this post was submitted on 28 Oct 2023
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How about instead of giving money to private companies in the hopes that they build housing you give that money to people so they can afford to live in all the housing that already exists.
Why do libs always make this shit more complicated than it needs to be
Because they don't actually support doing things to help people, they just want to give more money to the rich.
Now I don’t know whether to feel owned!
Because both just give money to crappy landlords, but with exta steps. Why not just tax the hell out of anyone who owns a building that's empty for longer than reasonable, maybe with an extension if you can prove you're redeveloping an office into housing.
Because there isn't enough housing that already exists.
Sure there is. An enormous chunk of housing sits unused and empty because real estate speculators want to rent them out at exorbitant prices rather than use it for it's intended purpose of having a roof over people's heads.
Pass nationwide legislation that restricts owning housing for commercial purposes beyond a certain threshold, and put rent controls in place pegged to 20% of the median income per town/city. You'd eliminate 95% of homelessness before the ink was dry, massively increase homeownership rates, and be the most popular politician of an era.
It's not even an ebil communist plot, and it'd still be more effective than giving even more money to private developers on a pinky promise they'll build something people can afford, just trust them this time.
If they are renting it out at exorbitant prices, then it's not empty. If it's empty, then they get zero money. You're saying it's both, which makes no sense. Interest rates and property taxes are both high right now. It costs investors money to hold empty property without renting it out. They don't have to wait for people to pay inflated prices. The demand is already there.
I'm all for more regulation, especially for developers and investors. Stiupulate that at least 50% of all new housing built be affordable. Give incentives to rehab old condemned properties. And stop letting AI algorithms determine rental prices.
Yes there is. The problem is housing is treated as a commodity instead of a basic human right
Getting people to live in offices is good because it brings people back to walkable, urban cores.
That would be good. Unfortunately this is more about bailing out rentseekers in urban cores, by enabling the building of unaffordable housing