this post was submitted on 26 Aug 2024
84 points (85.6% liked)
Housing Bubble 2: Return of the Ugly
334 readers
549 users here now
A community for discussing and documenting the second great housing bubble.
founded 7 months ago
MODERATORS
you are viewing a single comment's thread
view the rest of the comments
view the rest of the comments
The only group we should be blaming is Wall Street predators who have made billions "investing"(1) in private housing, and that group of people is made up of people of all age groups.
Stop falling for the divisionist propaganda these people put design to keep the fighting within the lower class. If you understood just how much of this country a very small group of entities owned, you'd realize that the problem isn't Cathy and William Hareman, both aged 75, who have decided they don't want to navigate the real estate market at this point in their lives. It's Wall Street, always has been, always will be.
These people aren't completely blameless. Home owners as a class have a vested interest in seeing their property values go up and will take actions to see that happen. This includes not only improvements on the property but also supporting policies to prevent high density affordable housing, school desegregation and public transit. The suburban sprawl and housing shortage were currently suffering through are a direct result of those policies. The real estate wealth of boomers was built off the exclusion of the lower classes and letting them off the hook and just blaming corporations will make us overlook the next generation who inherit these houses and will try to keep the same exclusionary policies.
Just how much of real estate is owned by corporate entities? Looks like they own 3.8% of single family homes, probably a larger percent of apartments but still probably under 10% as most of them are owned by "mom and pop" operations. Thats not enough to cause the housing problems we currently have. We need to recognize housing as an investment causes a perverse incentive to restrict supply in anyone, not just greedy corporations and to lower the cost of housing will require those people using it as an investment to lose money.
Exactly. Relatively wealthy private home owners tend to lean towards maintaining the status quo since it seems to be working in their favor. It's the same as with the discussion about taxing unrealized capital gains above 100 million. People who aren't even close to that number are afraid of this because they fear it'll develop into further legislation and ultimately become a threat to their own wealth. It's not just the 1% but also many of the top 20 or even 30% that feel a strong incentive to keep things from changing. They definitely carry a big part of the responsibility and the largest potential for change with their votes.