Live data from Hacker News

Rising Rents Are Pushing More Tenants Past the Breaking Point

bloomberg.com

281–290 of 312 posts

Re: Rising Rents Are Pushing More Tenants Past the Breaking Point

#281
post #222
post #201

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"If you want to understand the severity of the situation, I suggest just literally googling "homelessness housing crisis bay area" and read all the both qualitative and quantitive reporting done on the issue." As a resident of the bay area I assure you that I read about this topic every single day - and consume a wide range of reporting and editorial.[1] "... the rent went up 100% in one year. Needless to say, they a…

It's not "housing where one most prefers" in this instance, it's "housing where you're already lived for years, and where your children go to school".

Honestly, counting on being able to rent a single family home for an extended period of time is insane. That they were able to live there for over a decade makes them an outlier. Most single family homes are owned by individuals. Individuals and/or their heirs often need liquidity, so rental houses are way more likely to change hands than apartment buildings.

Re: Rising Rents Are Pushing More Tenants Past the Breaking Point

#282
post #179
post #36

In large cities across the US (and probably most of the world), there is some very large scale foreign speculation in the housing market going on. This is leading to rising rents and rising home prices. In Seattle, for example, many (newly) wealthy Chinese people are buying houses purely for investment purposes. I know some of them. One of them has purchased 10 houses, and lives in only one of them (when they are in…

I sincerely doubt foreign purchases are the main driver of rent increase, and no study has ever demonstrated as much. The anti-foreigner mindset is extremely dangerous. Rising rents are almost entirely because of local restrictions on creating more housing. The beneficiaries of restricted supply are existing owners and landlords.

Here are some recent new articles dealing with this issue.

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/new-zealand-foreigners-buy...

https://www.washingtonpost.com/realestate/wealthy-chinese-bu...

https://www.forbes.com/sites/sarahsu/2016/10/31/chinese-inve...

And here's an article talking about a study done in Vancouver indicating these activities are driving rent prices too high:

https://beta.theglobeandmail.com/news/british-columbia/out-o...

Making assumptions about people because they say something that doesn't fit your world view is just as dangerous as xenophobia itself.

Re: Rising Rents Are Pushing More Tenants Past the Breaking Point

#283

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Landlords do not set market rents. Renters and their employers do. Tax changes do not raise or lower rents. They make it more or less likely that new housing will be built, which affects future rents. Land value taxes are so attractive because they avoid changing the incentives to build.

Of course landlords set the rent they're going to charge for their property. They're free to do so, within certain bounds established by the market and based upon the value of the property they are renting. A land value tax, which would be applied to ALL landlords in the area, increases ALL of their costs at the same time, which forces ALL of them to raise their rents at the same time. It would shift the entire marke…

Your premise doesn’t make sense. A land value tax would not “increase all of their costs at the same time”, unless the tax was implemented in such a way. More realistic would be that the tax would be revenue neutral, such that taxes would increase per unit dwelling on land with poor utilization, but decrease on land with better utilization (i.e denser). This would be reflected in rents and would encourage people to move to denser neighborhoods because the rents would be cheaper.

Re: Rising Rents Are Pushing More Tenants Past the Breaking Point

#284
post #180

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"To me, this is absurd. This is a human rights issue (homelessness is growing by a large amount)." Homelessness is a mental health issue. Nobody is homeless because of foreign speculators. Yes, people are indeed incentivized to relocate to housing markets that Chinese people have never heard of like, for instance, Tacoma . If those people spent half their time working and saving (like their parents did) as they spent…

It probably was the case 5 years ago that most homeless people in the US has some kind of mental problem. These people were almost all men and you would see them sleeping on the sidewalks or parks with almost nothing in the way of possessions. Now, at least in Oakland, there are tents everywhere. From single ones trying not to get noticed to tent cities with 10-50 tents all in one area. Many of these people have a pi…

I truly have no idea what the situation actually is, but here is an, IMO, plausible explanation: policing practices around homelessness have changed as a result of changing attitudes toward the homeless (toward increasing acceptance) and this has created an environment in which the homeless are now able to accumulate possessions and erect semi-permanent shelters. Another, plausible scenario (again, IMO): if certain liberal cities have a reputation for being relatively accepting toward the homeless, there may be a simultaneous net migration of homeless from less accepting parts of the country to these cities.

Re: Rising Rents Are Pushing More Tenants Past the Breaking Point

#285
post #36

In large cities across the US (and probably most of the world), there is some very large scale foreign speculation in the housing market going on. This is leading to rising rents and rising home prices. In Seattle, for example, many (newly) wealthy Chinese people are buying houses purely for investment purposes. I know some of them. One of them has purchased 10 houses, and lives in only one of them (when they are in…

Korean housing prices are also heavily influenced by Chinese investors.

Re: Rising Rents Are Pushing More Tenants Past the Breaking Point

#286

I really hope the economy shifts toward remote work as the standard (at least in the career tracks where it is possible). The ever increasing share of higher jobs moving to metropolitan regions will continue to make the places on this list worse off. More remote work might also even out the salaries across the US a little bit. One can dream...

It will mostly help India, not the rural US.

Re: Rising Rents Are Pushing More Tenants Past the Breaking Point

#288
post #244

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I had found 1 room shared by bunkbed airbnb's for ~$1500/mo in SF, in a shitty location but forget where specifically about a year ago; and that was pretty cheap for near the heart, afaict $1900/mo got me a 2-story townhouse in chicago just south of the south loop; maybe 15 min by train to the heart of the city, 20 min walk to chinatown Had 3 proper bedrooms and an attic, so with 3 roomates it was more like $450/mo

Funny, I had an airbnb(I hosted) in nashville's downtown that made that rate look dirt cheap. Reason? Outdated zoning laws and hotels were slow to catch up with the tourist industry. It was crazy watching my nearby competitors(the major hotels) adjust prices like the stock market..... $1800 a night for the last suite at the sheraton up from $250-500 normally. Bonoroo and Country Music festival held the same week is w…

Why did you sell or stop hosting?

Re: Rising Rents Are Pushing More Tenants Past the Breaking Point

#289

I really hope the economy shifts toward remote work as the standard (at least in the career tracks where it is possible). The ever increasing share of higher jobs moving to metropolitan regions will continue to make the places on this list worse off. More remote work might also even out the salaries across the US a little bit. One can dream...

It will mostly help India, not the rural US.

Even though flying throughout the US is much easier and cheaper than to India and back? Tons of companies already use talent from other countries to create products, the lack of remote work hasn't stopped them.

Re: Rising Rents Are Pushing More Tenants Past the Breaking Point

#290
post #19

Heavily regulated (construction) market => high cost of building new (housing) units => low supply => high sale prices + heavily regulated (rental) market => high rents Simple economics, no?

Sale prices aren't coupled to rents like you think. Landlords charge what the market will bear - how high housing prices increase rents is through making purchasing housing impossible for more people, who are then force to bid up rents.
Post reply on HN