Hear me out: I don’t blame landlords for wanting to protect their investments. But, I do have a problem with them (and guys like James here) who do it at the expense of the downtrodden. Being a landlord should not have to be mutually exclusive with helping people.
For there to be squatters, the landlords had to have this property open and unrented for a while. The only way that happens is if the rent is too high.
What kind of landlord can afford to have a rental property vacant for a significant period of time and not accept a lower rent? Ones who own lots of property and would prefer to lose income rather than reduce the average rent price in the area.
In the industry, withholding housing from people because you want to make more money, when you can clearly afford to get no income from it, is called “a dick move”.
Counterpoint: some people would rent an Airbnb and stay after the two weeks they rented, effectively preventing the homeowner to return to their homes after a vacation. There’s little legal recourse to speedily remove them, as two weeks of occupation requires a lengthy judicial process to evict them (IIRC in California).
I dislike rent seekers too, but it happens to people with only one home as well. They think they could put their home to use while they’re not there (effectively reducing the problem of real estate under occupation), only to be exploited.
The thing is, what you describe is incredibly rare, to the point of being a statistical anomaly.
Also, if you take the “low income” piece out of it, abusing others and cheating the system to save money is “just good business.” Ask all the millionaires doing immoral but TECHNICALLY legal things on their taxes.
You’re mistaken, sadly. It doesn’t happen more often because people got smart to it and no longer put their houses for rent for longer periods.
And I don’t get your whatabout millionaires comment. My comment was that not all squatting hurts landlords, some hurt regular people. I don’t need to ask millionaires about it because it’s not about them, it’s about middle class people.
Landlords protecting their investments is always at the expense of the downtrodden. The role of landlord is one that exists solely at the expense of the downtrodden, and it is mutually exclusive with helping people.
I disagree, though I know I’ll get roasted for it… Landlords do serve a purpose to a point. Not everyone wants to own property. Owning property ties you to a particular place, makes it difficult to leave. If you know you want to stay in an area for the rest of your life, or even just the next 10 years, absolutely, you should be able to buy, and not being able to is a societal failure. But if you don’t know where you want to spend the rest of your life, you still need shelter now, and renting provides that, and when you decide to go somewhere else, it’s relatively easy. One of my bigger regrets in life was feeling pressured to buy a house in 2005… Just in time for the subprime mortgage crisis. I had a traditional mortgage, but nonetheless, my house went from $150k to <50k in months. I was stuck. Couldn’t sell without coming up with extra money to pay off the mortgage, but I wasn’t in as bad shape as some people, I could afford the payments, so I couldn’t justify walking away, just had to wait for it to rebound, which took another 5 years roughly. Had I been renting, I would have been able to leave much more easily.
There are ways to meet that particular need without landlords. Tenant unions buying out their apartment building and making it cooperatively owned, for example, or municipally owned public housing. The alternative to private property is public property. That kind of thing isn’t available because private property owners are the ones calling the shots, and that would undercut their parasitic lifestyle.
wanted to say the same thing. what a dickhead, simping for landlords.
Hear me out: I don’t blame landlords for wanting to protect their investments. But, I do have a problem with them (and guys like James here) who do it at the expense of the downtrodden. Being a landlord should not have to be mutually exclusive with helping people.
I’m not seeing it.
For there to be squatters, the landlords had to have this property open and unrented for a while. The only way that happens is if the rent is too high.
What kind of landlord can afford to have a rental property vacant for a significant period of time and not accept a lower rent? Ones who own lots of property and would prefer to lose income rather than reduce the average rent price in the area.
In the industry, withholding housing from people because you want to make more money, when you can clearly afford to get no income from it, is called “a dick move”.
Counterpoint: some people would rent an Airbnb and stay after the two weeks they rented, effectively preventing the homeowner to return to their homes after a vacation. There’s little legal recourse to speedily remove them, as two weeks of occupation requires a lengthy judicial process to evict them (IIRC in California).
I dislike rent seekers too, but it happens to people with only one home as well. They think they could put their home to use while they’re not there (effectively reducing the problem of real estate under occupation), only to be exploited.
The thing is, what you describe is incredibly rare, to the point of being a statistical anomaly.
Also, if you take the “low income” piece out of it, abusing others and cheating the system to save money is “just good business.” Ask all the millionaires doing immoral but TECHNICALLY legal things on their taxes.
You’re mistaken, sadly. It doesn’t happen more often because people got smart to it and no longer put their houses for rent for longer periods.
And I don’t get your whatabout millionaires comment. My comment was that not all squatting hurts landlords, some hurt regular people. I don’t need to ask millionaires about it because it’s not about them, it’s about middle class people.
Landlords protecting their investments is always at the expense of the downtrodden. The role of landlord is one that exists solely at the expense of the downtrodden, and it is mutually exclusive with helping people.
I disagree, though I know I’ll get roasted for it… Landlords do serve a purpose to a point. Not everyone wants to own property. Owning property ties you to a particular place, makes it difficult to leave. If you know you want to stay in an area for the rest of your life, or even just the next 10 years, absolutely, you should be able to buy, and not being able to is a societal failure. But if you don’t know where you want to spend the rest of your life, you still need shelter now, and renting provides that, and when you decide to go somewhere else, it’s relatively easy. One of my bigger regrets in life was feeling pressured to buy a house in 2005… Just in time for the subprime mortgage crisis. I had a traditional mortgage, but nonetheless, my house went from $150k to <50k in months. I was stuck. Couldn’t sell without coming up with extra money to pay off the mortgage, but I wasn’t in as bad shape as some people, I could afford the payments, so I couldn’t justify walking away, just had to wait for it to rebound, which took another 5 years roughly. Had I been renting, I would have been able to leave much more easily.
There are ways to meet that particular need without landlords. Tenant unions buying out their apartment building and making it cooperatively owned, for example, or municipally owned public housing. The alternative to private property is public property. That kind of thing isn’t available because private property owners are the ones calling the shots, and that would undercut their parasitic lifestyle.