Owners should pay if houses stay empty, new alliance says
February 17, 2023 7:08 AM Subscribe
Owners should pay if houses stay empty, new alliance says, as push begins to address rent crisis. A new alliance of community organisations is pushing for a levy to be paid by owners if houses are not occupied, as a means of addressing Tasmania's rental crisis, pointing to Vancouver, Canada, as an example of a similar measure working.
I don't believe in hell, but rentier scum make me wish I did.
They tried to do this as a ballot measure in Santa Cruz, CA last fall, but it failed (54% against it). My understanding is that the super rich opposition successfully lied and convinced regular people that it would drive up their taxes even if they didn't own empty homes. Still, it's good to see the effort.
'Tasmanian Premier Jeremy Rockliff said he had "not seen evidence where a tax on homes will solve the problem". ' I wish Tasmanians success here, perhaps someone can show the Premier this evidence that he seems determined not to see. E.g. the empty house tax in France decreased vacant housing rate by 13% in its first few years (1997-2001).
posted by SaltySalticid at 7:39 AM on February 17, 2023 [9 favorites]
They tried to do this as a ballot measure in Santa Cruz, CA last fall, but it failed (54% against it). My understanding is that the super rich opposition successfully lied and convinced regular people that it would drive up their taxes even if they didn't own empty homes. Still, it's good to see the effort.
'Tasmanian Premier Jeremy Rockliff said he had "not seen evidence where a tax on homes will solve the problem". ' I wish Tasmanians success here, perhaps someone can show the Premier this evidence that he seems determined not to see. E.g. the empty house tax in France decreased vacant housing rate by 13% in its first few years (1997-2001).
posted by SaltySalticid at 7:39 AM on February 17, 2023 [9 favorites]
Mr Bartl said TasWater data showed there were 2,700 empty homes in the Hobart, Glenorchy and Launceston council areas in 2021.
These homes were not shacks (holiday homes) or short-stay accommodation.
Second homes don't appear to be subject to this levy.
posted by grumpybear69 at 7:44 AM on February 17, 2023 [1 favorite]
These homes were not shacks (holiday homes) or short-stay accommodation.
Second homes don't appear to be subject to this levy.
posted by grumpybear69 at 7:44 AM on February 17, 2023 [1 favorite]
One of the biggest pieces of the solution to the housing affordability crisis is staring us in our face. It's obvious why it never gets real coverage, and it's obvious why it rarely gains much traction, but in nearly every major metropolitan area where affordability is in complete crisis, there is a stupidly simple (but politically impossible ---for now) move that can be made.
Vacancy taxes.
Eye-watering vacancy taxes.
Brutal vacancy taxes.
Vacancy taxes so thoroughly ruinous that gangs of landlords would seriously consider raiding homeless encampments en masse and offer room practically rent-free to avoid them.
And none of this "I poked a hole in the drywall and broke one of the faucet taps, I guess I can classify this unit as not inhabitable (until someone shows up with enough $ and I can fix it in 30 minutes)." Every unit that isn't "habitable" would have only a 90 day grace period on the vacancy tax.
posted by tclark at 7:45 AM on February 17, 2023 [71 favorites]
Vacancy taxes.
Eye-watering vacancy taxes.
Brutal vacancy taxes.
Vacancy taxes so thoroughly ruinous that gangs of landlords would seriously consider raiding homeless encampments en masse and offer room practically rent-free to avoid them.
And none of this "I poked a hole in the drywall and broke one of the faucet taps, I guess I can classify this unit as not inhabitable (until someone shows up with enough $ and I can fix it in 30 minutes)." Every unit that isn't "habitable" would have only a 90 day grace period on the vacancy tax.
posted by tclark at 7:45 AM on February 17, 2023 [71 favorites]
Vacancy taxes. Eye-watering vacancy taxes. Brutal vacancy taxes.
Vacancy taxes so thoroughly ruinous that gangs of landlords would seriously consider raiding homeless encampments en masse and offer room practically rent-free to avoid them.
I'd want there to be an exemption from the vacancy tax for situations like "owner-occupier broke a hip/had a stroke and is in a rehabilitation facility for 2 months or 3 months but all their stuff is still here and they are 100% planning on coming back" but otherwise, yes.
posted by chariot pulled by cassowaries at 7:56 AM on February 17, 2023 [29 favorites]
Vacancy taxes so thoroughly ruinous that gangs of landlords would seriously consider raiding homeless encampments en masse and offer room practically rent-free to avoid them.
I'd want there to be an exemption from the vacancy tax for situations like "owner-occupier broke a hip/had a stroke and is in a rehabilitation facility for 2 months or 3 months but all their stuff is still here and they are 100% planning on coming back" but otherwise, yes.
posted by chariot pulled by cassowaries at 7:56 AM on February 17, 2023 [29 favorites]
In that case they're still an owner-occupier and it's not actually a rental vacancy.
posted by tclark at 8:07 AM on February 17, 2023 [25 favorites]
posted by tclark at 8:07 AM on February 17, 2023 [25 favorites]
The taxes people are already paying in my metro area (Multnomah County, ie Portland) are insane and well beyond what is needed to cover affordable housing units for the homeless.
If people want to add another levy to vacant apartments have at it, but the homeless situation is so intractable and so founded on a failure of vision and leadership that people are fleeing or not going near Portland, sadly with good reason. Our tax situation is already insane, and if you talk to long-standing residents they don't oppose that, but driving past one tent fire after another (as in the one that set a church ablaze next door to my parents residence) is making more and more of us feel like it's hopeless.
Taxing homeowners with vacant properties sounds (to me) like another pointless exercise in not confronting real solutions, ie building new housing and allowing zoning for multi-family dwellings.
Perhaps if the levy was directed at landlords who own multiple units, ie corporate landlords and not the ever diminishing number of single entities who depend on stable rent for their income it would be more workable.
posted by docpops at 8:21 AM on February 17, 2023 [6 favorites]
If people want to add another levy to vacant apartments have at it, but the homeless situation is so intractable and so founded on a failure of vision and leadership that people are fleeing or not going near Portland, sadly with good reason. Our tax situation is already insane, and if you talk to long-standing residents they don't oppose that, but driving past one tent fire after another (as in the one that set a church ablaze next door to my parents residence) is making more and more of us feel like it's hopeless.
Taxing homeowners with vacant properties sounds (to me) like another pointless exercise in not confronting real solutions, ie building new housing and allowing zoning for multi-family dwellings.
Perhaps if the levy was directed at landlords who own multiple units, ie corporate landlords and not the ever diminishing number of single entities who depend on stable rent for their income it would be more workable.
posted by docpops at 8:21 AM on February 17, 2023 [6 favorites]
To be more clear, since my previous comment didn't successfully get the point across, this is about vacant units that are already on the market. There are more rental vacancies in LA than there are homeless people by a considerable margin, and LA is considered to have an immense unhoused population.
We do also need additional inventory, but there is an incredible amount of inventory that is artificially scarce, and a five-figure monthly tax on a vacant rental unit would put an awful lot of downward pressure on rental prices.
posted by tclark at 8:37 AM on February 17, 2023 [16 favorites]
We do also need additional inventory, but there is an incredible amount of inventory that is artificially scarce, and a five-figure monthly tax on a vacant rental unit would put an awful lot of downward pressure on rental prices.
posted by tclark at 8:37 AM on February 17, 2023 [16 favorites]
Ottawa adopted a vacant unit tax this year. You have to fill in a declaration to say your property(s) are occupied, which is super easy to do on-line, but there is a lot of push-back and complaints about it.
I think it is a fantastic idea. It took me about 5 minutes to do the declaration for our house.
posted by fimbulvetr at 8:42 AM on February 17, 2023 [3 favorites]
I think it is a fantastic idea. It took me about 5 minutes to do the declaration for our house.
posted by fimbulvetr at 8:42 AM on February 17, 2023 [3 favorites]
An better solution is to eliminate single family occupancy zoning and allow increased density. Build units until housing is affordable. Santa Monica has seen a huge surge in units under construction after the state applied the builders remedy and eliminated the restrictive local zoning rules that had blocked housing projects. Going after second homes isn't going to make much of a dent in the problem, I think it is mostly a deflection tactic to avoid doing the one thing that we are certain works.
posted by interogative mood at 8:43 AM on February 17, 2023 [6 favorites]
posted by interogative mood at 8:43 AM on February 17, 2023 [6 favorites]
It's obvious why it never gets real coverage
Yeah, it's pretty obvious. Per the article, 2700 units between Hobart, Glenorchy and Launceston council areas in 2021. That's a total population of over 300,000. So around 1% in terms of units.
And the corollary is that if you feel you need strong vacancy taxes to fill empty units, then you agree that you need to build more units, and filling the already built empty ones is just the stopgap to that.
Also these metros in Tasmania, best as I can tell, have 5% multi-family vs rest of Tasmania at 11%, so half. That's bad policies at the local government level.
posted by The_Vegetables at 8:44 AM on February 17, 2023 [1 favorite]
Yeah, it's pretty obvious. Per the article, 2700 units between Hobart, Glenorchy and Launceston council areas in 2021. That's a total population of over 300,000. So around 1% in terms of units.
And the corollary is that if you feel you need strong vacancy taxes to fill empty units, then you agree that you need to build more units, and filling the already built empty ones is just the stopgap to that.
Also these metros in Tasmania, best as I can tell, have 5% multi-family vs rest of Tasmania at 11%, so half. That's bad policies at the local government level.
posted by The_Vegetables at 8:44 AM on February 17, 2023 [1 favorite]
and a five-figure monthly tax on a vacant rental unit would put an awful lot of downward pressure on rental prices.
posted by tclark at 8:37 AM on February 17 [1 favorite +] [!]
Has anyone speculated on where that tax would be offset, ie is it not fairly obvious that once you start taxing corporate landlords they'll just shift the costs to existing tenants and exacerbate the problem? What am I missing?
posted by docpops at 8:45 AM on February 17, 2023 [2 favorites]
posted by tclark at 8:37 AM on February 17 [1 favorite +] [!]
Has anyone speculated on where that tax would be offset, ie is it not fairly obvious that once you start taxing corporate landlords they'll just shift the costs to existing tenants and exacerbate the problem? What am I missing?
posted by docpops at 8:45 AM on February 17, 2023 [2 favorites]
They recently implemented an empty-homes credit in Ottawa Ontario and there is GRIPING about it - basically you just have to fill out a small form, one time, with a whole year's grace period as a practice run, to confirm the home you pay property taxes on is occupied, whether lived in by the owner or rented out to someone else. Took me about two minutes to do and yet there's been several breathless, pearl-clutching stories about the burden on property owners. Wah wah, cupcakes.
posted by urbanlenny at 8:45 AM on February 17, 2023 [12 favorites]
posted by urbanlenny at 8:45 AM on February 17, 2023 [12 favorites]
Has anyone speculated on where that tax would be offset, ie is it not fairly obvious that once you start taxing corporate landlords they'll just shift the costs to existing tenants and exacerbate the problem? What am I missing?
What I think you may be missing is that maybe just maybe the corporate landlords might lower the rental price to fill vacancies, because passing the cost onto existing tenants would force more tenants out and therefore result in even more vacancies with insane taxes. Corporations usually aren't motivated by the suffering of their tenants, just greed. Flip the polarity on the greed switch and they'll be happy to lower rents because low rents and low vacancy rates make more money than high rents and high vacancy rates. Right now we have more vacancies than unhoused people in almost every housing-impacted area because they make more money that way.
posted by tclark at 8:48 AM on February 17, 2023 [19 favorites]
What I think you may be missing is that maybe just maybe the corporate landlords might lower the rental price to fill vacancies, because passing the cost onto existing tenants would force more tenants out and therefore result in even more vacancies with insane taxes. Corporations usually aren't motivated by the suffering of their tenants, just greed. Flip the polarity on the greed switch and they'll be happy to lower rents because low rents and low vacancy rates make more money than high rents and high vacancy rates. Right now we have more vacancies than unhoused people in almost every housing-impacted area because they make more money that way.
posted by tclark at 8:48 AM on February 17, 2023 [19 favorites]
Vacancy taxes so thoroughly ruinous that gangs of landlords would seriously consider raiding homeless encampments en masse and offer room practically rent-free to avoid them.I want this for businesses, too. DC has a ton of empty space where the landlords forced out a decent business which couldn’t handle a double-digit rent increase in the hopes of getting some high-end chain in there and then left it empty for years because the supply of suckers was smaller than they hoped. People lose long-running jobs every time that happens.
posted by adamsc at 8:49 AM on February 17, 2023 [41 favorites]
and a five-figure monthly tax on a vacant rental unit would put an awful lot of downward pressure on rental prices.
History says otherwise. It says these places would be bulldozed, and some other minor income-producing service would be placed there instead. That's what happened to downtowns during The Great Depression, with LA losing close to 25% of the existing buildings to parking lots, which generated more income than vacant buildings. Now in a sea of single family homes, it probably wouldn't be parking lots, but it would be something similar. Small barely maintained pocket parks perhaps.
posted by The_Vegetables at 8:49 AM on February 17, 2023 [5 favorites]
History says otherwise. It says these places would be bulldozed, and some other minor income-producing service would be placed there instead. That's what happened to downtowns during The Great Depression, with LA losing close to 25% of the existing buildings to parking lots, which generated more income than vacant buildings. Now in a sea of single family homes, it probably wouldn't be parking lots, but it would be something similar. Small barely maintained pocket parks perhaps.
posted by The_Vegetables at 8:49 AM on February 17, 2023 [5 favorites]
Toronto has also implemented a vacant home tax
posted by yyz at 8:50 AM on February 17, 2023 [6 favorites]
posted by yyz at 8:50 AM on February 17, 2023 [6 favorites]
That's what happened to downtowns during The Great Depression, with LA losing close to 25% of the existing buildings to parking lots, which generated more income than vacant buildings.
That situation does not obtain right now, and the vacancy tax can easily be dialed up or down based on affordability of housing to low income folks.
posted by tclark at 8:52 AM on February 17, 2023 [2 favorites]
That situation does not obtain right now, and the vacancy tax can easily be dialed up or down based on affordability of housing to low income folks.
posted by tclark at 8:52 AM on February 17, 2023 [2 favorites]
Toronto has also implemented a vacant home tax
In Toronto it is not trivial to rent out a place for six months (or more), if you plan to return (for example, if you want to use a condo as a second home for slightly less than half of the year). The Residential Tenancies Act guarantees a six-month renter a renewed lease at the end of the term, unless the owner can evict for cause. There is an eviction option for "landlord requires the rental unit", but it is paired with a required one-month rent reimbursement, and it could be challenged by the renter, leading to a drawn-out court proceeding (during which the renter remains in the unit, of course).
This, paired with the fact that many condo boards disallow rental terms of less than six months, makes it difficult to navigate the new rule if you want to split your time in the city.
posted by darntoughpawn at 8:58 AM on February 17, 2023 [1 favorite]
In Toronto it is not trivial to rent out a place for six months (or more), if you plan to return (for example, if you want to use a condo as a second home for slightly less than half of the year). The Residential Tenancies Act guarantees a six-month renter a renewed lease at the end of the term, unless the owner can evict for cause. There is an eviction option for "landlord requires the rental unit", but it is paired with a required one-month rent reimbursement, and it could be challenged by the renter, leading to a drawn-out court proceeding (during which the renter remains in the unit, of course).
This, paired with the fact that many condo boards disallow rental terms of less than six months, makes it difficult to navigate the new rule if you want to split your time in the city.
posted by darntoughpawn at 8:58 AM on February 17, 2023 [1 favorite]
if you want to use a condo as a second home for slightly less than half of the year
Sounds like someone who can afford to pay the tax.
posted by justsomebodythatyouusedtoknow at 9:05 AM on February 17, 2023 [24 favorites]
Sounds like someone who can afford to pay the tax.
posted by justsomebodythatyouusedtoknow at 9:05 AM on February 17, 2023 [24 favorites]
Sounds like someone who can afford to pay the tax.
Spoiler: it me. (Or, it could be, depending on the circumstances of a particular year.) And yes, probably. But if I'm already leaving it empty for the above-described reason (never away for six months, and condo won't allow "short-term" rentals), then the tax penalty is on top of a large monthly mortgage burden. So, it's actually borderline.
posted by darntoughpawn at 9:11 AM on February 17, 2023 [1 favorite]
Spoiler: it me. (Or, it could be, depending on the circumstances of a particular year.) And yes, probably. But if I'm already leaving it empty for the above-described reason (never away for six months, and condo won't allow "short-term" rentals), then the tax penalty is on top of a large monthly mortgage burden. So, it's actually borderline.
posted by darntoughpawn at 9:11 AM on February 17, 2023 [1 favorite]
Question: if you build denser housing, why is it guaranteed to be more affordable? This isn't a supply and demand issue where 20 people are selling apples, and if one person cuts the price, they'll sell a bunch more apples than their competitors and their competitors are left with a bunch of rotten apples. Real estate and land never rot or go out of fashion--why wouldn't you just build four apartments on the plot of what used to be a house, then charge as high a rent as you can and make four times the profit? It's not like people can turn away from the offer like "I don't need apples today, I'll get oranges instead," it's either you pay the going price or go homeless. Who would be the fool who cut their prices?
I just don't see how this doesn't end with smaller housing at the same ridiculous prices.
posted by kingdead at 9:26 AM on February 17, 2023 [1 favorite]
I just don't see how this doesn't end with smaller housing at the same ridiculous prices.
posted by kingdead at 9:26 AM on February 17, 2023 [1 favorite]
It is if all the ski towns of the world cried out as one for this. Our county already gives a significant 45% discount on property tax valuations if a home is your primary residence or you can show it is leased for at least 12 months long term (and it requires documentation of the lease and a person on the lease to have changed their state drivers license to the location / have children enrolled in the school district / or something similarly substantive) - yet it is still not enough and there are so many empty homes and due to the seasonal nature of skiing for workers 12 month leases may not work. If you own a second home here now typically worth $1m to $2m post covid - the difference between you paying $6k property tax or $10k property tax really isn’t material enough to make you want to rent it….it needs to be way more
(Shuddering at remembering a local Nextdoor thread where second home owners got really worked up because they had to pay the full property tax and how outrageous that was, while others tried to point out just how damaging the rental crisis was and the harm sitting on empty property was doing).
posted by inflatablekiwi at 9:26 AM on February 17, 2023 [2 favorites]
(Shuddering at remembering a local Nextdoor thread where second home owners got really worked up because they had to pay the full property tax and how outrageous that was, while others tried to point out just how damaging the rental crisis was and the harm sitting on empty property was doing).
posted by inflatablekiwi at 9:26 AM on February 17, 2023 [2 favorites]
Yeah the tax for vacant housing in a city with homeless people should be about the cost of one year's assistive housing times two times the number of bedrooms, minimum 1. I have some pity for people this might force to sell a partly-time unit because they can't afford it any more, but that's the idea: get them on the market and in the hands of someone who will use the dang thing.
posted by seanmpuckett at 9:38 AM on February 17, 2023 [10 favorites]
posted by seanmpuckett at 9:38 AM on February 17, 2023 [10 favorites]
History says otherwise. It says these places would be bulldozed, and some other minor income-producing service would be placed there instead. That's what happened to downtowns during The Great Depression, with LA losing close to 25% of the existing buildings to parking lots, which generated more income than vacant buildings. Now in a sea of single family homes, it probably wouldn't be parking lots, but it would be something similar. Small barely maintained pocket parks perhaps.Wait, are parks supposed to be a bad thing in this quote?
The idea that a landlord would demolish, convince the city to rezone (which is definitely not trivial for many of the residential lots this tax would apply to) and rebuild their property in order to avoid the empty homes tax is extremely funny to me. This would need to be fueled by pure spite.
posted by Pitachu at 9:39 AM on February 17, 2023 [5 favorites]
I am hoping Kingston will follow Toronto and Ottawa's lead. For a city of our size, the rental prices of anything is insane. Townies like to blame it on Queen's because we get a huge influx of students every year and landlords love them as tenants. They gouge the ever loving hell out of them, and in turn, this encourages landlords who don't rent to students to do the same for everyone else.
posted by Kitteh at 9:42 AM on February 17, 2023 [1 favorite]
posted by Kitteh at 9:42 AM on February 17, 2023 [1 favorite]
Every unit that isn't "habitable" would have only a 90 day grace period on the vacancy tax.
Yes, 100% yes. This would have taken care of the “I have insider knowledge that in 10 years the city is going to purchase land in this area to build a thoroughfare so I’ll buy this and let it fall into complete disrepair” urban blight that was Providence, RI for a time.
posted by Silvery Fish at 10:01 AM on February 17, 2023 [5 favorites]
Yes, 100% yes. This would have taken care of the “I have insider knowledge that in 10 years the city is going to purchase land in this area to build a thoroughfare so I’ll buy this and let it fall into complete disrepair” urban blight that was Providence, RI for a time.
posted by Silvery Fish at 10:01 AM on February 17, 2023 [5 favorites]
It's not like people can turn away from the offer like "I don't need apples today, I'll get oranges instead," it's either you pay the going price or go homeless.
This implies that people never move anywhere. When rents are high in the urban centers, people move to suburbs and commute. When those get too high, they start moving to exurbs or just out of the metro entirely.
posted by meowzilla at 10:53 AM on February 17, 2023 [2 favorites]
This implies that people never move anywhere. When rents are high in the urban centers, people move to suburbs and commute. When those get too high, they start moving to exurbs or just out of the metro entirely.
posted by meowzilla at 10:53 AM on February 17, 2023 [2 favorites]
Question: if you build denser housing, why is it guaranteed to be more affordable
Communities can provide bonus density and provide incentives if they agree to make a certain percentage of the units available to low income people at a discounted rate to help out as an interim measure. We have a situation now where there is an artificial scarcity of housing units because of rules about land use and density. This has resulted in a situation where housing prices have exceeded the rate of inflation for decades. My understanding is that in places that eliminated it there has been a stabilization of prices and then housing price increases fall below the rate of inflation as the portion of housing as part of a household budget returns to a more historic average. The downside of this solution is that it takes years and people need housing now. So government support to subsidize rents and other programs are going to be needed to reduce the burden on the poor and disadvantaged.
posted by interogative mood at 10:58 AM on February 17, 2023 [1 favorite]
Communities can provide bonus density and provide incentives if they agree to make a certain percentage of the units available to low income people at a discounted rate to help out as an interim measure. We have a situation now where there is an artificial scarcity of housing units because of rules about land use and density. This has resulted in a situation where housing prices have exceeded the rate of inflation for decades. My understanding is that in places that eliminated it there has been a stabilization of prices and then housing price increases fall below the rate of inflation as the portion of housing as part of a household budget returns to a more historic average. The downside of this solution is that it takes years and people need housing now. So government support to subsidize rents and other programs are going to be needed to reduce the burden on the poor and disadvantaged.
posted by interogative mood at 10:58 AM on February 17, 2023 [1 favorite]
This implies that people never move anywhere. When rents are high in the urban centers, people move to suburbs and commute. When those get too high, they start moving to exurbs or just out of the metro entirely.
Literally one of the reasons we pulled up sticks last year and left Ann Arbor for Pittsburgh.
posted by Lentrohamsanin at 11:21 AM on February 17, 2023
Literally one of the reasons we pulled up sticks last year and left Ann Arbor for Pittsburgh.
posted by Lentrohamsanin at 11:21 AM on February 17, 2023
Question: if you build denser housing, why is it guaranteed to be more affordable? This isn't a supply and demand issue
It is, in fact, a supply and demand issue. You can see it when the dot com bubble hit SF and everyone went home. Or here when COVID emptied out NYC. Or in Minneapolis where building policies have resulted in rents actually dropping. It certainly isn't simple, and of course just building a bunch of new housing isn't going to cause rents to immediately drop. But it will cause them to rise more slowly, thereby mitigating the displacement effect of people who are priced out of one area and move into other, cheaper areas where they then price out the people who live there. Because when you don't build, you get the Bay Area.
The truth is that the solution to our housing crisis has no One Simple Fix. A vacancy tax on purposely warehoused inventory is good, but also not nearly enough. There needs to be a large amount of new construction, subsidized housing for low income families and individuals and robust protection for tenants to keep them from getting evicted.
posted by grumpybear69 at 11:54 AM on February 17, 2023 [19 favorites]
It is, in fact, a supply and demand issue. You can see it when the dot com bubble hit SF and everyone went home. Or here when COVID emptied out NYC. Or in Minneapolis where building policies have resulted in rents actually dropping. It certainly isn't simple, and of course just building a bunch of new housing isn't going to cause rents to immediately drop. But it will cause them to rise more slowly, thereby mitigating the displacement effect of people who are priced out of one area and move into other, cheaper areas where they then price out the people who live there. Because when you don't build, you get the Bay Area.
The truth is that the solution to our housing crisis has no One Simple Fix. A vacancy tax on purposely warehoused inventory is good, but also not nearly enough. There needs to be a large amount of new construction, subsidized housing for low income families and individuals and robust protection for tenants to keep them from getting evicted.
posted by grumpybear69 at 11:54 AM on February 17, 2023 [19 favorites]
When rents are high in the urban centers, people move to suburbs and commute.
This assumes that people can afford the suburbs, or can afford to move. Hi, I live in Portland, and I assure you that not all of the people priced out get to leave the city. They just get to leave their housing.
posted by ivan ivanych samovar at 11:55 AM on February 17, 2023 [8 favorites]
This assumes that people can afford the suburbs, or can afford to move. Hi, I live in Portland, and I assure you that not all of the people priced out get to leave the city. They just get to leave their housing.
posted by ivan ivanych samovar at 11:55 AM on February 17, 2023 [8 favorites]
The Oh the Urbanity! video on a closely related topic is worth watching.
posted by daveliepmann at 11:58 AM on February 17, 2023
posted by daveliepmann at 11:58 AM on February 17, 2023
I think vacancy taxes and spare bedroom taxes are a good measure for places where there's more demand for housing than supply. Absolutely the cities should also adjust their zoning to allow construction of more multi-unit residential properties but that's a solution that'll take years to have a significant impact so these taxes would be needed at least for a while. My house has a pretty nice finished basement that barely gets used for anything. Once every couple of months we'll have guests over for a couple of days but that's about it. Maybe in a couple of years when my kids want more privacy and aren't scared of the basement they might hang out there or use it as one of their rooms but until then it is unutilized space. I could rent it out but the allure of a bit of extra money seemingly isn't attractive enough. If I was actively being taxed for not using the basement though then I probably would rent it out.
The London Rental Opportunity of the Week FPP from yesterday had some good points about the state of rental housing too. Many cities need more tools to encourage that the available housing gets utilized but there also needs to be better enforcement to make sure that the housing actually meets some minimum standards.
posted by any portmanteau in a storm at 12:01 PM on February 17, 2023
The London Rental Opportunity of the Week FPP from yesterday had some good points about the state of rental housing too. Many cities need more tools to encourage that the available housing gets utilized but there also needs to be better enforcement to make sure that the housing actually meets some minimum standards.
posted by any portmanteau in a storm at 12:01 PM on February 17, 2023
There seems to be a (I hope not willful) misconception that the goal here is taxing owner-occupiers for unrented rooms or often-vacant second homes. I fear this comes from the weaponized precarity of small scale home ownership.
Vacancy taxes should land heavily on unrented apartments/townhomes, institutional landlords, commercial real estate, and yes single family landlords (not owner occupied, not your spare room, not your lake house, etc).
And yes, they should be eye watering.
And no it won't solve zoning and construction and everything else, but it has the benefit of not having to - it's merely a way to assert the primacy of the state over landed interests and provide a future lever to negotiate measures like multi-family only rezoning. Oh while actually applying downward pressure on rents - game out all the hypotheticals you want, landlords with dollar signs in their eyes are only patient while there's no cost to it.
Vacancy tax asserts there is a public good and private landlords have a responsibility to participate in it (or pay handsomely not to).
posted by abulafa at 12:26 PM on February 17, 2023 [13 favorites]
Vacancy taxes should land heavily on unrented apartments/townhomes, institutional landlords, commercial real estate, and yes single family landlords (not owner occupied, not your spare room, not your lake house, etc).
And yes, they should be eye watering.
And no it won't solve zoning and construction and everything else, but it has the benefit of not having to - it's merely a way to assert the primacy of the state over landed interests and provide a future lever to negotiate measures like multi-family only rezoning. Oh while actually applying downward pressure on rents - game out all the hypotheticals you want, landlords with dollar signs in their eyes are only patient while there's no cost to it.
Vacancy tax asserts there is a public good and private landlords have a responsibility to participate in it (or pay handsomely not to).
posted by abulafa at 12:26 PM on February 17, 2023 [13 favorites]
San Francisco voters recently passed a vacancy tax but it's being challenged by property owners as a violation of the Takings Clause of the 5th Amendment. I'm watching with interest, but a little sad to read that the new law only applies to about 4,000 of the 40,000 vacant units in the city.
posted by pmdboi at 12:29 PM on February 17, 2023 [6 favorites]
posted by pmdboi at 12:29 PM on February 17, 2023 [6 favorites]
A vacancy tax is one thing- a spare bedroom tax quite another. I say this as someone who lives in California where older people refuse to sell their sprawling, empty nest homes because of Prop 13 and thinks there needs to be incentives for older people to downsize. However forcing people to have roommates can compromise safety for vulnerable people. A tax incentive to sell and move into smaller places is better. If people feel that the benefit of renting out a room and making some extra cash does not outweigh the cons, they shouldn't be forced to do that.
posted by oneirodynia at 12:30 PM on February 17, 2023 [5 favorites]
posted by oneirodynia at 12:30 PM on February 17, 2023 [5 favorites]
And yes, the burden should be focused on businesses, not individuals.
posted by oneirodynia at 12:32 PM on February 17, 2023
posted by oneirodynia at 12:32 PM on February 17, 2023
Why not "your lake house," though, abulafa?
posted by Selena777 at 1:35 PM on February 17, 2023 [5 favorites]
posted by Selena777 at 1:35 PM on February 17, 2023 [5 favorites]
I live in Vancouver. Our empty homes tax doesn't apply to basement suites; nobody has to rent out their basement if they don't want to. But if you own a house or a condo that isn't anybody's primary residence, and it sits empty for at least 6 months, then you have to pay the tax -- or, you know, rent it out to someone! It hasn't solved the housing crisis, but it added a few thousand homes to the rental market.
We also have a provincial "speculation and vacancy tax" that works more or less the same way. It only applies to specific geographic regions where there's a housing shortage, so your cottage or lake house probably isn't subject to the tax. And frankly, if it is subject to the tax, then you should probably be renting it out instead of letting your second home sit empty while your neighbors struggle to find somewhere to live.
posted by Gerald Bostock at 1:57 PM on February 17, 2023 [8 favorites]
We also have a provincial "speculation and vacancy tax" that works more or less the same way. It only applies to specific geographic regions where there's a housing shortage, so your cottage or lake house probably isn't subject to the tax. And frankly, if it is subject to the tax, then you should probably be renting it out instead of letting your second home sit empty while your neighbors struggle to find somewhere to live.
posted by Gerald Bostock at 1:57 PM on February 17, 2023 [8 favorites]
I mean, the whole concept of a lake house is that it's in a place where few to no people live/want to live. Taxing a vacancy on such a house is sort of punitive for no valuable reason. Forcing people out of lake home ownership doesn't free up housing supply, it just leaves empty vacation homes. Which is not great for anyone who does live in the little communities nearby, and relies on summer/weekend vacationers for income.
Keep in mind, "lake house" does not necessarily mean "I am a rich asshole with tons of money." Where I grew up, yes. In other parts of the country, it is a much more accessible thing. As I learned when I asked a group of broadly middle-class Midwestern students to write about a place special to them, and got 80% "Summer at the Lake House" essays.
posted by desert outpost at 2:42 PM on February 17, 2023 [7 favorites]
Keep in mind, "lake house" does not necessarily mean "I am a rich asshole with tons of money." Where I grew up, yes. In other parts of the country, it is a much more accessible thing. As I learned when I asked a group of broadly middle-class Midwestern students to write about a place special to them, and got 80% "Summer at the Lake House" essays.
posted by desert outpost at 2:42 PM on February 17, 2023 [7 favorites]
The idea that a landlord would demolish, convince the city to rezone (which is definitely not trivial for many of the residential lots this tax would apply to) and rebuild their property in order to avoid the empty homes tax is extremely funny to me.
Why would they have to rezone anything? They would simply be empty, with the parks private (ie: empty lots between homes) because the majority of the value is in the land in a housing-constrained metro, and the taxes on empty land are less. Again, this is what people have actually done in the past. And basically what people still do. It's called land-banking.
posted by The_Vegetables at 2:52 PM on February 17, 2023 [3 favorites]
I fully support a vacant property tax, it's not a bad measure to free up supply, it's been around for many years, this news is literally just the smallest state in Australia implementing their own version of it. But, really, this whole vacancy tax news cycle is part of a whole set of xenophobic and racist dog-whistles by political parties in Australia.
82% of Australians believe Chinese investors are driving up house prices when in reality only 2.2% to 3.7% of sales have been to foreign buyers. There's this belief that "rich foreigners" buy property in Australian and for some reason leave them vacant, so now they want to enact a vacancy tax on them.
Even the federal government said it was targeted at foreign investors and they expected about 1,000 homes to be impacted nationally. Out of 10 million dwellings...
It's just some lip service to get some red blooded Aussies voting for their party.
Australia has really robust laws protecting tenants - as a tenant myself for many years and as a landord, and having many friends in both positions. Any damage we caused as a tenant - towel rail was pulled clear out of the wall by a friend, some water damage, etc - the landlord tried to claim from our bond, but VCAT said it was "normal wear and tear" given the number of years we rented and the landlord would have to fix at his own cost.
In fact, the laws are skewed so far in favor of the tenants it will probably surprise you. Tenants pretty much get a free pass for anything. I had a tenant who simply decided to stop paying rent (this is a known scam). You have to keep maintaining the property and performing repairs, etc, otherwise this will prejudice VCAT against you. After about 8 months your application to VCAT for eviction might reach a hearing, and the tenant just shows up and goes, oh, my bad, I'll leave now. Then they just trash the place (requiring a few thousand in cleanup and repairs, the amount of trash they left cost $600 in landfill fees alone just to drop it off at the dump) and leave owing you $13,000 and you never hear from them again, there's not much you can do to pursue them, so I guess they're just happily living their own life? They had three 65 inch TVs mounted on the walls and even left one behind they couldn't be bothered taking with them.
I don't really care either way, I'm not in it for money, I don't need the money, many people become inadvertent landlords - there are work or family commitments that require them to move out of their home, and they can't leave it vacant otherwise they get taxed. About 68% of rental properties operate at a loss (negative gearing) which means rents are being priced below cost and landlords are hoping to recover their investment purely on capital gains on the land itself in the long run, which may or may not happen. If you actually wanted to invest your money and make a profit there are better ways, investing in actually profitable businesses like mining or banking (BHP yields were something like 40% in 2022 full year, that level of yield is scam levels of territory if you were looking at crypo or ponzi schemes). Property is an awful investment in so many ways, being illiquid, having high transaction costs for purchase or sale, having a concentration of risk and lack of diversification.
posted by xdvesper at 3:38 PM on February 17, 2023 [1 favorite]
82% of Australians believe Chinese investors are driving up house prices when in reality only 2.2% to 3.7% of sales have been to foreign buyers. There's this belief that "rich foreigners" buy property in Australian and for some reason leave them vacant, so now they want to enact a vacancy tax on them.
Even the federal government said it was targeted at foreign investors and they expected about 1,000 homes to be impacted nationally. Out of 10 million dwellings...
It's just some lip service to get some red blooded Aussies voting for their party.
Australia has really robust laws protecting tenants - as a tenant myself for many years and as a landord, and having many friends in both positions. Any damage we caused as a tenant - towel rail was pulled clear out of the wall by a friend, some water damage, etc - the landlord tried to claim from our bond, but VCAT said it was "normal wear and tear" given the number of years we rented and the landlord would have to fix at his own cost.
In fact, the laws are skewed so far in favor of the tenants it will probably surprise you. Tenants pretty much get a free pass for anything. I had a tenant who simply decided to stop paying rent (this is a known scam). You have to keep maintaining the property and performing repairs, etc, otherwise this will prejudice VCAT against you. After about 8 months your application to VCAT for eviction might reach a hearing, and the tenant just shows up and goes, oh, my bad, I'll leave now. Then they just trash the place (requiring a few thousand in cleanup and repairs, the amount of trash they left cost $600 in landfill fees alone just to drop it off at the dump) and leave owing you $13,000 and you never hear from them again, there's not much you can do to pursue them, so I guess they're just happily living their own life? They had three 65 inch TVs mounted on the walls and even left one behind they couldn't be bothered taking with them.
I don't really care either way, I'm not in it for money, I don't need the money, many people become inadvertent landlords - there are work or family commitments that require them to move out of their home, and they can't leave it vacant otherwise they get taxed. About 68% of rental properties operate at a loss (negative gearing) which means rents are being priced below cost and landlords are hoping to recover their investment purely on capital gains on the land itself in the long run, which may or may not happen. If you actually wanted to invest your money and make a profit there are better ways, investing in actually profitable businesses like mining or banking (BHP yields were something like 40% in 2022 full year, that level of yield is scam levels of territory if you were looking at crypo or ponzi schemes). Property is an awful investment in so many ways, being illiquid, having high transaction costs for purchase or sale, having a concentration of risk and lack of diversification.
posted by xdvesper at 3:38 PM on February 17, 2023 [1 favorite]
Why not "your lake house," though, abulafa?
For the reasons desert outpost described especially the "the housing shortage isn't on the lake you can't get to half the year." Maybe I can see a point in like a jersey shore house but in the end my actual reason is the owner-with-a-lake-house isn't likely the one keeping rents artificially high by holding their rental off the market (and often taking a write off for it!)
posted by abulafa at 3:38 PM on February 17, 2023 [3 favorites]
For the reasons desert outpost described especially the "the housing shortage isn't on the lake you can't get to half the year." Maybe I can see a point in like a jersey shore house but in the end my actual reason is the owner-with-a-lake-house isn't likely the one keeping rents artificially high by holding their rental off the market (and often taking a write off for it!)
posted by abulafa at 3:38 PM on February 17, 2023 [3 favorites]
...California where older people refuse to sell their sprawling, empty nest homes because of Prop 13 and thinks there needs to be incentives for older people to downsize.
I think it was terribly flawed, but wasn't that a major point of California Prop 19 (2020)
• Allows homeowners who are over 55 years of age (without regard to wealth), disabled, or victims of natural disasters to transfer their existing property tax assessed value under 1978 California Proposition 13 to a replacement home, including a more expensive home.
• Significantly limits the existing property tax benefits under Proposition 13 for certain real estate transfers between family members, such as the transfer of property from a parent to a child following the death of the parent.
posted by soylent00FF00 at 4:03 PM on February 17, 2023
I think it was terribly flawed, but wasn't that a major point of California Prop 19 (2020)
• Allows homeowners who are over 55 years of age (without regard to wealth), disabled, or victims of natural disasters to transfer their existing property tax assessed value under 1978 California Proposition 13 to a replacement home, including a more expensive home.
• Significantly limits the existing property tax benefits under Proposition 13 for certain real estate transfers between family members, such as the transfer of property from a parent to a child following the death of the parent.
posted by soylent00FF00 at 4:03 PM on February 17, 2023
About 68% of rental properties operate at a loss (negative gearing) which means rents are being priced below cost and landlords are hoping to recover their investment purely on capital gains on the land itself in the long run, which may or may not happen.
Well...okay? That's a business calculation they're making. They have no particular right to its coming true. It's not clear to me that society has any particular interest itself in protecting their interests here.
If you actually wanted to invest your money and make a profit there are better ways,
They aren't in it for the benefit of mankind. If they find they can't afford it, then they can resign themselves to the enormous adversity of living in only one place.
posted by praemunire at 4:17 PM on February 17, 2023 [15 favorites]
Well...okay? That's a business calculation they're making. They have no particular right to its coming true. It's not clear to me that society has any particular interest itself in protecting their interests here.
If you actually wanted to invest your money and make a profit there are better ways,
They aren't in it for the benefit of mankind. If they find they can't afford it, then they can resign themselves to the enormous adversity of living in only one place.
posted by praemunire at 4:17 PM on February 17, 2023 [15 favorites]
Australia has really robust laws protecting tenants - as a tenant myself for many years and as a landord, and having many friends in both positions. Any damage we caused as a tenant - towel rail was pulled clear out of the wall by a friend, some water damage, etc - the landlord tried to claim from our bond, but VCAT said it was "normal wear and tear" given the number of years we rented and the landlord would have to fix at his own cost
Speaking as an Australian, this varies enormously depending on what state you live in.
Some states have much more robust laws for tenants than other states.
And all too often, tenants who pay rent on time and look after the property get thrown out because the owner has decided to renovate or decided to sell.
In most Australian states, the landlord doesn't have to provide any reason for not renewing a lease, regardless of how good the tenant's behaviour has been. You can pay your rent on time, and keep the place pristine, and the landlord can still choose not to renew your lease without having to provide any reason whatsoever.
posted by chariot pulled by cassowaries at 4:49 PM on February 17, 2023 [4 favorites]
Speaking as an Australian, this varies enormously depending on what state you live in.
Some states have much more robust laws for tenants than other states.
And all too often, tenants who pay rent on time and look after the property get thrown out because the owner has decided to renovate or decided to sell.
In most Australian states, the landlord doesn't have to provide any reason for not renewing a lease, regardless of how good the tenant's behaviour has been. You can pay your rent on time, and keep the place pristine, and the landlord can still choose not to renew your lease without having to provide any reason whatsoever.
posted by chariot pulled by cassowaries at 4:49 PM on February 17, 2023 [4 favorites]
I mean, the whole concept of a lake house is that it's in a place where few to no people live/want to live. Taxing a vacancy on such a house is sort of punitive for no valuable reason.
There are parts of BC that have housing shortages despite being "cottage country" for people from the cities. When restaurants, hospitals, and ferries can't maintain service because there's nowhere for their workers to live, I feel like a modest tax on vacation homes is not an outrageous idea. I doubt it will happen, though.
In places where there isn't a housing shortage, yeah, there's no reason for a vacancy tax.
posted by Gerald Bostock at 4:52 PM on February 17, 2023 [7 favorites]
There are parts of BC that have housing shortages despite being "cottage country" for people from the cities. When restaurants, hospitals, and ferries can't maintain service because there's nowhere for their workers to live, I feel like a modest tax on vacation homes is not an outrageous idea. I doubt it will happen, though.
In places where there isn't a housing shortage, yeah, there's no reason for a vacancy tax.
posted by Gerald Bostock at 4:52 PM on February 17, 2023 [7 favorites]
There are parts of BC that have housing shortages despite being "cottage country" for people from the cities. When restaurants, hospitals, and ferries can't maintain service because there's nowhere for their workers to live, I feel like a modest tax on vacation homes is not an outrageous idea
Yes, in Margaret River, Australia there are people forced to live in tents (including people with cancer and pregnant people!) while the area is filled with vacant holiday homes.
The people in tents are
a) people who used to rent in the area, until their landlord realised they could get more money doing short term vacation rentals through Airbnb;
b) people working at cafes, restaurants, supermarkets etc in the region.
posted by chariot pulled by cassowaries at 7:19 PM on February 17, 2023 [13 favorites]
Yes, in Margaret River, Australia there are people forced to live in tents (including people with cancer and pregnant people!) while the area is filled with vacant holiday homes.
The people in tents are
a) people who used to rent in the area, until their landlord realised they could get more money doing short term vacation rentals through Airbnb;
b) people working at cafes, restaurants, supermarkets etc in the region.
posted by chariot pulled by cassowaries at 7:19 PM on February 17, 2023 [13 favorites]
Well...okay? That's a business calculation they're making.
Profits / losses are relevant in terms of long term supply of rental housing. As steel, timber and concrete costs have risen astronomically in the past two years, and labor costs have gone up, the cost of building a house has gone from about $300,000 to about $450,000, all the while interest rates are rising - while rents on the other hand aren't keeping up with those increases - there's going to be less and less supply coming online as building activity starts to reduce.
My estimation is that rents are currently still artificially low, too low to provide sufficient supply on the market - as shown by record low vacancy rates of under 1% in most capital cities.
and the landlord can still choose not to renew your lease without having to provide any reason whatsoever.
I'm mostly familiar with VCAT / NCAT / QCAT processes, so it may be that TASCAT is more landlord biased... I'd love to know more though if you can elaborate or provide anecdotes!
In theory? Yeah, any landlord can give the tenant a "notice to vacate" for the cost of a registered letter.
In practice, how is eviction going to work? The tenant ignores the notice and says well see you at the Tribunal, so you have to apply for a possession order. The Tribunal sees the application and goes, wow this is clearly not urgent, tenant is paying the rent on time, property is well maintained, both parties are abiding by the law. To the back of the queue it goes! Remember, even tenants who are behind over $10,000 in rent are only getting seen by the tribunals after 8 months. If you're current on rent, maybe it will take 18 months to get a hearing.
So you finally get a hearing. Tribunal member will ask why you want a possession order. You have to spin some kind of story, and it better be more convincing to the Tribunal member than the sob story the tenant will put together (significant disruption to my life, I have kids, they're going to a local school, etc etc). Will the landlord win? All depends, but I wouldn't always bet on it. And you'll definitely lose if you have the temerity to say "no reason required". Even if the landlord "wins" the Tribunal member will use their judgement and go, well the tenant needs to vacate but will ned reasonable time, so we will set a date 4 months in the future.
By this point they'll be about 2 years past the point the notice to vacate was issued, at a point they might have well moved to a different property on their own.
posted by xdvesper at 7:20 PM on February 17, 2023 [3 favorites]
Profits / losses are relevant in terms of long term supply of rental housing. As steel, timber and concrete costs have risen astronomically in the past two years, and labor costs have gone up, the cost of building a house has gone from about $300,000 to about $450,000, all the while interest rates are rising - while rents on the other hand aren't keeping up with those increases - there's going to be less and less supply coming online as building activity starts to reduce.
My estimation is that rents are currently still artificially low, too low to provide sufficient supply on the market - as shown by record low vacancy rates of under 1% in most capital cities.
and the landlord can still choose not to renew your lease without having to provide any reason whatsoever.
I'm mostly familiar with VCAT / NCAT / QCAT processes, so it may be that TASCAT is more landlord biased... I'd love to know more though if you can elaborate or provide anecdotes!
In theory? Yeah, any landlord can give the tenant a "notice to vacate" for the cost of a registered letter.
In practice, how is eviction going to work? The tenant ignores the notice and says well see you at the Tribunal, so you have to apply for a possession order. The Tribunal sees the application and goes, wow this is clearly not urgent, tenant is paying the rent on time, property is well maintained, both parties are abiding by the law. To the back of the queue it goes! Remember, even tenants who are behind over $10,000 in rent are only getting seen by the tribunals after 8 months. If you're current on rent, maybe it will take 18 months to get a hearing.
So you finally get a hearing. Tribunal member will ask why you want a possession order. You have to spin some kind of story, and it better be more convincing to the Tribunal member than the sob story the tenant will put together (significant disruption to my life, I have kids, they're going to a local school, etc etc). Will the landlord win? All depends, but I wouldn't always bet on it. And you'll definitely lose if you have the temerity to say "no reason required". Even if the landlord "wins" the Tribunal member will use their judgement and go, well the tenant needs to vacate but will ned reasonable time, so we will set a date 4 months in the future.
By this point they'll be about 2 years past the point the notice to vacate was issued, at a point they might have well moved to a different property on their own.
posted by xdvesper at 7:20 PM on February 17, 2023 [3 favorites]
I'm mostly familiar with VCAT / NCAT / QCAT processes, so it may be that TASCAT is more landlord biased... I'd love to know more though if you can elaborate or provide anecdotes!
From Western Australia, all separate incidents that have happened to people who I know:
"You have to move out so that we can repaint"
"You have to move out so that we can replace the carpets"
"You have to move out so that we can sell the house as an empty house"
"You have to move out because I was having an affair and now I have left my wife for my boyfriend, and I need to move in" (this happened with *very little notice*)
"You have to move out because I want to see how much I can jack the rent up by"
"You have to move out because I want to turn this place into an Air BNB"
posted by chariot pulled by cassowaries at 7:38 PM on February 17, 2023 [6 favorites]
From Western Australia, all separate incidents that have happened to people who I know:
"You have to move out so that we can repaint"
"You have to move out so that we can replace the carpets"
"You have to move out so that we can sell the house as an empty house"
"You have to move out because I was having an affair and now I have left my wife for my boyfriend, and I need to move in" (this happened with *very little notice*)
"You have to move out because I want to see how much I can jack the rent up by"
"You have to move out because I want to turn this place into an Air BNB"
posted by chariot pulled by cassowaries at 7:38 PM on February 17, 2023 [6 favorites]
>Why would they have to rezone anything? They would simply be empty, with the parks private (ie: empty lots between homes) because the majority of the value is in the land in a housing-constrained metro, and the taxes on empty land are less. Again, this is what people have actually done in the past. And basically what people still do. It's called land-banking.
Do you have any examples from the last 30 years of people doing this as a result of an empty homes tax?
Whether something will need to be rezoned or not will depend on the lot and municipality. When I made my comment, I was thinking specifically about a hypothetical residential lot in Vancouver (where I grew up), where you would need to rezone if you wanted to both avoid an empty home tax and not build/maintain housing.
posted by Pitachu at 8:18 PM on February 17, 2023 [1 favorite]
Do you have any examples from the last 30 years of people doing this as a result of an empty homes tax?
Whether something will need to be rezoned or not will depend on the lot and municipality. When I made my comment, I was thinking specifically about a hypothetical residential lot in Vancouver (where I grew up), where you would need to rezone if you wanted to both avoid an empty home tax and not build/maintain housing.
posted by Pitachu at 8:18 PM on February 17, 2023 [1 favorite]
Profits / losses are relevant in terms of long term supply of rental housing.
If you're actually renting out the property, then you won't be paying the vacancy tax.
Landlord casuistry, always illuminating of the human character.
posted by praemunire at 8:38 PM on February 17, 2023 [7 favorites]
If you're actually renting out the property, then you won't be paying the vacancy tax.
Landlord casuistry, always illuminating of the human character.
posted by praemunire at 8:38 PM on February 17, 2023 [7 favorites]
chariot pulled by cassowaries
Like I said, anyone can send a notice to vacate for any reason under the sun.
Did any of those reasons pass muster in tribunal or court? Or was it just a case of the landlord bluffing with a notice to vacate and the tenant folding in response?
Many of those reasons are pure bluffs and would be thrown out, it wouldn't even reach court and waste the magistrate's time. In WA you both appear before the registrar who reviews the evidence and gives their opinion of the likely outcome before setting up a court date. If I was a tenant I'd be moving out in response to (3) and (4) but I wouldn't be overly worried about the others.
posted by xdvesper at 9:23 PM on February 17, 2023
Like I said, anyone can send a notice to vacate for any reason under the sun.
Did any of those reasons pass muster in tribunal or court? Or was it just a case of the landlord bluffing with a notice to vacate and the tenant folding in response?
Many of those reasons are pure bluffs and would be thrown out, it wouldn't even reach court and waste the magistrate's time. In WA you both appear before the registrar who reviews the evidence and gives their opinion of the likely outcome before setting up a court date. If I was a tenant I'd be moving out in response to (3) and (4) but I wouldn't be overly worried about the others.
posted by xdvesper at 9:23 PM on February 17, 2023
I take it you live in some magic place where you can rent a place without a reference from your current landlord, xdvesper?
Because in jurisdictions where we need a reference, it makes it hard to get a property if we didn't vacate after the notice period in a notice to vacate, whether or not the court system could theoretically protect us.
posted by ambrosen at 10:22 PM on February 17, 2023 [8 favorites]
Because in jurisdictions where we need a reference, it makes it hard to get a property if we didn't vacate after the notice period in a notice to vacate, whether or not the court system could theoretically protect us.
posted by ambrosen at 10:22 PM on February 17, 2023 [8 favorites]
82% of Australians believe Chinese investors are driving up house prices when in reality only 2.2% to 3.7% of sales have been to foreign buyers. There's this belief that "rich foreigners" buy property in Australian and for some reason leave them vacant, so now they want to enact a vacancy tax on them.
There's been similar discussions here in Canada - especially in Vancouver, and certainly, there's been some unfortunate xenophobia and racism driving it. Even after a vacancy tax in BC has returned a lot of vacant units into the market, as of 2021 foreign owners in BC leave their properties vacant at 17 times the rate that Canadian owners do (5.3% vs. 0.31%).
And yes, these are single digit numbers; as are the share of AirBnBs; as are other small market influences. But the housing market is shaped by the marginal unit, and those small changes result in really large impacts. Here in Calgary, the long term vacancy rate is 3.1%. When the vacancy rate is within 1% of that, rents have on average only gone up as fast as inflation. When the vacancy rate drops below 2.1%, the average change in rent has been a 5.4% increase above inflation; when the vacancy rate rises above 4.1%, the average change in rent has been a 4.1% drop after inflation. (The five years vacancy has dropped below 1.1%, we've had an average change in rent of 9.4%.)
About 68% of rental properties operate at a loss (negative gearing) which means rents are being priced below cost and landlords are hoping to recover their investment purely on capital gains on the land itself in the long run, which may or may not happen.
So what? 100% of investments in Apple, Google, Facebook and Amazon operate at a loss (brokerage fees, plus investment fees if done in a mutual fund or ETF). Plenty of folks still do well with those. The general sentiment is that investors "earn" their returns because they take the risk that a positive return may or may not happen. Now that you mention it, the main source of money these landlords are intending to get, capital gains, are highly subsidized via the taxman by all of the people who perform work to get their money.
In practice, how is eviction going to work? The tenant ignores the notice and says well see you at the Tribunal, so you have to apply for a possession order. [...] If you're current on rent, maybe it will take 18 months to get a hearing.
What proportion -- calculated from records, not the three worst tenants that stick in your mind -- of your tenants have stuck around for two years after you issue a notice? This article suggests tribunal actions on eviction in Sydney at the rate of 1-3%, but ABS says that 29% of renters have moved in the past year, which suggests somewhere between 10 and 30 tenants leaving peacefully for every shit case. And in any case, that's just the cost of doing business; coffee shops sometimes sell a small black coffee to someone who lingers for hours, shops get shoplifted, consultants spend time bidding on jobs they don't get.
posted by Superilla at 10:31 PM on February 17, 2023 [8 favorites]
There's been similar discussions here in Canada - especially in Vancouver, and certainly, there's been some unfortunate xenophobia and racism driving it. Even after a vacancy tax in BC has returned a lot of vacant units into the market, as of 2021 foreign owners in BC leave their properties vacant at 17 times the rate that Canadian owners do (5.3% vs. 0.31%).
And yes, these are single digit numbers; as are the share of AirBnBs; as are other small market influences. But the housing market is shaped by the marginal unit, and those small changes result in really large impacts. Here in Calgary, the long term vacancy rate is 3.1%. When the vacancy rate is within 1% of that, rents have on average only gone up as fast as inflation. When the vacancy rate drops below 2.1%, the average change in rent has been a 5.4% increase above inflation; when the vacancy rate rises above 4.1%, the average change in rent has been a 4.1% drop after inflation. (The five years vacancy has dropped below 1.1%, we've had an average change in rent of 9.4%.)
About 68% of rental properties operate at a loss (negative gearing) which means rents are being priced below cost and landlords are hoping to recover their investment purely on capital gains on the land itself in the long run, which may or may not happen.
So what? 100% of investments in Apple, Google, Facebook and Amazon operate at a loss (brokerage fees, plus investment fees if done in a mutual fund or ETF). Plenty of folks still do well with those. The general sentiment is that investors "earn" their returns because they take the risk that a positive return may or may not happen. Now that you mention it, the main source of money these landlords are intending to get, capital gains, are highly subsidized via the taxman by all of the people who perform work to get their money.
In practice, how is eviction going to work? The tenant ignores the notice and says well see you at the Tribunal, so you have to apply for a possession order. [...] If you're current on rent, maybe it will take 18 months to get a hearing.
What proportion -- calculated from records, not the three worst tenants that stick in your mind -- of your tenants have stuck around for two years after you issue a notice? This article suggests tribunal actions on eviction in Sydney at the rate of 1-3%, but ABS says that 29% of renters have moved in the past year, which suggests somewhere between 10 and 30 tenants leaving peacefully for every shit case. And in any case, that's just the cost of doing business; coffee shops sometimes sell a small black coffee to someone who lingers for hours, shops get shoplifted, consultants spend time bidding on jobs they don't get.
posted by Superilla at 10:31 PM on February 17, 2023 [8 favorites]
I take it you live in some magic place where you can rent a place without a reference from your current landlord, xdvesper?
Because in jurisdictions where we need a reference, it makes it hard to get a property if we didn't vacate after the notice period in a notice to vacate, whether or not the court system could theoretically protect us
Yes, this.
Not to mention the risk of getting onto the tenant blacklist that is shared among multiple real estate agencies.
posted by chariot pulled by cassowaries at 11:14 PM on February 17, 2023 [3 favorites]
Because in jurisdictions where we need a reference, it makes it hard to get a property if we didn't vacate after the notice period in a notice to vacate, whether or not the court system could theoretically protect us
Yes, this.
Not to mention the risk of getting onto the tenant blacklist that is shared among multiple real estate agencies.
posted by chariot pulled by cassowaries at 11:14 PM on February 17, 2023 [3 favorites]
founded on a failure of vision and leadership
Oh, pray tell, what is the solution in PDX?
posted by DeepSeaHaggis at 12:23 AM on February 18, 2023
Oh, pray tell, what is the solution in PDX?
posted by DeepSeaHaggis at 12:23 AM on February 18, 2023
Ah yes the notoriously tenant friendly refusal to deal with a leaking bedroom window, illegally renovated bathroom, and pest infestation from the vacant flat downstairs - not only did I have to break lease and pay wildly for it, I got an illegal post-exit inspection claim on the bond. Then a terrible reference until I contacted them with the email proof that what the new PM was saying was incorrect.
A reference that simply said I didn't clean well enough on exit and some items were broken. It stopped me getting rentals for over six months until one agent accidentally informed me that I'd been rejected for it. I didn't even take them to tribunal for saying everything was fine on exit then weeks later claiming $200 for scratched tiles in the entryway.
(The mould was not remediated, now was the window fixed, and the bathroom was just going to remain as is)
The issue is that if you get into a pissing match with the landlord/property manager, where you live becomes a problem. I couldn't just get the window fixed. I couldn't get pest treatment for the building. It didn't matter what any tradie said either. Because them not doing right by you makes your home uncomfortable or awful or genuinely unlivable. And the only leverage you have is paying rent. And for all of that you have to hope they don't slander you in the reference.
Property as an investment is a risk. Choosing to engage in being a landlord exposes you to that risk of financial damage. On the other hand I risk homelessness, illness, and harm, from landlords prioritising the potential extreme profit over renting out empty housing/doing appropriate maintenance.
posted by geek anachronism at 3:38 AM on February 18, 2023 [13 favorites]
A reference that simply said I didn't clean well enough on exit and some items were broken. It stopped me getting rentals for over six months until one agent accidentally informed me that I'd been rejected for it. I didn't even take them to tribunal for saying everything was fine on exit then weeks later claiming $200 for scratched tiles in the entryway.
(The mould was not remediated, now was the window fixed, and the bathroom was just going to remain as is)
The issue is that if you get into a pissing match with the landlord/property manager, where you live becomes a problem. I couldn't just get the window fixed. I couldn't get pest treatment for the building. It didn't matter what any tradie said either. Because them not doing right by you makes your home uncomfortable or awful or genuinely unlivable. And the only leverage you have is paying rent. And for all of that you have to hope they don't slander you in the reference.
Property as an investment is a risk. Choosing to engage in being a landlord exposes you to that risk of financial damage. On the other hand I risk homelessness, illness, and harm, from landlords prioritising the potential extreme profit over renting out empty housing/doing appropriate maintenance.
posted by geek anachronism at 3:38 AM on February 18, 2023 [13 favorites]
I take it you live in some magic place where you can rent a place without a reference from your current landlord, xdvesper?
A large chunk of the inner Sydney / Melbourne rental market consists of students. Who have neither prior references, nor are able to demonstrate income. It's common to receive and accept applications with neither.
You can only be put on a blacklist if you have rent in arrears or were the subject of a possession order. Obviously I'm not saying you're entitled to live in someone else's property for 40 years, no one is saying that. It's like switching energy / insurance / mortgage providers - loyalty doesn't get you anything. You should be on the lookout for something cheaper and better even if your current landlord is willing to extend your lease. I've had many tenants I wish would stay longer move due to personal circumstance - landlord incurs more costs (advertising, vacant property, agent fees) than the tenant does (moving costs are about half that). If it's clear the landlord wants to end your arrangement, 6 months to move out is plenty: even if the landlord gives you less time than that, and issues a notice to vacate, you'll be long out of there long before the hearing date at the tribunal or magistrates court so you're in no danger of being the subject of a possession order or blacklist.
In any case, I'm just sharing some information: there's a power imbalance in business relationships if an information gap exists. The people who know the ins and outs of the legal system are the real estate agents and they end up exploiting both the individual tenants and individual landlords to ensure they keep the maximum profit for themselves. I often hear of people in an absolute panic when they get a notice to vacate within 30 days when it's really nothing to worry about at all, the soonest you will get an eviction notice is 12 months later as long as you're current on rent. Like I said I'm not buying nor selling, I advise everyone I know to "not" get involved in the landlord business.
Re: stats on tribunal actions - unfortunately there aren't detailed stats I could find but I'll wager almost all of them relate to unpaid rent, as the article alludes to. Most applications to VCAT / NCAT are in fact, in my experience, just a starting step for the tenant to receive social housing relief - they need to demonstrate they have fallen behind in payments in order to access funding. Landlords have every incentive to provide advice and make sure tenants have access to funding resources.
On vacancy rates - if foreign buyers own 3% of houses, and they have a vacancy rate of 4% higher than baseline, this equates to potentially taking 0.12% of supply off the market. I still don't believe it's significant. By the time you're talking about numbers this small, it's like talking about the straw that breaks the camel's back - blame the last 10 grams you put on, no one is talking about the 200kg you loaded on a few minutes ago? The whole thing is a distraction to buy votes.
And re: profit / loss rates - all I'm saying is that as yields drop, you will naturally see a reallocation of capital away from housing to more productive uses like mining, further restricting supply. The only way for supply to increase is for yields to rise. I'm working in the manufacturing sector and we're seeing huge demand that is outpacing our ability to supply - people are cash rich coming out of the pandemic and our supply chains are still in the process of getting unjammed.
posted by xdvesper at 7:25 AM on February 18, 2023
A large chunk of the inner Sydney / Melbourne rental market consists of students. Who have neither prior references, nor are able to demonstrate income. It's common to receive and accept applications with neither.
You can only be put on a blacklist if you have rent in arrears or were the subject of a possession order. Obviously I'm not saying you're entitled to live in someone else's property for 40 years, no one is saying that. It's like switching energy / insurance / mortgage providers - loyalty doesn't get you anything. You should be on the lookout for something cheaper and better even if your current landlord is willing to extend your lease. I've had many tenants I wish would stay longer move due to personal circumstance - landlord incurs more costs (advertising, vacant property, agent fees) than the tenant does (moving costs are about half that). If it's clear the landlord wants to end your arrangement, 6 months to move out is plenty: even if the landlord gives you less time than that, and issues a notice to vacate, you'll be long out of there long before the hearing date at the tribunal or magistrates court so you're in no danger of being the subject of a possession order or blacklist.
In any case, I'm just sharing some information: there's a power imbalance in business relationships if an information gap exists. The people who know the ins and outs of the legal system are the real estate agents and they end up exploiting both the individual tenants and individual landlords to ensure they keep the maximum profit for themselves. I often hear of people in an absolute panic when they get a notice to vacate within 30 days when it's really nothing to worry about at all, the soonest you will get an eviction notice is 12 months later as long as you're current on rent. Like I said I'm not buying nor selling, I advise everyone I know to "not" get involved in the landlord business.
Re: stats on tribunal actions - unfortunately there aren't detailed stats I could find but I'll wager almost all of them relate to unpaid rent, as the article alludes to. Most applications to VCAT / NCAT are in fact, in my experience, just a starting step for the tenant to receive social housing relief - they need to demonstrate they have fallen behind in payments in order to access funding. Landlords have every incentive to provide advice and make sure tenants have access to funding resources.
On vacancy rates - if foreign buyers own 3% of houses, and they have a vacancy rate of 4% higher than baseline, this equates to potentially taking 0.12% of supply off the market. I still don't believe it's significant. By the time you're talking about numbers this small, it's like talking about the straw that breaks the camel's back - blame the last 10 grams you put on, no one is talking about the 200kg you loaded on a few minutes ago? The whole thing is a distraction to buy votes.
And re: profit / loss rates - all I'm saying is that as yields drop, you will naturally see a reallocation of capital away from housing to more productive uses like mining, further restricting supply. The only way for supply to increase is for yields to rise. I'm working in the manufacturing sector and we're seeing huge demand that is outpacing our ability to supply - people are cash rich coming out of the pandemic and our supply chains are still in the process of getting unjammed.
posted by xdvesper at 7:25 AM on February 18, 2023
E.g. Today's post in /r/Auslegal where a tenant was given notice to vacate by the landlord due to them selling the property, Tenants Victoria advised them if they hadn't found a place by the 60 days notice not to stress because they still need to apply for a possession order. Which everyone knows takes nearly a year. Their advice is more pragmatic - make an offer to move out for 8k. The tenant has the landlord over a barrel here because they can potentially delay the sale of the property over a year while house prices are expected to decline by almost 80k.
posted by xdvesper at 8:13 AM on February 18, 2023
posted by xdvesper at 8:13 AM on February 18, 2023
Or read Evicted, which is so brutal a piece of reportage I actually had to take a break from reading it at one point, and it wasn't even describing a phenomenon new to me.
posted by praemunire at 10:39 AM on February 18, 2023 [3 favorites]
posted by praemunire at 10:39 AM on February 18, 2023 [3 favorites]
Yeah, I'm not reading 589 words of bluster about how landlords are hard done by, sorry.
posted by ambrosen at 4:19 PM on February 18, 2023 [6 favorites]
posted by ambrosen at 4:19 PM on February 18, 2023 [6 favorites]
I got dinged 150$ this year for not doing my empty homes declaration in Vancouver in time (due to newborns, this is not the only thing that slipped through the cracks) and I’m still broadly in favour of it. We need much bigger changes, though, like maybe reducing or removing entirely the 0% capital gains on sales of owner-occupied properties.
posted by Jon Mitchell at 5:00 PM on February 18, 2023 [1 favorite]
posted by Jon Mitchell at 5:00 PM on February 18, 2023 [1 favorite]
If you make housing an investment you are taking a risk. That is the choice you make when you take your extra money, buy property, and play the speculative capital gains over time. The issue for renters is that this action - housing as investment - vastly weighs in favour of those already economically advantaged AND makes a necessity of life a commercial trade. Which means having to move - regardless of your circumstances and costs - because the owner decides to sell is somehow ethically or legally linked to the action of said owner in deciding to buy property.
The idea that a potential lack of capital profit - NOT a loss, but an unrealised extra amount of gain, a smaller amount of profit - should be weighed the same as safe, accessible, and affordable housing for actual humans is a reading that buys into the idea that property must be profitable, vs it being the risk it actually is.
Only getting four times what you paid off twenty years ago, or only getting a 15% profit, not the ten times or 300% or whatever absurd housing bubble expectation is not a valid rationale for forcing people out of housing. Extreme profit seeking is the standard for housing, even when there is negative gearing, because the tenants aren't a system that makes profit the way housing speculation does, they're a nasty side effect of the wait between sales. That's the problem, and what drives the vacancies, extreme rental markets, and genuinely illegal bullshit.
Real estate agents 'bluffing' with an illegal notice should NOT be standard behaviour. You shouldn't have to be on guard for illegal shit when you need somewhere to live.
posted by geek anachronism at 9:49 PM on February 18, 2023 [14 favorites]
The idea that a potential lack of capital profit - NOT a loss, but an unrealised extra amount of gain, a smaller amount of profit - should be weighed the same as safe, accessible, and affordable housing for actual humans is a reading that buys into the idea that property must be profitable, vs it being the risk it actually is.
Only getting four times what you paid off twenty years ago, or only getting a 15% profit, not the ten times or 300% or whatever absurd housing bubble expectation is not a valid rationale for forcing people out of housing. Extreme profit seeking is the standard for housing, even when there is negative gearing, because the tenants aren't a system that makes profit the way housing speculation does, they're a nasty side effect of the wait between sales. That's the problem, and what drives the vacancies, extreme rental markets, and genuinely illegal bullshit.
Real estate agents 'bluffing' with an illegal notice should NOT be standard behaviour. You shouldn't have to be on guard for illegal shit when you need somewhere to live.
posted by geek anachronism at 9:49 PM on February 18, 2023 [14 favorites]
And what occurs with no references is:
Demand for bank statements
Demand for income statements
Demand for guarantors
Demand for rent in advance
And sure they might not phrase it as a demand. You just don't get a place to live.
Blacklists may have specific demands for application. The instantaneous request for a referral if using ANY major system for rental applications, or manual contact lists of prior rentals outside those systems, doesn't adhere to those rules. And you get no info either - as I said I had a RE apply an incorrect reference that I only discovered when another RE explained the issue with my application. They denied ever having done a reference (in spite of the obvious proof they did). Apart from being false, the information also was not actually terrible, but was worded as negatively as possible.
What's also fun is that every application includes a call to my employer. Every. Single. One.
posted by geek anachronism at 9:55 PM on February 18, 2023 [5 favorites]
Demand for bank statements
Demand for income statements
Demand for guarantors
Demand for rent in advance
And sure they might not phrase it as a demand. You just don't get a place to live.
Blacklists may have specific demands for application. The instantaneous request for a referral if using ANY major system for rental applications, or manual contact lists of prior rentals outside those systems, doesn't adhere to those rules. And you get no info either - as I said I had a RE apply an incorrect reference that I only discovered when another RE explained the issue with my application. They denied ever having done a reference (in spite of the obvious proof they did). Apart from being false, the information also was not actually terrible, but was worded as negatively as possible.
What's also fun is that every application includes a call to my employer. Every. Single. One.
posted by geek anachronism at 9:55 PM on February 18, 2023 [5 favorites]
When a friend of mine in Western Australia sold their house (splitting assets because of a divorce), they had a hell of a time trying to find somewhere to rent, because they didn't have recent references from a previous landlord - because they had owned a house for 20 years!
In the end, the only way they were able to get rental housing without references was to offer to pay more rent than the landlord was asking for AND to pay 6 months rent in advance.
posted by chariot pulled by cassowaries at 10:26 PM on February 18, 2023 [3 favorites]
In the end, the only way they were able to get rental housing without references was to offer to pay more rent than the landlord was asking for AND to pay 6 months rent in advance.
posted by chariot pulled by cassowaries at 10:26 PM on February 18, 2023 [3 favorites]
The rent in advance and a reference from my friend whose spare bedroom I'd stayed in was how I dealt with a similar situation. That and searching right at the start of some big spikes and covid lockdown that scared a bunch of folk.
The same real estate is the one who gave me the false reference. And since I am searching, again, I get to go through this apparently 'minimal disruption and cost' of moving plus rental applications.
posted by geek anachronism at 11:20 PM on February 18, 2023 [2 favorites]
The same real estate is the one who gave me the false reference. And since I am searching, again, I get to go through this apparently 'minimal disruption and cost' of moving plus rental applications.
posted by geek anachronism at 11:20 PM on February 18, 2023 [2 favorites]
Article mentioned France so..
As of 2023, France phased out their taxe d’habitation for primary residences, but retained the related taxes for second homes, and retained their taxe foncière on land. Also, communes can now augment this tax in zone tendue aka areas with housing shortages.
Yes, it became de facto a taxe d’non-habitation now but landlords already paid this tax whenever not paid by tenants. It depends upon local tax rates but it looks typically less than rental income taxes landlords pay.
In brief, any hypothetical French landlord who'd benefit by bulldozing properties already benefited before. If you own property in a bad neighborhood then yes a vacant lot maybe more profitable or less unprofitable or less physically dangerous than renting, but bad apartment buildings being removed should help revitalize bad neighborhoods.
There exists a larger penalty on property speculation in France: At sale, buyers pay supposedly 8% of the total property value to the government. I say supposedly because I've only ever witnessed this number be like 20% or 15% of total property value, so larger than shorter mortgages. I highly doubt sellers ever avoid capital gains in France, but maybe they defer some other costs against the capital gains somehow.
posted by jeffburdges at 7:00 PM on February 19, 2023
As of 2023, France phased out their taxe d’habitation for primary residences, but retained the related taxes for second homes, and retained their taxe foncière on land. Also, communes can now augment this tax in zone tendue aka areas with housing shortages.
Yes, it became de facto a taxe d’non-habitation now but landlords already paid this tax whenever not paid by tenants. It depends upon local tax rates but it looks typically less than rental income taxes landlords pay.
In brief, any hypothetical French landlord who'd benefit by bulldozing properties already benefited before. If you own property in a bad neighborhood then yes a vacant lot maybe more profitable or less unprofitable or less physically dangerous than renting, but bad apartment buildings being removed should help revitalize bad neighborhoods.
There exists a larger penalty on property speculation in France: At sale, buyers pay supposedly 8% of the total property value to the government. I say supposedly because I've only ever witnessed this number be like 20% or 15% of total property value, so larger than shorter mortgages. I highly doubt sellers ever avoid capital gains in France, but maybe they defer some other costs against the capital gains somehow.
posted by jeffburdges at 7:00 PM on February 19, 2023
We rely on the landlord business model to manage a lot of our housing supply. What do we replace it with?
posted by interogative mood at 8:12 PM on February 19, 2023 [1 favorite]
posted by interogative mood at 8:12 PM on February 19, 2023 [1 favorite]
Social housing of one form or another. There are various systems to choose from including England and Singapore where something like 80% of the population lives in homes owned by the government.
posted by Mitheral at 8:49 PM on February 19, 2023 [1 favorite]
posted by Mitheral at 8:49 PM on February 19, 2023 [1 favorite]
We rely on the landlord business model to manage a lot of our housing supply. What do we replace it with?
To the extent it's not social housing...landlords who make less money. People still buy predominantly rent-stabilized buildings in NYC. I wonder why that is.
posted by praemunire at 9:10 AM on February 21, 2023 [2 favorites]
To the extent it's not social housing...landlords who make less money. People still buy predominantly rent-stabilized buildings in NYC. I wonder why that is.
posted by praemunire at 9:10 AM on February 21, 2023 [2 favorites]
Social housing was a pretty big disaster in the US. Not that our current system isn’t. It is hard to sell the voters on it.
posted by interogative mood at 6:37 PM on February 21, 2023
posted by interogative mood at 6:37 PM on February 21, 2023
That's because it was targeted at poor people. Aim it at least some of it at the middle class and it would be an easier sell.
posted by Mitheral at 4:48 AM on February 22, 2023 [1 favorite]
posted by Mitheral at 4:48 AM on February 22, 2023 [1 favorite]
We just passed I-135 in Seattle, establishing a new social housing org, actually! Currently passing by a 14 point margin, so it can be done. It's targeting up to 120% of median income.
Ballotpedia for more details.
posted by vibratory manner of working at 6:38 PM on February 22, 2023
Ballotpedia for more details.
posted by vibratory manner of working at 6:38 PM on February 22, 2023
We have an org like this where I live and it helps. The main problem is it still operates on a landlord / tenant model where the rent must be paid. Voters are sold on the idea that it will provide the benefits of social housing; but not cost the taxpayer much. So you have a better landlord; but all the problems of maintenance, evictions, etc are still there.
posted by interogative mood at 3:26 PM on February 23, 2023
posted by interogative mood at 3:26 PM on February 23, 2023
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New York City also has a lot of empty apartments; and listen, I have no problem with someone wanting to have a second home in my city. But if they choose to make my city a second home, that comes with a responsibility to contribute to that city, even if they're only there part-time.
If you want the privilege of belonging to a given community, you need to contribute to it, just like the rest of us.
posted by EmpressCallipygos at 7:20 AM on February 17, 2023 [46 favorites]