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19% of California houses are owned by investors

ocregister.com

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Re: 19% of California houses are owned by investors

#51

Post by ianferrel »

ashdksnndck wrote: post #14

I’m interested in the methodology they use to identify investor-owned homes. Are they comparing known resident addresses to the names on property tax records? How does it work when multiple members of the same family have different last names? It seems fairly common for members of different generations of family (including in-laws) to live in a house that one person owns. How are you distinguishing an investment from…

California has a homeowner-occupied tax exemption, and it is listed on the county assessor's website whether a given property is taking it (at least it is for a relative's property in CA I just checked). So I expect they're using that.

This might undercount (if owners don't file the form) or overcount (tax fraud or error), but there's financial incentives to get it right on both sides, so it's probably fairly accurate.

Re: 19% of California houses are owned by investors

#53

Post by fortran77 »

koolba wrote: post #32
nikanj wrote: post #17

California real estate is such a tragedy, as huge portions of the population are suffering from a housing shortage caused almost exclusively by not building enough homes. A majority of people own real estate, so they're happy with the status quo. Why would you put up with even the slightest personal inconvenience from added housing, if all it got you was a reduced value of your property?

> California real estate is such a tragedy, as huge portions of the population are suffering from a housing shortage caused almost exclusively by not building enough homes. The real issue with CA real estate is prop 13. It directly disincentivizes selling your home as you would be paying significantly higher taxes on the same house (same value etc) somewhere else. So if you do own a home, you’re much better off keepi…

> The real issue with CA real estate is prop 13

I don't want to be forced out of my home because the neighbors paid too much for theirs raising my "property value" and tax assessment.

Re: 19% of California houses are owned by investors

#54

Post by jondwillis »

arcticbull wrote: post #26

I mean someone has to rent, to renters right? Not everyone plans to live in the same place forever, and not everyone wants to put up the capital to buy a place. Some percentage of housing needs to be owned by investors to make that capacity available for short-term living. What's the delta between 19% and neutral? California has a massive housing problem, which is just not building enough houses. Doesn't matter much…

I live in the (relatively affordable) part of the “hills” in LA, and there are a LOT of houses (single family and some multi-family, not apartments) sitting unoccupied, prices not moving. I’m talking 1+ year on the market. The managing real estate agents do some Zillow dance moves from what I can tell to obfuscate how slow the market is, and avoid lowering the prices significantly, even to 2021ish levels.

This indicates some broken market dynamics to me. Entities with more capital are having property sit unoccupied, decaying slowly, paying property taxes, because they are betting their self-interested reward for doing so outweighs the risk.

I realize this doesn’t generalize to the entire housing stock, but it sure seems vulgar to me.

Re: 19% of California houses are owned by investors

#55

Post by nemomarx »

fortran77 wrote: post #44
rtkwe wrote: post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Easy first step is anything not listed as owned by individual people. Investors will have some type of business ownership arrangement in 99%+ of cases and individuals will rarely have an LLC or similar setup for their purchases.

My house is owned by an LLC that I own. I live in the house and don't rent it. If you count this way you will overcount by quite a bit!

Why'd you set up an LLC for this?

Re: 19% of California houses are owned by investors

#56

Post by joe_the_user »

xoqem wrote: post #10

For anyone who didn't click into the article, the headline may be misleading without the sub headline, which currently is "Relatively speaking, California is not a hot spot for housing investors". The map graphic shows that 19% is lower than other large states (e.g. 22% in Texas, 21% in Florida, 20% in New York). And lower than other west coast states generally (22% in Washington and Oregon, 25% in Nevada, and 23% in…

The headline isn't misleading unless your only concern is placing California in relative position.

The headline is true and relevant if you are wondering how investors influence housing prices - with a 20% share, clearly investors influence prices a lot. Moreover, California is where the housing bubble began but it's quite logical it's no longer where the bubble is concentrated so again 20% doesn't imply investor ownership is unimportant.

Re: 19% of California houses are owned by investors

#57

Post by taeric »

whimsicalism wrote: post #45
taeric wrote: post #39

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This kind of cuts to the problem of conflating housing to houses. Most short term living is almost certainly better served by things other than stand alone houses. Is why colleges are dominated by dorms.

I prefer to rent whole homes and would appreciate that not being legislated away.

I don't disagree? Just noting that that is largely not in this number.

Re: 19% of California houses are owned by investors

#58

Post by grafmax »

xoqem wrote: post #10

For anyone who didn't click into the article, the headline may be misleading without the sub headline, which currently is "Relatively speaking, California is not a hot spot for housing investors". The map graphic shows that 19% is lower than other large states (e.g. 22% in Texas, 21% in Florida, 20% in New York). And lower than other west coast states generally (22% in Washington and Oregon, 25% in Nevada, and 23% in…

And yet 20% of the market being captured by those who already have a home, while so many go without one, indicates a shortcoming in our society’s ability to distribute resources from those who don’t need them to those who do.

Re: 19% of California houses are owned by investors

#59

Post by AnimalMuppet »

tossandthrow wrote: post #20
jimmytucson wrote: post #15

To save you a click, 19% is actually not a lot (I thought it was): > 19% of California houses were owned by investors, ranking No. 36 among the states and just below the 20% national norm. States with the highest share of investor-owned houses: > Hawaii at 40%, Alaska at 35%, Vermont at 31%, West Virginia at 30%, and Wyoming at 30%. States with the lowest are all in the Mid-Atlantic and lower New England: > Connectic…

That doesn't really qualify it for "not a lot". Look at it in a historic or idealized context. Personally I would say that is is a lot, and also too much - people tend to be less indifferent about things they own.

You say it is a lot, but you also say to look in a historic context. So, got any data to present, to say that 19% is a lot historically?

Re: 19% of California houses are owned by investors

#60

Post by siliconc0w »

koolba wrote: post #32
nikanj wrote: post #17

California real estate is such a tragedy, as huge portions of the population are suffering from a housing shortage caused almost exclusively by not building enough homes. A majority of people own real estate, so they're happy with the status quo. Why would you put up with even the slightest personal inconvenience from added housing, if all it got you was a reduced value of your property?

> California real estate is such a tragedy, as huge portions of the population are suffering from a housing shortage caused almost exclusively by not building enough homes. The real issue with CA real estate is prop 13. It directly disincentivizes selling your home as you would be paying significantly higher taxes on the same house (same value etc) somewhere else. So if you do own a home, you’re much better off keepi…

+1

Prop 13 massively distorts the market and creates large disparities in what two neighbors may be paying. It essentially ensures that you cannot live where you were born, breaking up families and hurting communities.

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