Not necessarily. I rent my house, and the housing corporation who I rent from are not rent seekers, they provide a service to me which I'm happy with, and which they invest in.

They could've bought up the land and house and not improved it at all and depend on the housing crisis deepening for increased resell profit- but they did not do so, they maintained this house I'm in and ensured me and future tenants can continue enjoying this place. That's not rent seeking.

People who can't afford to buy a house need a place to live too. Believe it or not, there are people who buy houses with the intent of renting them out to those people, to actually help them.

Please don't fulminate on HN. The guidelines make it clear we're trying for something better here. https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html

i could not afford the capital investment to buy a house, and i am not interested, it would only lock me down. my family once bought an apartment. we lived there for a few years. the mortgage payments were twice as high as the rent would have been. when we moved out we were told the place could not be sold. the family still has the place and it is probably still empty. lots of money wasted.

when you buy a house with the intent to sell it for a profit, then you are driving up housing costs. i'd say that's even worse than renting it out.

Why? There are loads of people who can afford to rent a house but can't afford to rent a million dollars. I genuinely cannot understand where this hatred of people who rent out houses comes from.

Let me guess..you have an equal disdain for people who own hotels, rental cars, or work as an UBER driver.

All these things involve renting out something to fill a temporary need.