Ironically, "building more housing" still solves this problem.
The corporations are buying and renting because it makes business sense. If we just keep building houses, the market values for rents and home prices will reach an inflection point. Investment companies aren't going to keep buying houses if they have a high vacancy on existing stock, they're going to start selling houses or lowering rent.
The fundamental problem is "too little supply". Regulating the demand side is at best a bandaid. The solution is to change regulations to allow faster, cheaper, easier building until the equilibrium market price of housing is something reasonable.
>> Ironically, "building more housing" still solves this problem.
Raising interest rates may help too. How many of those purchases are financed? I'm guessing a lot. The commercial side got screwed when they needed to refinance underperforming properties at higher interest rates.
As long as cheaper lines of credit (or straight-up massive amounts of cash on hand) remain more available to RE corporations than regular people looking for their first home then no, building more housing will never solve the problem.
There are structural problems with the demand side that also need addressing.
> building more housing will never solve the problem.
It only seems that way because in many popular metros around the country, demand has far outstripped supply for decades.
The problem is "solved" in areas that aren't as popular, with zero regulation on who's allowed to purchase homes; ordinary people can buy ordinary homes on ordinary incomes. But aspirational young people don't tend to move to such areas.
Why has this been the case in every area in our country? Because we have a policy at the national level that encourages speculation and hoarding. The problem is not just supply, we have a national aversion to shaping demand.
> The problem is "solved" in areas that aren't as popular,
The problem is absolutely not solved, in any place in our country[1]. You used to be able to maintain a minimum standard of living on a single wage earner's salary. That is not the case, literally anywhere in this nation any more.
The corporations are buying and renting because it makes business sense. If we just keep building houses, the market values for rents and home prices will reach an inflection point. Investment companies aren't going to keep buying houses if they have a high vacancy on existing stock, they're going to start selling houses or lowering rent.
The fundamental problem is "too little supply". Regulating the demand side is at best a bandaid. The solution is to change regulations to allow faster, cheaper, easier building until the equilibrium market price of housing is something reasonable.