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Priced out of home ownership

bbc.co.uk

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Re: Priced out of home ownership

#691

Post by charlie0 »

crtified wrote: post #445
ProllyInfamous wrote: post #340

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I recently kayaked a stretch of the Tennessee River, between state parks, and within an hour of paddling I passed both a homeless riverside "tent city" [technically "public camping" on TWRA/state land] and then the most-expensive house for sale in our entire metro area (just around the same peninsula). These inholdings, both impoverished and not, were each having their respective parties (cheap beer in common) along…

It's one of the interesting paradoxes of human life, I think - that the poorer have more incentive to have fun.

The poor have much less to lose and have probably accepted their fate. The rich are always thinking of how to get richer without loosing it all.

Re: Priced out of home ownership

#692

Post by tumetab1 »

dhx wrote: post #145

Some other less-cited reasons home ownership may increasingly be considered expensive: - Increasing density in older cities requires infrastructure upgrades that are much more complex and expensive to retrofit than it was to plan and build the first time when space was abundant. - Multi-story buildings are more expensive per floor space area than single-story buildings. As cities become denser, the added expense of m…

Yep :)

I saw a recent "podcast" on Portugal reality from a business side perspective about this, the calculations are simple (numbers inaccurate but up to scale) - Around 2005, you could build "up-to-code" houses for around 1000€/m2 - Now, you build "up-to-code" houses for around 2500€/m2

The purchasing power has not increased 2.5X so housing now it's less affordable.

His overall comment is that now we have "Nordic" (richer) construction standards but we still earn Portuguese (poorer) standards.

Re: Priced out of home ownership

#693

Post by Gupie »

EgregiousCube wrote: post #448
fire_lake wrote: post #240

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Inequality is another issue. Even with enough homes, if they are all owned by minority of the population who extract rents from the rest the situation remains pretty dire.

Is inequality bad in and of itself? If there's a healthy market of buyers and sellers, but also a lot of inequality, is that a problem?

Yes, it is bad. The distribution of wealth determines the distribution of resources. The housing stock is limited. It ends up being mainly owned by those with a lot of money, in the process putting prices up beyond even what the middle class can afford. Building new houses won't fix this as the new houses will end up being owned by the rich as well.

Re: Priced out of home ownership

#694

Post by zbrozek »

screye wrote: post #304
whoknowsidont wrote: post #196

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's not the problem at all. Stop allowing people to buy multiple homes. Stop allowing landlords to "collaborate" on prices.

Both are band aids for the real problem. Housing can't both be an investment and a basic need. You need to pick one or find an opinionated middle ground. If housing is an investment, then remove all protections and open up the supply. No height regulations, no minum parking regulations, no mandatory HOAs. No moratoriams or legal protections when loans default. If housing is a need, then regulate it like a limited res…

At least here in the US, we'll need to lose a war on home soil to a more enlightened power before we get land use liberalization.

Re: Priced out of home ownership

#695

Post by newyankee »

xyst wrote: post #659
tmnvix wrote: post #274

People intuitively jump to the conclusion that the problem is caused by a lack of building. While more building would help, a lack of it isn't the main cause of this problem. Ask yourself, do Canada, Australia, New Zealand, the US, Britain, Ireland, etc, all have the same inability to build or is there maybe some other common cause? In my view this is symptomatic of a more fundamental issue - global asset price infla…

It’s a multitude of factors - limited supply in certain (most?) markets, “cheap money”, supply chain factors with certain common building materials, “corporate owned homes”. One thing that has definitely not helped is hostile building codes that prevent density. In some cities in the US, building height is constrained by the nearest single family home. Then there’s the parking minimums for buildings that allocate mor…

I recently visited a Baltic state and was impressed with a refurbished Soviet style brutalist building used as a hotel/ long term stay. It definitely seemed like a good solution.

Re: Priced out of home ownership

#696

Post by pif »

A utopic solution would be to learn, at last, how to have a thriving economy without increasing megalopolis.

Housing prices are unaffordable in big cities, while abandoned properties are rotting in the countryside everywhere. It's time we start spreading the economy rather than concentrating the people.

Re: Priced out of home ownership

#697

Post by newyankee »

015a wrote: post #679
tmnvix wrote: post #274

People intuitively jump to the conclusion that the problem is caused by a lack of building. While more building would help, a lack of it isn't the main cause of this problem. Ask yourself, do Canada, Australia, New Zealand, the US, Britain, Ireland, etc, all have the same inability to build or is there maybe some other common cause? In my view this is symptomatic of a more fundamental issue - global asset price infla…

IMO takes like this are problematic. The problem is not enough building. That's it. All the other stuff you said is just noise that confuses people into believing this is some hyper-complicated modern-financial-system problem that's going to end the world due to its intractability. Its not any of that. Its just not enough building. There are problems which feed into there not being enough building; the biggest one is…

Not enough building, and also the inequality in ownership of land and houses. May be tax every third or later house owned higher and plug loopholes that allow you to own an extra house under trust or other structure to rent.

But where will this end for a lot of investors (which in Canada seems like a lot of the influential population) ?

Re: Priced out of home ownership

#698

Post by xivzgrev »

throwitaway222 wrote: post #684
tmnvix wrote: post #274

People intuitively jump to the conclusion that the problem is caused by a lack of building. While more building would help, a lack of it isn't the main cause of this problem. Ask yourself, do Canada, Australia, New Zealand, the US, Britain, Ireland, etc, all have the same inability to build or is there maybe some other common cause? In my view this is symptomatic of a more fundamental issue - global asset price infla…

Absolutely agree. Everyone else that replied seems to disagree probably because they are landlords. Which is fairly high in HN. Oh I'M not the problem it's someone / something else. The reason "not building" is not the issue, is because even brand new homes are being scooped up in investments. Raise property taxes for all non-occupied, airbnbs, and fuck even rentals, and while it might cause rentals to temporarily go…

Raise property taxes? Those are usually a rounding error in a rental P&L (and it’s tax deductible)

The only way I see out of this mess is to ban ownership of SFH by anyone other than…single families as primary owners. Corporations, foreign owners, secondary homes, etc.

But we need to address other issues too: zoning (make Houston’s approach nationwide) and construction costs.

Re: Priced out of home ownership

#699

Post by mtalantikite »

kylehotchkiss wrote: post #481
nasmorn wrote: post #289

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Also they build with what is almost slave labor.

Blame the nearby countries providing no jobs, no education, and no future for these laborers instead. Also don’t forget the hundreds of thousands of people from the exact same countries who gain respectable middle class, stable jobs in UAE that their home countries don’t provide. I’m not here to defend every decision that UAE has made but they’ve done a lot of good for people who come from countries with unspeakably…

You don't just get to do human rights abuse because someone was born into poverty or conflict. [1][2][3]

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Treatment_of_South_Asian_labou...

[2] https://www.bbc.com/news/technology-50228549

[3] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gMh-vlQwrmU

Re: Priced out of home ownership

#700

Post by wing-_-nuts »

imgabe wrote: post #554
ivan_gammel wrote: post #366

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Iirc, 20% of all bedrooms in UK are spare bedrooms in houses that are too big for their owners. This is indeed underutilization.

The owner is living there and happy with the space or they would move. That is not underutilization. The solution to housing shortage is to build more housing, not to create “bedroom police” who go around and tell you’re not allowed to have your house because they will decide for you how much space you need.

Lol bedroom police. Yes, because that's exactly what we were discussing.

Or, you could, you know, make it more affordable to build smaller homes with fewer bedrooms so people actually have options when they become empty nesters.

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