Hacker News Reader

Comment by lbarrow | Hacker News Reader

55% is one of the lowest home ownership rates in the country. If high levels of home ownership drive policies that prohibit new construction and drive up prices, how is it that places like Minnesota, with a home ownership rate in the mid-70s, are so cheap to live in?

View on HN

The problem isn't that 55% is "high" (or not). The problem is that, currently, there is a housing problem that is significantly profitable for 55% of a population. This means that 55% of people have conflicting interests with fixing this problem.

Yes, and those 55% wield extremely disproportionate political power. This is why I’m pessimistic that NIMBYs will always rule.

> Yes, and those 55% wield extremely disproportionate political power.

House owners don't have any additional political power than renters. Still one vote per person and politicians don't consult homeowners any more often than anyone else.

No one say they do, point is they benefit from not solving housing and has SOME power simply by being a large group. I you believe solving housing is public interest then that's a problem.

Of course you can say when 55% of people are against affordable housing then affordable housing is not public interest.

Those homeowners get richer and richer every year. Their borrowing power increases and even as renters are getting gouged by rising rents, homeowners don't even have to worry about their property tax going up. This leads to disproportionate political power.

One Czech ex-minister of health owns 67 properties. So he probably has a lot of acquintances and relatives among the political elite of my country. To me it seems he has more political power than me, a dude sitting in underwear and ranting on Hackernews.

No doubt high level (ex)politicians are very privileged and operate above most limitations imposed on regular people. But that's moving the goalposts of the discussion pretty far indeed.

The original premise was that the entire "55% [of homeowners] wield extremely disproportionate political power". Sure, a few of those homeowners are also politicians with disproportionate political power. But nearly everyone is just regular people with one vote and no other influence, whether homeowner or renter.

Someone: wield extremely disproportionate political power.

You: House owners don't have any additional political power than renters.

Me: one dude has 67 properties and connections to political elite, so he probably has more political power than renters. Implicitly: chances are the entire political system amassed a huge amount of properties, and are in one bed with prominent businessmen, who have the capital to acquire even more properties than said politicians.

You: u R M0v1nG tHe gO4lPoStS. You are a clown xD

I have friends more invested in housing issues than I am. But they generally agree with my assessment that without fixing transportation issues there is only downsides for homeowners and even renters to new development. It definitely seems like developers don't want to to pay a cent for mass transit. The just want to build lux houses and lofts in some neighborhood and then run away with the money.

I think Scott Wiener is right. Build mass transit and allow developers build housing close in.

Picking a couple specific issues, to me, seems like a naive hope in counting a majority of over-privileged under-taxed folk whose land-value goes up the more they suppress change or growth. Trying to argue this or that specific issue, get them to come around each time, seems unlikely to provide real progress.

Prop 13 takes away the normal downside to rising home prices.

If there is empirical evidence in favor of land value taxes then it would be the entirety of California.

Come on, taxes on land are glorious. Hongkong charges 17% income taxes on the rich and <7% on people who earn less than the median.

https://youtu.be/XL3n59wC8kk?t=1917

They're not a voting block and their financial well being doesn't revolve around their home prices remaining high.

If you buy a $1M 1400 ft^2 in CA, and the price goes down, you're going to be deeply underwater in your mortgage. If home prices stay high enough long enough than it "embeds" itself into politics.

It's worth noting that property taxes in California are only re-assessed on ownership change or new construction. There's no downside to having the value of your home balloon as much as possible.

Sure there is. Your property tax still goes up 2% a year if home prices rise. That's more than inflation has been.

Rising prices also traps people -- they can't afford to move anywhere unless they go far away.

As a CA homeowner (nortgage paid up!) I'd be much happier if house prices were half off what they are.

Yes, if you actually want to stay in California, rising house prices only actually benefit you if you never want to buy a larger house - but the weird tax laws also disincentivize downsizing. If the smaller house costs more than your current house did when you bought it, you’ll see a significant property tax rise.

I believe that, to counter this, There are some counties where if you move to a smaller house, you get to keep a tax rate akin to what it would’ve cost you at the time you purchased your old house!

Then argue in favor of land value taxes instead of regressive taxes on work.

They can increase when home values increase.

But, that increase is capped at a percent per year, which practically speaking means taxes lag behind home values when they increase.

> But, that increase is capped at a percent per year

Property taxes in CA (Prop 13) go up by 2% every year.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com