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Except they aren't actually occupying the pool, just gatekeeping it. They still have to find tenants in order to actually make money.
In other words, the real problem -- the only reason they can charge exploitatively high rents in the first place, the outsize profits from which is fueling the buying spree -- is lack of supply in places people want to live. As fun as scapegoating landlords is, it doesn't actually fix anything. The way to actually solve the problem is to allow denser zoning!
That won't solve the problem, they'll buy all of those too.
I think the key is to tax the absolute dog shit out of houses after your first or second. A company can own a house but unless the company lives there, tax the dog shit out of it.
Make it so that houses are reasonable for people to own and live in but speculators are out here subsidizing all our schools, parks, and roads.
Sliding scale makes more sense. I dont object to a person owning a couple of apartments or houses as investments (as long as they actually landlord ethically) but once you're a person making more than a "good living" off the rental income then ratchet up the tax sharply.
The reason I say that is 2 fold.
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Investors drive a lot of new development, someone has to buy the land and pay for the house to be built and not a lot of people can afford to rent and pay a mortgage for the 12 to 18 months it takes, you need people building houses for people to buy completed. Its either going to be mom and pop investors or property developers.
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Realestate is about the best investment regular folks can make. If you have worked hard, gotten lucky, had a demand job... whatever. Its realestate, stock market or just shove it in the bank and get diddly in interest. Im all for "people" doing well by owning half a dozen apartments as opposed to corporations buying up whole subdivisions.
I ain't mad at that idea either. And now I'm drunk enough not to have any arguments about much of anything.
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I'd love to see that happen, both because (a) fuck speculators, and (b) being able to say "told you so!" when it still doesn't result in housing that's affordable because the real problem is still simply high-demand areas not being allowed to have enough supply.
If high demand areas don't end up more affordable, you can absolutely say that. But if they do you have to come back here and tell me I'm the prettiest drunk you know.
Sure, I would gladly pay that price for zoning reform!
(If it ever happens, send me a PM to remind me.)
Same, buddy.
Well, they could certainly try, fail, and go bankrupt when the rents and values collapse. (If that's not the result, it just means you need to densify the zoning even harder.)
So everybody has to live toe-toe like God damn sardines because these people are too greedy? Sounds so great.
No, everybody has to live toe-toe because they all want to live in the same place. The 'landbastards' are ultimately just red herrings that have nothing to do with it.
Bruh, people are making money on Bitcoins and nfts. Speculative investments don't need to have any tangible value to be profitable. It doesn't matter that there's more houses than anyone could ever live in. It's a tulip panic, actual value is irrelevant.
Let's kill two birds with one stone by having a communist revolution. Boom, no more hoarding empty houses for profit, and the government which now serves the people instead of Capital can build more houses. Ideally according to sensible neighbourhood planning.