951–960 of 1001 posts
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…
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…
Being able to obtain assets, when you don't have any is a relatively new thing, historically speaking. One could also say that we were living in a brave new world of opportunities and growth for a few centuries. And now we are returning to the historical norm. One thing that all the examples you listed is that they could be seen as "late game" economies.
I might be totally wrong, though. This is just another angle.
Stop subsidizing demand at the national level. Stop restricting supply at the local level.
That's not the problem at all. Stop allowing people to buy multiple homes. Stop allowing landlords to "collaborate" on prices.
Stop subsidizing demand at the national level. Stop restricting supply at the local level.
That's not the problem at all. Stop allowing people to buy multiple homes. Stop allowing landlords to "collaborate" on prices.
Housing location is really important, not just the total number of vacant properties.
The UK made renting property a lot less lucrative a few years ago. Something about the tax position of letting mortgaged property. That meant landlords sold their houses - which I believe was broadly the point - and thus there are fewer places to rent and the cost of renting has increased to the new point of stability. I think this probably has decreased house prices to some extent, but people are really insanely rel…
A similar thing has happened in France, where the government has restricted the rental of less energy efficient dwellings[0]. This is generally a good thing for the environment, but it has already had an effect on rental prices as those apartments are now taken off the market. The exact impact is a little hard to work out, because, at least in Paris, it's also coincided with apartment owners wanting to hold on to emp…
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…
> In my view this is symptomatic of a more fundamental issue - global asset price inflation driven by a broken financial system (i.e. a system being artificially pumped up with cheap credit). I've been crowing on this since the 2008 crash. The cycle is this: 1. A person has a job, but can't afford things 2. They get credit to buy the things they want, in lieu of demanding better pay 3. Everyone does this, so demand g…
[...]
2. They demand a better pay
3. Everyone does this, so the cost of everything goes up and prices go up.
[...]
Unless that better pay is somehow tied to higher productivity and overall GDP increase it would not solve the problem.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
As someone with spare bedrooms, this itself is a problem of undersupply. If you can't be sure of being able to trade up when you need to (e.g. after starting a family) because house prices are up 100% in 10 years, then you're going to want to buy a house for all possible future needs, rather than current needs. Add to that, things that might be desirable for other reasons, like garden space, rooms for use as offices,…
House ownership is higher among boomers, who are not going to have children anyway. Maybe for some people concern for future prices is a good reason, but certainly it is not for everyone. If there’s spare capacity enough for 20% more people and population growth forecast by 2050 is just one third of that, you cannot really talk about undersupply, when there’s enough accommodation to cover even future demand.
Equally, houses in Cornwall are of little use when the jobs are in London.
U.K. view here... and I'd guess this applies the the majority of the world too. I was born in, grew up in and currently live in a location that the HN community never even thinks about. Most people in here have no idea of how the regular 99% live and then base their whole world view on expensive capital cities and hold the strangest views of housing. I bought my current house in the 2010s, my mortgage is still half t…
Suddenly, the 1.5 bed flat we could afford in a good area of London became a 5 bed detached in the best area of Leeds - 15 minutes from the centre. We have huge parks, cinemas, waterfalls, cafes, public transport, swimming pools, yoga studios etc. all within 10 minutes of our house. This is the exact same stuff that I would crave and pay a premium for in London (or any other world city). However, I also have neighbours who are on minimum wage, also affording houses a few roads away from mine, getting to live that amazing lifestyle too. I would arguably say they are living better lifestyles than the majority of my peers in London who are finance bros, consultants, techies but stuck in flats or house shares in Peckham or wherever. This was a massive eye opening realisation for me, and I've recently come across the term 'Deano' to describe it.
Anyway - the answer in my opinion to the housing crisis is decentralisation. Make it feasible to continue to achieve at high levels, but in regional areas. Improve public transport to increase the effective population of these cities so businesses have larger talent pools to choose from, and thus it is more viable for them to relocate. STOP centring so much of global media/films/tv/culture on these fantasy worlds set in New York and help people build fantasy imagines of nice lives by setting them in LCOL areas.
Take the pressure off the big cities, share the wealth, the opportunities, and everyone will be better off for it.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
How is this not a defacto transfer of wealth from renters to owners? Rental supply will go down due to reduced profits, and therefore ultimately rental prices as a whole will go up once a new equilibrium with fewer rentals is reached. These sorts of suggestions generally seem hugely biased towards buyers at the expense of everyone else.
Marginally higher and higher property taxes for non primary residences would deal with that.
Yes, the investor makes less, but the expected result is less supply so rents are higher, not the same supply but with strictly lower rents.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
Portugal had a golden visa program that granted citzenship if you bought real state of at least 500k EUR. That drove home prices up signficantly in Lisbon, specailly units in that price range. Under new law, the Portuguese Golden Visa no longer provides Residency status through Real Estate investments. [1] https://www.portugalhomes.com/golden-visa-portugal
The golden visas were issued in relatively small numbers, I doubt they affect price much vs all the short term rentals like Airbnb combined with explosive popularity of Portugal.
The golden visa is just a fast and convenient way to get a foothold in the country and do further investments. And what would these investments be? Probably AirBnBs...
This is supported by data presented in [1]: >90% of golden visa holders acquired it via real estate investments. Now, would anyone pour their life's savings in a single property investment in a far away land? I would say no. So these golden visa holders are probably very well-off and they will continue "investing" in real estate, and expecting returns on their investment. Which translates to more AirBnBs.
[1] https://getgoldenvisa.com/portugal-golden-visa-statistics#ft...