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Homes in 97% of U.S. cities are overvalued, Moody's says

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Re: Homes in 97% of U.S. cities are overvalued, Moody's says

#481

Post by glerk »

turtledove wrote: post #345

The sooner we collectively decide that housing shouldn't be a market, the better. We all need it, and we should figure out mechanisms to make it available to all. Practically that means paying to build and maintain housing stocks, changing tax incentives so developers are incentivized to build more housing and less luxury housing, charging a premium for unused land in desirable areas (parking lots don't house people)…

Housing shouldn't be a market? Then how would housing be allocated? The state builds and gives housing to everyone?

Maybe you should take a trip to Eastern Europe one of these days to see the final result of what you're advocating. Pros: everyone is given an apartment to live in. Cons: your city's skyline looks like this: https://i.imgur.com/5X1sIeP.jpg

"We collectively decide" just means you decide for me. You think you know better than everyone else and want to impose your values on others.

Re: Homes in 97% of U.S. cities are overvalued, Moody's says

#482

Post by turtledove »

headsoup wrote: post #444
turtledove wrote: post #416

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You could have a lottery, adjust prices within a regulated range, offer incentives for less desirable lots. You could reward developers for lots that have long wait lists and lots of interest, incentivizing developers who build places people want to live.

What if someone less fortunate 'wins' the mansion on the beach. How do they afford the future upkeep?

This is a fair question, and one I'm not entirely satisfied that I have the answer for. Ideally, in my mind, I wouldn't own my home but I'd also be on the hook for maintenance and upkeep. But I recognize this does not meet everyone's needs and needs more thought.

I would also hope that we would tend to build fewer mansions in favor of more multi family complexes, cohousing, coops, and small community oriented housing on the beach.

Re: Homes in 97% of U.S. cities are overvalued, Moody's says

#483

Post by vertis »

kriops wrote: post #424
turtledove wrote: post #413

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In what sense? I mean, I'd love it if that were the case, but at least here in the US housing is extremely commodified.

Wikipedia: "A commodity is an economic good (...) that has full or substantial fungibility. (...)" On the basis of geography alone, housing can not be a commodity.

You're confusing want and need though. You might not like to live in any house, and you might need to be roughly geographically located to do work, but for the most part any house that fits your family is interchangable.

When you take the other things, like job and where you want to send your kids to school it becomes a hell of a lot more fungible.

Given that commoditization is a scale, I would say it could be toward that end of the spectrum if we wanted it to be.

Re: Homes in 97% of U.S. cities are overvalued, Moody's says

#484

Post by simonh »

turtledove wrote: post #385
5ersi wrote: post #371

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Nobody "decided" that housing is a market. If something can be bought and sold, then this is inherently a market. Yes, we can and should regulate markets, and we probably all agree that the purpose of the housing is for people to have a roof over their head, as opposed to use housing as an (speculative) investment market. This can easily be regulated via taxes (on ownership and transactions), but it comes with a cave…

I buy electricity from a monopoly provider in my area, run the government. Is that a market? I buy sewer and garbage service likewise. There are some commodities we choose to operate as natural monopolies because competition and profit seeking leads to bad outcomes for society. My argument is fundamentally that housing is the same.

I'll try and argue the point without the useless pejoratives in a companion comment.

Those payments are the equivalent of rent in the housing market. The thing that isn't a market and isn't being bought and sold is the right to provide those services, it's the power grid and generation plants, or the garbage infrastructure. The monopoly on those is what is anti-market and is the equivalent of not being able to buy and sell property.

I'm not making a political point there, I happen to thing some thing are natural monopolies and that markets have their limit. Housing is a complex issue in this respect. Flats in big city blocks are much like a commodity and limited urban building space naturally reduces competition, while nice houses in the suburbs or country are very much a market with lots of options suiting different needs.

Re: Homes in 97% of U.S. cities are overvalued, Moody's says

#485

Post by Gh0stRAT »

tomato-sauce wrote: post #365
rsync wrote: post #328

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"... there are few if any middle-class families in the bay area that own their homes except by inheritance or some other luck ..." This is a ridiculous statement. There are plenty of middle class (by Bay Area standards) folks who have bought houses in Fremont and San Pablo and San Leandro and Hayward. In fact, even in Marin there are parts of Novato and weird pockets of West Marin (Forest Knolls ?) where this was, an…

I’m surprised anyone has heard of Forest Knolls! I grew up there. It definitely used to be weird and relatively affordable for the middle class but not really any more. Last year someone bought a house in the neighborhood for $1.3 m. It was worth $350k when my parents moved to the area about 25 years ago. The new owners have a pair of new Porsches in the driveway. Maybe that counts as middle class in the Bay Area the…

$350k in 1997-dollars means that 25 years ago, it was worth $627k in today-dollars.

Adjusting for inflation, it's doubled in real value over 25 years, which works out to I guess the point I'm trying to make is that $1.3M isn't worth what it used to be but it sounds big in our head because we remember a time when a dollar went a lot further than it does today.

Re: Homes in 97% of U.S. cities are overvalued, Moody's says

#486

Post by dazc »

turtledove wrote: post #475
shetill wrote: post #474

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The reason the housing has turned into such a market is not because the evil overlords are deciding. It's due to overwhelming demand and the supply cannot keep up, so landlords have the freedom to choose any prices. The reason there is so much demand is because there are way more people on this planet now than there ever used to be. So if you want cheaper houses, solve the overpopulation problem first.

Landlords don't need to raise rent if their costs aren't rising.

Landlords who acquired property 20 years will use 'market rate' as a justification. I know of someone making a living from such a building consisting of 2 small apartments and a single office. He doesn't have a job, just idols away at home at all day getting anxious about climate change and identity politics.

Re: Homes in 97% of U.S. cities are overvalued, Moody's says

#487

Post by carom »

turtledove wrote: post #416
paisawalla wrote: post #390

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How will you be deciding who gets to have a view of the ocean, and who gets to sleep next to the overpass? First come first serve? Birthright?

You could have a lottery, adjust prices within a regulated range, offer incentives for less desirable lots. You could reward developers for lots that have long wait lists and lots of interest, incentivizing developers who build places people want to live.

How often would people have to move?

Re: Homes in 97% of U.S. cities are overvalued, Moody's says

#488

Post by carom »

turtledove wrote: post #466
cycrutchfield wrote: post #392

Earlier quoted context omitted.

“profit from rent is amoral”. Care to elaborate on this? Does this ethical standard also extend to other human needs as well? For instance should farmers not be able to profit from providing food?

A farmer and a landlord are different things. My family are farmers, I've been a landlord. (FWIW, before anyone calls me a hypocrite, I paid back every renter every penny of profit I made from them plus appreciation.) The labor that the farmer puts in should absolutely be rewarded. But the labor of a farmer is absolutely nothing like a landlord who makes money purely because they had enough money to buy housing. Plen…

What if I owned farm land and hired someone to work it, and collected profit?

Re: Homes in 97% of U.S. cities are overvalued, Moody's says

#489

Post by maccard »

glerk wrote: post #481
turtledove wrote: post #345

The sooner we collectively decide that housing shouldn't be a market, the better. We all need it, and we should figure out mechanisms to make it available to all. Practically that means paying to build and maintain housing stocks, changing tax incentives so developers are incentivized to build more housing and less luxury housing, charging a premium for unused land in desirable areas (parking lots don't house people)…

Housing shouldn't be a market? Then how would housing be allocated? The state builds and gives housing to everyone? Maybe you should take a trip to Eastern Europe one of these days to see the final result of what you're advocating. Pros: everyone is given an apartment to live in. Cons: your city's skyline looks like this: https://i.imgur.com/5X1sIeP.jpg "We collectively decide" just means you decide for me. You think…

Eastern European cities aren't the only examples. Nordic cities (e.g. Stockholm and Copenhagen) are great examples - they have different problems but people are housed. Cities like Berlin don't have a speculative housing market due to excellent renters rights meaning the majority of people rent long term. Finally, Vienna is the poster child for "how to do social housing".
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