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The carpetbagger’s guide to home ownership

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Re: The carpetbagger’s guide to home ownership

#181

Post by mauvehaus »

jeffreyrogers wrote: post #178
halpert wrote: post #168

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I've looked into moving to Japan. My family has a house in Setagaya, which had severely distorted what I thought Tokyo living to be. It turns out, a typical one bedroom apartment is like 20 sq meters. Separate from that, I don't believe zoning has anything to do with housing shortages. Housing has "induced demand" similar to traffic. You can look at heavy traffic over a bridge and think, "if only we had another bridg…

Houston's housing isn't expensive though. It has few zoning laws and is not land constrained though (unlike NYC or SF).

There's also an awfully short list of places in the US that sprawl more than Houston.

I'm not arguing that sprawl is inherently bad, but it definitely does add the need to own a car (for most people) and spend a lot of time in it (ditto).

Re: The carpetbagger’s guide to home ownership

#182

Post by Ozzie_osman »

treis wrote: post #172
Ozzie_osman wrote: post #121

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Here's a person who worked a working class job, lived frugally, saved up, took a few risks, and was able to buy a couple out of state properties. How this will be perceived? Very positively, at least by me. Good for them. We're not talking about a slumlord here.

The part you're missing is that they bought into one of the highest appreciation real estate markets ever. Yes they made smart moves, but this is mostly a story of falling ass backwards into wealth. Put them in almost any other city and the story doesn't end the same. And the cherry on top is that they use their new found wealth to deny others the opportunity they had.

I'm missing what they did that denies others opportunity. Buying a couple houses in another state?

And sure, any wealth story has some piece that involves luck and/or timing. Nothing wrong with that.

Re: The carpetbagger’s guide to home ownership

#183

Post by cma »

np_tedious wrote: post #92
cma wrote: post #54

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why not buy securities with inflation protection? The treasury offers them.

I think you're training about i bonds, and they are capped at 10k / person / year

No, but good to buy those too. You can buy these uncapped: https://www.treasurydirect.gov/indiv/products/prod_tips_glan...

Re: The carpetbagger’s guide to home ownership

#184

Post by refurb »

HarryHirsch wrote: post #170
refurb wrote: post #165

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don’t disagree that zoning impacts prices, but it’s still “fair market price”, no? I choose to move to SF knowing that rents were absurd compared to other cities I could have moved to. But I choose to roll the dice on SF being the better choice. I get it that people who grew up in SF face a different choice - leave or not. But it’s still a choice for them.

Established landlords have friends on the local council, and can determine who gets a building permit. Prices are set by the two or three biggest players, who all know each other. That stuff happens all the time.

Sure, but someone still makes a decision “yes this rent is worth it” or “no I’ll go somewhere else”.

Re: The carpetbagger’s guide to home ownership

#185

Post by aww_dang »

bradlys wrote: post #151
VRay wrote: post #84

People are fighting the wrong fight when they attack this guy (or attack the people attacking this guy, for that matter) It isn't SF Bay Bros'/foreigners'/companies' fault that houses are too expensive. It's because of strict zoning laws and a lack of building enough housing to match supply with demand[1]. Demand keeps going up way faster than supply, nationwide, and we're all feeling the squeeze [1]: A great example…

Main thing I see people attacking this guy over is the “I did it and so can you” mentality more than anything. It’s survivorship bias at its strongest. No different than the FIRE post trending here as well. Dude literally saw his NW double in a year and income go up 50% cause of stock appreciation. Along with incredible starting salary and overall close to top tier comp the entire way - and no kids or what not. I thi…

>"I did it and so can you"

What is the antithesis here? "You won't succeed, so don't bother trying. Become an employee, rail against capitalism and wage slavery."

Dismissing it as luck can only work if the author succeeded on the first try. Did everyone succeed on the first try? Before it can be called "survivor's bias", you need to survive. If you croak at the first unforeseen and perhaps unfair hardship...

What is missing from many of these stories are the concepts and ideas which were eliminated by failure or analysis. It would be unusual for the first idea that pops into someone's head to come to successful fruition.

Maybe it would be illustrative if the author listed all of his failed endeavors and how he reasoned his way through them. Undoubtedly, it would make for much longer-form content and perhaps ramble off-track from his chosen subject.

Persistence is an unspoken companion to what you flippantly dismiss as luck. Trial and error, iterative improvements and self-sacrifice are also key ingredients.

Of course, you don't need to listen to that. It is much easier to lay blame than manifest the change you wish to see.

Re: The carpetbagger’s guide to home ownership

#186

Post by treis »

Ozzie_osman wrote: post #182
treis wrote: post #172

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The part you're missing is that they bought into one of the highest appreciation real estate markets ever. Yes they made smart moves, but this is mostly a story of falling ass backwards into wealth. Put them in almost any other city and the story doesn't end the same. And the cherry on top is that they use their new found wealth to deny others the opportunity they had.

I'm missing what they did that denies others opportunity. Buying a couple houses in another state? And sure, any wealth story has some piece that involves luck and/or timing. Nothing wrong with that.

>I'm missing what they did that denies others opportunity. Buying a couple houses in another state?

Yes. The number of affordable fixer uppers in a place like Madison is effectively fixed. The two houses they bought means two fewer young people can climb onto the property ladder.

>And sure, any wealth story has some piece that involves luck and/or timing. Nothing wrong with that.

The wrong part is not having the self awareness to realize that they were lucky.

Re: The carpetbagger’s guide to home ownership

#187

Post by HarryHirsch »

brigandish wrote: post #106
VRay wrote: post #82

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You're the one ignoring reality. In your defense, basically every clueless voter living in the US and a lot of Europe does it too, though. In Tokyo, you can work part time as a non-union, non-salaried janitor or a nail stylist and make enough to live within 20 minutes of the bustling heart of downtown. That's due to light zoning restrictions making housing into a depreciating asset for everybody instead of a stupid f…

I can't believe that anyone who actually lives or has lived in Japan and who has also lived outside of Japan could defend the property market in Japan, so I am willing to presume that you are not in that group. It's a corrupt, poorly regulated market that suits the construction industry and produces - on the whole - ugly, poorly insulated and tiny living spaces, surrounded by concrete (again, the amount of concrete u…

Never set feet into Japan, but the US construction industry is no better. The only difference is that what you get isn't tiny and made from concrete, instead it's huge and made from sheetrock and chipboard. But it's ugly, shoddy, poorly insulated and overpriced. And the industry and the permitting process is corrupt.

Re: The carpetbagger’s guide to home ownership

#188

Post by onion2k »

strken wrote: post #167
onion2k wrote: post #140

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I remain steadfastly convinced that it's good for humans to have some unnecessary luxuries. It'd be amazing if everyone had things they don't need. I'd love to live in a world where everyone had what they need and more . That's a no brainer. The problem is that you're saying "the luxuries they're unwilling to compromise on" should be considered needs because some entitled rich idiot isn't able to accept that they cou…

All of those things I listed are things I've either done, or that someone I know has done. Arguing that you need windows or a private room is ridiculous. You do not need them, though they're a reasonable want that nearly everyone has. Not having a private room to sleep in didn't kill me, it doesn't kill the billions of people who do it, and it wouldn't kill you. The broader point here is that whittling away everythin…

Needs are things that people need in order to live with dignity and respect; they are not simply "things you'd die if you didn't have."

Re: The carpetbagger’s guide to home ownership

#189

Post by ahepp »

yholio wrote: post #119
djbebs wrote: post #94

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No, they don't. Ifbyou want control over who can move in somewhere, or what can be built somewhere, you have a simple solution, buy the land in question.

> buy the land in question. NIMBYs will argue that, in a certain sense, they did: they bought the land their houses stand on decades or centuries ago, when the area was farm land, and then promoted a city charter for a certain type of community, together with every other citizen in the area. They paid taxes for local infrastructure, schools, time and effort to organize and solve community issues, inconvenience when a…

I have been pondering this recently, and I feel the most fair solution is to simply reduce the of landowners to have input on what other people do with their land.

I believe the comparison to limited farmland is actually much more appropriate. Land in SF or Seattle is a very valuable and scarce resource. It can help a lot of people when used efficiently.

If you take Seattle for example, the land isn’t valuable because NIMBYs did such a great job running the city. They’ve done an awful job. Every possible mistake has been made. The land is valuable because it’s close to Amazon or Microsoft.

I don’t think that a decline in my property’s value should be a basis for legal restrictions on another person’s right to use their property. That seems like a hijacking of the legal system for my own personal wealth at the very real cost of others.

If a wealthy landowner in Seattle wants a yard and hates the look of skyscrapers, they can sell their land for millions of dollars and buy in a community more suited to their tastes. Nobody likes to move, but making it illegal to use land efficiently for one’s own convenience is frankly pretty disgusting to me.

Re: The carpetbagger’s guide to home ownership

#190

Post by onion2k »

AYBABTME wrote: post #164
onion2k wrote: post #117

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Anyone who thinks the privacy to sleep in your own bedroom and the luxury to have a second kitchen to use for canning fruit because it'd make using your first kitchen a little harder are two points on the same scale is just plain wrong. They aren't. One is a point on the scale of "things you need for basic human dignity", and the other is a point on the scale of "amusing shit deluded rich people think is normal." Tho…

A lot of people with good life outlooks and plenty of dignity have their entire family sleeping in the same bedroom. Your "basic human needs" are actually on a scale that isn't "basic" or "need" at all. I've spent 2y in such a setting, my wife grew up like that. Probably more than half of the planet lives like that.

I am certainly posting in the capacity of having a Western outlook. I didn't make that clear and you rightly point out that the particular need we're talking about isn't a universal one.
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