this post was submitted on 18 Oct 2023
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Funny you say that, since the reason why houses are so expensive is because landlords are buying all of them to rent, and creating artificial scarcity which drives up the price. They create a problem where the only solution is to pay them.
Without landlords, worst case, housing would be far more inexpensive. Best case we could even make them free, and start treating housing like a human right and fundamental need.
Upvoting out of pure hope
One separate reason housing is expensive in the US, at least, is that most jurisdictions make it very hard to build new housing. Law of supply, if supply goes down, price goes up, if supply goes up, price goes down. Supply hasn't been allowed to increase much for the last few decades, therefore price goes up. If we could double the amount of housing over night, it wouldn't matter how much landlords wanted to buy everything up, they wouldn't be able to keep up.
We already have more than enough housing to give everyone a home, and have some left over. Landlords are causing an artificial scarcity.
Not even close.
It's also not enough to just have enough units in total (which we don't have), you also have to have them in places people are actually willing to live. People are on average wanting more and more to live in cities each year. Cities are exactly where it's hardest to build and where we're most short on housing relative to demand.
https://unitedwaynca.org/blog/vacant-homes-vs-homelessness-by-city/
https://www.self.inc/info/empty-homes/
Location is an obvious factor but so are vacation homes, homes on the market, and homes for rent. Rising rent prices and home prices are the number 1 cause for vacant homes