It's possible to attack this problem from multiple angles. As it stands right now the tenants that occupy my properties either don't want to own (grad students) or can't afford it (e.g., service workers, low-end "white collar" job holders in the bay area). By charging (significantly) lower than market rent, deferring or waiving rent, setting up very long term payment plans, and basically treating them like they're people with lives that shit happens to them in I do what I can as an individual. By working in other areas (e.g. with NGOs) I do what I can to contribute as an individual to a larger group effort to change the way housing works in this area.
Given that one person can't make the rental market go away, no matter how much they might want to, mitigating it is perfectly reasonable. I'd go further and suggest forming a Humane Landlord's Association with explicitly stated humane values.
The poor person it better served by someone who rents fairly at or below market rate, than it is by social housing that can take years to get into.
Making money while also doing the right thing is the best thing at all, everyone feels good about it, and its a relationship built off mutual respect.
Like, I want to encourage landlords to do this, and I want to move property holdings away from the consolidation we've seen towards private equity and massive REIT's holding rental housing - locally owned rentals, where the owner has a stake in the communities these homes are in, is the best practical case of all.
Do you really believe that homeownership is for everyone? It’s not. Hell, it is not for some of my friends in tech. You’ve got a lot to maintain, a lot of work to do, a lot to keep track of. That either means money, or pretty broad DIY skills. That’s not for everyone. It’s definitely not (at least right away) for someone who has perhaps not had the opportunity to experience homeownership via their parents.
If earlier poster is indeed renting at comfortable rates and taking better-than-average care of the properties and the residents, s/he truly is doing some good in the world.
Entering into and then holding up your end of fair bargains with other people is a good thing to do. We need that a lot more than we need altruistic gestures, in my opinion.
As throughly demonstrated in this thread - unless you go to extreme effort like threatening to take someone to court - Landlords hold all the power to set rates, increase rates, ignore complaints etc and there are almost no avenues for recompense.
So no, there can be no fair exchange when lambs negotiate with wolves.
What happens if you have a landlord who follows (or exceeds) the law?
I've rented from plenty like this, simply because I took the effort to find places that were locally owned (while not a cure all, it helps).
Also, whats the alternative? not everyone can meet the financial or responsibility requirements that come with homeownership. So what are you left with after that, government owned housing?
Your point is bullshit. Anyone who can rent can afford to own. I’ve owned half a dozen properties at this point and it’s clear that Banks just do as much fuckery as possible to make lending impossible to anyone that doesn’t perfectly fit their mold.
How about a system that doesn’t primarily benefit property owners?
I dont think thats correct, as a recent homeowner.
The deposit requirements are high to get a loan, now yes, we could change that thru subsidy or guaranty by the government.
But what about maintenance? renting is turn-key, even when your mortgage is lower than rent, you still have the unexpected costs that appear?
In the six months I've been here, I've had to replace or repair:
Garburator
Cooktop
Oven Coils
Shower Controls
Sink Faucets
A couple circuit breakers
Sprinklers (all of them, 80% of them were broken)
Also, yard maintenance is this ongoing battle, between tree droppings, grass mowing, and weed abatement (some of which you must do, like dealing with noxious vines).
If you wanna fix a greater social ill, the issue isn't 'benefitting owners' its that people have been conditioned to treat their home like an investment rather than a place to live and prosper in. Property Values shouldn't be going up 5x faster than inflation, but they have been for a couple decades.
You realize all those costs are baked into the rent right? Even with cost distribution among multiple properties or multi-family complex, the per-service fees often exceed what you would pay a tradesman and the lack of flexiblity drives certain costs up in renting situations like limitations on modifications.
In my experience (Owned 3 homes, rented 4 homes) it’s net-net between renting and owning across multiple factors including overall cost, and think I’m near the mean when it comes to handiwork - so it’s not like I’m doing all my electrical and HVAC myself and I’m in an expensive area.
Yes, all of the costs are just baked into rent. They're not baked into a Mortgage, and people dont get that so they end up buying as much house as their rent was, and then get over their skis when they suddenly need to cough up 15k for a new roof?
If you're in the position where even paying the rent consistently is a marginally difficult problem, even if lending standards are relaxed sufficiently, how is this person going to pay for a new roof unless the price of that loan is subsidized to the point that it either has a zero or negative interest rate?
Not everyone can buy - either because of the work required, or because of the financial outlays needed. Also to be honest, not everyone wants that responsibility.
In the states not having a garbage disposal is a relative rarity, but I'll give you that. Sprinklers are a regional thing.
We also had to replace:
Drywall due to mold issues
Leaking Laundry Valves (see above)
A leaking hose bib which necessitated sweating on new fittings
New fittings on the hot water heater (to add a shutoff)
Various other electrical work (replace outlets, retorque loose neutral, brought grounding most of the way up to modern code - house had no buried ground rod)
To make my point further - I've had many of these issues at an apartment, in my time living in apartments I've had the following work done in or around my unit:
Replacement of in wall heater
Replacement of Garburator
Replacement of Hot Water Heater
Replacement of Shower Vales
Replacement of AC Condenser
Replacement of Dishwasher
Replacement of Hot Water Heater (and remediation of the water damage from it)
Replacement of Water Faucets
Replacement of Load Center (Fuse Box)
Repair of Refrigerator and Stove
Installation of new landscaping (new sod, bushes, etc)
Repair/Replacement of Sprinklers
Repaving of parking area
Replacement of Roof
Painting
Replacement of Siding
Cleaning of HVAC Ducting
The total cost to me on all of these issues was zero dollars - and thats my point. Those multitude of repairs are not free when you own your home, and can often be quite costly.
Spoken like somebody who has clearly never owned property, rented homes, or built anything, or risked money to build a business. You are so, so far off here. Landlords only hold "all the power" if we constrict housing. That is a policy problem, not "evil landlords". Read up!
You're mostly right though, so long as housing is consistently treated as an investment rather than a commodity produced and sold in bulk, landlords hold all of the power.
People who criticize the commodification of housing I think tend to believe the correct and valid definition is:
(2) something useful or valued.
or
(5) one that is subject to ready exchange or exploitation within a market. (emphasis added)
I tend to focus on:
(1c) a mass-produced unspecialized product.
or
(4) a good or service whose wide availability typically leads to smaller profit margins and diminishes the importance of factors (such as brand name) other than price.
Housing was commodified after WWII, when we stamped out so much housing, it was cheap and available to everyone. When housing is that available, it removes much of the power of landlords to distort the market.
