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Comment by jeffbee | Hacker News Reader

Implied: in select population of nations where renters are regarded as serfs. Of course the financial circumstances of shelter aren't causal, because you'd be left unable to explain the robust health and longevity of Switzerland, where owner occupancy is less widely practiced.

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It is very much a cultural thing. I remember understanding plain as day for the first time in my life when COVID hit, that renters and owners are a distinctly separate class in the US, with the latter being protected at any cost. Homeowners received subsidy after subsidy to maintain their capital, while renters were left in the dust.

Can't pay your rent? That's a crime, and the sheriff will be knocking on your door in 30 days.

Can't pay your mortgage? That's a tragedy. Here are some local, state, and federal subsidies to take care of you. And if that's not enough, don't worry, because foreclosures take over a year anyways, and you can live there for free. Oh, and we'll be sure to give billions to the private equity firms buying up houses in your neighborhood to keep the prices artificially inflated, too.

>Can't pay your rent? That's a crime, and the sheriff will be knocking on your door in 30 days.

What on Earth are you talking about? There was an emergency order during COVID that prevented anyone from being evicted for about two years. A ton of landlords got absolutely screwed because their tenants stopped paying rent and could not be evicted by any means.

Federally subsidized loans pumped the value of their properties to the moon and saddled the rest of us with the resulting inflation, but I am supposed to feel sorry that they couldn't collect rent from the poorest tenants for a few months?

Huh? During COVID the US had several eviction moratoriums, which covered non-payment: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/COVID-19_eviction_moratoriums_...

it was incredibly difficult to evict people in my area during COVID, as that required an eviction hearing and those were on hold for quite a long time.

> Huh? During COVID the US had several eviction moratoriums, which covered non-payment: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/COVID-19_eviction_moratoriums_...

Sure, for the few lucky people in federal housing and the handful of states that implemented their own (the vast majority of which were lifted in less than 6 months). Point is that nearly all homeowners in the US received 18 months of mortgage forebearance immediately.

https://www.consumerfinance.gov/coronavirus/mortgage-forbear...

99% of the time, the story was "hahaha we're gonna jack your rent cuz we can, suck it loser."

Yes, professional tenants were exempt. No, that wasn't much consolation to most renters.

Exactly. I paid rent during the pandemic then afterwards, California paid landlords for any missed rent money but they did not reimburse renters who did pay. What a scam!

Some aspects of your comment are a little anti-factual, but generally yes. Renters in the united states are regarded as subhuman, and it is socially acceptable to denigrate them as "transients" or worse. Even when such statements are made by government officials in formal proceedings, hardly anyone takes notice. As you noted a defaulting tenant will be turfed out by the sheriff in 72 hours but a defaulting mortgage payer goes through an adversarial court process that can take potentially forever. There are many such inequalities. These legal scholars cataloged them last year. It is for the USA but it applies almost perfectly in all Anglosphere places. https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=4068843

To correct in specifics but not character: there were renter support/eviction prevention programs, as well as some amount of eviction moratoriums. All almost without fail came alongside mortgage/homeowner relief (with owners able to accept the latter while rejecting the former, covering their own asses while leaving renters in the lurch). My personal experience was with an EP program that provided 1) reassuring but functionally useless legal assistance - they couldn't do anything if you didn't have the money - and 2) back-rent cash assistance. The latter (predicated on you having a balance with your landlord but having not actually been kicked out yet) was hobbled by low funding, a long wait list, a process fractured across jurisdictions, and an invasive application process. We only received assistance because we got a tip from our legal assistance rep that the fund had been quietly reopened to applications after half a year of senescence. Ultimately, this did not prevent our eviction, as our property manager's next step was to raise our rates as much as 30% (annual increase + month-to-month fees).

Meanwhile, even at the highest levels of monetary policy, the aim has been to placate hysterical homeowners. Beyond aid programs, beyond preexisting tax incentives, you have the Fed refusing to Volcker us out of the way of catastrophic inflation with an appropriate rate increase, because it would wipe out the market and put everyone who wasn't in a fixed-rate loan for a house they don't plan to leave in dire straits. Instead, we let rental property owners mask their price-fixing under the guise of inflation.

> while renters were left in the dust

In Seattle, renters didn't have to pay rent during the pandemic.

> Can't pay your rent? That's a crime

Not in Seattle, where it's considered the landlord's fault.

> Here are some local, state, and federal subsidies to take care of you.

Like what, property tax?

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