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Political Memes @lemmy.world return2ozma @lemmy.world

Time to solve the housing crisis...

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  • I still think that instead of banning perfectly valid use cases of housing to lower prices (forcefully decreasing demand), we should focus more on just building more stock to satisfy all needs?

    And before someone says "we can do both!" we aren't. The majority of attention is going to things like this, and corporate investment (which is valid, tbh).

    • The more houses they build the more airbnbs there will be.

      The reality is that there are enough empty houses to house everyone who needs them, the problem is that those who own them either want them empty as a holiday home they can later sell as an investment, or rented out, as an investment.

      Because that's what housing is today.

      Which is why the only real solution is to decommodify housing, since it's a human right and should be treated as such, while the profits of the rich are not, and should not.

      • I absolutely agree we need to decommodify housing.

        I don't think there's infinite supply for airbnb's though.

        And I still think we don't have enough houses.

        • If it's not airbnb then it's rentals at extortionate rate, but the bottom line is the same - new houses will just be used to make the rich more money, not provide more affordable housing.

          As for not believing there are enough houses, it's easy enough to look up, here are articles about it in US, UK, OZ, just to provide some examples..

    • If you build more houses, what is to stop someone with capital using them to airbnb? Unless you are going to flood the market with SO many houses that airbnbs become too competitive to be profitable we end up in the same scenario. And that level of building seems kind of ridiculous.

      • SO many houses that airbnbs become too competitive to be profitable we end up in the same scenario. And that level of building seems kind of ridiculous.

        Why is that? It's simple market dynamics. Supply goes up to meet demand until they hit equilibrium. Works for almost everything else, why not houses? I think it would happen faster than you think, as prices go down and your airbnb is sitting empty for 3/4 of the year, suddenly it stops being such a good investment. Houses are only a good investment because we artificially made them into that.

187 comments