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The elderly are becoming homeless at a rate not seen since the Great Depression

moneywise.com

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Re: The elderly are becoming homeless at a rate not seen since the Great Depression

#421

Post by mcv »

trident5000 wrote: post #314
klodolph wrote: post #305

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The parent comment is complaining about the specific amount, $500, and indeed, raising the rent by a large amount (defined percentagewise) is illegal in many jurisdictions. So it seems difficult to come the idea that it is somehow absurd.

Price controls dont work. This is economics 101 and tested many times in the past and as of recent. All you're doing with artificially constraining price and other regulations is reducing supply in the long run. The issue bubbles and then eventually bursts. However, the issue in congested areas is a matter of physics and people unwilling to relocate. Its not from renters simply fulfilling the pricing demand. I mean w…

It's not the rent prices that are constraining the housing market, but the restrictions on building new houses. And in many parts of the US, the prohibition on building anything other than single-family detached homes.

Re: The elderly are becoming homeless at a rate not seen since the Great Depression

#422

Post by throw1234651234 »

The tragedy here is that if you don't see this coming 20 years out, or at 45, it's really too late. I have a few relatives who are in their mid / early 60s, and there is not much they can directly do outside of a huge amount of luck and "hustling" like they are 25.

Re: The elderly are becoming homeless at a rate not seen since the Great Depression

#423

Post by sokoloff »

seanmcdirmid wrote: post #409
sokoloff wrote: post #109

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If it works temporarily, but gets consumed by induced demand, then do it again. And then again. And then again. This is a good thing. If SF is so great, many more people will be able to go there.

So you are claiming that if SF becomes as dense as Manhattan, it will be as cheap as Manhattan? Or maybe Hong Kong’s density and housing affordability is the target here? The ideal situation is Tokyo, where a lack of culture in speculating on housing coupled with population decreases leads (going down in the metro area for the last three years) to housing affordability.

I'm claiming that the balance of supply and demand affects housing prices.

If you increase the supply by enough, that will tip the balance to where the market clearing price will go down.

Re: The elderly are becoming homeless at a rate not seen since the Great Depression

#424

Post by macNchz »

J_Shelby_J wrote: post #231
jwestbury wrote: post #112

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Most Metro areas do not have enough affordable housing. There's no such thing as affordable housing[0]. Just housing. You can certainly argue that building a house is too expensive -- and due to NIMBYism, discriminatory policies, and anti-density regulatory environments, this is often true -- but affordability is not an intrinsic value of a building, and the problem is generally that housing stock simply doesn't ke…

Building any housing is building affordable housing. Adding one home at the top of the price range, increases the number of affordable homes for someone, somewhere, by at least one.

It’s exasperating how many people will fight this. I believe it has been supported by research as well. Anecdotal, but I experienced it firsthand:

Several years ago I was living in a lovely, historic, but no-frills apartment in a desirable area (Cobble Hill, Brooklyn) when several new “luxury” apartment buildings opened nearby, all around the same time. They were only a bit more expensive but offered lots of amenities (doorman, elevator, gym etc) that my building didn’t have.

The impact was remarkable: when other apartments in my building went on the market they sat unrented for weeks, when they’d previously rented in hours. The landlord actually lowered the rent on them! In NYC! Our lease was up soon after, and we managed to negotiate that they gut renovate our kitchen in exchange for extending our lease.

Re: The elderly are becoming homeless at a rate not seen since the Great Depression

#425

Post by pnutjam »

unethical_ban wrote: post #320
mlinhares wrote: post #218

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not only building new homes is unnecessarily complicated and expensive, single family homes are an incredible waste of space and money, had the US and it's big cities invested in apartment buildings with better amenities or forced developers to build shared neighborhood amenities Americans in general wouldn't be so incredibly against it. It's insane to me that my hometown of 1M people in Brazil has more tall apartmen…

The only problem with apartments in the US is the lack of equity.

Equity is a red-herring. People just want a place to live. Developers want equity.

Re: The elderly are becoming homeless at a rate not seen since the Great Depression

#426

Post by mwbajor »

escapedmoose wrote: post #192
jongjong wrote: post #16

Part of the problem is government regulation. In some places, it's almost impossible to build new houses due to regulations. Some portion of the population wants to see house prices continue to increase and they will vote for politicians who will implement policies which will support that agenda. Of course this happens at the expense of another, also large portion of the population who do not own a house and have to…

Among my friends seeking to buy houses, the greater problem is the ability of large companies to buy up whatever is on the market, which they then immediately turn into a rental. It’s nearly impossible to compete with a company who will pay $50k over asking price, in cash, for the house you’re trying to get. Comparatively, immigrants don’t have the purchasing power to compete, so saying they’re the problem is a weird…

"Comparatively, immigrants don’t have the purchasing power to compete, so saying they’re the problem is a weird conclusion to draw."

Does more demand drive up price or does it not? Large swaths of farmland are being bulldozed in my state to build townhouses that are largely populated by 1st generation immigrants. I'm sure this is not the only place.

Re: The elderly are becoming homeless at a rate not seen since the Great Depression

#427

Post by fatfingerd »

skeeter2020 wrote: post #261
spir wrote: post #234

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You only perceive corporate landlords as the greater problem because we're not living in the counterfactual reality where there are millions of new apartments that are inexpensive, tiny, safe, quiet, modern, clean, dignified, and well-located. In pretty much every major city in North America, it is illegal or there is too much red tape to build the affordable housing people actually want. Why is it that living in a t…

Maybe? Or how about they are in no-way comparable.Unless you are talking mass subsidization there is an absolute floor for providing housing, not to mention finite capacity for both tent cities and affordable apartments.

The absolute floor is nothing, far less than the cost of tent cities which use a lot of horizontal space compared to high rises of prefab micro apartments.

The trouble is that local government is coerced to eliminate people who don't directly or indirectly pay a lot of property tax, especially if they are minors and require school.

The federal government should be required to pay general costs per head to local government from it's excessive collection of income tax to put an end to this nonsense of states and towns trying to evict the poor and steal the rich from each other.

Re: The elderly are becoming homeless at a rate not seen since the Great Depression

#428

Post by dukeyukey »

escapedmoose wrote: post #192
jongjong wrote: post #16

Part of the problem is government regulation. In some places, it's almost impossible to build new houses due to regulations. Some portion of the population wants to see house prices continue to increase and they will vote for politicians who will implement policies which will support that agenda. Of course this happens at the expense of another, also large portion of the population who do not own a house and have to…

Among my friends seeking to buy houses, the greater problem is the ability of large companies to buy up whatever is on the market, which they then immediately turn into a rental. It’s nearly impossible to compete with a company who will pay $50k over asking price, in cash, for the house you’re trying to get. Comparatively, immigrants don’t have the purchasing power to compete, so saying they’re the problem is a weird…

Rentals are more accessible to poorer people than buying somewhere so I'd be surprised if that led to homelessness.

Re: The elderly are becoming homeless at a rate not seen since the Great Depression

#429

Post by DiabloD3 »

poorbutdebtfree wrote: post #186
PixyMisa wrote: post #168

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's the strongest argument in favor of the Second Amendment I've ever seen.

[flagged]

Every time I hear "smart guns", all I can imagine is some redneck yelling at their gun, "Alexa, turn off the safety!" and a little Alexa voice coming out of their smart gun, "Now playing Turn Off The Safety by Some Gen Z Artist Nobody Has Heard Of".

Re: The elderly are becoming homeless at a rate not seen since the Great Depression

#430

Post by jxramos »

jongjong wrote: post #16

Part of the problem is government regulation. In some places, it's almost impossible to build new houses due to regulations. Some portion of the population wants to see house prices continue to increase and they will vote for politicians who will implement policies which will support that agenda. Of course this happens at the expense of another, also large portion of the population who do not own a house and have to…

I'm starting to wonder about the debt and housing matter more deeply of late. I don't know what avenues investments should pour into but it seems like propping up housing as some trustworthy investment return seems to be an indicator of no one knowing where else they should park their money productively. Somehow housing investment is like an admission we don't know of any future productive and lucrative prospects any longer.
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