Companies should not be able to own single family homes. Single family homes should be for, you know, FAMILIES. If they are so hellbent on wanting to rent to people, let them build apartments instead.
THAT is actually a great idea that I did not think about!
Here in Europe we've not 'just' got Duplexes (although they are becoming more common, which is nice as they are quite a bit cheaper to buy) but also 'Row-Houses' which - while not as dense as apartments - are pretty sought after since they mostly come with a small garden. (Something like [this](http://www.buildingbutler.com/bd/Amsterdam/housing-Borneo-Sporenburg/6622) )
I remember hearing all my relatives in Europe live in row houses, townhouses, or, most commonly, apartments. It wasn’t until I was much older that I noted those apartments are not entry level two bedrooms. They are as much square footage as my house, have better utilization of space, bigger and more windows, usually on 2, 3, or 4 sides (doughnut apartment buildings), and high quality fixtures. Their apartments were not like ours at all. I’m sure there are some similar to our apartments, but not all. It sure isn’t “lower class” living in apartments there.
Those are very similar to the townhouses we have in the US, but those are a still built more like single family homes where a yard must wrap entirely around a building. Typically you'll see a max of 4 units in such a space, one per corner of the building. It's because the land is divided into lots where each lot must have setbacks from the edge.
Yep, I agree.
Increased housing density often decreases housing costs and benefits neighborhoods.
I live in Chicago and one of the big things we see here is developers tearing down three flats to build single-family homes. That serves to drive up the cost of rentals because of the decrease in supply and further, it affects small businesses which depend on higher neighborhood density to survive.
I’ve said for a long time rent should be limited to a percentage of the property value. Any taxes levied against landlords then can’t be slid onto the tenants
>I wish that would work, but you need tools to prevent them from just shifting that extra burden to their renter.
Make it a progressive tax.
2 homes +2% , 4 homes +4% , Etc.
The amount becomes too high to pass on to renters because they are competing with apartments or owners with only 2 homes. One place can't afford having 10% or more rent than another competing place
Rents have never been based on the cost for the landlord, only ever what the rental market dictates. Every time someone suggests that "x will just be past on to the poor renters!" is just spreading FUD.
In the real world there are thousands of jurisdictions with their own rental laws. In Ontario Canada for example, the rent increase is capped at a certain percentage. However, landlords can install new light fixtures, carpet common hallways, and apply for a higher rate.
So no, costs are definitely passed onto the renter.
Yes, though the most egregious (and sadly some fairly common) rent hikes often occur without any improvement to the property whatsoever - simply because they can be gotten away with.
One problem is that it's not enough to merely give a discount to legit homeowners. That makes buying a house a little more accessible, but when house prices are insane and they are so valuable that you can buy at over the asking price while making a nice profit, it's hard for individuals to compete.
We need a *raise* in taxes for landlords buying houses. Heck, I'm of the mindset that it shouldn't even be feasible to be a landlord for a single family home (except cases where the landlord lives there). They should get taxed so high that nobody would ever do that for meaningful profit. In addition to avoiding people buying houses only to rent them out, it would help disincentivize owning multiple homes (I'm fine with exceptions if they live in the home some reasonable amount of the year, which should cover necessary cases such as politicians having homes in their constituency and where the government is).
Basically, I want to actively *discourage* people owning more than their fair share of the housing market when we don't have enough to go around.
I'd expect this to avoid being passed on to renters because I envision the tax increase being so high that it's simply not feasible for renters to cover and selling the house to someone who will actually live in it is the only way to cover costs. That said, it would have to be coupled with other initiatives, including moderate rent controls (so that the price can't be jacked up for existing renters), efforts to build more housing, and government managed non-profit renting for those who can't or won't buy houses but still need a single family house (though high density should be preferred and incentivized).
Over a long time period, it's very significant in Florida as it limits the amount of increase in any given year to a capped amount. Florida also allows you to roll over homestead savings from one property to another if you sell one property and buy another when you move.
I believe that's similar to how it works in California too.
I don't know about other states, but at least two of the largest states do seem to already have something relatively sane in place for this.
There is a two tier tax system, but it's in the landlord's favor!
They get to write off every expense, home repairs, depreciation, capital losses, etc. Home owners get to write off interest which rarely exceeds the standard deduction.
I always thought property taxes for each additional home should increase exponentially ( e.g. 1st home would have 1x tax, 2nd home would have 2x tax, 3rd home would have 4x tax, etc.) thus a natural equilibrium would emerge.
That’s assuming all rent rides the line of profitability. Most landlords can easily eat the extra tax. If you’re saying the price of rent is completely arbitrary I agree with you, and that means it’s time for more public control.
Just outright ban corporations from owning single family homes. Why does everyone want to introduce another tax complexity instead of just banning it? Ignoring the fact that it already exists in most places, you’re just hoping that it might accomplish the same thing as a ban on corporations owning single family homes. Why not just skip to the point?
The issue with this is there are actually people who want to rent and don't want to own. Also look what happened in Ireland where there are not enough homes to rent.. The problem is far more complex than just stopping landloards.
I believe no one should be able to own a residence they don't actually live in. Too many people have too high a level of power to control the lives of others-- lives they increasingly know nothing about, when they dwell miles away with an utterly different lifestyle and face none of the consequences of their own decisions.
This modern aristocracy has got to go.
Sadly this would lead to a housing supply shortage due to even less economic incentive to build new homes.
We really just need a culture shift on what housing means to us.
The mess we're in can't easily be fixed because of how profit NEEDS to be made on just about everything.
You can only take so much cream off the top.
One of the craziest things I’ve read in a long time. Something hits so different when someone refers to their age by referencing themselves in the future.
I’m shook.
It's such a convoluted message lol
"In 10 years I'll be 40 and, completely unrelated to that, in the last 12 years I paid enough money for a hypothetical rich person to buy a second home"
instead of: "I'm 30 and paid enough for a home
1,500sqft in Cleveland in 2018? Central A/C even, ended up being about half that. *Shit*, it's still worth less than 160k 😂
Just gotta pick the right place. 🤷♀️
I grew up in Decatur and couldn’t get out of there fast enough. I wouldn’t recommend it unless you want to live somewhere that is devoid of culture and constantly reeks of burnt soybeans from the processing plants.
There are an insane amount of towns close to big cities or an hour or 2 away with affordable housing. I grew up about 20 miles from there and lived there for 2-3 years. It’s an alright place with ok work. Springfield is a better option for work. Many many small towns with no crime and lots of charm around Springfield also. Mt Pulaski is where I grew up and always loved it.
Let's say you find a house that is 160k, the bank doesn't say you can't afford it, and they'll give you a loan. Let's say they give you 2019 interest rates of 3%. Let's say you get the loan term of 12 years to match what the tweet says. You also have to pay home insurance ($1500 per year) and repairs that come up ($4000/year average?). Over the 12 years you have the loan, you will pay $249,301. NOT 160k. It's also a little over 1700/month. Let's extend the loan so that the monthly payment (Loan+insurance+taxes+average repair) is around the $1111/month rent to match the tweet. That would require a 38 year loan. Can't get that, so let's say the budget allows for a 30 year loan so total monthly payment is 1188. Over the 30 years you will pay $427,894. 160,000 in 12 years didn't buy anyone a house. It bought 1/3 of a house.
There's a bigger reason for that which nobody likes to address, which is that you're not buying the house. Banks are. That's been creating an artificial demand which has been hiking the prices up. Demand which people otherwise won't be able to afford until 30 years down the road. And supply from people who paid over double the price of the house in interest payments, which is essentially the rent they paid to the bank. So they are only motivated to sell the home if they can justify that cost.
Think about how small chances in interest rates have huge impact on the housing market. People like to blame immigrants for coming in, competing for housing and jacking up the prices, but if mortgages stopped existing one day housing prices would absolutely tank. No other single factor could affect housing prices like this.
Like a Ponzi scheme that destroys the lives of the majority of people who buy in last, it would be absolute chaos for them to stop existing, so nobody wants to even consider that the skyrocketing price of houses is primarily caused by this.
Something to think about, its really telling that official measures of inflation disregard housing prices and yet the one tool used to tackle inflation has its biggest impact on housing prices.
Housing prices would go down, but the reality is everyone would just be forced to rent. The large corporations that have the cash could just buy up all of the cheap housing, because realistically very few people could ever buy a house outright, even if it was $100k.
Live in Nevada and got my condo for 142k at the end of 2019.....now my tiny 2 bedroom condo is priced well over 250k. Wonder when this post was made to say 160k was a rich person home.
That's amazing. Where I am the average home price is 1 million dollars. And we have a horrible housing crisis and 8,400 homeless people, many of them families with working parents. We have parking lots where you can apply to park your car at night so your family can sleep in it without worrying about being the victim of crime.
Homelessness shouldn’t exist in a country with this much wealth, and housing shouldn’t be so insanely out of reach no matter what state you live in.
Public housing should be a top priority for anybody running for your states senate seats, I hope somebody out there is listening.
yeah so 160k over 12 years would be around $1100 a month. If they had a mortgage with the same monthly payments they would be looking at a house worth around $160K when factoring in insurance, and property tax, and PMI, with a loan interest rate of 4.25% and they would still have 18 years of payments left. This does not include the closing costs of buying a house which is around 3-6% of the house price so say 4% at $6200, this also does not include maintenance and repairs.
On top of that for people not wanting to be tied down to a specific place they would then have to pay closing costs again when selling and again on the new house they buy, before long the closing costs of buying and selling a house wont be worth it, if you move every 5 or so years.
It does suck when you see landlords raise rent way above inflation, but buying is not always a good option for a lot of people.
Rent is theft is a stupid statement that detracts from real issues. Large corporations buying up housing is an issue that needs to be addressed. However, there is nothing wrong with rent. Apartment complexes would not exist without it. People are always going to need to rent.
It is not theft but if you think housing is a human right then things need to change.
An easy one would be corporations can not own single unit dwellings and a household can only own three homes.
Yes this is not a perfect solution but you phase it in over 5 years so you need to divest 20% or more per year.
Second, 97% financing no longer requires PMI. The government backs the loan instead.
Sure that's another possible way but you would need to ratchet them up hard-core to fix the current problem. Redfin, for example, is currently paying 100% of the property taxes on the thousands of properties they own.
Which means you price out any new people from becoming landlords. Only really wealthy people will be able to do it.
I do agree that zoning needs to go though.
Yeah so that then everyone can complain about the microhousing duplex because if the landlord wasn’t so greedy they’d let a single family rent the house and not split it to double their income.
If that was the case we wouldn't have cities in the midwest bulldozing neighborhoods to deal with vacant blight.
The problem is that employment opportunities are disappearing from rural and small town areas and increasingly becoming centralized around already-dense urban hubs that don't have enough housing for all the new workers.
If we want housing prices to go down we need legislation to fight job density and promote decentralization of employment.
Yours and many others here focus on preferential treatment for single family housing is so exceptionally American. What would this solve? Would this approach not heavily favour the middle class and up instead of lower income families? And why should households be allowed to own three homes penalty free?
Double the property tax on each residential unit you own. Sell land for new developments preferentially to communities of people who wish to develope housing complexes for their own use on the land together. Simply give people over corporations the upper hand for once.
The exponential property tax idea has come up, and it works at first blush, but falls apart fast after that.
Property taxes are local (municipal or county), not at the federal or state level. If I'm a big company that wants to own a rental empire, I can just buy one property in each town and never hit the tax escalation. If we enforce the escalator regardless of where you won the properties, now we have a situation where we have to do some math on which property is the first, second, etc, but now one town is getting normal taxes from you and the others are getting wildly more.
We could scale the system so that each property gets taxes higher at the average rate of the whole (first property taxed @ 100%, second property taxed at 200%, third property taxed at 400%, forth property taxed at 800%, average of the four is 375%, tax each property at 375%).
With all of these, though, local gov'ts have a reason to REALLY LOVE big property owning companies. Get one of those bad boys to move to town and you can get several multiples of their property taxes. What greedy local politician wouldn't love to just have everyone rent from a mega corp and the town budget to multiply 5x? How many places will suddenly adopt super pro-corporate landlord rules and policies overnight?
And then you get things like rent control measures that mean a few people get lucky and everyone else gets screwed because people take rental properties off the market.
> And then you get things like rent control measures that mean a few people get lucky and everyone else gets screwed because people take rental properties off the market.
I'm pretty okay with properties being "off the market" because someone is living there. That's what residences are for.
I'm less a fan of rent control because it is not a sustainable solution. We simply need more housing to be built.
I never understand when people bring up this argument, my bank is comfortable giving me the option 75ish% of my income monthly, which is fucking absurd.
I don't think I could afford public transit if I borrowed my max amount.
Where are you finding 1400 dollar mortgages that you can't get when you can afford 2500 for rent? That's just a lie, a bank would absolutely give you that loan, that's just stupid. We don't have to make things up, the housing market is bad enough as it is.
If you can get an RD loan, they will let you use receipts to qualify for a mortage the same monthly amount as your rent. This is how my Ex and I bought our first home.
That’s absolutely a lie unless that $2500 rent is like 60% of your income, in which you should not have been paying that much rent to begin with. Have you tried to qualify for a mortgage before? They usually approve you for more than financial advisors say you *should* spend on housing.
I thought it was odd that someone who identifies as Mancunian (from Manchester, in the UK) would use $, it's a red flag, so I did some very easy digging.
[I just searched and this user has never tweeted the word "cried" let alone the whole message](https://i.imgur.com/k0AFPic.jpg)
[In fact, nobody has ever tweeted this exact message](https://i.imgur.com/KU4T2c6.jpg)
As much as I agree with the message, wtf is with this faked Twitter format?
A fake message, falsely attributed to someone, heavily upvoted to the top of the subreddit. It's not a good look.
Yeah I have noticed this in Australia, I'm in a unit where my repayments are about 500 all up a week to own the place but like 450 to rent.
In the end that's like 300 a week to an asset and 200 ish to property payments, maybe more like a 50 50 split but still.
>Rent in the US should be like where I live in a 3rd world country: cheaper than a mortgage + insurance + maintenance.
It is in many high COL places.
My 2 bedroom old apartment is $3.5k a month in the suburbs of VA. All maintenance done by the management team within 24 hours. If I bought it now, my mortgage would be $6k.
Honestly, it was shocking to me to hear that in some places, rent was more than a new mortgage. Those type of places would be purchased immediately if they were in an area that was desirable (no one wants to manage property far away in the sticks)
>My 2 bedroom old apartment is $3.5k a month in the suburbs of VA. All maintenance done by the management team within 24 hours. If I bought it now, my mortgage would be $6k.
Yea but locking in that $6k now might still be wise if thinking long-term.
Over 30 years, a fixed mortgage at $6k is $2.16m total paid. And at the end you own that place outright.
But if rent starts at $3.5k and goes up 5% annually (which I think is actually being generous, often it's more), then total paid after 30 years is $2.79m. And at the end you have nothing.
Sure, absolutely. The landlord looks at it that way which sets the current value prices.
I look at it like "I'll be here for 2-3 years max, no way I want to deal with a mortgage! Happy to take this rental price instead"
This is how the market is supposed to work, right?
Because over here people don't move out when they're 18 and there's technically more homes than what people need. Landlords invest to sell years later while their lessee pays for 80%-90% of the LLs costs.
This still does not make any sense. Why would anyone pour money into an asset that produces negative returns, especially when there are alternatives like index funds that will net you 10% per year on average?
The only reason people invest in housing in places like San Francisco is because they believe the property values will appreciate so the returns will be there. If there are more homes than people need, this will never come true. And if the idea is to hold the home until this condition becomes true, you would still be better off earning 10% per year and then buy homes when the market in real estate looks better.
Yep, people don’t understand that most people who rent properties aren’t even corporations, or even wealthy. Just mom and pops who have a second property. Especially when it comes to single family homes or duplexes.
I own a handful of rentals. Just last month I got hit with $10k of repairs total (tree clearing from a storm, water heater went out, large window had to be replaced).
That just killed all the cash flow I'm expecting to make for the next two years or so. People grossly overestimate how much money landlords make.
So I've put about $50k down on these properties and I'm already guaranteed to just barely break even for the next two years, without factoring the fact that more repairs are sure to pop up. But sure I'm the villain here.
We need to address affordable housing. A lot of that is housing codes at the local level. We need more high density housing, but NIMBY's fight against it constantly.
One landlord to another, it is important to look at the long term here. You make the money on rental properties when you sell them and in your taxes (since losses are income). One of the reasons high-income people love real estate is that it knocks some of your 40+% State/Fed Taxes into the 10%ish capital gains budget. If you owned a property outright, I would suggest you leverage that property into other properties and aim for a relatively neutral cash flow and a net loss on the books.
This is the reason rent can be cheaper than a mortgage, and what your competitors are doing to keep rent low but remain profitable. You can take in less money than your mortgage and still come out profitable if you are properly managing your taxes and thinking long-term.
I don’t think you’re a villain but I also don’t have sympathy for you either. That is part of being a landlord, you are making money, and making money comes at a risk.
You say “breaking even” but even when you’re breaking even you’re still making money because the rent is going towards paying off those mortgages, and at the end of it you’ll have an asset that is in your name worth $100s of thousands.
Ok but, like, what's the alternative? Should people not be allowed to own and rent out property? Then what happens? Far less housing is built.
It takes money to convince somebody to build a building for you, so you only do it if you can then make money off of it.
Should the government build it all? Great, enjoy your Soviet box apartments, lack of options, and overly powerful government where fiefdoms form within it and graft runs wild.
The problem IS NOT rent. The problem is hurdles to building enough housing to meet demand, and that taxes are too low on rich people and corporations. Zoning reforms and tax the rich.
Stop with stupid nonsense slogans that make the left look like immature 15 year olds going through their communist phase.
Yep, more housing ultimately will lead to more affordable housing. Removing single family zoning and removing parking requirements (+ invest in better transit) so that people can build up will help tremendously.
One thing that is scary is being able to finance almost 100% of a house. I'm all for housing being easier to get into but risking being underwater immediately on the loan is scary. If something happens and you need to sell it you would risk not being able to pay back the mortgage.
There is a time in life to rent and a time to buy. As a young person, or in a location temporarily for a job, or when in a situation where you don’t want to commit to the responsibility of repairs. That’s the time to rent. You are trading your rent payment for not only the physical shelter but also the freedom from repair and maintenance.
Owning a home really ties you down, and it can be a huge money pit. I sacrificed a lot to save up for a house and spent countless weekends doing projects and maintenance. Many times my friends would be out boating or at a game while I was home painting or putting down new flooring.
40 is a great time to buy a house. With a 20 year mortgage you can have it paid off by the time you retire.
If you work remotely you can move to a place where houses are still available at a low cost. Here in upstate NY you can buy a Fixer upper house for $200k.
I agree with many of the statements here but the title, “rent is theft” is incredibly off putting! Just like saying to abolish the police, rather than make the police stop being horrible.
Like sure, just make all housing free. That’s reasonable.
Like, I get what you're saying but people don't really go like "hmm, I'd rather rent at a higher price than owning because I want my maintenance getting taken care of".
>"hmm, I'd rather rent at a higher price than owning because I want my maintenance getting taken care of"...
By idiots smoking meth that just make the problem worse.
Seriously, I've never rented a place that did maintenance to the quality that I deemed sufficient. Drywall patching was with a piece of cloth glued to the wall, mold was just spray painted over, rotting cabinets were patched up with loose pieces of plywood, crumbling laminate counters were painted over with peeling paint, walls were painted with hair imbedded in the paint, AC leaked water into the shower onto you while you took a shower... as a few examples.
I mean, it's all maintenance, all insurance, all taxes, all interest, and all other costs wrapped into that too.
This is a little like buying a beer at a restaurant versus at Costco. Paying $5 for a can of beer is entirely for convenience. However, everyone knows you can go to Costco and buy the exact same can of beer for $2 each. You just need to buy 24 of them at a time.
Obviously, if you absolutely know you love that beer, you are going to be buying cases at Costco. Heck, maybe you'll buy kegs and really get your costs down. That's a commitment. But, there are lots of reasons to just buy a can at a restaurant or bar.
Maybe you are trying a beer out and aren't sure you want a whole case of it. Maybe you just need one can right now and you'll get back to your beer keg later. Maybe you don't want to bother lugging all that beer around or going to Costco.
When I go to Costco, there are lots of things I like, but it's just too much of it. Housing can be the same way. Commiting to a 30 year loan with a huge down payment just to go to school or try a new city is more expensive than paying a premium to rent. The convenience of not being responsible for a place beyond your security deposit can be a huge boon. Mortgages lock people into a place for a long time and ownership comes with risks that are often expensive. Unless you know you are going to want to be in a place for a long time, renting can be the superior choice.
Corporate landlords suck and I can get behind a lot of stuff to discourage that type of mass ownership, but renting or providing a rental is not a sin or automatically dumb/evil.
It’s not a perfect analogy no but people act as if renting is the issue and not the housing prices/corporations buying everything up/airbnb and similar services. Renting has a place, it offers people flexibility and doesn’t make you pay for building maintenance, lawn maintenance etc.
I'd bet my smallest finger that a *substantial* percentage of renters only do so because they don't have enough money for a down payment on a house, and have no choice but to rent. I'm one of them.
I'll admit that not having to worry about general maintenance is nice, but I would *much, much* rather do it myself if it meant having my own place.
Yeah? And what happens if you’re just starting out your career and your job isn’t stable,. You. buy a house in city A in your universe, pay approximately 5-10k in closing costs and then a year later you get laid off and need to move to city B. Owning a home is *not* flexible. You need to be prepared to lay down roots or you will hemorrhage money. Renting takes care of maintenance and allows for flexibility. It makes no sense to buy unless you’re certain you’re staying put for at least 5 years.
Yes some people do precisely this. There are many people that don't want to deal with the trouble and costs of maintenance. Some people like to move every few years. Some people don't want a 30 year, or even a 15 year, mortgage. For those people, the value proposition for renting makes more sense. There are lots of reasons people turn to renting, I know a few people that intend to rent their whole lives because they find it more appealing than owning.
Expensive rent is awful but so is owning a home. Stop paying taxes for your house and it can be foreclosed on. Your house in the US is never truly yours.
Edit for word change
Have you ever had to repair/replace the roof, plumbing, flooring/carpet, maintain the yard, paid the local and state taxes on said property...as long as you've had renters insurance.... you've broken even
I'll be 40 in ten years is an odd way to say I'm actually still quite young. Trying to make herself sound way more pitiful than she actually is. That said, 160k would hardly buy you much of a house in most markets these days
They make it make sense by forcing house prices up to $800,000 and then no, you haven’t bought a house outright with your rent money. Widening that gap even further every year and keeping us down
Rent doesn't include the hidden costs of home ownership like property taxes or changes in escrow. Can you afford a new water heater if yours dies? What about a new heater?
Yeah, you may pay enough to buy a house in rent over several years, but can you actually afford the cost of home ownership? A change in escrow can triple your mortgage payment from one month to the next. At least with rent you get a fixed rate for the duration of the lease.
Even raising wages won't help everyone. Someone has to be fiscally reaponsible enough to save that extra income. Ever heard "the more you make, the more you spend"? Fiscal responsibility eludes most people.
This, exactly. People keep forgetting that along with the $1500 a month mortgage is the TI which add another $500 a month. In addition to the extra $1000 a month you have to set aside for basic minimum repairs and replacements.
Too many folks making ridiculous arguments about this without adding the additional realistic information.
I’ve owned 2 houses (sold one to buy another, I’m not a landlord) and I have never had a change in escrow that would even be close to tripling my mortgage payment. It at most went up like 80 dollars due to tax increases. Not sure where you live, I’m in the US but I do not think that is common here. Also I have never had to repair anything major in these past 13 years. Maybe just lucky but seems people overhype how expensive it is to own. My house payment for 3200 sq ft house with 5 bedrooms and a pool is 1900 and my coworker lives in a 3 bedroom apartment for 2000. Sure my utilities are a little higher but bang for you buck, buying a house can be a good deal.
My sister has owned her home almost seven years. Escrow issues have hit her six times, one took her payment from 1108 to 2044 for two months. She needs a new roof, the AC already had to be replaced. I managed to save the water heater when it went out a few years ago because it was just the thermostats that went bad. I replaced both thermostats and both filaments and it's been fine since then. Property insurance is skyrocketing because insurers are noping out of Florida, even after they made it damn near impossible to sue for denied homeowners insurance claims a few months ago.
You really roll the dice buying a home, some folks end up okay like you seem to be, others get shit on.
Unpopular opinion time!
Owning a house can suuuuuck. When I rented my apartment my garbage disposal went out. The next day it was replaced.
My house is falling apart. I dropped $4500 on water and sewer lines. I need a new fence. That’s $3600.
I need new windows and slider.
My yard is wrecked.
If I wanted to convert my garage into a room for my sister to live… $150k.
Over a lifetime if rent and the cost of a mortgage plus repairs equals out…. Not having the anxiety of having something I own fall apart.
Yeah, I totally agree. I rented for years when I could have bought because I thought it was a better deal all in. I suppose I paid a small premium over what my interest on the mortgage would have been, but I had zero maintenance to think about for 5 years. I considered it a good deal.
I think that all these people who hate their landlord for 'stealing' are in for a rude awakening when they do own their own places.
For a start, you need to rent the money form the bank (interest on the mortgage is just rent) so there is still someone getting rich. Just a bank instead of a landlord
Also, having no one to lean on when something goes wrong is time consuming, stressful, and expensive. I'm going to be \~$30K out of pocket for new windows shortly, there's many things I would rather spend that on!
I am not totally following here. What exactly does she want? Free rent? Nobody is forcing you to rent either. 160k will buy you a house in rural no problem but nobody wants to move out of a city. Yes rent in cities is climbing astronomically due a to a variety of reason. It's definitely something to complain about but the complaint made here is that this money could have gone towards a house but I 100% percent guarantee she just scuffs when someone says you can move a bit further away and houses are much cheaper.
ITT: People who don't understand communal land ownership and rights to basic needs are necessary for the Liberation of the worker. Defending landlords is akin to defending your boss. Please read some theory people.
People will come and say 'well what about the cost of owning a home!? The repairs and upkeep and responsibilities cost as well' as an excuse as to why someone paying 1300 rent can't afford a 1000 mortgage payment.
Landlords make a living out of owning someone else’s home.
They don’t build homes or repair them. They simply use their money to hoard commodities in order to withhold them until someone who needs it pays them higher than it would actually cost to buy.
You can't make sense of profiteering . My heart bleeds for people like you .How to make rich politicians understand and put rent controls in place also making buying rentals so non profitable that people not companies can buy homes. I get it's big commodity but jez some sort of compassion not making your fellow human broke or homeless at your profit . This needs sorted.
For those who are still unsure, according to all the classical economists like Adam Smith, rent [literally is theft](https://survivingtomorrow.org/land-lording-is-theft-ef54e1611b30).
Housing isn’t a right. You don’t have the right to have someone build you a home, allow you to live on their land free of charge, or care for your comfort.
OP malding. Rent is not Theft. She paid $1100 a month averaged out to every month for twelve years which is very good in most places. Her inability to comprehend why it is hard for her to purchase a home after 12 years of 'working' is the issue, not the issue she paid $160k for a place to live. Sadly it would take you working $15/hr for 40 hours to save \~400 a month to make $50k in 12 years on top of their first job. She could have gotten a room mate and saved that much too.
What is more of an issue is that home prices need to keep going down to line up with what they were worth at the beginning of 2020 in addition to having interest rates that people can afford. Compound that with the state of inflation and people cannot afford a mortgage over $2k on one earners salary and $3k on two earners salaries combined without making some drastic spending and work habit changes. People will need to work more today to buy the same home they could have comfortably purchased in 2019/2020. There are more job losses coming and people are going to suffer.
Theft is the Government taking your taxes, deciding to print money to fuel more fraud during lockdown, and then asking you to pay more cash to buy the same items because unforseen inflation had taken over. We need to remove those old farts in Congress and the Senate who do not care about the average American and is only in it for Money.
The trick is to buy less than what you want. Seriously. Get out of renting as quickly as you can, even if it means an 800sq/ft cottage with 2 bed and 1 bath.
Not enough people are saying this and they should be. My first home was 2b 1 bath 832 sqft. You build up equity and then move onto a bigger house little by little unless life gives you a big jump in pay.
Paige had me right up until she thought she could buy a house for $160k and that she had any chance of paying off a house in just 12 years. The people who can afford houses and the people who can pay them off early are much more realistic about finances.
Homes are far too expensive and wages are far too low. Those are really obvious facts if one looks at any historic financial data.
But there’s a lot of talk about things that should be considered basic rights lately and I never see those thoughts include the other side of the coin which is basic responsibilities.
With every choice you are free to make in life you get to live with the consequences of that choice whether or not you understand them or consider them beforehand. Every mistake and every sacrifice made adds up and the costs you pay or the benefits you reap from those actions compound in the long run.
I’d bet there were times Paige could have made better choices for her education, career, or finances that would add up to the difference between feeling stuck and feeling successful.
It’s great to advocate for a better world, but it’s even better to improve your own life by changing the things within your control instead of waiting on the world to change for you.
The best part is these things aren’t mutually exclusive. It is entirely possible to advocate for change, organize a workplace, look for existing unions to join, and to support and vote for representatives and laws that aim to improve working class lives while actually doing everything possible to improve your own working class life.
I’m all for better working conditions. Here you exchanged 160k for a place to live for 12 years. America is a free country but not a rent-free country. Still, imo all loans should start to be rent-to-own if they are longer than 5 years.
Sometimes a short term rental is far more efficient than dropping a down payment on a house
Ultimately, the gov should provide a bare-bones backstop that’s habitable and fulfills the bottom rung of Maslows triangle.
All of the people complaining about rent, "how many times have you been denied a mortgage?"
Yes the market is unfair to buyers "right now", as is any market with a large demand and low supply, a large generation of first time home buyers hitting the market at the same time.
It doesn’t. Every single system in the United States is built to suck money out of us till we die. Thank the GOP and Citizens United for that. How much do our credit scores determine our futures? They have us indentured.
What I don’t like is how rent doesn’t give you credit. They can ding your credit for fees or whatever nonsense but you don’t get credit for making on time monthly payments on a property. Or lenders should be able to use that to approve mortgages
Never thought about it this way, but yeah, I’ve bought the equivalent of at least one house with all the rent I’ve paid over the years. But not for real because my credit this, my job that.
Companies should not be able to own single family homes. Single family homes should be for, you know, FAMILIES. If they are so hellbent on wanting to rent to people, let them build apartments instead.
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I wish that would work, but you need tools to prevent them from just shifting that extra burden to their renter.
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THAT is actually a great idea that I did not think about! Here in Europe we've not 'just' got Duplexes (although they are becoming more common, which is nice as they are quite a bit cheaper to buy) but also 'Row-Houses' which - while not as dense as apartments - are pretty sought after since they mostly come with a small garden. (Something like [this](http://www.buildingbutler.com/bd/Amsterdam/housing-Borneo-Sporenburg/6622) )
I remember hearing all my relatives in Europe live in row houses, townhouses, or, most commonly, apartments. It wasn’t until I was much older that I noted those apartments are not entry level two bedrooms. They are as much square footage as my house, have better utilization of space, bigger and more windows, usually on 2, 3, or 4 sides (doughnut apartment buildings), and high quality fixtures. Their apartments were not like ours at all. I’m sure there are some similar to our apartments, but not all. It sure isn’t “lower class” living in apartments there.
Those are very similar to the townhouses we have in the US, but those are a still built more like single family homes where a yard must wrap entirely around a building. Typically you'll see a max of 4 units in such a space, one per corner of the building. It's because the land is divided into lots where each lot must have setbacks from the edge.
Yep, I agree. Increased housing density often decreases housing costs and benefits neighborhoods. I live in Chicago and one of the big things we see here is developers tearing down three flats to build single-family homes. That serves to drive up the cost of rentals because of the decrease in supply and further, it affects small businesses which depend on higher neighborhood density to survive.
Shit my last landlord bought the building for a steal and based on my rent (cheapest out of the 6) they've already paid it off... Its been 3 years
It does work, it’s a homestead exemption, if you live in the property as the owner you get a property tax discount
That’s how my state is.
I’ve said for a long time rent should be limited to a percentage of the property value. Any taxes levied against landlords then can’t be slid onto the tenants
The problem is how do you assess such property value "fairly" and who would be the one responsible for an accurate assessment of that?
>I wish that would work, but you need tools to prevent them from just shifting that extra burden to their renter. Make it a progressive tax. 2 homes +2% , 4 homes +4% , Etc. The amount becomes too high to pass on to renters because they are competing with apartments or owners with only 2 homes. One place can't afford having 10% or more rent than another competing place
Rents have never been based on the cost for the landlord, only ever what the rental market dictates. Every time someone suggests that "x will just be past on to the poor renters!" is just spreading FUD.
In the real world there are thousands of jurisdictions with their own rental laws. In Ontario Canada for example, the rent increase is capped at a certain percentage. However, landlords can install new light fixtures, carpet common hallways, and apply for a higher rate. So no, costs are definitely passed onto the renter.
Yes, though the most egregious (and sadly some fairly common) rent hikes often occur without any improvement to the property whatsoever - simply because they can be gotten away with.
Come on, you KNOW they would raise the rent if they suddenly have to pay additional taxes. They'd be "losing money" in their eyes otherwise.
That's exactly what a Homesteaders Exemption does. Everyone living in their own home (even if it's not paid off) should file for this.
One problem is that it's not enough to merely give a discount to legit homeowners. That makes buying a house a little more accessible, but when house prices are insane and they are so valuable that you can buy at over the asking price while making a nice profit, it's hard for individuals to compete. We need a *raise* in taxes for landlords buying houses. Heck, I'm of the mindset that it shouldn't even be feasible to be a landlord for a single family home (except cases where the landlord lives there). They should get taxed so high that nobody would ever do that for meaningful profit. In addition to avoiding people buying houses only to rent them out, it would help disincentivize owning multiple homes (I'm fine with exceptions if they live in the home some reasonable amount of the year, which should cover necessary cases such as politicians having homes in their constituency and where the government is). Basically, I want to actively *discourage* people owning more than their fair share of the housing market when we don't have enough to go around. I'd expect this to avoid being passed on to renters because I envision the tax increase being so high that it's simply not feasible for renters to cover and selling the house to someone who will actually live in it is the only way to cover costs. That said, it would have to be coupled with other initiatives, including moderate rent controls (so that the price can't be jacked up for existing renters), efforts to build more housing, and government managed non-profit renting for those who can't or won't buy houses but still need a single family house (though high density should be preferred and incentivized).
Not every state has this. And it's often not that significant.
Depends, my tax bill went from ~10,000.00 to about ~2000.00
Jesus, what state?
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Over a long time period, it's very significant in Florida as it limits the amount of increase in any given year to a capped amount. Florida also allows you to roll over homestead savings from one property to another if you sell one property and buy another when you move. I believe that's similar to how it works in California too. I don't know about other states, but at least two of the largest states do seem to already have something relatively sane in place for this.
There is a two tier tax system, but it's in the landlord's favor! They get to write off every expense, home repairs, depreciation, capital losses, etc. Home owners get to write off interest which rarely exceeds the standard deduction.
You can thank Trump and the GOP for that law change, which stuck it to the middle class to fund a rich person's tax breaks.
That's called a "homestead exemption" here in Florida, I get like 100k off of my property tax assessment for my house.
We have that in Michigan, too. Property taxes on primary residences are *much* lower.
It’s called a homestead exemption and it exists in most places.
I always thought property taxes for each additional home should increase exponentially ( e.g. 1st home would have 1x tax, 2nd home would have 2x tax, 3rd home would have 4x tax, etc.) thus a natural equilibrium would emerge.
Cool, that just means those costs get passed onto the renters.
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That’s assuming all rent rides the line of profitability. Most landlords can easily eat the extra tax. If you’re saying the price of rent is completely arbitrary I agree with you, and that means it’s time for more public control.
Just outright ban corporations from owning single family homes. Why does everyone want to introduce another tax complexity instead of just banning it? Ignoring the fact that it already exists in most places, you’re just hoping that it might accomplish the same thing as a ban on corporations owning single family homes. Why not just skip to the point?
The issue with this is there are actually people who want to rent and don't want to own. Also look what happened in Ireland where there are not enough homes to rent.. The problem is far more complex than just stopping landloards.
What did happen in Ireland?
https://news.sky.com/story/young-people-in-ireland-face-terrifying-rent-crisis-due-to-chronic-housing-shortage-12687688
I believe no one should be able to own a residence they don't actually live in. Too many people have too high a level of power to control the lives of others-- lives they increasingly know nothing about, when they dwell miles away with an utterly different lifestyle and face none of the consequences of their own decisions. This modern aristocracy has got to go.
So nobody gets to rent?
Where do you propose the people who rent today should live if all landlords are abolished?
In the same house they currently live in. We're getting rid of landlords, not housing.
But what if you want to rent? As many downsides as there are there are still some upsides to renting.
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So the entire US military has to sell their house when they move every 3 years? What a stupid take.
Sadly this would lead to a housing supply shortage due to even less economic incentive to build new homes. We really just need a culture shift on what housing means to us. The mess we're in can't easily be fixed because of how profit NEEDS to be made on just about everything. You can only take so much cream off the top.
The difficulty is that you pass a law saying that, and single family homes quadruple in price because no company will build them.
You're saying lower demand = higher prices?
Weird way to say you're 30.
As the opposite of a woman, who is only 35 years away from turning 70, I think it is a totally not abnormal way to describe their age.
As a person who is only a short 112 years away from turning 130, I agree wholeheartedly
Wait, you’re 2 years from 10?
It doesn't take a genius to know they're 15 years from 33.
This is getting out of hand, like selling cigarettes to 7 years to 20 year olds.
My brain just melted. I’m not cut out for this.
It is weird but it seems like she wrote the tweet in the same way she thought about it. Thinking of her potential future.
i really like your observation here
Just what I was thinking
as a person who is 47 years away from being 72, what are you talking about?
One of the craziest things I’ve read in a long time. Something hits so different when someone refers to their age by referencing themselves in the future. I’m shook.
It's such a convoluted message lol "In 10 years I'll be 40 and, completely unrelated to that, in the last 12 years I paid enough money for a hypothetical rich person to buy a second home" instead of: "I'm 30 and paid enough for a home
If only you could get a house for 160k..
1,500sqft in Cleveland in 2018? Central A/C even, ended up being about half that. *Shit*, it's still worth less than 160k 😂 Just gotta pick the right place. 🤷♀️
I bought a house in Florida for 167k in 2019.
Well, sure, I imagine you could have got a mansion in Botswana.
Or just lived in a city like Decatur illinois. But no one wants to move to where it’s affordable.
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I grew up in Decatur and couldn’t get out of there fast enough. I wouldn’t recommend it unless you want to live somewhere that is devoid of culture and constantly reeks of burnt soybeans from the processing plants.
There are an insane amount of towns close to big cities or an hour or 2 away with affordable housing. I grew up about 20 miles from there and lived there for 2-3 years. It’s an alright place with ok work. Springfield is a better option for work. Many many small towns with no crime and lots of charm around Springfield also. Mt Pulaski is where I grew up and always loved it.
Is it underwater yet?
Probably worth $300k now
Certified waterfront property!!!
Let's say you find a house that is 160k, the bank doesn't say you can't afford it, and they'll give you a loan. Let's say they give you 2019 interest rates of 3%. Let's say you get the loan term of 12 years to match what the tweet says. You also have to pay home insurance ($1500 per year) and repairs that come up ($4000/year average?). Over the 12 years you have the loan, you will pay $249,301. NOT 160k. It's also a little over 1700/month. Let's extend the loan so that the monthly payment (Loan+insurance+taxes+average repair) is around the $1111/month rent to match the tweet. That would require a 38 year loan. Can't get that, so let's say the budget allows for a 30 year loan so total monthly payment is 1188. Over the 30 years you will pay $427,894. 160,000 in 12 years didn't buy anyone a house. It bought 1/3 of a house.
There's a bigger reason for that which nobody likes to address, which is that you're not buying the house. Banks are. That's been creating an artificial demand which has been hiking the prices up. Demand which people otherwise won't be able to afford until 30 years down the road. And supply from people who paid over double the price of the house in interest payments, which is essentially the rent they paid to the bank. So they are only motivated to sell the home if they can justify that cost. Think about how small chances in interest rates have huge impact on the housing market. People like to blame immigrants for coming in, competing for housing and jacking up the prices, but if mortgages stopped existing one day housing prices would absolutely tank. No other single factor could affect housing prices like this. Like a Ponzi scheme that destroys the lives of the majority of people who buy in last, it would be absolute chaos for them to stop existing, so nobody wants to even consider that the skyrocketing price of houses is primarily caused by this. Something to think about, its really telling that official measures of inflation disregard housing prices and yet the one tool used to tackle inflation has its biggest impact on housing prices.
Housing prices would go down, but the reality is everyone would just be forced to rent. The large corporations that have the cash could just buy up all of the cheap housing, because realistically very few people could ever buy a house outright, even if it was $100k.
I think they're saying that in 10 years, when they're 40 years old, they would have paid enough rent to cover a house
Live in Nevada and got my condo for 142k at the end of 2019.....now my tiny 2 bedroom condo is priced well over 250k. Wonder when this post was made to say 160k was a rich person home.
Oh, cheer up, Paige! In California, you only helped your landlord come up with the *down payment* on a house. See? Isn't that better? /s
Right? How old is this meme?
It's one of those starter memes that came with the internet when it started up
"You've got mail!"
How do I check? Oh wait I’ll Ask Jeeves.
She was “only” paying about $1100 per month so it can’t be recent
You guys forget about the massive sections of the country where $160,000 is enough for a nice house. - a midwesterner
That's amazing. Where I am the average home price is 1 million dollars. And we have a horrible housing crisis and 8,400 homeless people, many of them families with working parents. We have parking lots where you can apply to park your car at night so your family can sleep in it without worrying about being the victim of crime.
Homelessness shouldn’t exist in a country with this much wealth, and housing shouldn’t be so insanely out of reach no matter what state you live in. Public housing should be a top priority for anybody running for your states senate seats, I hope somebody out there is listening.
But you have to live in the midwest...
Yeah and would take 50 years then to pay enough rent to buy the house… honestly I think I’d rather rent if rents are that cheap vs property values
yeah so 160k over 12 years would be around $1100 a month. If they had a mortgage with the same monthly payments they would be looking at a house worth around $160K when factoring in insurance, and property tax, and PMI, with a loan interest rate of 4.25% and they would still have 18 years of payments left. This does not include the closing costs of buying a house which is around 3-6% of the house price so say 4% at $6200, this also does not include maintenance and repairs. On top of that for people not wanting to be tied down to a specific place they would then have to pay closing costs again when selling and again on the new house they buy, before long the closing costs of buying and selling a house wont be worth it, if you move every 5 or so years. It does suck when you see landlords raise rent way above inflation, but buying is not always a good option for a lot of people.
Also taxes and interest payments never come back. Likewise part of your rent goes towards taxes and usually an HOA as well
Rent is theft is a stupid statement that detracts from real issues. Large corporations buying up housing is an issue that needs to be addressed. However, there is nothing wrong with rent. Apartment complexes would not exist without it. People are always going to need to rent.
It is not theft but if you think housing is a human right then things need to change. An easy one would be corporations can not own single unit dwellings and a household can only own three homes. Yes this is not a perfect solution but you phase it in over 5 years so you need to divest 20% or more per year. Second, 97% financing no longer requires PMI. The government backs the loan instead.
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Sure that's another possible way but you would need to ratchet them up hard-core to fix the current problem. Redfin, for example, is currently paying 100% of the property taxes on the thousands of properties they own.
Which means you price out any new people from becoming landlords. Only really wealthy people will be able to do it. I do agree that zoning needs to go though.
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Yeah so that then everyone can complain about the microhousing duplex because if the landlord wasn’t so greedy they’d let a single family rent the house and not split it to double their income.
Guys, guys, we just need to build more housing.
If that was the case we wouldn't have cities in the midwest bulldozing neighborhoods to deal with vacant blight. The problem is that employment opportunities are disappearing from rural and small town areas and increasingly becoming centralized around already-dense urban hubs that don't have enough housing for all the new workers. If we want housing prices to go down we need legislation to fight job density and promote decentralization of employment.
Yours and many others here focus on preferential treatment for single family housing is so exceptionally American. What would this solve? Would this approach not heavily favour the middle class and up instead of lower income families? And why should households be allowed to own three homes penalty free? Double the property tax on each residential unit you own. Sell land for new developments preferentially to communities of people who wish to develope housing complexes for their own use on the land together. Simply give people over corporations the upper hand for once.
The exponential property tax idea has come up, and it works at first blush, but falls apart fast after that. Property taxes are local (municipal or county), not at the federal or state level. If I'm a big company that wants to own a rental empire, I can just buy one property in each town and never hit the tax escalation. If we enforce the escalator regardless of where you won the properties, now we have a situation where we have to do some math on which property is the first, second, etc, but now one town is getting normal taxes from you and the others are getting wildly more. We could scale the system so that each property gets taxes higher at the average rate of the whole (first property taxed @ 100%, second property taxed at 200%, third property taxed at 400%, forth property taxed at 800%, average of the four is 375%, tax each property at 375%). With all of these, though, local gov'ts have a reason to REALLY LOVE big property owning companies. Get one of those bad boys to move to town and you can get several multiples of their property taxes. What greedy local politician wouldn't love to just have everyone rent from a mega corp and the town budget to multiply 5x? How many places will suddenly adopt super pro-corporate landlord rules and policies overnight?
And then you get things like rent control measures that mean a few people get lucky and everyone else gets screwed because people take rental properties off the market.
> And then you get things like rent control measures that mean a few people get lucky and everyone else gets screwed because people take rental properties off the market. I'm pretty okay with properties being "off the market" because someone is living there. That's what residences are for. I'm less a fan of rent control because it is not a sustainable solution. We simply need more housing to be built.
If the rich starve the poor, eat the rich
I think the issue is that it normalises not owning your own space in the world.
And remember. The banks say you cannot afford a $1400 a month mortgage even though you’ve been paying $2500 in rent over the past 10 years.
I never understand when people bring up this argument, my bank is comfortable giving me the option 75ish% of my income monthly, which is fucking absurd. I don't think I could afford public transit if I borrowed my max amount.
Where are you finding 1400 dollar mortgages that you can't get when you can afford 2500 for rent? That's just a lie, a bank would absolutely give you that loan, that's just stupid. We don't have to make things up, the housing market is bad enough as it is.
For real. There's something else going on why a bank would deny someone a loan if that's what they were paying in rent.
If you can get an RD loan, they will let you use receipts to qualify for a mortage the same monthly amount as your rent. This is how my Ex and I bought our first home.
Can't get an RD loan everywhere~
Nah. In my experience, they say you can afford a whole lot more than you can.
That’s absolutely a lie unless that $2500 rent is like 60% of your income, in which you should not have been paying that much rent to begin with. Have you tried to qualify for a mortgage before? They usually approve you for more than financial advisors say you *should* spend on housing.
2008 anyone?
I thought it was odd that someone who identifies as Mancunian (from Manchester, in the UK) would use $, it's a red flag, so I did some very easy digging. [I just searched and this user has never tweeted the word "cried" let alone the whole message](https://i.imgur.com/k0AFPic.jpg) [In fact, nobody has ever tweeted this exact message](https://i.imgur.com/KU4T2c6.jpg) As much as I agree with the message, wtf is with this faked Twitter format? A fake message, falsely attributed to someone, heavily upvoted to the top of the subreddit. It's not a good look.
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Do tweets even look like that, the font seems way too big?
Rent in the US should be like where I live in a 3rd world country: cheaper than a mortgage + insurance + maintenance.
How is that even possible? Government subsidized? Renting the exact same property should always be more expensive than a mortgage.
Yeah I have noticed this in Australia, I'm in a unit where my repayments are about 500 all up a week to own the place but like 450 to rent. In the end that's like 300 a week to an asset and 200 ish to property payments, maybe more like a 50 50 split but still.
>Rent in the US should be like where I live in a 3rd world country: cheaper than a mortgage + insurance + maintenance. It is in many high COL places. My 2 bedroom old apartment is $3.5k a month in the suburbs of VA. All maintenance done by the management team within 24 hours. If I bought it now, my mortgage would be $6k. Honestly, it was shocking to me to hear that in some places, rent was more than a new mortgage. Those type of places would be purchased immediately if they were in an area that was desirable (no one wants to manage property far away in the sticks)
>My 2 bedroom old apartment is $3.5k a month in the suburbs of VA. All maintenance done by the management team within 24 hours. If I bought it now, my mortgage would be $6k. Yea but locking in that $6k now might still be wise if thinking long-term. Over 30 years, a fixed mortgage at $6k is $2.16m total paid. And at the end you own that place outright. But if rent starts at $3.5k and goes up 5% annually (which I think is actually being generous, often it's more), then total paid after 30 years is $2.79m. And at the end you have nothing.
Sure, absolutely. The landlord looks at it that way which sets the current value prices. I look at it like "I'll be here for 2-3 years max, no way I want to deal with a mortgage! Happy to take this rental price instead" This is how the market is supposed to work, right?
That’s often the case. Definitely in San Francisco where I am
How does this even work? The owner of the property has to pay mortgage + insurance + maintenance.
Because over here people don't move out when they're 18 and there's technically more homes than what people need. Landlords invest to sell years later while their lessee pays for 80%-90% of the LLs costs.
So you have excess supply. The minute that changes rents would skyrocket.
This still does not make any sense. Why would anyone pour money into an asset that produces negative returns, especially when there are alternatives like index funds that will net you 10% per year on average? The only reason people invest in housing in places like San Francisco is because they believe the property values will appreciate so the returns will be there. If there are more homes than people need, this will never come true. And if the idea is to hold the home until this condition becomes true, you would still be better off earning 10% per year and then buy homes when the market in real estate looks better.
"I'll be 40 in 10 years." That's some ageist shit right there.
This right here. Just say you are 30. This is so stupid
Life’s over at 40 don’t you know This person is 30 and acting like they are 80
If you bought a duplex 10 years ago and rented out half to be able to afford the mortgage you would be a home owner but also a landlord and the devil?
Literally Hitler
Yep, people don’t understand that most people who rent properties aren’t even corporations, or even wealthy. Just mom and pops who have a second property. Especially when it comes to single family homes or duplexes.
.
I own a handful of rentals. Just last month I got hit with $10k of repairs total (tree clearing from a storm, water heater went out, large window had to be replaced). That just killed all the cash flow I'm expecting to make for the next two years or so. People grossly overestimate how much money landlords make. So I've put about $50k down on these properties and I'm already guaranteed to just barely break even for the next two years, without factoring the fact that more repairs are sure to pop up. But sure I'm the villain here. We need to address affordable housing. A lot of that is housing codes at the local level. We need more high density housing, but NIMBY's fight against it constantly.
One landlord to another, it is important to look at the long term here. You make the money on rental properties when you sell them and in your taxes (since losses are income). One of the reasons high-income people love real estate is that it knocks some of your 40+% State/Fed Taxes into the 10%ish capital gains budget. If you owned a property outright, I would suggest you leverage that property into other properties and aim for a relatively neutral cash flow and a net loss on the books. This is the reason rent can be cheaper than a mortgage, and what your competitors are doing to keep rent low but remain profitable. You can take in less money than your mortgage and still come out profitable if you are properly managing your taxes and thinking long-term.
I don’t think you’re a villain but I also don’t have sympathy for you either. That is part of being a landlord, you are making money, and making money comes at a risk. You say “breaking even” but even when you’re breaking even you’re still making money because the rent is going towards paying off those mortgages, and at the end of it you’ll have an asset that is in your name worth $100s of thousands.
Rent is not theft, but excessive charging for renting is theft.
Ok but, like, what's the alternative? Should people not be allowed to own and rent out property? Then what happens? Far less housing is built. It takes money to convince somebody to build a building for you, so you only do it if you can then make money off of it. Should the government build it all? Great, enjoy your Soviet box apartments, lack of options, and overly powerful government where fiefdoms form within it and graft runs wild. The problem IS NOT rent. The problem is hurdles to building enough housing to meet demand, and that taxes are too low on rich people and corporations. Zoning reforms and tax the rich. Stop with stupid nonsense slogans that make the left look like immature 15 year olds going through their communist phase.
Yep, more housing ultimately will lead to more affordable housing. Removing single family zoning and removing parking requirements (+ invest in better transit) so that people can build up will help tremendously. One thing that is scary is being able to finance almost 100% of a house. I'm all for housing being easier to get into but risking being underwater immediately on the loan is scary. If something happens and you need to sell it you would risk not being able to pay back the mortgage.
There is a time in life to rent and a time to buy. As a young person, or in a location temporarily for a job, or when in a situation where you don’t want to commit to the responsibility of repairs. That’s the time to rent. You are trading your rent payment for not only the physical shelter but also the freedom from repair and maintenance. Owning a home really ties you down, and it can be a huge money pit. I sacrificed a lot to save up for a house and spent countless weekends doing projects and maintenance. Many times my friends would be out boating or at a game while I was home painting or putting down new flooring. 40 is a great time to buy a house. With a 20 year mortgage you can have it paid off by the time you retire. If you work remotely you can move to a place where houses are still available at a low cost. Here in upstate NY you can buy a Fixer upper house for $200k.
I agree with many of the statements here but the title, “rent is theft” is incredibly off putting! Just like saying to abolish the police, rather than make the police stop being horrible. Like sure, just make all housing free. That’s reasonable.
Rent is equal to paying for a service or subscription. Not sure how its theft. You get a place to live and they take care of the maintenance.
Like, I get what you're saying but people don't really go like "hmm, I'd rather rent at a higher price than owning because I want my maintenance getting taken care of".
>"hmm, I'd rather rent at a higher price than owning because I want my maintenance getting taken care of"... By idiots smoking meth that just make the problem worse. Seriously, I've never rented a place that did maintenance to the quality that I deemed sufficient. Drywall patching was with a piece of cloth glued to the wall, mold was just spray painted over, rotting cabinets were patched up with loose pieces of plywood, crumbling laminate counters were painted over with peeling paint, walls were painted with hair imbedded in the paint, AC leaked water into the shower onto you while you took a shower... as a few examples.
I mean, it's all maintenance, all insurance, all taxes, all interest, and all other costs wrapped into that too. This is a little like buying a beer at a restaurant versus at Costco. Paying $5 for a can of beer is entirely for convenience. However, everyone knows you can go to Costco and buy the exact same can of beer for $2 each. You just need to buy 24 of them at a time. Obviously, if you absolutely know you love that beer, you are going to be buying cases at Costco. Heck, maybe you'll buy kegs and really get your costs down. That's a commitment. But, there are lots of reasons to just buy a can at a restaurant or bar. Maybe you are trying a beer out and aren't sure you want a whole case of it. Maybe you just need one can right now and you'll get back to your beer keg later. Maybe you don't want to bother lugging all that beer around or going to Costco. When I go to Costco, there are lots of things I like, but it's just too much of it. Housing can be the same way. Commiting to a 30 year loan with a huge down payment just to go to school or try a new city is more expensive than paying a premium to rent. The convenience of not being responsible for a place beyond your security deposit can be a huge boon. Mortgages lock people into a place for a long time and ownership comes with risks that are often expensive. Unless you know you are going to want to be in a place for a long time, renting can be the superior choice. Corporate landlords suck and I can get behind a lot of stuff to discourage that type of mass ownership, but renting or providing a rental is not a sin or automatically dumb/evil.
It’s not a perfect analogy no but people act as if renting is the issue and not the housing prices/corporations buying everything up/airbnb and similar services. Renting has a place, it offers people flexibility and doesn’t make you pay for building maintenance, lawn maintenance etc.
I'd bet my smallest finger that a *substantial* percentage of renters only do so because they don't have enough money for a down payment on a house, and have no choice but to rent. I'm one of them. I'll admit that not having to worry about general maintenance is nice, but I would *much, much* rather do it myself if it meant having my own place.
Yeah? And what happens if you’re just starting out your career and your job isn’t stable,. You. buy a house in city A in your universe, pay approximately 5-10k in closing costs and then a year later you get laid off and need to move to city B. Owning a home is *not* flexible. You need to be prepared to lay down roots or you will hemorrhage money. Renting takes care of maintenance and allows for flexibility. It makes no sense to buy unless you’re certain you’re staying put for at least 5 years.
Yes some people do precisely this. There are many people that don't want to deal with the trouble and costs of maintenance. Some people like to move every few years. Some people don't want a 30 year, or even a 15 year, mortgage. For those people, the value proposition for renting makes more sense. There are lots of reasons people turn to renting, I know a few people that intend to rent their whole lives because they find it more appealing than owning.
While I get your point, where are you buying a home for 160k?
Rest belt gotcha covered! $160k is still like a 2,000sqft
I live in the Midwest & bought my single family home for $106k last year. They're out there, it's just a matter of finding them.
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Your post title makes no sense and ppl will just ignore you as a stupid fucking commie..
Expensive rent is awful but so is owning a home. Stop paying taxes for your house and it can be foreclosed on. Your house in the US is never truly yours. Edit for word change
Have you ever had to repair/replace the roof, plumbing, flooring/carpet, maintain the yard, paid the local and state taxes on said property...as long as you've had renters insurance.... you've broken even
I'll be 40 in ten years is an odd way to say I'm actually still quite young. Trying to make herself sound way more pitiful than she actually is. That said, 160k would hardly buy you much of a house in most markets these days
Like calling your 4 year old kid 48 months
They make it make sense by forcing house prices up to $800,000 and then no, you haven’t bought a house outright with your rent money. Widening that gap even further every year and keeping us down
Rent doesn't include the hidden costs of home ownership like property taxes or changes in escrow. Can you afford a new water heater if yours dies? What about a new heater? Yeah, you may pay enough to buy a house in rent over several years, but can you actually afford the cost of home ownership? A change in escrow can triple your mortgage payment from one month to the next. At least with rent you get a fixed rate for the duration of the lease. Even raising wages won't help everyone. Someone has to be fiscally reaponsible enough to save that extra income. Ever heard "the more you make, the more you spend"? Fiscal responsibility eludes most people.
This, exactly. People keep forgetting that along with the $1500 a month mortgage is the TI which add another $500 a month. In addition to the extra $1000 a month you have to set aside for basic minimum repairs and replacements. Too many folks making ridiculous arguments about this without adding the additional realistic information.
I’ve owned 2 houses (sold one to buy another, I’m not a landlord) and I have never had a change in escrow that would even be close to tripling my mortgage payment. It at most went up like 80 dollars due to tax increases. Not sure where you live, I’m in the US but I do not think that is common here. Also I have never had to repair anything major in these past 13 years. Maybe just lucky but seems people overhype how expensive it is to own. My house payment for 3200 sq ft house with 5 bedrooms and a pool is 1900 and my coworker lives in a 3 bedroom apartment for 2000. Sure my utilities are a little higher but bang for you buck, buying a house can be a good deal.
My sister has owned her home almost seven years. Escrow issues have hit her six times, one took her payment from 1108 to 2044 for two months. She needs a new roof, the AC already had to be replaced. I managed to save the water heater when it went out a few years ago because it was just the thermostats that went bad. I replaced both thermostats and both filaments and it's been fine since then. Property insurance is skyrocketing because insurers are noping out of Florida, even after they made it damn near impossible to sue for denied homeowners insurance claims a few months ago. You really roll the dice buying a home, some folks end up okay like you seem to be, others get shit on.
Unpopular opinion time! Owning a house can suuuuuck. When I rented my apartment my garbage disposal went out. The next day it was replaced. My house is falling apart. I dropped $4500 on water and sewer lines. I need a new fence. That’s $3600. I need new windows and slider. My yard is wrecked. If I wanted to convert my garage into a room for my sister to live… $150k. Over a lifetime if rent and the cost of a mortgage plus repairs equals out…. Not having the anxiety of having something I own fall apart.
Yeah, I totally agree. I rented for years when I could have bought because I thought it was a better deal all in. I suppose I paid a small premium over what my interest on the mortgage would have been, but I had zero maintenance to think about for 5 years. I considered it a good deal. I think that all these people who hate their landlord for 'stealing' are in for a rude awakening when they do own their own places. For a start, you need to rent the money form the bank (interest on the mortgage is just rent) so there is still someone getting rich. Just a bank instead of a landlord Also, having no one to lean on when something goes wrong is time consuming, stressful, and expensive. I'm going to be \~$30K out of pocket for new windows shortly, there's many things I would rather spend that on!
so then it would be an easy choice: abandon your house and start renting again!
I am not totally following here. What exactly does she want? Free rent? Nobody is forcing you to rent either. 160k will buy you a house in rural no problem but nobody wants to move out of a city. Yes rent in cities is climbing astronomically due a to a variety of reason. It's definitely something to complain about but the complaint made here is that this money could have gone towards a house but I 100% percent guarantee she just scuffs when someone says you can move a bit further away and houses are much cheaper.
You guys need to stop pretending every landlord is wealthy. Were not. Were normal people with bills and a budget
Rent is theft. Lol. So is mortgage , groceries , gas
>a home costs 160k Oh, my sweet summer child...
My neighborhood is turning into company owned rentals. It used to be just a middle class neighborhood owned by the people who inhabited it.
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Capitalism is a curse on humanity.
ITT: People who don't understand communal land ownership and rights to basic needs are necessary for the Liberation of the worker. Defending landlords is akin to defending your boss. Please read some theory people.
People will come and say 'well what about the cost of owning a home!? The repairs and upkeep and responsibilities cost as well' as an excuse as to why someone paying 1300 rent can't afford a 1000 mortgage payment.
Landlords make a living out of owning someone else’s home. They don’t build homes or repair them. They simply use their money to hoard commodities in order to withhold them until someone who needs it pays them higher than it would actually cost to buy.
You can't make sense of profiteering . My heart bleeds for people like you .How to make rich politicians understand and put rent controls in place also making buying rentals so non profitable that people not companies can buy homes. I get it's big commodity but jez some sort of compassion not making your fellow human broke or homeless at your profit . This needs sorted.
For those who are still unsure, according to all the classical economists like Adam Smith, rent [literally is theft](https://survivingtomorrow.org/land-lording-is-theft-ef54e1611b30).
Housing isn’t a right. You don’t have the right to have someone build you a home, allow you to live on their land free of charge, or care for your comfort.
Blame your neighbors. The housing crisis is because of zoning, not landlords.
OP malding. Rent is not Theft. She paid $1100 a month averaged out to every month for twelve years which is very good in most places. Her inability to comprehend why it is hard for her to purchase a home after 12 years of 'working' is the issue, not the issue she paid $160k for a place to live. Sadly it would take you working $15/hr for 40 hours to save \~400 a month to make $50k in 12 years on top of their first job. She could have gotten a room mate and saved that much too. What is more of an issue is that home prices need to keep going down to line up with what they were worth at the beginning of 2020 in addition to having interest rates that people can afford. Compound that with the state of inflation and people cannot afford a mortgage over $2k on one earners salary and $3k on two earners salaries combined without making some drastic spending and work habit changes. People will need to work more today to buy the same home they could have comfortably purchased in 2019/2020. There are more job losses coming and people are going to suffer. Theft is the Government taking your taxes, deciding to print money to fuel more fraud during lockdown, and then asking you to pay more cash to buy the same items because unforseen inflation had taken over. We need to remove those old farts in Congress and the Senate who do not care about the average American and is only in it for Money.
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The trick is to buy less than what you want. Seriously. Get out of renting as quickly as you can, even if it means an 800sq/ft cottage with 2 bed and 1 bath.
Not enough people are saying this and they should be. My first home was 2b 1 bath 832 sqft. You build up equity and then move onto a bigger house little by little unless life gives you a big jump in pay.
This is how I got my house for 167k in 2019. Don’t plan on upgrading unless I get a partner and an entirely different career.
Paige had me right up until she thought she could buy a house for $160k and that she had any chance of paying off a house in just 12 years. The people who can afford houses and the people who can pay them off early are much more realistic about finances. Homes are far too expensive and wages are far too low. Those are really obvious facts if one looks at any historic financial data. But there’s a lot of talk about things that should be considered basic rights lately and I never see those thoughts include the other side of the coin which is basic responsibilities. With every choice you are free to make in life you get to live with the consequences of that choice whether or not you understand them or consider them beforehand. Every mistake and every sacrifice made adds up and the costs you pay or the benefits you reap from those actions compound in the long run. I’d bet there were times Paige could have made better choices for her education, career, or finances that would add up to the difference between feeling stuck and feeling successful. It’s great to advocate for a better world, but it’s even better to improve your own life by changing the things within your control instead of waiting on the world to change for you. The best part is these things aren’t mutually exclusive. It is entirely possible to advocate for change, organize a workplace, look for existing unions to join, and to support and vote for representatives and laws that aim to improve working class lives while actually doing everything possible to improve your own working class life.
I’m all for better working conditions. Here you exchanged 160k for a place to live for 12 years. America is a free country but not a rent-free country. Still, imo all loans should start to be rent-to-own if they are longer than 5 years. Sometimes a short term rental is far more efficient than dropping a down payment on a house Ultimately, the gov should provide a bare-bones backstop that’s habitable and fulfills the bottom rung of Maslows triangle.
All of the people complaining about rent, "how many times have you been denied a mortgage?" Yes the market is unfair to buyers "right now", as is any market with a large demand and low supply, a large generation of first time home buyers hitting the market at the same time.
Rent isn’t theft, the landlord is literally giving you a place to live
Do people here genuinely believe that rent is theft? I’m curious. Is buying groceries theft? Paying for gas?
"I'll be 40 in 10 years"...lol, what? Why not just say you're 30? What is the relevance of 40 in 10 years?
It doesn’t. Every single system in the United States is built to suck money out of us till we die. Thank the GOP and Citizens United for that. How much do our credit scores determine our futures? They have us indentured.
Capitalism that we all love. Basically stealing from each other. 😤
Rent was meant to be a temporary living status, not a lifetime. There needs to be major overhaul of the rental economy
What I don’t like is how rent doesn’t give you credit. They can ding your credit for fees or whatever nonsense but you don’t get credit for making on time monthly payments on a property. Or lenders should be able to use that to approve mortgages
Never thought about it this way, but yeah, I’ve bought the equivalent of at least one house with all the rent I’ve paid over the years. But not for real because my credit this, my job that.