago
I don't think you can say that universally. Some people prefer to rent instead of own. Some people would like to own, but would probably still only be afford to rent even if home prices were more affordable. Sure, you can absolutely make the argument that for some specific region there are too many rental properties and not enough owner-occupied properties, by looking at the supply, demand, and pricing for each type in that region. But you absolutely can't say that as a general statement. There is demand for both sorts of housing.

tptacek 9mo ago

Why? Why should I care what the balance of rental and owner-occupied is? Owned is not strictly better than rented!

Eddy_Viscosity2 9mo ago
And neither is rented strictly better than owned. You would care if you wanted to own but couldn't.
- tptacek 9mo ago
  I agree, in the same way I'd care the other direction if I wanted to rent, which is why I don't understand the concern about inventory shifting to rentals.
  - epistasis 9mo ago
    In my experience, there are a lot of people who don't consider renters as people that deserve consideration in governmental decision making. So if rental supply becomes available, it doesn't matter, not only because the person doesn't want to rent, but more so because renters are not considered permanent citizens of the local city and therefore they don't matter. This is a recurring theme k see among both right wing and left wing people when it comes to looking at single family homes.
    - tptacek 9mo ago
      Yes, it's a real problem. A surprising number of politically-well-connected people in my muni believe that renters don't even pay property tax.
    - PaulDavisThe1st 9mo ago
      Can you point to any municipality anywhere in the USA (or anywhere else, if you like) that prevents renters from voting, attending public meetings, donating to candidates and otherwise participating in local decision making?
      - epistasis 9mo ago
        No but that is not what my comment was talking about.
        PaulDavisThe1st 9mo ago
        > there are a lot of people who don't consider renters as people that deserve consideration in governmental decision making How does it matter whether "a lot of people don't consider" something if there are no laws or enforcement actions that make their opinions actually effective in the world?
        epistasis 9mo ago
        > no laws or enforcement actions that make their opinions actually effective in the world? How do you come to that conclusion? The people who show up to local planning meetings are clearly very effective at enacting their opinions in the world, and local planning is the place where a tiny number, perhaps 3-5 people, can drastically change the results for an entire area.
        PaulDavisThe1st 9mo ago
        The line I quoted from you concerned people who don't consider that renters should be involved in local decision making. I'm asking you what difference it makes what they consider, when they are not actually able to enact any barriers to participating in local decision making? I mean, sure, they make think that renters should stay out of the planning meetings, but if they do not stop them, what difference does it make what they think? Renters vote too ....
  - immibis 9mo ago
    Are you concerned about physical DVD purchases shifting to subscription-based websites?
    - tptacek 9mo ago
      Not remotely. As someone who came of age in the 1990s, I can say with complete confidence that it has never, ever, in the whole of human history, been easier for ordinary people to access more film content than it is today. If I had to pay every single time I watched a film, as opposed to opting to "buy" (say) Big Night, I'd still take that in preference to going to a fucking video store. But either way this has nothing at all to do with housing affordability.
      - immibis 9mo ago
        My point is that the rent vs own model is taking over every industry and it's never good long-term. If you had to watch the same movie every day, and you knew that fact in advance, and your only option was pay-per-view, wouldn't that suck?
        tptacek 9mo ago
        You're doing my job on this thread for me by trying to set rental up as some kind of second-class residency we should be skeptical of. I agree, that's the subtext of this corporate investment stuff: that renters are bad.
        immibis 9mo ago
        > renters are bad Uh, no, don't equivocate "forced rent" with "renters". That's bad faith.
        tptacek 9mo ago
        No, it isn't. This is literally the subtext behind the policy. You see it all over this thread: the idea that converting an owner-occupied unit to a rental, even though it lowers area median rent, is a bad thing. There's no other interpretation. If reading that makes you uncomfortable, recheck your priors on the policy itself!
brightball 9mo ago
At scale, it limits the supply of available homes to buy which increases the prices. When we constantly read stories about people not being able to afford homes today, it’s all driven by pure supply and demand. When a firehose of money gets aimed at any aspect of the economy everything gets more expensive. This is from institutional investors. Sometimes it’s government when we are talking about the price of education or healthcare for example.
- tptacek 9mo ago
  None of this is happening "at scale", but either way, you're talking about the price of deeds on houses, and affordable housing isn't about home ownership; in fact, the urge people have to drive this issue towards "starter homes" is a big part of the problem, because the highest-opportunity areas have strictly limited carrying capacity for single-family homes in the first place, and what we desperately need to do is upzone and diversify the housing stock.
- kgwgk 9mo ago
  > it limits the supply of available homes to buy It also lowers the demand (it increases the supply of an alternative).
- sokoloff 9mo ago
  It’s literally a new development. Someone went out and turned some raw land into rental houses. If they had left it as raw land, there also would have been no change in supply of houses to buy. Instead, now they’ve created a slight reduction in demand for houses to buy by offering a housing alternative that didn’t exist before.
lupusyndrby9 9mo ago
Isn’t manipulation of zoning an example of why it’s important and how even with a small share they can have an outsized influence on the market? Also I seriously doubt the return to work directives are driven by anything more then the projected drop in property values.
- tptacek 9mo ago
  No. I actually don't give a shit whether corporations can buy single-family houses, by which I mean, I don't care if that's banned. My problem is that high-opportunity high-value residential areas are deeply resistant to upzoning and are actively using this "corporate investor" narrative as a reason why they should wait. Corporate investors are not why the inner ring suburbs with the good schools in major metros are expensive; zoning is. This is literally a distraction from affordability work.
  - paulryanrogers 9mo ago
    There can be more than one problem at once. Two different solutions can be tried at the same time.
    - tptacek 9mo ago
      This doesn't acknowledge anything I just wrote.
      - paulryanrogers 9mo ago
        You said blaming corp buyers is a distraction from NIMBYISM. I'd argue corp buyers are a problem as well as NIMBYISM. Both should get blamed and be addressed.
        tptacek 9mo ago
        In fact, it's the opposite: corp buyers are associated with declining rents. I don't care what happens with them either way, they're a second-order factor, but most of what people are saying about this phenomenon is just wrong.

reop2whiskey 9mo ago

[dead]

renewiltord 9mo ago

My wife and I prefer to rent. Greater flexibility. This is not a big problem any more than the fact that Costco replaced stock of Spiceology rubs with Bang Bang Sichuan seasoning.

edoceo 9mo ago

Example of large buyer in thin market - just as up-thread described.

kelnos 9mo ago

I don't think you can say that universally. Some people prefer to rent instead of own. Some people would like to own, but would probably still only be afford to rent even if home prices were more affordable. Sure, you can absolutely make the argument that for some specific region there are too many rental properties and not enough owner-occupied properties, by looking at the supply, demand, and pricing for each type in that region. But you absolutely can't say that as a general statement. There is demand for both sorts of housing.