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1-Euro Houses

1eurohouses.com

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Re: 1-Euro Houses

#91

Post by api »

onion2k wrote: post #79
bryanlarsen wrote: post #57

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Or you could just wait. A lot of people have been surprised that the housing market hasn't crashed. Two of the theories are: 1: supply is more elastic than demand. In other words, more sellers took potential listings off the market than buyers stopped looking. 2: governments printing money inflated investor assets like stocks and real estate. If these are true, a backlog of listings from could flood the market next y…

Over the past 30 years buy-to-let has fundamentally changed the housing market to the point where I honestly don't believe there'll ever be a housing market crash again. Rich people will buy up all the available housing stock to rent out (or to AirBnB) if there's a small price drop. That will stop there ever being a big price drop. Barring a sea change in housing policy that enables massive amounts of new houses to b…

Add to this the fact that governments (at least in the US, and in many other countries) have made it clear that housing won't be allowed to fall. This combined with money printing means the price is almost guaranteed to rise.

The reason is that for most homeowners their home equity is the majority of their savings, and homeowners vote in higher proportion than renters (on average). Any politician that allows home values to fall too much will be facing the end of their career.

Under these conditions the only way housing will fall in a lasting way is if something so terrible happens to the economy that... well... you'll have bigger problems than housing.

Housing is fundamentally broken and very hard to fix due to vested interests all over the place. "Housing cannot simultaneously be affordable and a good investment," and we've clearly decided that housing is a financial instrument first and a place to live second.

There is one way out of the housing price trap: telework plus ubiquitous broadband via things like 5G and Starlink. That could allow people to escape the housing trap by locating away from price hotspots. If you simply must live in a big city this won't work for you, but keep in mind that you could always live somewhere more rural and visit big cities any time you please.

Re: 1-Euro Houses

#92

Post by novok »

rbecker wrote: post #42
ArkVark wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is the problem with a lack of land and property taxation. Elderly people will hold onto assets forever, until death essentially, whilst the building and society collapses around them. Meanwhile they demand a huge amount of welfare and healthcare services without paying into the system. At least the land tax system in the USA encourages downsizing and efficient allocation of this resource.

Land tax also does not allow you to simply exist - you have to make a profit to pay the tax. You can't just grow your own food and ignore the economy. It also comes with perverse incentives, like opposing anything that might raise property values unless you want to sell. Perhaps it's a uniquely American view, having no connection to the land you live on, looking at it as just an economic resource to be 'allocated'.

> like opposing anything that might raise property values unless you want to sell

Are you in America? Raising your property values is like a religion here.

Re: 1-Euro Houses

#93

Post by novok »

iagovar wrote: post #5

Im +30 in Spain and I thought the demographic winter would land some great opportunities to buy a home. But looking into some deserted municipalities everything keeps being expensive, despite the extremely low demand (and I know this because I scrape the listings and track em). If I want to buy a shitty house that needs restoration I'm investing over 200k. Not to mention that the land registry holds values way above…

So property taxes aren't high enough to encourage them to rent or sell out the properties?

Re: 1-Euro Houses

#94

Post by wizzwizz4 »

H8crilA wrote: post #81
iagovar wrote: post #5

Im +30 in Spain and I thought the demographic winter would land some great opportunities to buy a home. But looking into some deserted municipalities everything keeps being expensive, despite the extremely low demand (and I know this because I scrape the listings and track em). If I want to buy a shitty house that needs restoration I'm investing over 200k. Not to mention that the land registry holds values way above…

Sometimes I wish that people could short sell homes ...

They're not fungible, so that wouldn't even make sense. What do you mean?

Re: 1-Euro Houses

#95

Post by benrbray »

david927 wrote: post #90
onion2k wrote: post #79

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Over the past 30 years buy-to-let has fundamentally changed the housing market to the point where I honestly don't believe there'll ever be a housing market crash again. Rich people will buy up all the available housing stock to rent out (or to AirBnB) if there's a small price drop. That will stop there ever being a big price drop. Barring a sea change in housing policy that enables massive amounts of new houses to b…

My feeling is that the pandemic and impending economic collapse will change that. Remember when the 2008 crisis hit, no one was buying but no one was renting either. And a lot of banks with real estate on their books just let it sit there (where it sits today). Once a the credit default domino chain starts to fall, people and organization will need to get liquid. The first stage will see some people jump in on pent-u…

> no one was buying but no one was renting either.

As someone who was in eighth grade at the time, can you clarify what you mean by this? Every person either 1) buys property, 2) rents property, 3) goes homeless, or 4) dies. There aren't really any other choices.

Re: 1-Euro Houses

#96

Post by AnIdiotOnTheNet »

bryanlarsen wrote: post #60
throwaway0a5e wrote: post #23

If after a decade of reading about $500 houses in Detroit people haven't figured out what "cost of compliance" means then they probably never will at this point. When you read the words "$ house" the words you should read in your mind are "dilapidated building in a municipality with crazy back-tax scheme that would make the California RMV proud and probably also regulatory capture by relevant trade(s) that inflates t…

Or maybe "$ house" just means somewhere no one wants to live. You can get a reasonable house in rural Saskatchewan without any fine print for under USD$20K. https://www.point2homes.com/CA/Cheap-Homes-For-Sale/SK.html?...

I'd buy it right now if it came with a free Canadian citizenship.

Re: 1-Euro Houses

#97

Post by mensetmanusman »

rbecker wrote: post #42
ArkVark wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is the problem with a lack of land and property taxation. Elderly people will hold onto assets forever, until death essentially, whilst the building and society collapses around them. Meanwhile they demand a huge amount of welfare and healthcare services without paying into the system. At least the land tax system in the USA encourages downsizing and efficient allocation of this resource.

Land tax also does not allow you to simply exist - you have to make a profit to pay the tax. You can't just grow your own food and ignore the economy. It also comes with perverse incentives, like opposing anything that might raise property values unless you want to sell. Perhaps it's a uniquely American view, having no connection to the land you live on, looking at it as just an economic resource to be 'allocated'.

This. Nothing ever simply exists (entropy!).

Money in the bank changes in value. Investments in companies that go bang or bust. Ignoring a fruit plant that dies...

Change is the only constant in life.

Re: 1-Euro Houses

#98

Post by rmason »

Detroit ten years ago was famous for $1000 houses. But these houses were gutted, without wiring or plumbing or furnaces. In other words a shell, stripped by scrappers.

Most of those houses have been torn down. But the city has a program that rebuilds the salvageable houses to better than new then sells them at a bargain. The deal is you must live there as your primary residence for five years. These houses begin at $50,000.

https://buildingdetroit.org/rehabbed-ready/

Re: 1-Euro Houses

#99

Post by mensetmanusman »

ciguy wrote: post #51
SuoDuanDao wrote: post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In theory, could someone who wanted to spend a year in Italy buy one of these houses for 1 Euro and just not initiate any of that repair work?

No, you cannot live in the house until it is certified as habitable. Like many things in Italy this would no doubt be flexible with the right "permits" paid for to the right officials. But the houses would likely have no working electricity, heat, water or plumbing. So you wouldn't really want to live there anyway.

“Doctor, I’m not dead!”

Re: 1-Euro Houses

#100

Post by david927 »

benrbray wrote: post #95
david927 wrote: post #90

Earlier quoted context omitted.

My feeling is that the pandemic and impending economic collapse will change that. Remember when the 2008 crisis hit, no one was buying but no one was renting either. And a lot of banks with real estate on their books just let it sit there (where it sits today). Once a the credit default domino chain starts to fall, people and organization will need to get liquid. The first stage will see some people jump in on pent-u…

> no one was buying but no one was renting either. As someone who was in eighth grade at the time, can you clarify what you mean by this? Every person either 1) buys property, 2) rents property, 3) goes homeless, or 4) dies. There aren't really any other choices.

You're not alone -- it was quite surprising to a lot of people! What happened was the fifth option: move in with others, such as parents.

P.S. I just saw this article:

Mortgage Delinquencies Have Risen Fastest In US History

https://thewashingtonstandard.com/housing-crash-2-0-mortgage...

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