Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Most renters shut out of energy-saving upgrades – study

binghamton.edu

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

91–100 of 113 posts

Re: Most renters shut out of energy-saving upgrades – study

#91

Post by throwaway81523 »

ww520 wrote: post #83

There's the plug-in solar panel system. It's very easy to install. It's suitable for renters to add supplemental solar power with little cost and effort. It's portable enough that renters can bring them to their next rentals. It's very popular in Germany, with several million units installed. They call it balcony solar panel. People hang the panels on their balconies in apartment buildings. Germany allows up to 800-w…

> balcony solar

That's swell if you have a balcony facing the sun and enough space for 4m2 of solar without blocking your neighbors' sun. In my unit for example, it's completely infeasible.

Re: Most renters shut out of energy-saving upgrades – study

#92

Post by sgerenser »

throwaway81523 wrote: post #91
ww520 wrote: post #83

There's the plug-in solar panel system. It's very easy to install. It's suitable for renters to add supplemental solar power with little cost and effort. It's portable enough that renters can bring them to their next rentals. It's very popular in Germany, with several million units installed. They call it balcony solar panel. People hang the panels on their balconies in apartment buildings. Germany allows up to 800-w…

> balcony solar That's swell if you have a balcony facing the sun and enough space for 4m2 of solar without blocking your neighbors' sun. In my unit for example, it's completely infeasible.

These also aren’t allowed by code anywhere in the U.S. AFAIK.

Re: Most renters shut out of energy-saving upgrades – study

#93

Post by 7speter »

jmyeet wrote: post #29

There is always going to be an adversarial relationship between landlords and renters. Make no mistake: that we allow this to happen is state violence. Why? Because we are allowing individuals and corporations to deny housing to people by raising prices to make it unaffordable. We even allow them to collude [1]. The only solution to this that demonstrably works is for the state to provide a significant amount of hous…

Why yes, those evil wallstreet adjacent millionaire landlords who may rent out their basement to keep the lights on, are evil lizard people.

Re: Most renters shut out of energy-saving upgrades – study

#94

Post by throwaway81523 »

sgerenser wrote: post #92
throwaway81523 wrote: post #91

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> balcony solar That's swell if you have a balcony facing the sun and enough space for 4m2 of solar without blocking your neighbors' sun. In my unit for example, it's completely infeasible.

These also aren’t allowed by code anywhere in the U.S. AFAIK.

I'm not sure but I think California may have something in the pipe.

https://legiscan.com/CA/text/SB868/id/3299951

Re: Most renters shut out of energy-saving upgrades – study

#96

Post by immibis »

gruez wrote: post #36
immibis wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A landlord is a parasite by definition, since they don't produce anything, and charge money for producing nothing. But they perform important functions in our society, like providing housing. Even though landlords don't actually produce housing, without landlords there would be no housing and that would suck.

>A landlord is a parasite by definition, since they don't produce anything, and charge money for producing nothing. No, they provide capital. In modern society it's hard to picture what "capital" actually is aside from some wall st bankers in suits, but at the most basic level it's forgone consumption. Every dollar invested in a company or a house is a dollar that could have been spent on an iPhone or a nice steak, a…

Sounds like you agree they don't produce anything, since "providing capital" is not producing something.

Re: Most renters shut out of energy-saving upgrades – study

#97

Post by gruez »

immibis wrote: post #96
gruez wrote: post #36

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>A landlord is a parasite by definition, since they don't produce anything, and charge money for producing nothing. No, they provide capital. In modern society it's hard to picture what "capital" actually is aside from some wall st bankers in suits, but at the most basic level it's forgone consumption. Every dollar invested in a company or a house is a dollar that could have been spent on an iPhone or a nice steak, a…

Sounds like you agree they don't produce anything, since "providing capital" is not producing something.

So rental car companies are "parasites" too because they don't "produce" anything? What about banks, for that matter? I'm not seeing widgets coming out of their factories so they're "parasites" too. Don't forget about supermarkets either. They're certainly don't "produce" any of the stuff they sell.

Re: Most renters shut out of energy-saving upgrades – study

#98

Post by bluGill »

gruez wrote: post #76
bluGill wrote: post #69

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In a few years you have enough equity in the old that the difference is plenty to make that 20% and still have 20% in the old.

Where's all the equity coming from? Keep in mind when you're buying the house in the first place, you're competing with other people who are also potential renters. They're incentivized to bid up to whatever their rents are, which also happens to equal how much you can hope to earn by renting it out. If anything they're willing to bid even higher, given how people are irrationally attracted to housing, and how much y…

Inflation and the amount you have paid off from the first loan

Re: Most renters shut out of energy-saving upgrades – study

#99

Post by ghaff »

Aurornis wrote: post #79
ghaff wrote: post #38

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Pre-fire, I got cabinet above fridge taken out because fridges have basically gotten taller. And the over-the-range microwave is what caused the fire in the middle of the night in the first place while I was sleeping. Dishwashers are pretty standard as are stovetop widths although I decided to shift to a range from my prior double ovens and cooktop.

Sorry about the fire > I got cabinet above fridge taken out because fridges have basically gotten taller. You're right that refrigerator heights aren't standardized but you must have had a really short space if nothing at all would fit. Installations are typically supposed to leave some additional clearance for the heat to escape from behind, although some builders will try to tightly integrate them for a different l…

"Something" would have fitted but it would have been a big volume downgrade. In any case, fire happened and all the cabinetry and appliances came out anyway. So things worked out. Had a bit of margin but not enough to accommodate a current French Door fridge.

(Suspect changes in energy regs would have made what I had difficult to accommodate.)

Re: Most renters shut out of energy-saving upgrades – study

#100

Post by ghaff »

roughly wrote: post #10
fragmede wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Do you plan on moving any time soon? The best time to plant a tree was ten years ago. The second best time is now.

Oh I know. Started tackling a couple things already, and it does make a difference. The two I really can’t do on my own that I absolutely would are replace the windows and put in solar.

I've had a bunch of windows replaced over time. It is expensive but some had gotten really ugly looking--in addition to being, I'm sure very inefficient. I have oil heat and have just never seen the justification for solar especially given my electrical usage and all the scammy solar stuff out there.
Post reply on HN