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The Portuguese can no longer afford to live in Portugal

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Re: The Portuguese can no longer afford to live in Portugal

#421

Post by dionidium »

armchairhacker wrote: post #265
jonathanstrange wrote: post #97

Yes, the situation is dire. I live in Lisbon as a foreigner for more than 12 years now. We pay a rent for a small flat that used to be very expensive and now is on the cheap side in our quarter of the city. Luckily, we have an older contract that cannot be changed as easily as newer ones. I'm not thrilled by the possibility that our landlord might cancel it some day, however, e.g. for relatives to move in. Rents in t…

I’ve literally seen this same exact comment many, many times except with different locations. Eastern Mass, New York, Ontario, Britain, and even starting to hear it from suburban areas. The exact same concepts: cheap grandfathered lease, hoping the landlord doesn’t cancel, can’t afford rent despite making >100k, “luxury apartments”, empty apartments, illegal renting (e.g. AirBnB) and shadiness.

The underlying issue is that demand for these places has increased in our new globally-connected world. That's not going away. Cute little lake houses aren't going to be a local secret anywhere in the world, anymore, and the sooner people realize that, the sooner they can think about how to adjust to it.

We are currently in the "denial" phase. We can't get to "acceptance" fast enough.

Re: The Portuguese can no longer afford to live in Portugal

#422

Post by ginja »

stainforth wrote: post #227
jonathanstrange wrote: post #107

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There are tons (like, really many) of empty, closed rotting buildings in Lisbon. My assumption is the owners are waiting for prices to increase or simply demanding unreasonably inflated prices until they find a buyer. I'd like to know the reasons for it. Anyway, whole blocks are empty. Heck, there is a large empty building directly next to the German embassy (and, ironically, part of the German embassy is also abando…

Exactly. There should be a tax on vacancy. We've made the 1) mistake of turning a very special need like shelter into a commodity or security vehicle, and 2) this commodity the owner can "hold-out" on in that makes it violate the principles of economics that we all supposedly agreed upon from above that the market is the most fair and best solution for people.

We already tax vacant property up to 12 times the regular tax when located in high demand areas[1] which includes all of Lisbon municipality. It's definitely had some effect as you see a lot less vacant property, but it unfortunately doesn't fix everything.

[1]: https://dre.pt/dre/detalhe/decreto-lei/67-2019-122349221

Re: The Portuguese can no longer afford to live in Portugal

#423

Post by [deleted] »

stuaxo wrote: post #348
jonathanstrange wrote: post #97

Yes, the situation is dire. I live in Lisbon as a foreigner for more than 12 years now. We pay a rent for a small flat that used to be very expensive and now is on the cheap side in our quarter of the city. Luckily, we have an older contract that cannot be changed as easily as newer ones. I'm not thrilled by the possibility that our landlord might cancel it some day, however, e.g. for relatives to move in. Rents in t…

Where does this end? A planet full of empty "luxury apartments" and most of us homeless?

[deleted]

Re: The Portuguese can no longer afford to live in Portugal

#424

Post by aperson_hello »

andrekandre wrote: post #325
citilife wrote: post #275

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Many dislike the idea, but this is why people turn to "nationalism". If you want to decrease unemployment, you add tariffs for imports enabling more businesses to open domestically (i.e. tariffs effectively increase import costs). Similarly, you can loosen building codes to increase production of homes, limit visa duration, require citizenship for home ownership, etc. Those are some obvious fixes, why is the governme…

none of those things gets rid of the root causes: too much financialization and speculation alot of these things used to be regulated, discouraged or prohibited, but with deregulation of much of finance more and more wealth is generated from speculation, rents and leverage... if people can make money passively from doing nothing but owning something (real or virtual) there is less motivation for "real productive work…

The only real way to fight this is oversupply imho. Can't financialize something that doesn't generate outsized returns. If expected returns are lower (and risk higher) than the next financial class, money will move to that other financial class instead. Right now, real estate is low risk/high reward compared to the next best option (stocks?). So...money pours into real estate. Increase that supply to the point where finding a renter is at least marginally challenging, and you'll find that cash goes elsewhere.

Re: The Portuguese can no longer afford to live in Portugal

#425

Post by [deleted] »

zizee wrote: post #409
bobthepanda wrote: post #362

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You’re forgetting household size. As with all wealthy countries, household size has fallen in Portugal over the past few decades, so the same amount of people needs more house. This is especially true in the context of empty nest retirees.

So that could be one of the extra factors that we're looking for. People want/expect more, which has caused people to have to pay more. But I'm doubtful that it is going to account for a lot of the cost of living issue in Portugal. I'd still like the GP to connect the dots for me on his "it's all demographics" argument. It sounds like are argument you hear on Reddit.

[deleted]

Re: The Portuguese can no longer afford to live in Portugal

#426

Post by mercy_dude »

This isn’t unique to Portugal. In Toronto, where I used to live asa kid, home prices have gone at least 300% depending on areas. Vancouver has experienced the same type of price increase. At this point, a lot of Canadians I know unless you are someone with a spouse making over 100k, you can’t afford a house in Canada.

I know parts of UK has also experienced the same thing from my relatives there.

And speaking of Government, we have a similar left wing government which is only left wing by name, and its policies has exacerbated the housing crises.

Everyone said our housing market is in bubble for last 5yrs. But bubble has never popped. So I guess it’s something else. In Toronto and Vancouver there were ample evidences of Chinese snow washing money and buying up real estates under shell companies.

Madness.

Re: The Portuguese can no longer afford to live in Portugal

#427

Post by pessimizer »

buscoquadnary wrote: post #321
ttymck wrote: post #158

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is interesting, because (at least in America) the current rhetoric is that housing was laughably affordable up until the 70s(?). Now, even in suburbs, housing is far more expensive than most wage earners could expect to afford. Maybe we are thinking of two different sides of the same coin, but I would genuinely be interested in reading articles from the ~mid-century describing what you suggest.

The problem in the US is pretty obvious. We are the time period where the largest generation of Americans (the boomers) are at the retirement, or about to retire point, at the same time the Zoomers, which are a decent sized generation, are entering the housing market. Over the next several decades as the boomers die off or move to retirement homes the housing supply will increase substantially, and the value of prope…

I see the same cause, but to me Boomers aren't limiting supply as much as many are relying on passive income to maintain luxury lifestyles. When they downsize, they're going to move to retirement homes that have $4-6K/mo rents at the midrange.

As they die, and pass on their property, their kids will just retire young and rents will still rise, along with the prices of luxury goods.

I'll believe that house prices are high because of constrained supply when I see the prices of luxury goods drop.

Re: The Portuguese can no longer afford to live in Portugal

#428

Post by bcrosby95 »

zizee wrote: post #409
bobthepanda wrote: post #362

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You’re forgetting household size. As with all wealthy countries, household size has fallen in Portugal over the past few decades, so the same amount of people needs more house. This is especially true in the context of empty nest retirees.

So that could be one of the extra factors that we're looking for. People want/expect more, which has caused people to have to pay more. But I'm doubtful that it is going to account for a lot of the cost of living issue in Portugal. I'd still like the GP to connect the dots for me on his "it's all demographics" argument. It sounds like are argument you hear on Reddit.

I think you're missing the point.

For example, when my siblings were kids we all lived in 1 house. I have 3 siblings so there were 6 of us including my parents. In 1 house.

As we graduated from college we moved out. Now there were 6 of us in 5 houses.

Beyond the raw house count, you're going to need more space. Multi-bedroom homes have shared common space. The house we grew up in had 1 dining room, 1 kitchen, 1 living room, 4 bedrooms, and 2 bathrooms.

If we each moved out on our own, we now needed a minimum of 5 dining rooms, 5 kitchens, 5 living rooms, 5 bedrooms, and 5 bathrooms.

The number of people is the same. Still just 6. But we needed more housing and more space since we didn't share common space anymore. We didn't expect more than we had before (well, beyond the practicalities - it's difficult to share a bathroom with someone you don't live with), we expected the same as we had before we moved out.

Re: The Portuguese can no longer afford to live in Portugal

#429

Post by WalterBright »

rovolo wrote: post #370
WalterBright wrote: post #260

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Inflation is not the result of profits, gouging, etc. It's the result of funding the deficit by running the printing press. (Or the modern equivalent, creating debt backed by nothing.) The proof is the observation that endemic inflation only happens in countries with fiat money systems.

> Inflation is not the result of profits, gouging, etc. Inflation is the measure of the price of goods > It's the result of funding the deficit by running the printing press Increasing the money supply indirectly increases the price of goods. It matters in the long run, but the price of goods can change in the short-term based on supply. The oil crisis of the 1970s caused oil prices to increase because oil supply was…

You can tell it's a monetary thing because you don't see deflation.

> Fiat systems aren't inherently inflationary; but they target a low level of inflation because they prefer it to deflation.

That's just the excuse. The real reason is so the government can spend money without raising taxes. So they sell you on the idea that inflation is good.

Re: The Portuguese can no longer afford to live in Portugal

#430

Post by aperson_hello »

renewiltord wrote: post #391
capableweb wrote: post #268

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> The nice thing about indoor space is that we can make pretty much as much of it as we'd like. What? Have you ever been in Lisbon? The city is pretty dense as it is. You could mostly just build higher, and that has its limits too, depending on the structure and foundation. Adding more housing outside the core of the city might not be attractive enough. And increasing the density of people also means you need to incr…

Have you been to San Francisco? Lisbon: 100.05 km^2 , 544k people San Francisco: 121.48 km^2, 873k people 20% more room than Lisbon, 60% more people.

And SF isn't exactly a model of good urban planning either. It could double or triple its density and be just fine!
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