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US will ban Wall Street investors from buying single-family homes

reuters.com

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Re: US will ban Wall Street investors from buying single-family homes

#831

Post by nikanj »

rgmerk wrote: post #165

It will make very little difference in the end. Australia's land tax system makes it effectively impossible for large corporations to own large chunks of residential property, but our real estate is amongst the world's most expensive and landlords are still awful - it's just that the landlords are hundreds of thousands of dentists and, yes, software engineers rather than corporate entities. If you want housing to be…

The window-dressing is great. You get the votes from the renters because you are doing ”something”, and you get the votes from the landlords because property values remain high

Re: US will ban Wall Street investors from buying single-family homes

#832

Post by mexicocitinluez »

averysmallbird wrote: post #739
yalogin wrote: post #655

Interesting to see that he did not issue an executive order to ban this but called on congress to do so. This is just pandering to the base and election signaling and nothing else, at least for now.

This cannot be done by Executive Order anyway.

That's not the point.

He's issued plenty of other executive orders that aren't legal in order to continue to bullshit his base. The reason why he's deferring to congress now (instead of trying to take credit) is because he knows it's not possible and can use that as leverage against members of Congress.

Re: US will ban Wall Street investors from buying single-family homes

#833

Post by mexicocitinluez »

cush wrote: post #667
yalogin wrote: post #655

Interesting to see that he did not issue an executive order to ban this but called on congress to do so. This is just pandering to the base and election signaling and nothing else, at least for now.

Midterm pandering, for sure

Just think of the shit he's going to throw against the wall when it's only a few months away. I bet he'll wade into "Cancelling all student loans" or "Legalizing Marijuana" knowing his base is too stupid to understand his intentions.

Re: US will ban Wall Street investors from buying single-family homes

#834

Post by a2tech »

rgmerk wrote: post #673
ropable wrote: post #570

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In Australia we've treated the family home as an investment, a primary mechanism for wealth creation (rather than an essential for life) for far too long. I fully agree that supply is the #1 driver for housing affordability, but like many things it's mult-factorial. Tax incentives, market forces, town planning, land use regulation, etc. all play their role. I'm hopeful that successive governments over here show the c…

YIMBYs would argue (and in my view rightly) that if you allow townhouses and apartments to be built, the market will build them where there is a demand.

The only problem is that in the US, if you let apartments and townhouses to be built, homeowners will get muscled out by large builder concerns and single family homes will be converted into dense housing--which sounds great, until you realize there's no way those housing concerns will SELL those units--they're going to be rented forever. There's no incentive to actually sell those to people and every reason to keep them as rentable apartments forever.

So you have attractive locations being completely dominated by rentable corporate owned housing and the net outcome is that people are completely boxed out of home ownership. There's no way pricing comes down because they do this in areas where people are willing to pay top dollar to live.

I live near Ann Arbor and we're seeing it play out right now--more dense housing in the inner core is being allowed (as current thinking says should be done) and whats happening is that smaller old-timey landlords and homeowners are being pushed out and their homes and apartment buildings are being replaced with brand new high dollar rentals. Not condos (although there are some of those as well, but fewer), rentals. And the rental prices are going up! Normal people get pushed further and further from the attractive areas to live, and pressure from these people moving out pushes up rent in the surrounding areas.

Re: US will ban Wall Street investors from buying single-family homes

#835

Post by chaosbolt »

Even if they do it's a little late at this point, plus I don't believe it, since Trump and most people in the admin are too friendly (borderline controlled) by the people who are friendly/control entities like Blackrock, it's either beneficial to them to stop the competition from doing it since they bought enough for now or there is a big gotcha in there.

I know how that paragraph reads, but the past couple of years have made me too cynical to trust anything they say they're going to do.

Re: US will ban Wall Street investors from buying single-family homes

#836

Post by arthurofbabylon »

bs7280 wrote: post #260
roadside_picnic wrote: post #48

The key word here is "Wall Street". And this statement is playing off a popular misconception around corporate investors buying up American houses. There has been a bit of a panic around "Investors buying up all the property!!!" With people often citing Black Rock and Blackstone as the main culprits. But most of the "investors" buying up property are individuals purchasing investment properties. Here's an article on…

I propose two changes to (try) and broadly solve this: - Additional property tax if you do not live in your home fulltime. This includes vacation homes. - First time, US Citizen, non-corporate homebuyers can get a loan at the federal interest rate. If I were to try and buy the condo I rent, due to interest rates, taxes, and HOA's I would be paying $1000 more per month. At the end of my mortgage I would given the enti…

Key adjustment to your first proposal: the additional property tax should also be waived when having long-term renters/occupants.

Re: US will ban Wall Street investors from buying single-family homes

#837

Post by servo_sausage »

rgmerk wrote: post #165

It will make very little difference in the end. Australia's land tax system makes it effectively impossible for large corporations to own large chunks of residential property, but our real estate is amongst the world's most expensive and landlords are still awful - it's just that the landlords are hundreds of thousands of dentists and, yes, software engineers rather than corporate entities. If you want housing to be…

We have a significant number of problems related to housing; generally I would call it a demand side issue not a supply side however.

My reasoning is we have a massive construction sector compared to other nations, with a relatively high productivity in terms of dwellings built per capita. We also have pretty slack standards, with even weaker enforcement.

In addition to that, we have a very weak growth in productivity per capita; and since we are trying to rapidly grow, we have to play catch up to provide the same level of services. This needs to happen while our construction sector is stressed, so the same amount of wealth goes a shorter distance again.

You can also see this in rental prices; negative gearing should allow the capital price to decouple from the rental yield to a larger extent than without it; but we still see high rents...

Re: US will ban Wall Street investors from buying single-family homes

#838

Post by Y_Y »

a2tech wrote: post #834
rgmerk wrote: post #673

Earlier quoted context omitted.

YIMBYs would argue (and in my view rightly) that if you allow townhouses and apartments to be built, the market will build them where there is a demand.

The only problem is that in the US, if you let apartments and townhouses to be built, homeowners will get muscled out by large builder concerns and single family homes will be converted into dense housing--which sounds great, until you realize there's no way those housing concerns will SELL those units--they're going to be rented forever. There's no incentive to actually sell those to people and every reason to keep…

Surely they'll sell if the price is right.

Re: US will ban Wall Street investors from buying single-family homes

#839

Post by Y_Y »

JoshTriplett wrote: post #571
jasonfarnon wrote: post #557

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Maybe have a limited exception then, like rape shield laws. You don't need to gut the entire framework for this rare situation. (Plus it would be fun to watch corporate lawyers try to exploit this loophole.)

Or maybe just stop telling people what cases are "legitimate" reasons to protect themselves and what cases aren't. I know multiple people who have gotten death threats because of technical comments they made online, or just for having the temerity to exist as a member of a minority group. Not the vague "I'm going to kill you" kind, the "here's a picture of your front door on Google Street View, and an unsolicited piz…

I don't feel like the solution to this is having victims set up LLCs.

Re: US will ban Wall Street investors from buying single-family homes

#840

Post by credit_guy »

klipklop wrote: post #409
JoshTriplett wrote: post #23

One additional important detail: if this gets implemented at all, hopefully it does not affect the common practice of having a self-owned LLC owning your home. This is common for the purposes of keeping your personal name out of public records; it is far too easy to link someone's name and address, and people at risk of doxing can do this to protect themselves.

Personally I feel people and especially corporations/REITs do not have the right to hide what real estate they own. Sure put it in a trust, but the public has the right to know who controls it.

Where do you stand on encryption? Do you feel like the "I have nothing to hide" argument has any merit? If you think people have the right to privacy, why should real estate be an exception? I personally find the fact that real estate ownership is public in the US to be quite bizarre.
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