Get rid of landlords...
Get rid of landlords...
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What do families do, that only want or need to live in a place or area for like a year or so? Buy a house, pay thousands in closing costs and inspections, lose several thousand to realtors, and then have to go through the trouble of trying to sell the place a year later?
We very much need landlords. What's screwing everything up is corpos doing it as a business or individuals with like 20 homes instead of one or two. Renting a house is a viable need for some people and it would actually suck if it was an option that didn't exist at all.
The only reason costs of houses are so high in the first place is because they are lucrative investment objects, along with the fact that the most important part of city (and rural) planning, building homes, is largely left to private companies. You are assuming houses would be just as inaffordable without landlords, which is a problem of the current paradigm and not the one proposed.
A couple of years ago, my boss' father (who founded the company and still worked there on and off) and I had a chat over lunch. I'm not sure how the topic of house prices came up, but he mentioned that when he and his wife bought their house, a car cost more than a house, so you knew that someone was really well off if they had two cars in the driveway.
I think that's the first time I've actually gotten my mind blown. The idea that a car could cost more than a house just didn't compute, and it still doesn't quite sit with me.
Of course, the general standard of houses decline the further back in time you go, but houses were a lot cheaper back in the days. Below is a figure of housing prices in Norway relative to wages at the time (mirroring the situation almost everywhere in the west):
Factoring in the increased production capabilities over the same period of time, the construction cost of houses are not that much higher. If we designed our communities better and had a better system for utilizing the increased labour power, we could have much more affordable housing and more beautiful and well functioning societies.
Do not let it sit right with you. This future was stolen from you.
Gods, and that's Oslo too. I couldn't imagine even renting there today.
Yeah, it is terrible :-( On average anyone who simply had grandparents living in Oslo has 1 000 000 NOK (about 100 000 USD) higher net worth than those that did not due to this increase.
I can believe that.
I was born in Stockholm to a single mother. Honestly not sure how we could afford to live in that 2½ roomer, I think the rent was about 5k when we moved away back in 2003? Right now I live in a small town and my rent is almost 11k for a 3-roomer. Stockholm isn't even on the radar for me.
When I say Stockholm I also mean Stockholm, not the suburbs; we lived right by Zinken in Södermalm. Like, this is literally the same block and it's 22k. I'm doing quite alright for myself, and my income is around 28k after taxes.
Another thing that really fucks me off is the fact that since a couple of years back we've been urged to not have too large salary increases because that'd contribute to the inflation. Meanwhile, landlords are making more money than they ever have, they're circumventing the established system for negotiating rent increases, and increasing it many times more than done in the past 20 years!
This is a graph, taken from this article on Hem & Hyra, a news outlet operated by the tenants union.
When the bubble popped back in 2009 the rent increases were on average around 3%, there are cases where you only saw about a 1% increase and now we've gotten a 4-5% rent increase two years in a row. Last year my rent increase was on 6%! Sure there are places where it's way worse; my sister's boyfriend got slapped with a spontaneous rent increase of 150%, and she herself got her rent increased from $1200 to $3500 when her landlord sold the duplex; but we have a system in Sweden where this kind of thing shouldn't happen.
The way I see it; if you can't afford to keep the properties, sell them back to the government and let the public landlord deal with them instead.
Wonder when and where. Sounds exceptional, though I ain’t much of an economic historian.
Sweden. He's about 80 now I believe, so if we assume he bought his house around his 30s that'd be around late 60s to early/mid 70s?
A reason, sure. The only reason though? I suppose that many builders going bust in the 2008 crash, inevitably slowing down supply growth compared to population, while anything that resembles a shortage causes prices to go way up because housing is kinda needed... That's all a coincidence?
Of course not the sole reason in a strict sense. In many places, there are also tendencies of centralization that increases the pressure of housing in cities and some cities are subjected to geography that does not allow them to expand blindly. Ultimately however, the problem is one of failed politics. With sufficient planning, we could solve all of this.
Landlords and private real estate companies, often the same entities, do propagate and amplify this problem. Removing them is a step in the right direction. Short term it would crash the housing market, which is great for anyone not speculating in housing. Long term it would allow for and necessitate publicly planned housing based on actual needs instead of profitability for people that never needed the house in the first place.
Solving it is also quite easy: Raise taxation on any homes owned by someone not inhabiting it by an additional 100 % or so for each unit. Buy back some housing to be able to provide free housing for those unable to get even a subsidized home for themselves. Then treat housing as an actual need and human right, similar to food, electricity and other infrastructure.
That would be good for almost everyone and also actually good for the economy, if you give a crap about it.
There's no reason that local governments can't do this job, there's no need for middle men leaching money.
But you could replace just about any product with that statement.
Now, you’re getting it…
I don't want this government running any new services until we remove the utterly fucked voting system.
While I'm writing a fantasy novel, let's also get rid of all forms of gerrymandering. Including giving two senators to both California and Wyoming. You know what, no more Senate at all. The entirety of congress is proportional representation with more representatives than 1 per 600,000 citizens.
Exactly
The senate is the american version of the house of Lords and is where good legislation goes to die.
Abolishing the senate is one step in unfucking the government. And setting up direct election of the president through popular vote. Wyoming should not have the same say in who leads the country as California.
I love the theory of a really effective government that can produce things that are consistently better than private corporations. But that's just never been my experience. In fact, it feels like the bigger a government gets the worst it operates. So how would you imagine a government that produces all the products and services for a society better than a free market?
Just look at most developed countries in Europe and you will find government operated services that are much better than what the free market came up with the in the US. Namely health services and transportation for instance. Postal services as well.
I just did a week long trip in the USA and all the National Parks were a joy to visit. I actually thought about and commented that it would be a totally different experience, read worse, if those things were privatized.
Honestly the whole argument that private entities are run better is bullshit. There’s nothing stopping any government from hiring the same managers and you just eliminated a certain % that would be the middle men. And now the main objective isn’t profit at all costs, so it will very easily be a better service for us, the consumers.
It seems like a majority of these countries have a much smaller population and economy. It's a good point though. It makes me think we could achieve it, but it would require effort at the level of state government rather than federal. But that has its own problems. Do you agree? If not, why not? Do you feel like a massive government can effectively implement this? How? Feels like any massive organization gets shittier... I regularly feel like massive corps just forget about some products. E.X.: Google canceling almost every service they run. Microsoft's websites being basically broken. Etc...
It’s true that countries in Europe are more akin to states in the US but while there are difficulties scaling up there are also benefits. And in the end everything is divided anyway. It’s not just done in one centralized place.
The EU has done some meaningful things, though it’s mostly laws and not so much services. I’d argue that it had a much more difficult job also.
But there’s the private vs non private debate and the small vs big debate
There is nothing stopping them, but there is nothing motivating them to hire competent people either. From my experience, every single time, they hire "friends". "Friends" with no expertise or skill.
That does not mean every single thing can be run better privately. Emergency services, healthcare, utilities, mass transit, ... There are areas that for one reason or another are better being government run (in spite of the mismanagement), but they are relatively few.
"Free" market is for TVs and stuff, government is for living, like housing, heat, water etc.
Any government
these guys are trying to topple.
What comes to mind is like Russia, Venezuela, China, or North Korea. Maybe something could be learned from the Chinese economy, but it feels like a lot of the successful parts are free market based. What am I missing?
You're missing the smaller players. Cuba saw a really increased standard of living, I think, so has vietnam, so did burkina faso and the DRC before both of their governments got dunked on by the CIA. The larger players are more obvious because the CIA isn't able to meddle with them as much, which means they can get away with much more, but they're still not usually the best example.
The rapid increase in standards of living in china didn't come about as a result of free market intervention, but mostly as a result of the rapid upscaling of a command economy and industrialization in their earlier years. Same for the soviet union. In fact, the biggest downscale in standard of living in the soviet union as I understand it came about after it's collapse, at the hands of vampires like thatcher and reagen getting buddy buddy with big gorbo, while their economy got chopped up for parts. They were pretty fucked by that point anyways though. The biggest problem with those economies, outside of their goofery, is mostly stuff that we've solved in the intervening years since their latent demise with computers. Probably there's also an argument to be made that monopolies like walmart have realistically solved most of those problems and already operate as a command economy as noted in the book "The People's Republic of Walmart", though you could probably make that argument about a lot of different sectors of the economy.
But then I also see a pretty big divide between autocratic, authoritarian controls that centralize power, and more democratized controls, and mostly the argument for socializing goods like housing comes from the probably correct instinct that the average person can exercise more democratic control over their local government than they can any given business, even small scale. Nobody would want a walmart controlled by the government if they made like the same quality of shit and served the exact same function, you know? I dunno I'm sure some .ml freak will be along here to support my arguments with more hard evidence. Any day now. Aaaaany day now.
Here in Sweden we have publicly owned housing. Each municipality has its own company that acts as a landlord. The main issue is queue times, but that could honestly be solved quite easily if the government decided to prioritise housing. They don't, however, and instead opt to try and privatise it, leading to private landlords that have driven up the prices and cost of living, while slowly eking out the life of the publicly owned housing.
We need to look to history for insights into what works, and what doesn’t. In my humble opinion, some form of socialism is the obvious answer. We must move past the minority ruling over the majority. For the sake of humanity, and the Earth, a new system must be implemented. This system doesn’t have to look like China, the Soviet system, or even any socialist system of the past. The key is recognizing that change is inevitable, and necessary. But that change must be decided by the masses, not the select few.
Yeah, Venezuela tried that and it didn't work at all.
Yes...
Basic human rights shouldn't be left to private companies to manage
If BestBuy want to gouge customer on new TVs, it sucks but it won't make you homeless.
Based on the way they maintain infrastructure, I'm not certain that's going to work out well either, but then again the status quo ain't working either.
Now that's funny.
Some of the biggest law breakers and abusive landlords are independent landlords. They're also the ones who don't seem to realize that being a landlord is a full time job where you are the handy man, maintenance, property manager, etc. It's not just collecting a cheque every month, you actually have to earn it.
Not really. I don't have to fix things on a monthly basis at my own house. When my parents rented the landlord would have to do something maybe twice a year.
But OP just said it's not a job in the meme. Which is it?
Yeah managing and up keeping properties. Dealing with taxes, zoning, and potentially HOA. Mitigating liabilities and complaints. Landlord is absolutely a job.
I've known a couple people who have inherited property that already had tenants and were excited for the extra income. I think both of them sold the property within 3 years because it was a nightmare to manage.
I'm not op, and the thing is that 99% of independent landlords don't do shit. I was a model tenant at my last place and I'm a handy man by trade so I would actually do every minor repair in my apartment, I would keep that place tip top and never bothered the landlord. He still thought I was a shit tenant and kicked me out as soon as he could because he wanted to charge more for the place.
The problem is that these socalled "viable needs" are treated as and acted upon like they are elective priviledges by charging exhorbitant prices for the properties that are being made available. Blaming the market for it is just passing the buck and not owning up to your own choices in what you charge. I get that the 'market' has some effect on your rates but making it the main driver for your price that reflects the cost of the entire mortgage on the property is what makes you look like a parasite. If you and your tenants shared the cost of a mortgage in a more equitable fashion, i bet there would be fewer complaints.
Are you taking it too literally or am I not taking it literally enough? Whenever I see stuff like this it never registered that the author is trying to say landlords shouldn't exist just that the people who call being a landlord their job are a problem. I've rented a lot throughout my short years and having a landlord who has some extra property they're trying to make a buck off are pretty decent it's the ones who treat it like their 9-5 I've had problems with.
I agree with you, but, it is titled "get rid of landlords".
Eat the rich doesn't mean cannibalism.
it doesn't? Fuck.
The OP's image literally calls collecting rent "stealing", so it seems pretty obvious how they feel about it.
Some people honestly believe this 100% which of course is nonsense.
Keeping properties in good livable shape is literally a job. The money goes to many tradesmen that fixes many things. It takes time to manage it. Even if its not a 9-5, it still takes time. What is the logic behind if its 9-5, it is evil, and if its not 9-5 (how about 12pm-2pm?) it is not?
We started out with a small house. But when my family grew, we decided to move to a bigger house and rent out our small home to generate some income. Our goal is to eventually move back into the small home when we no longer need the space of our big home.
Our tenants so far have been people from out of town that needed a place temporarily before they commit to buying a home. We are on our 4th set of family/tenants now. Every family have successfully moved out and purchased a home after renting from us, usually 1 or 2 years. Its a stepping stone for people. Without landlords and places to rent, as you said, it would be prohibitively expensive for people to be mobile and to improve their lives (I mean, that's the main reason people move around: new opportunities.) The anti-landlord crowd doesn't understand this, and those type of posts are ridiculous.
When someone live in a home, there are wear and tear on the home. When we first moved out, we spent a good chunk of money to renovate our old home to make it nice, presentable, and livable. A place that is desirable to live in. Then we continuously maintain the landscape, and fix anything that broke. Because one day we are planning to move back in, so we going to keep it in as best shape as possible. So charging a high enough rent to cover the costs and a bit more to make the time worthwhile is totally reasonable.
I was a renter once. It is the same situation for myself when I moved to this city. New job, new opportunity. I rented an apartment, saved up money, and then made a purchase a few years later. Among my friends, there's always a discussion of rent vs. buy. Some of my friends believed that they could save and invest and earn more money by never owning a home. I think if you do it right, it will work out either way. I am on the buy camp and it worked out. He was in the rent camp, and it also worked out for him. He is single and doesn't need a lot of space. And he is extremely mobile, and is able to move to another city for a grad degree and a new job in a very short notice. Without a place to rent, it makes it very difficult for people to do that.
No, there are plenty of landlord's that are scumbags. It's emphatically not just corporations.
There are countless solutions to your problem, they just don't exist because we have landlord's.
This is a reminder that society as we know it is a mishmash at best, it's not the evolution of humanities best ideas and practices.
Plenty of options? Like what, because I bet your options are terrible.
Yeah, I’ve got to go with this. There are a small few of us that want the reasonable sized home we raised our families in, for retirement, but need to live for work elsewhere due to how things are now. I don’t make but $100 a month on rent and I promise that goes back into maintenance. I’m in a small condo that I own now, but I’m not attached here. I’ll move away and sell it.
Is someone else paying my mortgage, technically, yes. But damn if I’m not moving there when I retire and would like to NOT have a mortgage when I m too old to work. I raised my kids there, I loved the neighborhood. And the moment I decide I don’t need it anymore, I’ll sell it. But until then, I’ll be a responsible landlord and make sure I’m helping my tenant by keeping the house in good condition and reasonable rates.
"You evil bastard"...
Were talking about a whole new way of thinking about ownership and your trying to apply the current paradigms. If we dealt with home ownership differently obviously everything else would be different too.
I like how you throw this one thing out and are like oop, guess nothing can be done about that.
He clearly enunciated the part of the situation he's discussing as an issue: corps purchasing tons of properties.
He isn't obligated to address every facet of the situation.
Lemmy can't handle faceted discussion
Their first conciet is we "need" landlords. That is the part of the argument in which I feel is hand waving.
The problem is supply and demand not landlords.
If business could knock down single family homes that were built 100 years ago when the city was 10% the size and put in modern medium or high density apartments the issue would resolve itself.
We need a land tax or the government to just outright buy huge acres of land and demolish it and build public transport.
The root cause of this issue is not landlords its land hoarders, whether it is the family who doesn't want housing built next to them or the real estate company who wants to keep supply constrained. There are more regular people causing this issue than landlords or corporations. No one wants an actual solution to the problem people just bitch.
Although landlord rules do need improving. Things like being able to rent out a mouldy house should be jail time for repeat offenders. But currently it's nothing.
I'd agree with you, but the cost to build a house has more than doubled over the past 15 years. Even where land is cheap, the house isn't. Look at my own house for instance. Built in 07. Bought in 2010 for $129k. Now it's 15 years older, but it's worth nearly $300k. My land is worth like $5k or so more than is was. All the rest is just house.
paying thousands in closing costs, and losing thousands, possibly tends of thousands to realtors, seems like a pretty good deal compared to renting that same house, which is probably going to cost you more, if not about as much money. For marginally less effort.
Of all the comments in this string, yours is the only dumb one.
i like how we're defaulting to ignoring the fact that the OP literally started off with "buying a house and then selling it a year later" because renting doesn't exist anymore.