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Ask HN: Anyone else feels the commoditization of real estate is unethical?

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Re: Ask HN: Anyone else feels the commoditization of real estate is unethical?

#411

Post by coryrc »

thr0wawayf00 wrote: post #379
theplumber wrote: post #310

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It looks like you can't see the real issue: too many people want to live in NYC. If you make it cheaper to own, build or rent in NYC even more people will come and the there will not be enough housing. Perhaps people should be encouraged to live somewhere else/in more places? Living in NYC is not a human right either.

The problem is that when the cost of living goes up, it tends to force out poorer residents that have been there for many years. Encouraging people to just live somewhere else because they can no longer afford the home they've owned for decades undermines the entire premise of home ownership because it means that you may own the deed today, but you only control the property as long as the financial system underpinnin…

I don't feel bad for the millionaire elderly taking up inordinate amount of space so young people can't afford anything.

However, if you feel differently, we could make gains in property tax payable on death or property sale.

Re: Ask HN: Anyone else feels the commoditization of real estate is unethical?

#412

Post by pgcj_poster »

lr4444lr wrote: post #40

No, because governments' ability to procure it for the needy is a very separable problem. But let me play Devil's Advocate: agriculture, the foundation of the food supply, is one of the most commoditized markets that exist. Does this bother you too? Why not? If it's because food is generally a smaller part of income, highly responsive to market pressure to keep prices low in addition to some stabilizing subsidies fro…

> agriculture, the foundation of the food supply, is one of the most commoditized markets that exist. Does this bother you too?

Yes? Most people who have ever lived have always produced their own food. That most of us in the developed world have lost the ability to do so—and that access to the physical essence of our being is dependent on monetary transactions with faceless entities that value profit above human life—seems deeply alienating.

Re: Ask HN: Anyone else feels the commoditization of real estate is unethical?

#413

Post by zhdc1 »

> Doesn't anyone feel uneasy about it, that more and more people are looking at real estate as a financial tool, not a basic human right to have a roof over one's head?

It’s always been viewed this way, at least in the west. Land ownership quite literally defined western social power structures for a very long time.

That said, the use case for housing is housing. Ownership generally isn’t that relevant, to the extent that prices are still set by supply and demand. If there are enough units on the market, prices or rents will be reasonable. If not, prices will go up.

My suspicion is that the attraction of single family houses as an investment asset on this scale are going to partially fade away. It’s driven by the fact that real estate is somewhat uncorrelated with equities and unleveraged returns have historically been comparable to the SP500. However, historical performance does not necessarily reflect future performance, and single family homes cost a lot to maintain.

Re: Ask HN: Anyone else feels the commoditization of real estate is unethical?

#414

Post by s1artibartfast »

rojobuffalo wrote: post #257
targ65 wrote: post #172

Like another comment here mentioned, housing is complicated. People don't want to live in a random house in the middle of nowhere ('roof over your head'). Some people prefer to be homeless on the street versus getting to a roof over their head that they don't like. People want to live where they want to live (near family, jobs, culture etc) Take NYC for instance. Politicians try to address the NYC housing crisis from…

I would start by making property taxes substantially higher for non-owner-occupied property. If you are rent-seeking rather than residing on the property you should pay way more, maybe 4x or higher, in taxes. Housing prices would crash and that would be the point; but everyone who owns property would be against it because they don't want to see their assets drop in value. The counter-argument people make is "that wou…

There are multiple taxes on rental properties. You have to pay both income tax, and if you are a corporation you have to pay corporate taxes.

That's roughly 20% and then another 20%.

If you wanted to go with this approach, the better solution is to remove tax deductions for corporate residential real estate investment

Re: Ask HN: Anyone else feels the commoditization of real estate is unethical?

#415

Post by sershe »

There's no basic human right to have a roof over your head, for the simple reason that someone has to make the roof. Saying "I have a right to have it [without building it yourself]" is saying "I have a right to force someone to build it for me". I dunno about you, I'm uneasy about forced labor.

Even beyond that, there's certainly no right to have the roof over your head wherever you want - there is simply not enough space for everyone to have it. Commoditization of housing basically lets the scarcity be managed via market mechanism, the best we have - what creates the problems, like making scarcity worse, is /absence/ of commoditization - where someone decides that things should be a certain way, e.g. via zoning, design reviews, environmental rules, etc. If we could commoditize more in these areas (e.g. something like carbon tax for congestion/sewer use/... instead of a committee deciding; removing free public parking and letting the market resolve that and probably save space and reduce car use; etc.), there'd be more housing. If we commoditize less, scarcity would just be managed via different means - like corruption, connections, etc.

Re: Ask HN: Anyone else feels the commoditization of real estate is unethical?

#416

Post by shakes_mcjunkie »

softwarebeware wrote: post #360
rojobuffalo wrote: post #257

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I would start by making property taxes substantially higher for non-owner-occupied property. If you are rent-seeking rather than residing on the property you should pay way more, maybe 4x or higher, in taxes. Housing prices would crash and that would be the point; but everyone who owns property would be against it because they don't want to see their assets drop in value. The counter-argument people make is "that wou…

Yeah, Vancouver BC actually is creating policies like taxing unoccupied housing at a higher rate, instituting a tax on the sale of homes to foreign buyers, and further regulations around real estate "commoditization" and these are effective tools. I don't know why people say it's a difficult problem. Cities are actually just looking the other way.

I find that a lot of the criticisms of taxation and better housing policy are boiled down to the bad faith, we can't try anything because it's too complicated, but really they mean this is going to cause me or my rich friends problems so don't do it.

Re: Ask HN: Anyone else feels the commoditization of real estate is unethical?

#417

Post by ghaff »

nrmitchi wrote: post #398
elevatortrim wrote: post #374

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That would be true if rent was a percentage on top of cost. But it is not, it is whatever maximum renters are willing to pay.

It's whatever maximum renters are willing to pay, combined with whatever minimum property owners are willing to accept and the availability of alternatives. Applying a cost increase across the board, in a way where everyone knows it was across the board , will reset the market floor. If California (just as an example) can out and said "There will be a flat $200/month tax on all home rentals" you can be damn sure that…

And, if they can't rent it for that, they'll just take the property off the rental market and sell it.

Re: Ask HN: Anyone else feels the commoditization of real estate is unethical?

#418

Post by foogazi »

ItsMonkk wrote: post #333
nrmitchi wrote: post #276

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The biggest thing missed when proposals like that is that not everyone wants to (or does it make sense to) buy a property. Making it 4x more expensive to own a rental property means that rent will be 4x more expensive for those that have to rent. If I was moving to NYC for 6 months, or 2 years, there’s no way I want to spend tens of thousands of dollars buying-and-then-selling a property.

Not true, but I'm a Georgist so would be against the GP's targeting non-owner tax. Tax everyone according to the value of the unimproved value of their land. I can show you plenty of places with $3k+ rents in SF with prop 13 property taxes that have not changed their tax meaningfully in decades. Taxes have absolutely no effect on what the renter pays. The tenant is always paying the land value. It's just going straig…

> Tax everyone according to the value of the unimproved value of their land.

Why ?

How do you figure the unimproved value of land ?

There is so much land in this country why do we have to fight over the coastal regions ?

Why not incentivize building out other areas and creating population hubs ?

Re: Ask HN: Anyone else feels the commoditization of real estate is unethical?

#419

Post by thomastjeffery »

alfor wrote: post #338
bamboozled wrote: post #304

Earlier quoted context omitted.

housing is complicated My bullshit detector went off right here. Housing isn't complicated. It's only complicated by investment money being involved. Having a roof over ones head is a basic human right. In Australia, the market is so hot, very few young people can afford anything, if you're living in a nice place, you can easily be kicked out after your rent doubles. I know of good, professional people who migrated t…

But you need someone else to provide your ’basic human right’ Is housing expensive in popular cities or everywhere? What is preventing people (you?) from building cheap houses on cheap land? Is it regulation? We are headed for a massive population crash almost everywhere, the housing market will completely collapse in the next 10 years and will not recover. You can look at Japan and Italy as a head up, they are start…

I don't think you know what cheap means.

I, and most people, don't have $10,000 to spend, and even that wouldn't be nearly enough to build a house, let alone buy a cheap lot of land, let alone install a septic system and a well, post for gas and maintenance for my car, all while incurring the time cost of living farther from work.

Re: Ask HN: Anyone else feels the commoditization of real estate is unethical?

#420

Post by reustle »

sixdimensional wrote: post #405

After looking into achieving personal freedom through tiny home living (and which could take different forms than what we think of today with some creativity), I can say that one of the most challenging things standing in the way is zoning laws. You'd be surprised how difficult it is to find any piece of land anywhere in the US where zoning allows relatively unfettered building of tiny or smaller dwellings. It's poss…

Isn't this why so many folks keep it on wheels / a trailer base? That seems to get around many of these issues, but does present difficulty if you're trying to claim it as your permanent domicile.
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