Where can you afford a home on your income?

[Josh]

Ken,

I did not have you advocating for replacing homeowners with big private equity home ownership on my bingo card.

Do you really think neighbourhoods of homeowners are a bad thing?

[Ken]

Ken,

I did not have you advocating for replacing homeowners with big private equity home ownership on my bingo card.

Do you really think neighbourhoods of homeowners are a bad thing?

Read what I wrote again. I’m not advocating for private equity buying up homes. I’m just not as alarmed by it as some people since it doesn’t actually reduce the housing supply. It just makes those homes available to people for rent so they still get occupied by families. Often families who aren’t wealthy enough to buy in that same neighborhood or city.

My main point is that the actual problem driving high prices is insufficient supply and the actual solution is building more housing. Private equity buying up single family homes is kind of just a side issue.

I also don’t think Christians should be so obsessed with living in the “right” neighborhoods with the “right” neighbors who are all homeowners rather than renters. That is contrary to God’s teaching in the Ten Commandments about not coveting your neighbors house. Wasn’t it you that was here not long ago lecturing us about how the Ten Commandments were “God’s Perfect Law?” Or was that a different Josh?

[Josh]

Those rents paid to private equity (which goes to enrich the wealthy) are often more than the mortgage on the exact same place was a decade (or four years) ago. So no, everyone is worse off - except the super wealthy, who grow even wealthier.

I am not personally concerned with living in the "right" neighbourhood, although I do appreciate it that my wife and children don't have to live in a place where they are cowering in fear of violence, such as many of our brethren in Haiti face on a day to day basis. However, I do not judge at all my worldly neighbours who desire to live in a place that is not dominated by violence, crime, and drugs.

[Ken]

Those rents paid to private equity (which goes to enrich the wealthy) are often more than the mortgage on the exact same place was a decade (or four years) ago. So no, everyone is worse off - except the super wealthy, who grow even wealthier.

I am not personally concerned with living in the "right" neighbourhood, although I do appreciate it that my wife and children don't have to live in a place where they are cowering in fear of violence, such as many of our brethren in Haiti face on a day to day basis. However, I do not judge at all my worldly neighbours who desire to live in a place that is not dominated by violence, crime, and drugs.

Rents are market driven. If you are concerned about private equity firms charging too much for rent then build more homes. The rents will drop like clockwork. The housing market is not immune from the laws of supply and demand. In fact if you want to make the private equity firms lose their shirts, build LOTs more housing.

[Josh]

Those rents paid to private equity (which goes to enrich the wealthy) are often more than the mortgage on the exact same place was a decade (or four years) ago. So no, everyone is worse off - except the super wealthy, who grow even wealthier.

I am not personally concerned with living in the "right" neighbourhood, although I do appreciate it that my wife and children don't have to live in a place where they are cowering in fear of violence, such as many of our brethren in Haiti face on a day to day basis. However, I do not judge at all my worldly neighbours who desire to live in a place that is not dominated by violence, crime, and drugs.

Rents are market driven. If you are concerned about private equity firms charging too much for rent then build more homes. The rents will drop like clockwork. The housing market is not immune from the laws of supply and demand. In fact if you want to make the private equity firms lose their shirts, build LOTs more housing.

Or reduce demand by not flooding the country with economic migrants who enter illegally and then go on welfare.

[barnhart]

The housing market is not immune from the laws of supply and demand. In fact if you want to make the private equity firms lose their shirts, build LOTs more housing.

Just changing building codes away from single family homes on leafy lots to allow medium density housing would dramatically reduce housing costs in many markets.

[Josh]

The housing market is not immune from the laws of supply and demand. In fact if you want to make the private equity firms lose their shirts, build LOTs more housing.

Just changing building codes away from single family homes on leafy lots to allow medium density housing would dramatically reduce housing costs in many markets.

Could you explain to us how we had single-family zoning for decades and yet didn't have unaffordable housing?

Likewise, can you explain how California has outlawed SFH zoning including outlawing minimum lot sizes, yet housing prices there haven't budged?

This has become almost an axiom in centre-left circles, yet we don't actually have any evidence that it's true. What I see is a strong push to create poorer-quality housing in overcrowded conditions, which benefits nobody except developers and landowners, and falsely claim is to "improve affordability". The main impediments to housing affordability right now are (1) the cost of building materials and (2) the cost of labour. Unless you're going to propose that we should pay people less than minimum wage, (2) can't be fixed, and (1) can't be fixed either unless we magically stop having trouble with inflation in our economy.

[Ken]

Those rents paid to private equity (which goes to enrich the wealthy) are often more than the mortgage on the exact same place was a decade (or four years) ago. So no, everyone is worse off - except the super wealthy, who grow even wealthier.

I am not personally concerned with living in the "right" neighbourhood, although I do appreciate it that my wife and children don't have to live in a place where they are cowering in fear of violence, such as many of our brethren in Haiti face on a day to day basis. However, I do not judge at all my worldly neighbours who desire to live in a place that is not dominated by violence, crime, and drugs.

Rents are market driven. If you are concerned about private equity firms charging too much for rent then build more homes. The rents will drop like clockwork. The housing market is not immune from the laws of supply and demand. In fact if you want to make the private equity firms lose their shirts, build LOTs more housing.

Or reduce demand by not flooding the country with economic migrants who enter illegally and then go on welfare.

So now we are blaming immigrants for the fact that housing construction has not come close to meeting demand in the past decade or two? Any excuse to avoid building more housing for families? And avoid facing the fact that our regulatory regime in much of the country serves to exacerbate if not cause our housing crisis?

[Josh]

As I keep telling you, in most of America there aren’t any impediments to building homes. You can even build duplexes where I live with no government involvement whatsoever other than septic. (You don’t think we should deregulate septic do you?)

[Ken]

The housing market is not immune from the laws of supply and demand. In fact if you want to make the private equity firms lose their shirts, build LOTs more housing.

Just changing building codes away from single family homes on leafy lots to allow medium density housing would dramatically reduce housing costs in many markets.

Could you explain to us how we had single-family zoning for decades and yet didn't have unaffordable housing?

Likewise, can you explain how California has outlawed SFH zoning including outlawing minimum lot sizes, yet housing prices there haven't budged?

This has become almost an axiom in centre-left circles, yet we don't actually have any evidence that it's true. What I see is a strong push to create poorer-quality housing in overcrowded conditions, which benefits nobody except developers and landowners, and falsely claim is to "improve affordability". The main impediments to housing affordability right now are (1) the cost of building materials and (2) the cost of labour. Unless you're going to propose that we should pay people less than minimum wage, (2) can't be fixed, and (1) can't be fixed either unless we magically stop having trouble with inflation in our economy.