Abundance isn't going to happen unless politicians are scared of the status quo • Hacker News Board

Re: Abundance isn't going to happen unless politicians are scared of the status quo

#271

Post by phil21 » Thu, Mar 27, 2025, 9:20 PM UTC

steveBK123 wrote: post #221

seryoiupfurds wrote: post #194

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Do people abuse the process? Sure, some do. They get away with it at most once, because...there's a record of it all in housing court and eviction proceedings are pretty much a deathblow with any landlord doing their homework. The problem is that for large corporate landlords this is a statistical risk that can be priced in and accounted for across hundreds of units. For small mom-and-pop landlords renting out thei…

It's an interesting problem I'm not sure what the solution is. Being a small-time landlord is unreasonably risky due to tenant friendly laws and backed up courts. Similarly, I've found renting from small-time landlords to be a worse experience. They tend to do things that a large corporation would eventually face lawsuits over - discrimination, demanding more money up front, keeping deposits, poor upkeep of units, et…

> Some things maybe really are better managed by big, lawsuit-averse, emotionless companies.

Completely disagree. Every poor experience I had renting was with a big emotionless company. I have never had a poor experience with a small time landlord.

Just like landlord vet their prospective tenants, you should be vetting your prospective landlords. Someone with a few units is pretty easy to track down folks for references.

The problematic ones tended to be the ones in the "midrange" - between small time and big company. Using horrible management companies as contractors to farm out the dirty work, and generally getting away with it since they were big enough to throw their weight around - but not big enough to care about being squeaky clean to the letter of the law.

I'd rent out my basement mother in law unit, but due to tenant rights in my city there is not a single chance I will ever do so. From direct personal experience I know how difficult it is to remove a problematic tenant from a living situation no matter how much impact they may have on your life.

The outcome is that there is one less extremely affordable unit in the area for living in.

Re: Abundance isn't going to happen unless politicians are scared of the status quo

#272

Post by sir0010010 » Thu, Mar 27, 2025, 9:21 PM UTC

bluecalm wrote: post #178

singpolyma3 wrote: post #103

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is ideal if you're a landlord, but hell if you're a tenant.

Limiting tenants' rights is good for vast majority (95%+ at least) of tenants. The way it is there are more and more obstacles (insurance, requiring proof of contract/work, very high deposits etc.) to just rent an apartment or a house. If the government thinks everyone deserves a roof then the government should build cheap, simple housing of last resort instead of forcing the property owners to take the risk.

Tenants rights are not only about how long you get to stay without paying rent. Not being able to compel your landlord to remove pests, mold or fix noisy steam radiators is not something that would benefit the vast majority of tenants.

Re: Abundance isn't going to happen unless politicians are scared of the status quo

#273

Post by floatrock » Thu, Mar 27, 2025, 9:27 PM UTC

ReptileMan wrote: post #263

ethersteeds wrote: post #214

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think this completely elides the point the gp was making about the edge cases being the hardest part. As siblings have pointed out, even establishing "no damage to the property beyond normal wear and tear" is frequently contentious and not self-evident. Rights (and courts) exist precisely because parties frequently represent the facts of a situation to their maximal benefit. Also, while reasonable people can agree…

It works wonders for utilities and telcos. You stop paying your bills - your phone is dead, you have no internet and electricity in X days after skipping an invoice. Why should be leasing real estate any different?

It is expensive to be poor because of feedback loops.

If you lose a job and miss a paycheck this month, maybe you need an extra month to get back on your feet. If you lose housing right away, it's gonna be harder to find a job ("why is your suit wrinkled? why do you smell like you haven't taken a shower in a week?"), which makes it harder to get an apartment that would stabilize things.

We have safety nets so the smallest bump doesn't shoot you right to the bottom.

It shouldn't be indefinite, and the problem is finding how many months of friction should exist before we reach "this aint gonna get better", but instant-cutoff quickly becomes a feedback loop of shit.

Re: Abundance isn't going to happen unless politicians are scared of the status quo

#274

Post by nimish » Thu, Mar 27, 2025, 9:29 PM UTC

scoofy wrote: post #213

pessimizer wrote: post #209

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> We have the tools, it's just going to be inter-generational warfare, and nobody really wants to say it out loud. No, it's not. The people who own houses pass them down to their kids. As people invading a neighborhood, YIMBYs may be new , but they are not that young. They are early middle-aged and wealthy. They are trying to move into elite neighborhoods and cities that they can't afford, not trying to avoid homeles…

Yea, this is exactly what I mean by economic warfare: >The people who own houses pass them down to their kids. Pass them to one of their kids , who will likely be 65 or older when they inherit it. That leaves about 45 years where these kids will need to find housing. >As people invading a neighborhood That's an interesting way to say "moving somewhere for a job and to build a life." >They are trying to move into elit…

Yep!

Re: Abundance isn't going to happen unless politicians are scared of the status quo

#275

Post by huijzer » Thu, Mar 27, 2025, 9:34 PM UTC

TulliusCicero wrote: post #163

huijzer wrote: post #150

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Unfortunately, we have one party that wants the government to get some stuff done From what I’ve seen in university, Western governments don’t really care about getting anything done. But I don’t know who is responsible exactly. As I see it, all parties since there hasn’t been much done to align incentives again in academia in the last decades (even while papers such as Why most published research findings are fals…

The problem is that voters don't seem to actually reward parties for getting stuff done, or for basic good governance in general. Trump accomplished relatively little of his agenda in his first term, and tried to overthrow the government at the end, and people decided to reelect him four years later anyway.

> and people decided to reelect him four years later anyway.

Underlying to your sentence seems to be the idea that “people” are dumb, which is also a widespread belief in some political circles. I think this idea is very unhelpful. Maybe some civilians are making bad decisions. Yes that’s probably true. But it’s still better than having some select few decide what is best for us. Politicians have to listen to and respect the people. And not push opinions of certain groups away just because they are “uneducated” or “uninformed”. That’s not politics. Or at least it’s how you get people to vote for the other side.

Re: Abundance isn't going to happen unless politicians are scared of the status quo

#276

Post by mrguyorama » Thu, Mar 27, 2025, 9:38 PM UTC

ReptileMan wrote: post #263

ethersteeds wrote: post #214

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think this completely elides the point the gp was making about the edge cases being the hardest part. As siblings have pointed out, even establishing "no damage to the property beyond normal wear and tear" is frequently contentious and not self-evident. Rights (and courts) exist precisely because parties frequently represent the facts of a situation to their maximal benefit. Also, while reasonable people can agree…

It works wonders for utilities and telcos. You stop paying your bills - your phone is dead, you have no internet and electricity in X days after skipping an invoice. Why should be leasing real estate any different?

This is laughably wrong.

I can stop paying my electricity bill in november and our state's utility companies CANNOT cut me off until the spring, because without heat I would literally die in Maine. There are similar laws for gas utilities.

I can have a billion dollar bill with Verizon, but if I dial 911, they are legally obligated to connect me to emergency services.

Also, ask people who work for utility companies how well any of this works to actually compel payment from the kind of people who are good at abusing debt.

Answer: Fucking not at all. My brother worked for the cable company, rather limited regulation in terms of requiring the company to continue servicing someone who was delinquent. 95% of his job was still disconnects, often involving someone showing up to the door with their rifle to make a point.

Re: Abundance isn't going to happen unless politicians are scared of the status quo

#277

Post by m463 » Thu, Mar 27, 2025, 9:46 PM UTC

PaulHoule wrote: post #202

legitster wrote: post #154

Earlier quoted context omitted.

My dad is landlord of an 8-plex in a small town. My brother is a social worker in a big city. When they get together and talk it's amazing how much their jobs overlap. So much of the job as a small time landlord these days is dealing with drug abuse, interpersonal problems, police, social services, housing authorities, etc.

Around the time we bought our place we had some spare cash and thought about getting another house. I'd seen the Rich Dad, Poor Dad book which had the advice that you should buy a rental property only it was wildly cashflow positive after the mortgage. That's not realistic in most cases but we saw one rental property which looked crazy profitable that was full of Section 8 tenants. We passed on it because it was real…

I thought "section 8" tenants had a guaranteed rent. But yeah, probably would still be a job.

Re: Abundance isn't going to happen unless politicians are scared of the status quo

#278

Post by Analemma_ » Thu, Mar 27, 2025, 9:51 PM UTC

horsawlarway wrote: post #205

nimish wrote: post #7

Old people are 'aging in place' instead of cultivating the new generation and it really, really shows

I think this is closer to hitting the truth. I'll add... I think idealizing single family housing as the default, over generational family housing (mostly as a response to industrialization wanting worker movement, and the advent of automobiles) is going to eventually be seen as an unforgivable mistake. And they're all made out of ticky-tacky And they all look just the same

I see this take a lot, and I think it has a terribly romanticized and unrealistic rose-colored view of the past. Multi-generational housing suuuuucks, and it’s a near-universal feature of human societies that as soon as people become wealthy enough to vote with their feet and get out of it, they immediately do so, because “multi-generational housing” means constantly having nosy relatives butting into your business, demanding a say in your decisions, and being a downward drag on your life trajectory. People romanticize it if they’ve never experienced it, but in practice everybody hates it.

Re: Abundance isn't going to happen unless politicians are scared of the status quo

#279

Post by brailsafe » Thu, Mar 27, 2025, 9:55 PM UTC

legitster wrote: post #46

I've grown a little bit more skeptical of what can realistically be achieved by the passive nature of YIMBY-ism. In Portland, they passed some radical new zoning laws a few years ago that allowed anyone, anywhere the ability to zone ADUs on their property. And the cost to get permits is almost nothing. I have lots of friends and family in the area with property. But not a single one has added an ADU. It seems like it…

They did something similar in Vancouver, BC. To me it just seemed like everyone's been leaving the city and saying "We literally can not afford to own a place here" and politicians heard "You want us to manufacture more landlords and pull up the ladder even further!? Ok, we'll try".

Yes in my backyard shouldn't mean literally yes, you can live in my actual physical backyard, more than there shouldn't be undue restrictions on building more densely nearby

Re: Abundance isn't going to happen unless politicians are scared of the status quo

#280

Post by ty6853 » Thu, Mar 27, 2025, 9:59 PM UTC

Analemma_ wrote: post #278

horsawlarway wrote: post #205

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think this is closer to hitting the truth. I'll add... I think idealizing single family housing as the default, over generational family housing (mostly as a response to industrialization wanting worker movement, and the advent of automobiles) is going to eventually be seen as an unforgivable mistake. And they're all made out of ticky-tacky And they all look just the same

I see this take a lot, and I think it has a terribly romanticized and unrealistic rose-colored view of the past. Multi-generational housing suuuuucks , and it’s a near-universal feature of human societies that as soon as people become wealthy enough to vote with their feet and get out of it, they immediately do so, because “multi-generational housing” means constantly having nosy relatives butting into your business,…

It's code for free childcare. Although in the old days the deal was the elderly took care of the kids and in turn the sandwich generation takes care of the elderly. Now the elderly taxes the shit out the sandwich generation, wields housing regulation to enrich themselves, and renegs on giving anything in return because they have you by the balls already paying taxes to them whether any SS is left for you or not.