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Squatting in Spain: Understanding Spain's "okupas" problem

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Re: Squatting in Spain: Understanding Spain's "okupas" problem

#691

Post by zrn900 »

nerdawson wrote: post #541
zrn900 wrote: post #500

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> The actual outcome The actual outcome is that the policy does force people to use their houses and increase the available rental houses. > ordinary middle-class people. You seem to have meant 'working-class'. Outside the US nobody calls them 'middle class'. Middle class people in Spain would be white collar professionals who own more than one house. You people are literally making up things about a country that you…

> You people are literally making up things about a country that you don't know about. I’m not from the US. I spent 2 years living in Spain. Are you claiming that the average Spanish citizen believes that a typical person should be responsible for freeloaders rather than the government?

> I’m not from the US.

Even if you are not, your philosophy seems to be from there. Works out to the same.

> I spent 2 years living in Spain

Yeah that should have given you the past, present and future knowledge of all things about Spain.

> Are you claiming that the average Spanish citizen believes that a typical person should be responsible for freeloaders rather than the government?

Excellent example of how you have been talking about a country without knowing about it. Spaniards dont call them freeloaders. Even using that word means that you are American in mentality even if not geographically. The attitude is that if those people need it and some well-off person ends up with okupas in his second house, no one bats an eye and many even would say 'the bastards deserve it'. And anyone who has an extra house is 'well-off'.

Re: Squatting in Spain: Understanding Spain's "okupas" problem

#692

Post by bdowling »

carlosjobim wrote: post #664
bdowling wrote: post #493

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Are landlords the most vulnerable people right now? Increasing risk will eliminate a lot of the "mom and pop" landlords (widows, former small-business owners, retirees, etc.). If it is too risky to own only a few extra condo units or a single small apartment building, then those properties will go to large corporate landlords. > there are people whose sole contribution to society is "owning flats". Landlords make s…

Is it worth the major part of a full time worker's income to have somebody take care of those things in the rare occasion they happen? Most normal people can easily fix their plumbing issues, a leaky roof, termites and such in a couple of days with a few hundreds of dollars in budget. Landlords generally spend much less than 5% of their yearly rent income on maintenance. If they actually do something to improve an ap…

> that they own 100%

You might be surprised to learn that many small rental properties are heavily mortgaged. Along with insurance and property taxes, the biggest cost is usually mortgage interest. Some owners even lose money for a few years until the rents rise to meet the costs so that they can break even. (These owners are playing the long game, believing that rent and property values will go up over time and eventually their investment will be a good one compared to their other investment options.)

Re: Squatting in Spain: Understanding Spain's "okupas" problem

#693

Post by winterismute »

misja111 wrote: post #607
ghostDancer wrote: post #598

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In Spain there are lots of empty apartments, from the bubble and IIRC are more than 2 million empty , but prices are still going up, most of the market is on the hands of foreign funds who are emptying the cities with their prices. There's a lot of speculation with housing in Spain. Not to talk about the campaign in the media about squatting, sowing fear continuously. The supply is artificially being held by the owne…

Then the government should make it less attractive for speculators to hold those homes, e.g. by introducing taxes for empty properties. And on the other hand they could make it more attractive for them to rent them out, e.g. by improving owner's rights.

The problem imho is that a lot of people, not only "the very rich" but also some very "middle class" people/families, have access and can make use of houses as investment vehicles, but houses (aka shelter) is also a primary need for humans. If you hold share of a publicly traded company, you can hold it forever until you think somebody can accept to buy it from you at a price that you like, hoping to make a profit if such price is high enough, and nobody will suffer from this process. But with houses, there is always somebody in absolute need for it, which means that either they will accept to rent it to a price that covers extra taxes applied by the state to you (as a landlord), or they will try to squat if they can not. It's really hard to enforce the right set of disincentives that are wide enough to convince people not to "hold" but at the same time does not apply to too many people but mostly the ones that are using houses as investments.

The whole thing is complicated by being geographically unequal: for example I think even Spain is full of affordable houses, only they are not in Madrid or Barcelona or Valencia, which is where people really want to live. So if you have a second house in an unpopular town you actually have not much - thus you are not rich - and you have often an empty house (nobody wants to rent/buy it) which is an easy target for squatters, and therefore you will become "one of the poor people ruined by squatters", while othen you are somebody who accepted the narrative that using houses as investment was a good idea, both an investment house cheaply in a town that never attracted enough people, thus "lost the game" and is now also losing the house to squatters...

Re: Squatting in Spain: Understanding Spain's "okupas" problem

#694

Post by zrn900 »

piuantiderp wrote: post #440
diggan wrote: post #390

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's anecdotal though... How many of the current okupas happen in other's primary residence? Would be considered trespassing in those cases and a lot easier to get rid of them, compared to the other cases.

Lmao, that's wishful thinking. That's why in decent countries you can get them curb-stomped and their teeth kicked-in for invading a property.

> That's why in decent countries you can get them curb-stomped and their teeth kicked-in for invading a property.

Yeah. Decent countries like the US, and you end up with 99% of the population being unable to buy a house.

https://www.cbsnews.com/news/homes-for-sale-affordable-housi...

Lol at the delirium of you people's mentality. You don't know what 'decency' is. If that's decent, literally f*ck that.

Re: Squatting in Spain: Understanding Spain's "okupas" problem

#695

Post by kerkeslager »

RestlessMind wrote: post #683
kerkeslager wrote: post #653

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That logic also applies to demand. Why would you buy a house if someone can waltz in and... It's very much not in evidence that this is affecting supply more than demand.

> That logic also applies to demand. Why would you buy a house if someone can waltz in and... The clear answer is you'd buy one if you know how to handle squatters. In other words, you are well connected and have enough capital to take preventive measures described in the article. In other words, rich can get richer by having lengthy security apparatus to protect their property. Middle class investors, who might want…

> Why would you build new housing when someone can waltz in and change the locks and youre shit out of luck?

The clear answer is you'd build one when you know how to handle squatters.

> If so, let's pull that ladder away from everyone including the rich

Yes!

> not everyone can be a homeowner

Why?

Re: Squatting in Spain: Understanding Spain's "okupas" problem

#696

Post by s1artibartfast »

kerkeslager wrote: post #690
s1artibartfast wrote: post #681

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I support cheap and affordable housing. I support charity for people that are honest members of society. I think unrepentant thieves need to be incarcerated, not because they deserve a housing, but to protect innocent people from their destructive Behavior. >Quoting so you can't retract. I don't think you'll find much agreement there. I think you'll find that you are in the minority. Look at laws for felony theft. I…

> I think you'll find that you are in the minority. Look at laws for felony theft. I think the laws for felony theft as compared to the laws for murder and rape are pretty solid evidence that rape and murder are considered more serious crimes than theft. And that's setting aside that there are plenty of theft laws that are even less serious than felony theft. In cases where people are stealing to meet their basic nee…

> What's your argument for landlordism not being theft? Shouldn't those people get a job too? Or is theft only a crime when poor people do it?

It is very simple. Theft is when you take something from someone without voluntary agreement. renters and landlords enter voluntary agreement. If a landlord has a job or not seems irrelevant. They didn't steal anything from anyone. Everything they have, they obtained through mutually consensual exchange.

How do you think landlordism could be considered theft? Is it just because people need/want shelter that they have?

Is a farmer who grows food a thief because people need food to live?

Is a doctor a thief because you die without surgery?

Is a mechanic a thief because your car needs repair?

In my mind, lacking, wanting, or even needing something does not mean that everyone who has it and charges you is a thief.

Re: Squatting in Spain: Understanding Spain's "okupas" problem

#697

Post by nerdawson »

zrn900 wrote: post #691
nerdawson wrote: post #541

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> You people are literally making up things about a country that you don't know about. I’m not from the US. I spent 2 years living in Spain. Are you claiming that the average Spanish citizen believes that a typical person should be responsible for freeloaders rather than the government?

> I’m not from the US. Even if you are not, your philosophy seems to be from there. Works out to the same. > I spent 2 years living in Spain Yeah that should have given you the past, present and future knowledge of all things about Spain. > Are you claiming that the average Spanish citizen believes that a typical person should be responsible for freeloaders rather than the government? Excellent example of how you hav…

I'm merely pointing out that you're assuming ignorance simply because I have a different opinion to you. Having lived there myself, I'd like to think I have something of an understanding of the culture.

Freeloaders, admittedly a charged word, is how I'd view someone who helps themselves to something I've worked to pay for. How is that any different to a mugger stealing your phone or your wallet? After all, they're likely in a worse financial position than you. If you can afford to replace it, let them have at it.

> And anyone who has an extra house is 'well-off'.

I don't want to fall into a strawman here but my interpretation is that you're fine with criminals stealing from someone, as long as they're in a better financial position than you are. It's convenient to imagine that the only people falling victim to this are those who can afford to have their property stolen from them.

Re: Squatting in Spain: Understanding Spain's "okupas" problem

#698

Post by s1artibartfast »

Dylan16807 wrote: post #648
s1artibartfast wrote: post #575

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>I'm pretty sure they're talking about real property. Land and improvements. Not the strong taking away everything you have. An individual has to be very careful not to create any real property value or improvements, otherwise it will be taken from you. Conceptually there are lots of solutions to managing this problem. Historically, they rely on a state institution that goes around stripping people of what they creat…

> An individual has to be very careful not to create any real property value or improvements, otherwise it will be taken from you. This is the experience of the vast majority of renters. It's not too bad. And something like "you can own X amount of house" doesn't require going anywhere near communism.

>This is the experience of the vast majority of renters. It's not too bad.

I think it is terrible. I like to be productive and crate value. Absolutely miserable without it. I hated being a renter for this reason.

>And something like "you can own X amount of house" doesn't require going anywhere near communism.

There are so many better ways to solve this problem than putting a cap on value creation.

Re: Squatting in Spain: Understanding Spain's "okupas" problem

#699

Post by throwaway2037 »

Levitz wrote: post #276
southerntofu wrote: post #210

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> You are in IT earning only 20K EUR per year? Do you realize most people working in IT are paid minimum wage or close to that? Most sysadmins and developers i've met here in France are under 2000€/month and it's only on places like HN that i read about huge salaries in IT. (sorry i don't have stats this is just anecdata)

Spain has exceptionally low wages in the IT sector though, taking cost of living into account and all.

Why don't people move to a place with higher wages? Spain a member of the EU.

And, why do people enter IT in Spain, if the wages are so terrible?

Re: Squatting in Spain: Understanding Spain's "okupas" problem

#700

Post by throwaway2037 »

ccozan wrote: post #225
spaniard89277 wrote: post #218

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It is a pretty normal salary here in Spain. The housing crisis is happening because of several factors, but mostly because there's a huge increase in demand due to immigration (millions of people coming) from all profiles (richer and poorer) so we're getting squeezed hard. The regulations around housing are so bad that almost nothing is getting built. What's getting built is for wealthy people, and no public housing…

I can suggest Romania. Depending on your IT skills, 2000 euro in IT is considered minimum and country is still very cheap to live in. There is a great shortage in IT there.. Climate also similar to Spain in sommer , you will get used to winters as well. Seaside and mountains are available.

Great suggestion. Plus, the language will be easy to learn for a native Spanish speaker.
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