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Dutch cities want to ban property investors in all neighborhoods

nltimes.nl

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Re: Dutch cities want to ban property investors in all neighborhoods

#121

Post by inter_netuser »

nmca wrote: post #42

In the long term, the ethically right answer seems pretty clearly to me to be a land value tax [0]. But due to encouragement of home ownership [1], that's not going to democratically tenable in a lot of countries for 20+ years. Unfortunate situation. [0] In 1879, a man asked "How come all this new economic development and industrialized technology hasn't eliminated poverty and oppression?" That man was Henry George,…

how is land value tax any different from a property tax that all homeowners already pay?

If anything, it might end up being lower tax on residential housing, and much higher on commercial/retail.

Re: Dutch cities want to ban property investors in all neighborhoods

#122

Post by lsiebert »

csomar wrote: post #46
anothernewdude wrote: post #37

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Those empty homes should be torn down or squatted in. I imagine an organisation like a squatters union could be set up to manage protection for them.

Sure. Let's fix a housing crisis by completely breaking up laws, society and order.

America fixed it's British Colony issue by doing just that.

Re: Dutch cities want to ban property investors in all neighborhoods

#123

Post by jhgb »

988747 wrote: post #103
jhgb wrote: post #66

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There's no need for every family to sublet. Usually a small minority of residences house subletters. I'm not quite sure how worsening the situation for everyone by property investors hoarding houses would make it better for students, either.

Property investors are not "hoarding" houses. They buy them and then rent them out, thus increasing the supply. It is actually better for students this way: an investor that does not live in their property can rent out it whole. If a house can fit 5 people that means a living space for 5 students. If the house gets bought by a family, that family moves in, so 3 out of 5 spots are now occupied, leaving only 2 availabl…

> They buy them and then rent out, thus increasing the supply.

That doesn't increase supply. I'm really not sure how middlemen skimming money could increase supply since that should push the supply curve to the left.

> If the house gets bought by a family, that family moves in, so 3 out of 5 spots are now occupied, leaving only 2 available for rent.

And the family moved in from somewhere else, leaving you with three spots in that some other place plus two spots in the new place, so you have 5 places for students regardless. Not sure why you think this changes something.

The optimal solution is obviously to fix the dorm system. It's well organized, cheap, and space efficient - at least in my country, at about half the price of renting your own place. Surely my backwards country is not more capable than the Dutch in this respect.

Re: Dutch cities want to ban property investors in all neighborhoods

#124

Post by [deleted] »

nmca wrote: post #42

In the long term, the ethically right answer seems pretty clearly to me to be a land value tax [0]. But due to encouragement of home ownership [1], that's not going to democratically tenable in a lot of countries for 20+ years. Unfortunate situation. [0] In 1879, a man asked "How come all this new economic development and industrialized technology hasn't eliminated poverty and oppression?" That man was Henry George,…

[deleted]

Re: Dutch cities want to ban property investors in all neighborhoods

#125

Post by zeepthee »

thepangolino wrote: post #111
nmca wrote: post #42

In the long term, the ethically right answer seems pretty clearly to me to be a land value tax [0]. But due to encouragement of home ownership [1], that's not going to democratically tenable in a lot of countries for 20+ years. Unfortunate situation. [0] In 1879, a man asked "How come all this new economic development and industrialized technology hasn't eliminated poverty and oppression?" That man was Henry George,…

Wouldn't a land value tax encourage urban sprawling ? Current ubran policies in the western world, coupled with the normalization of remote working already do this to some extent.

How would it encourage urban sprawling?

Re: Dutch cities want to ban property investors in all neighborhoods

#126

Post by varjag »

toomanybeersies wrote: post #105
dmje wrote: post #25

Amen to this. Two case studies from the UK I've been thinking about recently: 1) Visiting London and spending time in South Kensington - walking back to hotel at night, only about 30% of houses had any lights on. Suggestion is the others are effectively uninhabited, and a search on RightMove shows properties sell for £20-£30m for a 4/5 bed. This isn't normal Londoners, it's outside investment. 2) Cornwall, where I li…

Has it ever been possible to buy a house on minimum wage?

I moved here years ago and was having doubts if it's the right time to buy at these insane property prices. A coworker said "I know some people who've been holding out for fair housing prices since 1949, they are still waiting".

Re: Dutch cities want to ban property investors in all neighborhoods

#127

Post by pydry »

mercy_dude wrote: post #39

There is a better way - raise the real rate. Cheap loans along with endless printing has basically made fiat useless as a medium to store value, the only reason fiat exists now is as a medium to exchange goods/services. Here the Fed has been buying over 100B of mortgage based securities a month. This got to stop. For all the talks about Wealth inequality, I don’t understand how politicians fail to understand this bas…

This would lead to a steep collapse of property prices and force new homeowners who have just scraped together enough for a deposit into negative equity. This would drive a lot of anger against it (all amplified by the media/ultrawealthy who would be furious too) even if it were the right thing to do long term.

The only time I could see this happening would be in the case the value of the dollar fell off a cliff due to externally triggered emergency.

Re: Dutch cities want to ban property investors in all neighborhoods

#128

Post by Aeolun »

akudha wrote: post #100
reacharavindh wrote: post #76

I may be biased because I moved recently to the Netherlands and looking to buy our first home and stop paying rent. But, the house prices are crazy out here. I work in tech and my wife is an academic. We earn what is definitely above market average, and it looks like we cannot afford most houses we find in the area where we are renting now(well outside Amsterdam). At this juncture, at least temporarily, investors who…

This is becoming a problem in farmlands too. Young farmers are unable to buy farmlands, they are forced to lease from huge landowners. It is zero risk investment for these big landowners. Farmers do all the work, put in all the investment like tools (except the land) - landowners simply collect rent. Some of these people own hundreds of thousands of acres (Bill Gates, for example). This is an ugly situation. This is…

Oh, I know! We can give them the land for free, but instead we get to collect a tax on their produce. Of course they cannot leave this arrangement without immediately paying for all the land.

I think we can call these people serfs.

Re: Dutch cities want to ban property investors in all neighborhoods

#129

Post by maccolgan »

bsksi wrote: post #60
keewee7 wrote: post #52

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm Danish and we call it "forstad". It's pretty much the same as a suburb. https://da.wikipedia.org/wiki/Forstad

I know they exist. What I'm saying is that European cities are built around the idea of people being able to live in walking distance of... Everything. Suburbs here exist for snobs and assholes.

Who are you speaking on behalf of?

Re: Dutch cities want to ban property investors in all neighborhoods

#130

Post by ForHackernews »

makomk wrote: post #106
ed_blackburn wrote: post #87

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Another Cornishman here (Par). The financial destitution and how much harder they have to work for the same things I do in the South East is unsustainable. Cornwall has Luther to the right politically and that’s because there’s been some useful scapegoats. Now those scapegoats have been slain and things are getting worse not better I hope we’ll see policies that are focused on root cause issues instead of ideology (l…

Unfortunately, the British press and all the wealthy people with second homes still have Brexit as a scapegoat for why cafes and shops in tourist destinations can't find staff. Never mind the fact that AirBNB and second homes have pushed up house prices and rents to the point that it's impossible to live there on the kind of pay those jobs have, according to the media it's all the fault of Brexit driving away the for…

That's a self-correcting problem, isn't it? Either those cafes and shops will raise prices and pay their staff more, or they'll close down. I've never understood why we're supposed to feel bad for "small business owners" who won't find staff when paying peanuts for their crappy jobs.
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