General Discussion
In reply to the discussion: Why not outlaw landlordism? [View all]Lee-Lee
(6,324 posts)You wouldn't see people who were just starting out or starting over in life have anything.
Think about it- a house has a minimum cost, period, of materials and labor to build it. This half-baked plan would indeed affect land values, making the value of the land the home is on drop, but the actual hard value of the home would be what it costs to build at any minimum.
Now, imagine you are a fresh out of school 19 year old who is setting out on life. You need to find a place to live. You don't have any money to buy a home outright. You don't have enough for a down payment and you don't have any credit so a mortgage, even a low one, is out of reach.
If you can't rent, where are you going to live?
Say your a newly separated single mom fleeing an abusive relationship and you made it out with little more than the clothes on your back. The family home will be in dispute with the divorce for months if not years, and you don't feel safe there. How do you buy a home while trying to feed and care for your kids and manage a newly single life?
None of those people can afford to buy a home.
Nobody is going to build multi family housing if they can't make money renting it, so more sprawl. And even if they did, someone just starting in life or starting over in life can't afford to buy an condoed out apartment no more than they can afford to buy a home- and any ownership of an apartment would require common management of the property as a whole with maintenance fees paid.