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The Victims of the Eviction Moratorium

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Re: The Victims of the Eviction Moratorium

#41

Post by door100 »

Cea Weaver, who is used as a foil and whose perspective is unfairly maligned in this article, is basically 100% correct. Landlordism should not exist. Housing is a human right and should not be an investment commodity.

> Emergency policies enacted in times of crisis are prone to becoming permanent, which some members of the #CancelRent movement say is the goal.

This is a good thing. The COVID crisis has exacerbated the huge inequalities in housing in the US, and now is a better time than ever to fix things.

Re: The Victims of the Eviction Moratorium

#42

Post by DC1350 »

I don’t really get how this is possible. They should be able to take out a loan against the property to pay for any expenses, and just sell it at the end to pay off debts if they need to once this is over. They’re upset about lost income but not really struggling... Their net worth is just as high as a renter with a few hundred thousand in the bank. I would have a hard time feeling sorry for somebody in that position

> working-class landlords

lol

Re: The Victims of the Eviction Moratorium

#43

Post by TaylorAlexander »

This is why I really like Vienna’s housing policy. They have half a million affordable housing units which are very nice. They’ve removed the private profit motive and speculation on land value that drives up housing prices. And if they needed to put a hold on rent collection, it would be the government that suffered the loss rather than private owners.

https://www.huduser.gov/portal/pdredge/pdr_edge_featd_articl...

Re: The Victims of the Eviction Moratorium

#45

Post by derekp7 »

pasabagi wrote: post #12
bigmattystyles wrote: post #5

I feel the same way about rent control. It's not fair for society at large to make property owners eat the cost or the lost potential income alone. I am aggressively pro rent control and pro eviction moratorium during the pandemic, but I am for a (progressive) tax to fund these programs. It's just unfair to make yourself feel good by supporting these programs when you don't have any skin in the game. I'm not naïve th…

What is the moral basis of rent? Rent is by definition differentiated from service provision in that it is simply the use of a legal right to extract an income. I don't see a moral basis, so I don't see how anything that impacts the interests of renters can be unfair. Bad on pragmatic level, perhaps, but not a moral one.

The moral basis comes from how the majority have agreed to structure society. A family isn't legally allowed to go to an unoccupied piece of land, start cutting down trees or making mud bricks into a shelter and stay there. We have divided up the land (a limited resource) into parcels of private ownership with government-enforced property rights.

With that comes a moral responsibility to make sure that everyone can obtain reasonable shelter. On the other side, for the person that owns the land, they provide access to what they own (as per the legal system that society has agreed upon -- private transfer of property, the banking system, etc). Not only do they provide access, they also provide the service of upkeep to the dwelling, upkeep of fixtures and security (locks, access control, etc). So it isn't like they are sitting back and collecting an income from the air that other people breath.

Re: The Victims of the Eviction Moratorium

#46

Post by imgabe »

tomg wrote: post #14

I don’t understand how a waiter and a home-care provider can afford to buy a rental property that is apparently worth charging $80,000/yr in rent. I’m in the wrong business! [edit: to be clear, this is tongue in cheek, though the circumstances where a bank made this loan seem unusual to me]

It is amazing what people can do when they work at it instead of demanding others give them stuff for free.

Re: The Victims of the Eviction Moratorium

#47

Post by harry8 »

mjfl wrote: post #21
testfoobar wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Landlords are part of the financial system. Deciding landlords must take the loss on rent so that their tenants can be safe is sensible health and social policy during the acute uncertain phase of the pandemic last year. That uncertainty is now gone. If the government wants to house people in rental properties indefinitely, then the government can pay to do so at the prevailing market rates.

Why should landlords take the loss on rent and not who they pay mortgage to?

Which of those two groups (landlords vs banks & debt holding funds) pays the most to lobbyists and campaign contributions to all parties? Sorry to be cynical but how can we not be so until it's properly cleaned up?

Re: The Victims of the Eviction Moratorium

#48

Post by nerdponx »

testfoobar wrote: post #6
ceejayoz wrote: post #2

As with much of the US pandemic response, a half measure with significant consequences.

The sad part is how politicians and organized groups are seemingly afraid to change their direction for fear of voter retribution. Comparing datasets across states and regions, it is not entirely clear to me which had the most effective policies. I would like to see an official CDC report that identifies which policies worked and which did not. I don't think we're going to see a report - because it would become an in…

No, the "half" aspect of the measure is the fact they didn't even try to protect small landlords. These laws were not passed by socialists, so the argument that "landlording shouldn't exist anyway" doesn't apply. It never made sense from day 1.

Re: The Victims of the Eviction Moratorium

#49

Post by jedmeyers »

testfoobar wrote: post #20
jedmeyers wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Individual owners such in the article will eventually lose their properties to deeper pockets How do we know that’s not the actual goal of those policies?

So much of the official government response has been to support entrenched wealth. Some examples: large stores remained open, while small stores were forced to close in many regions. Financial support was provided to large businesses via PPP funding that wasn't available to small businesses. Capital subsidies of near 0% loans were extend to the largest companies (e.g. the Fed owns Apple bonds) while smaller businesse…

> So much of the official government response has been to support entrenched wealth.

There is a word that describes this kind of merger of corporate and government power, I just don't seem to remember it.

Re: The Victims of the Eviction Moratorium

#50

Post by Veen »

pasabagi wrote: post #12
bigmattystyles wrote: post #5

I feel the same way about rent control. It's not fair for society at large to make property owners eat the cost or the lost potential income alone. I am aggressively pro rent control and pro eviction moratorium during the pandemic, but I am for a (progressive) tax to fund these programs. It's just unfair to make yourself feel good by supporting these programs when you don't have any skin in the game. I'm not naïve th…

What is the moral basis of rent? Rent is by definition differentiated from service provision in that it is simply the use of a legal right to extract an income. I don't see a moral basis, so I don't see how anything that impacts the interests of renters can be unfair. Bad on pragmatic level, perhaps, but not a moral one.

The moral basis is the tenancy contract signed by the tenant and landlord-unless you believe contracts should not be enforceable.
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