Generational Luck in the Housing Market • Hacker News Board

Re: Generational Luck in the Housing Market

#81

Post by Ctyra » Thu, Apr 04, 2024, 4:57 PM UTC

Der_Einzige wrote: post #35

bluefirebrand wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The year you are born is absolutely an uncontrollable force

Buddhists at least believe this to be controllable. It's the ultimate victim blaming religion - you're poor because you were a bad person in a previous life. Very awkward to jokingly say "I wish I were a puppy" when I play with my dog and to see the look of abject horror on my Buddhist partners face. I'm told even wishing for something like that significantly increases my chances of becoming a dog in the next life -…

> It's the ultimate victim blaming religion - you're poor because you were a bad person in a previous life.

A slight misunderstanding, or an inconsiderate person may use it for victim blaming, but that's not what lays down. It gives guidelines that our actions have consequences, good or bad even if they are not immediately visible to us. On HN, people talk about the role luck plays in the success of startups. Two different people working hard, with brilliant ideas: one of them gets to build a billion $ company, while the other may go bankrupt. What we call luck, or randomness here is explained as karma (good, or bad deeds accumulated from earlier lives). Used with right understanding, and compassion, this provides good guidance for those who seek it.

Re: Generational Luck in the Housing Market

#82

Post by bartonfink » Thu, Apr 04, 2024, 4:58 PM UTC

smallmancontrov wrote: post #65

cableshaft wrote: post #46

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm not complaining, I'm doing alright, I'm just agreeing as a general generation thing. Keep in mind though that I didn't buy a house until my late 30s. My parents, in contrast, bought their first house in their early 20s. Also they had me in their early 20s, and my brother in their late 20s. I'm in my 40s and I still haven't had children yet (might not ever at this rate).

Sorry, you said that you were falling behind your peers and that triggered me as someone who is considerably further behind on account of following conservative affordability advice.

If you followed bad advice years ago you don't get to complain.

Re: Generational Luck in the Housing Market

#83

Post by smallmancontrov » Thu, Apr 04, 2024, 5:13 PM UTC

bartonfink wrote: post #82

smallmancontrov wrote: post #65

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sorry, you said that you were falling behind your peers and that triggered me as someone who is considerably further behind on account of following conservative affordability advice.

If you followed bad advice years ago you don't get to complain.

Fuck you too. <3

Re: Generational Luck in the Housing Market

#84

Post by smallmancontrov » Thu, Apr 04, 2024, 5:22 PM UTC

SoftTalker wrote: post #71

enlyth wrote: post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Among other things, I think interest only mortgages are a completely degenerate financial product that shouldn't exist, the only purpose is so someone can leverage themselves to the tits on housing

Disagree. A mortgage is responsible debt, if you plan to live in the house for 30 years why not pay for it over that timeframe? And the house itself will usually appreciate if you take reasonably good care of it. Zero-down, no-income-no-credit-check mortgages, OK yeah those were a problem. Credit cards are the degenerate financial product that shouldn't exist, if anything is.

Increasingly leveraged mortgages are "responsible" to own, but they are terribly irresponsible as policy. It's good to get in early on a ponzi scheme, but ponzi schemes are overall bad things to base an economy on.

Using the word "responsible" to describe something that is good for an individual but bad for society is... a choice.

Re: Generational Luck in the Housing Market

#85

Post by Der_Einzige » Thu, Apr 04, 2024, 5:33 PM UTC

dangles wrote: post #55

testval123 wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It takes years to plan, get permits / financing, and build homes. It takes days/weeks to submit a bid or refinance a house.

It takes under 8 months to get permits and build homes end-to-end in parts of the US. It taking years is a local problem. As long as demand runs much higher than supply, prices will keep growing.

Usually places with no regulation look a lot like Houston TX.

Do you know the situation depicted from the movie "Up" where there's a house surrounded by parking lots of malls and stuff? That's what low regulation building gets you. I'm not talking about NIMBYs, I'm talking about lax zoning laws.

Re: Generational Luck in the Housing Market

#86

Post by bluefirebrand » Thu, Apr 04, 2024, 5:55 PM UTC

Der_Einzige wrote: post #35

bluefirebrand wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The year you are born is absolutely an uncontrollable force

Buddhists at least believe this to be controllable. It's the ultimate victim blaming religion - you're poor because you were a bad person in a previous life. Very awkward to jokingly say "I wish I were a puppy" when I play with my dog and to see the look of abject horror on my Buddhist partners face. I'm told even wishing for something like that significantly increases my chances of becoming a dog in the next life -…

My admittedly limited understanding of Karmic reincarnation is that it's still not viewed as a terribly controllable thing

If you have positive karma in this life you will be rewarded in the next but the manner of the reward is more or less beyond your control

And that's assuming you believe in that sort of thing to begin with

Re: Generational Luck in the Housing Market

#87

Post by Workaccount2 » Thu, Apr 04, 2024, 5:58 PM UTC

Ekaros wrote: post #74

Workaccount2 wrote: post #59

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A fixed 30 yr mortgage is insane. Insanely good if you have a home and a low rate (or refi into one) Insanely bad if you don't have a home. It's not a natural construct, it's an artificial loan that only exists because the fed is the counter party. In an natural economy, mortgages would all be variable rate, or fixed rate but much higher than what is available today. This would also mean that the housing rush of 2021…

Fixed rate is reasonable product. But there should be cost involved in paying it back in higher interest rate environment. So if you payback early you would need to pay the delta between current fixed rate and one you have.

It's a reasonable product when it is priced correctly. It's not priced correctly when the one taking on the risk is also the one who can pull money out of thin air.

Re: Generational Luck in the Housing Market

#88

Post by baerrie » Thu, Apr 04, 2024, 6:01 PM UTC

I was born in the early 90s, was working in film in 2019, broke my back, joined a bootcamp three months later, got a job in 2020, got another 6 months later, and managed to find a house in April 2021 before things started climbing. The combination of back breaking, career changing, pandemic, oh yeah I also got married, and getting a house, all in an ~2 year period proves to me that I am indeed lucky

Re: Generational Luck in the Housing Market

#89

Post by JumpCrisscross » Thu, Apr 04, 2024, 7:03 PM UTC

smallmancontrov wrote: post #72

JumpCrisscross wrote: post #70

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> when asset-holders try to blame the problem on their victims (the people who must pay higher prices for the pumped assets) How are the latter, those procuring assets, not also asset holders?

They become asset holders on worse terms. Now they must maintain their predecessor's degeneracy to simply not lose money. If they want to gain money, they must figure out how to impose even more degenerate terms on those beneath them. Ratchet goes click. Eventually it implodes. People who got in early on the ponzi walk away with windfalls but the last generation is the largest generation and it gets to hold the bags.

> the last generation is the largest generation and it gets to hold the bags

You're describing a housing-price decline as if it didn't happen less than two decades ago. It's painful, because of the leverage. But a lot of Americans are uniquely equity rich in their homes right now. The missing pieces in your equation are (a) default, which wipes out the debt and (b) real economic growth. It's a tragedy that so much of (b) gets funnelled into real estate prices, but that's a policy choice and far from unsustainable in general. (Versus at specific price points.)

Re: Generational Luck in the Housing Market

#90

Post by JumpCrisscross » Thu, Apr 04, 2024, 7:04 PM UTC

Workaccount2 wrote: post #59

landedgentry wrote: post #10

Calling it luck makes it sound like there are uncontrollable forces at work. However, these consequences are entirely downstream of artificial, man-made policies.

A fixed 30 yr mortgage is insane. Insanely good if you have a home and a low rate (or refi into one) Insanely bad if you don't have a home. It's not a natural construct, it's an artificial loan that only exists because the fed is the counter party. In an natural economy, mortgages would all be variable rate, or fixed rate but much higher than what is available today. This would also mean that the housing rush of 2021…

> it's an artificial loan that only exists because the fed is the counter party

The Fed doesn't originate mortgages. (And it's increasingly getting out of even holding them.)