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What broke Sweden? Real estate bust exposes big divide

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Re: What broke Sweden? Real estate bust exposes big divide

#391

Post by swexbe »

ars wrote: post #380
Bellend wrote: post #155

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I believe we are in a time where everyone is milking the 90s-20s real estate bubble and no one wants to be first to fold. Internationally, not just on a per country basis. As soon as say, French real estate collapses (or UK or USA or Germany etc), the whole rotten castle of cards will fold as well. If it doesn't you can enjoy the expensive property, but you won't be eating farmed foods, won't be in a clean environmen…

What does "fold" even mean? Real estate prices are not being artificially elevated, they are a simple function of supply and demand. Just build more houses and prices will do down, and they'll go down slowly, without collapsing. The typical model works like this: The suburbs around a city grow, the city runs out of space. This causes land in the suburbs to become expensive, so they subdivide lots and build more house…

No, the problem is that suburbs are the only thing we build anymore. Fresno has doubled it’s population since 1940 while 10x increasing it’s land usage.

Re: What broke Sweden? Real estate bust exposes big divide

#392

Post by conceptme »

nemo44x wrote: post #223
baseline-shift wrote: post #213

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In Japan, there are empty houses going cheap as old people die off. In a few decades, possibly there will be some effect as the de-population bomb from lowered birthrates globally begin to affect real estate prices. Let's hope.

Japan is unique for a few reasons: 1) Very insulated culture with nearly no immigration coupled with low birth rates. 2) They build houses very differently. They aren't generally made to last centuries if taken care of and renovated. The strategy is to build small units cheaply and tare down after 2- years. It's like Ikea for homes. 3) I agree, depopulation is a problem. We really need to incentivize middle and upper…

I read an article a week ago where they paid people to move outside of Tokyo as it's overpopulated.

Re: What broke Sweden? Real estate bust exposes big divide

#394

Post by tmnvix »

serpix wrote: post #358
timkam wrote: post #10

A key problem in Sweden -- besides the weird interaction of privatization and legacy over-regulation -- is that the current inflation and rising interest rates break the social contract: a relatively even salary distribution allowed many people to have a solid middle-class life style, recently albeit with never-ending mortgages. Now, the interest rates are too high for these mortgages to be even superficially sustain…

With mortgages paying down only the interest doesn't this mean people can become chained to the property? Unable to sell due to the value drop and having to own money to the bank after selling?

Negative equity is going to become a real problem for a lot of people who purchased in booming markets over the last few years.

As far as I'm aware, most places are 'non-recourse'. Some people might say "if you can carry on making the payments you'll be fine". This isn't true though. Not being able to move city for a job, being unable to upgrade to a larger place to start a family, or feeling financial pressure to stay in an unhealthy relationship are all very real potential problems.

Re: What broke Sweden? Real estate bust exposes big divide

#395

Post by robocat »

amelius wrote: post #224
b112 wrote: post #148

Earlier quoted context omitted.

then just about any solution How can you make such a claim, when you look at the state of many regions/countries in the world?

11.6% of Americans live in poverty.

Is that the World Bank numbers? They think poverty rate was:

  Sri Lanka  4.1% 2016
  Kazakhstan 4.3% 2018
  Morocco    4.8% 2013
  Belarus    5%   2019
Fuck the World Bank numbers. I’ve been to Sri Lanka and poverty is real over there.

Oh, and “According to the U.S. Census Bureau, the official 2017 poverty rate in the U.S. was 12.3%. However, other sources placed it as high as 17.8%. [snip] The 2021 poverty threshold in the United States is $26,246 for a family of four”.

So the poverty figures are relative to the wealth of the country? That makes the numbers meaningless to compare (since there is no standard cutoff - just pick a number that gives you a poverty rate of x%).

Re: What broke Sweden? Real estate bust exposes big divide

#396

Post by ricardobayes »

watrami wrote: post #103

It seems like it's the same story everywhere I look. Housing is the main driver of inequality and there is little change happening. We have the same problem here in Germany. I am currently living in Munich to finish my CS Master's at TUM and build a startup, and it is absolutely impossible to find anything remotely affordable. I am supported by two startup scholarships and make enough to get by, but no landlord even…

If you are able to work remotely, Spain is fantastic at the moment. Relatively low real estate rent/purchase prices. You can still get a nice 3 bedroom house with a pool under 200k by the Mediterranean sea (of course well, not in Marbella). There are some surprisingly high-tech jobs locally as well, the space industry is booming right now. Lots of programming jobs in Madrid, Barcelona and Valencia even if you don't speak Spanish. Just had two acquaintances move over and they both found tech jobs within a month (in English). There is startup culture and events as well. Surprisingly, Spanish companies are really hiring at the moment unlike most of Europe. It's not been hit as hard with inflation either. Plus, government and population are for the most part pretty grown-up and progressive. Universal base income, focus on equality etc...

Re: What broke Sweden? Real estate bust exposes big divide

#398

Post by ndsipa_pomu »

dumbotron wrote: post #307
TulliusCicero wrote: post #239

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> It seems like it's the same story everywhere I look. Housing is the main driver of inequality and there is little change happening. It's a way of transferring money from younger adults to older adults, and older adults vote. It's basically an intergenerational pyramid scheme where each generation pays to the previous one, and each time they pay more. Of course, like any pyramid scheme, you can only keep it up so lo…

Imagine if votes were weighted by life expectancy

I'd imagine political parties would then be poisoning their opponents' voters or encouraging diseases so that they could win/remain in power.

Re: What broke Sweden? Real estate bust exposes big divide

#399

Post by dgellow »

watrami wrote: post #103

It seems like it's the same story everywhere I look. Housing is the main driver of inequality and there is little change happening. We have the same problem here in Germany. I am currently living in Munich to finish my CS Master's at TUM and build a startup, and it is absolutely impossible to find anything remotely affordable. I am supported by two startup scholarships and make enough to get by, but no landlord even…

Munich is the most expensive place in Germany, by far. It’s not as extreme everywhere.

Re: What broke Sweden? Real estate bust exposes big divide

#400

Post by ndsipa_pomu »

bandrami wrote: post #125
rhaway84773 wrote: post #45

The Sweden story sounds so much like the SF story. Area doesn’t building housing, leading to a massive increase in house prices and a destruction of class mobility as the rich get richer (as their houses get more valuable) and the poor get poorer (as they pay more to rent the same living space). The growing wealth inequality leads to all sorts of other dysfunction including increased crime, worsening services, etc. a…

> the rich get richer ... and the poor get poorer I mean, what's actually happening is that the rich get richer and the poor also get richer but at a slower rate > growing wealth inequality leads to all sorts of other dysfunction including increased crime No, we have significantly higher inequality than the 1990s and significantly lower crime. So the opposite of what you said.

> No, we have significantly higher inequality than the 1990s and significantly lower crime.

I wonder how much of that is due to removing lead from fuel?

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