The landlord had told them he wanted to raise the rent to $3,500 and when they complained he decided to raise it to $9,500.
“We know that our building is not rent controlled and this was something we were always worried about happening and there is no way we can afford $9,500 per month," Yumna Farooq said.
Landlords are parasites on society.
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Nooo how dare you suggest solutions11!
You can’t afford to buy. If not for landlords who would you rent from? Where would you live?
The idea that if there were no landlords you’d be able to afford a house is absurd.
I agree corporations should be limited in how many single.family homes they are allowed to buy but this whole "all landlords are scum ". Schtick makes u look pathetic and ignorant of the facts.
When people trying to purchase their first home are outbid constantly by investors (corporate or not) who later try to rent out that same space at more than the first time buyer would be paying on their mortgage then no, you daft idiot, they are not providing a service.
This whole lAnDlOrDs ArE oUr FrIeNd shtick makes you look pathetic.
News flash dude. Way before all this increase when rates were low and there were tons of houses on the market I was trying to buy a first home and was outbid constantly by realtors who had more money and connections. It has never had anything to do with landlords per se.
If you dont think landlords are providing a service then you’re the idiot. No one is making you rent from anyone. I joined thought it was worth the space for the money no one would pay it.
News flash dude, it was wrong then and it’s wrong now, period.
If you think for profit renting is superior and less predatory to public housing, a successful model used in countries all over the world, and used to be successful in this country before the Conservatives and Liberals killed it in the 80/90s, then you’re an idiot.
No one is saying the empty nester with the basement suite charging an affordable price for the unit is in the wrong. The one’s that are in the wrong are the corporations and individuals who are buying up properties for their own personal gain at the sake of those around them who did nothing wrong other than being unlucky wth market timing. The ones in the wrong are the politicians who have lied to their voters into believing that for profit corporations are the solution to public services like housing, healthcare, and transportation, and the voters who have buried their heads in the sand and refused to listen to reason because they are scared of admitting they may not be right 100% of the time and would rather watch the world burn than change.
If you can’t understand this then again, you’re a fucking idiot.
I never said any of the things you claim I said…lmfao. who are u arguing against cuz I didn’t make any of the points u claim I did.
I never said anything close to what you assert in your first paragraph.
This is called a strawman. And you really beat him up…lol.
I never said any of that. What are you talking about?
You wrote it. You can’t re-read it?
Where did I say landlords are your friend? You’re not all there mentally are you?
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public housing is a thing, you know
If you have a crack addiction it is
I spent some of my formative years in public housing. It was definitely a bit more sketchy than the privately owned homes across the street but all in all it was a fantastic way for me to get my feet under me as a student and young adult. That’s exactly what scores of young and also not so young people desperately need right now
No one pays taxes to support that tho. I’m all for it. Go ahead.
public housing doesn’t require tax money. It is often facilitated by it, yes, but don’t act as if the rent is necessarily sponsored by the government just because public housing isn’t designed to extract the maximum amount of money from the renters. There’s plenty to criticize about public housing without resorting to falsehoods
The reason so many can’t afford to buy is because so many houses are bought purely to be rented back out again, if no landlords existed housing prices would drop and more people could afford to buy.
For those who still couldn’t, as others have said - public housing
It’s not that, it’s purely supply. Landlords are a proxy for tenants, whether willing or unwilling, in the housing market when it comes to demand. They are no more interested in driving up housing prices than owner occupants are (which is to say, the vast majority of both are interested in driving up housing prices). The catch is, you can’t drive up housing prices in a market where there isn’t a supply constriction. Build more housing where people want to live, and you won’t have to do anything else for the problem to fix itself.
Pretty sure this is the other way around.
People want to rent. The market responds with a supply of rentals.
I am not a “free market knows all” person but pretty clearly these sky high rents are a function of demand.
The inverse of your suggestion is that, if people bought houses instead of renting, there would be no demand for rental properties and prices would crash.
In fact, if it is true that there are excess properties being purchased to rent out, that should push prices down due to increased supply and competition for the finite number of people wanting to rent.
Demand isn’t high because so many more people prefer to rent - demand is high because it’s the only financially viable option. Why is it the only financially viable option? Because landlords (both corporate and personal) buy up all the property they can and rent it out. Because so many houses are getting bought as rentals, the supply of houses that can actually be bought is low.
Seriously, have you spoken to anyone who has tried to buy a house in the last few years? Every single one I know had a myriad of stories like “I put down an offer, but some investment company offered $20k over asking, cash in hand”
And because housing prices are so high because of the above behavior, more and more people are forced to rent, who would have 100% been able to buy a house not that long ago. And so rises demand.
If what you were saying was true (that rent prices are high purely because people love renting, and no one wants to be a homeowner), then why are we seeing sky high home prices at the same time? You’re quick to pull out a half baked supply and demand theory, but you’re very quick to ignore the other side of that equation.
Also, more fundamentally the whole “supply and demand explains all commerce” thing has been thoroughly untrue for ages. Maybe in a world without giant multinational conglomerates, political corruption, and price fixing. But in the real world, things are wildly more complicated
I mean this is patently false. Even when there were huge housing surpluses and rates were rock bottom people still rented. Sometimes even when they could afford to buy.
Sure now large corps have gobbled up the supply but even if they sold everything and tons of houses were on the market there would still be renters. And those renters need landlords.
Well yes, hence my last sentence - there will always be some people who have to rent (or just prefer it), and for those people, we could have public housing. Basically housing that’s treated as a public infrastructure - run not for profit, but for public good. It’s really not that hard to grasp - remove the landlords from the equation, and set the rent prices to exactly the cost of maintaining the properties.
If you remove the landlords leeching away extra value for investment profit, and instead just charged what it cost to make the housing available, it’d be cheaper by definition. Providing essential services at an affordable cost is literally the whole point of civil infrastructure
You don’t need landlords to give people a place to rent, in the same way I don’t need to pay someone to bring water to my house, or haul my sewage away, I use the public utilities in my area. And I’m not even talking about subsidizing the cost with tax dollars (though I think that’s a good idea), you could give renters significant savings simply by not trying to make money off them
No one wants to pay for any of that ever tho. You’re talking about massive infrastructure costs which sure on average is cheaper but good luck getting any gov to agree to the cost and maintenance. Idk about Canada but public housing in the US sucks.
Pay for what? Again, I’m not talking about subsidized housing here, just at-cost rentals. The only people paying are the renters, they’re just paying significantly less because they’re not funding some random person/corporation’s no-effort-required retirement plan.
I’m in the US, and idk where you live but public housing in my area is both high quality and super affordable (granted I live in a very liberal state, where such things are given priority). The only issue is that there isn’t enough of it, but that would be solved if we switched to public housing for rentals instead of landlords. If your area has “sucky” public housing, you should advocate for improvements in your community and vote for local policy makers who will prioritize it.
You seem to have this odd insistince that you can’t possibly have rental properties without someone leeching profits off the top of the whole deal
Do you not realize that buildings cost money? That has to come way way way before a single dime of rent is collected. You act like rents collected from tenants equal the cost of the building immediately.
So again, where is the money coming from in advance to build the housing??? You only have one option. You keep pretending otherwise by creating a crazy unrealistic situation.
Of course buildings cost money, no one is suggesting that the tenants of these public housing buildings don’t pay rent. Just that the rent is set at a rate that simply recoup costs instead of making the landlord (which in this case is the state) rich in the deal. And if states don’t have the funds to invest in the property, I’m pretty sure the state governments would qualify for some pretty solid mortgages. And the costs of those mortgages can be added onto the rent - same as a landlord would do, only in this case, that would be the end of the rent padding.
I can’t help but feel like you’re deliberately misinterpreting me at this point. That, or you’re just incapable of fathoming how human beings could possibly interact without one profiting off the other. The renters still pay rent, the mortgages on the property still get paid, the only difference is that the profit that would have gone to the landlord stays in the tenants pockets. That’s it - that’s literally the only difference. No free houses, no huge tax bills, just the removal of profit, and at-cost rents for folks who need them.
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Public housing. That’s where you rent it from. Landlords serve no purpose in society that can’t be solved in better ways.
For example, I would gladly purchase my apartment. The rent that I pay would be roughly equal to mortgage payments on the approximate value of the unit. But instead I’m stuck paying that amount so someone else can own it. Just cut out the parasite in the middle.
Isn’t there another similar unit somewhere you could buy, then? You’re right, it sounds like your landlord isn’t serving much of a role here.
There is not. An equivalently sized apartment in my neighbourhood is on the market for $1.6M at least. Because the only things being built are “luxury” units made for investment, not housing people.
Also, I wouldn’t qualify for a mortgage equal to my rent despite the fact I’ve been paying rent at that rate for nearly a decade.
And you think your apartment is worth a lot less? I don’t know if I buy that, honestly, unless it’s an absolute tear-down. I’ve played with markets enough to learn that there’s never an easy shortcut.
The bare minimum of research would tell you to qualify for a mortgage to buy an apartment is much more difficult than being able to rent.
Yeah, I know, because the banks also have to make money. So then OP can’t actually pay a mortgage for the same price, if you include downpayment and all those sort of things.
Why do banks have to make money though? What purpose do they serve that couldn’t be served better by an entity that doesn’t need to make a profit?
Well somebody has to think of the shareholders.
/s
No reason, there are credit unions too, my riding association uses one, and I personally bank with my province. They still function like banks, though, and when they give out loans they expect interest in turn for not having the money to use themselves (basically), and various other things to ensure you can actually pay them back.
If you’re wondering why we can’t just give houses out freely, it’s because the construction workers have to do tangible work that sucks and will want to be taken care of in turn. The only convincing way I’ve seen to ensure that in a complex industrial society involves currency of some kind, and then you’re right back to banks.
Now, you could ask why landlords get to have so much more money than their tenants in the first place, and I’d say dunno, seems dumb. I never said I loved capitalism, I’m just not sure why landlords are worse than all the other Guys That Own Things.
I understand how banks work, and that labour has to be compensated, but thanks for being condescending and somehow taking away that I want to abolish currency?
First: We could absolutely be giving homes away and still compensate the people that build them. Finland has been having huge success by (in some degree) giving housing away, or providing it at cost.
Second: saying there’s bigger evils out there doesn’t mean landlords get a pass. Especially in Canada where our housing costs are skyrocketing DIRECTLY because of landlords, corporate or otherwise. Them being any better or worse doesn’t matter when they’re the biggest problem RIGHT NOW.
You’ve said things that are objectively true and I can’t refuse, so I’m just going to angrily downvote instead.
Social housing should not exist.
Sounds like you’re saying you can buy your own house. So go do it.
The bare minimum of research would tell you to qualify for a mortgage to buy an apartment is much more difficult than being able to rent.
I worked in real estate. I’m aware of how a closing works.
Apparently not lol
Ok buddy. Lol. I’m a certified abstractor.
Yet you don’t know how a mortgage works. Pretty impressive honestly
Wow I never thought of that. It’s almost like people treating housing as an investment portfolio, corporate landlords, and greedy developers have made all the housing around me completely unaffordable.
On top of that, I wouldn’t qualify for a mortgage of that amount, despite the fact I’ve been paying the same in rent for nearly a decade.
If not for landlords who would suck all supply?
I wouldn’t be renting. Landlords solely exist to make profit, not to serve anyone.
You replied to wrong comment
You mean you’d pay the same amount for a house as a landlord pays? But you can do that now, why don’t you?
Has nobody ever informed you that growing demand leads to price growth only if supply grows slower? But if prices grow, then supply does also grow faster. These are feedback loops.
Which means that what a house costs now it would cost still, after a short transient process.
“Suck all supply”, my ass. You mean that you’d buy that house for 1/10 of what the landlord has paid for it, because it’d just be there, like a mushroom after rain? It wouldn’t get built, dummy, cause it wouldn’t be worth the money.
Except highers supply doesn’t bring prices to same level.
The only reason prices are 10 times bigger is because landlords ready to pay those prices.
Bad, bad, very bad boy.
Hahahahahhaaha. I’m not sure if you really think that way or only pretending.
If there are no artificial limitations to supply, and no demand growth, it eventually will. Eventually as in time of regulation.
They are ready to pay those prices because their tenants are ready to pay the prices they, in turn, offer. Which means that they don’t inflate demand.
You are illiterate in economics. I really don’t get why do you think putting “laugh” in text would negate that.
The only reason their tennats are “ready” to pay the prices is exactly because corporate landlords bought everything. AKA sucked the supply.
We are talking about 100x profit vs 10x profit for developers.
OK, maybe I was too quick to judge. See, in my country most landlords own 1-3 apartments which they rent out. That includes new construction. The idea of “corporate landlords” is not very common here.
If there’s no way a person willing to be such a 1-3 apartments’ landlord can buy realty to rent out in USA - then you may be right.
If there is, then my position doesn’t change.
You are saying that rent a landlord collects from an apartment in 10 years (you may make it 5 years or 20 years, should be the span of time in which landlord’s investment should return) is 10x the price for which the landlord buys it? That is, what you pay to a landlord in 1 year is the cost of the apartment plus utilities plus decoration plus furniture? I suspect this is not true.
Cost of apartment if landlord would not participate in bidding. For person it would be 10%, not 100%.
If not for someone to buy from developers would there be a supply?
If not for scalpers to buy tickets from LiveNation would there even be concerts?
Unironically no. Or, at the very least, the organisers of the concerts themselves would have to be the badguy charging giant ticket prices themselves. LiveNation is just a professional scapegoat.
I guess tickets going to connected people rather than rich and/or highly motivated people would be an option too, if artists could get funding other ways. Lots of societies have worked that way in the past; the Colosseum was free but you had to be invited.
Fundamentally there’s just less seats than people who would show up if it was cheap and open to anyone. Maybe you could build a bigger venue, if geometry allows, but then somebody has to pay for that too, and we’re back to real estate.
They are talking about scalpers, not the company selling the tickets.
Landlords are like scalpers: they go in and buy up the supply, so they can resell (rent out) for a higher price.
The people originally doing the selling (artists in the case of scalpers. Developers in the case of landlords) see nothing of the increased price.
So what prevents you from buying directly from developers?
Landlords(scalpers)
This is the most illogical and flat-out wring thing I’ve seen in a while.
That’s damn impressive, in its own stupid way.
No u? There is only so many seats in a venue, and you have to exclude someone, that’s just mathematical. If I erred somewhere else point it out.
So you are saying if not fo scalpers, then organizers would charge the same? And why organizers aren’t charging same anyway?
As I’ve heard it explained, LiveNation gives a big commission to the organisers to resell their tickets, to the point where they’re really just taking a cut for reselling it under a different name, for marketing purposes. I guess the existence of the old-style in-person scalpers kind of undermines that, I honestly never really understood how those guys existed.
In-person reselling sometimes has legit reasons like person can’t or don’t want to participate anymore. But in that case people are ready to sell under nominal price.
Technically they could charge more. Clearly the market is willing to pay more, else scalpers could not exist. But it would require more work by the organizer to get the tickets sold, and that extra work would not necessarily be worth the added payoff. Organizers have way better things to do than to spend their days trying to look high and low for someone wanting to buy a ticket. It is beneficial to just get tickets sold as fast as possible, even if at a discount, and move on to more useful work. Those who have nothing else going on in life can justifiably spend their time looking high and low and capture the difference for their efforts.
Because there is only so much time in the day. Same reason middlemen appear in essentially every industry known to man. They let people doing important things get back to doing important things rather than waste their time dealing with people.
Landlords provide housing the way scalpers “provide” tickets. The solution for people who need can’t afford to buy or who only need short term accommodation is public housing.
The CMHC used to provide funds to the provinces which would then build big public housing units with affordable rent. This provide a check & balance to the free market, keeping rents and house prices from skyrocketing. But then in the 80s and 90s, both Conservative and Liberal PMs successively defunded that aspect of the CMHC to solve budget issues, and those properties were destroyed as they reached their “maturity” date, regardless of whether the building was still usable or not.
I lived near one of them, located here: https://maps.app.goo.gl/SG2kkXeVsp3Nia2RA Check out the street view and click “see more dates” for 2012, that’s housing for 90+families. Then in 2014 it was closed for demolition. And today it’s still an empty grass lot. Almost 10 years as a Govt-owned empty lot, instead of affordable housing, because those Govts kept promising “market solutions” to housing problems.
But it turns out the “problem” with housing was letting the “free market” turn it into another Tulip Bulb craze, instead of keeping it an affordable necessity
How many tenants do you know wish they could buy vs needed to rent because they won’t stay long?
Like, all of them?
Sure bud
Most of my tenants wish they could buy. I always tell them they should just work harder and get good at capitalism.
Please tell us more about how the types of people who decide to jack rent up to absurd levels when given the slightest push back are actually a good thing for society.
I never said this. This is the definition of a strawman.
I’m surprised you’re getting downvoted so heavily here, they’re literally arguing a point you didn’t make.
Lotta justified anti-landlord sentiment is overflowing the barriers of nuance and creating a flood of “everything should be free in a perfect society” quasi-marxism.
“We’ve tried nothing and we’re all out of ideas”
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Decomodify housing. Like tax owning a home past like the 3th one so high it would destitute someone as rich as Musk in a month. Watch everyone who uses property for investment panic sell and crash the market into oblivion. The people who want to own a home can now do so and the rest can be bought up by the government for cheap to convert into public housing. Ez affordable housing and renting in one swoop.
Ok. I support this.
So I’m a big fan of reducing landlords (especially big corporate ones), but aren’t you worried about what happens to all the people that bought a house to live in with your plan? If my house halved in value I’d be well fucked, the house losing value won’t make my mortgage go down unfortunately.
Edit: I guess I crossed a threshold in that comment which puts me in the “landlord sympathiser camp”, which is far from the truth, I’m not too surprised about that though. Look, my preferred option is annihilation of capitalism, but just crashing the real estate market without doing anything else about the system itself would be devastating for a lot of common folks, not just through housing prices but all the other economic effects it would have.
I own my apartment too and if its value dropped to zero it would have no effect, I would still be living in it with no change.
Something should probably be done about housing bought with loans but even if it isn’t anyone who bought a home to live in will continue to do so, it’s value being pretty much irrelevant.
There is a change which is that you can’t move anymore, better hope you chose that house really well and never need to move ever again (which is extremely unlikely for us and I would think for most people). Not to mention the sheer insanity to be paying monthly for another 25 years for something with no value.
It might be frustrating if the value of my home dropped after buying it, but I don’t imagine it would mean I couldn’t move. I sell my current home for a lower price, but wouldn’t that be okay because the price of the house I’m buying is also lower now? (/gen curious, I don’t know a lot about this topic lol, just thinking out loud)
If you’re “underwater” (your mortgage is higher than the value of the house) then yeah you’re stuck unless you want to pay off that difference. That happened to friends of mine after 2008. If you own the house outright then yeah it matters less.
damn I see your point, that would suck. thanks for the explanation.
I’ve NEVER met a landlord who had low prices, just government subsidized low income housing. Even large real-estate companies/ banks tend to offer better prices. Landlords fucking suck. Investing in a house, is like “investing” in water. You’re just spending money to increase demand and make money, on SOMETHING PEOPLE NEED TO LIVE.
Because landlords are buying all the properties?
Found the landlord. If not for tenants, who would you and your estate agent squeeze for every possible cent, cutting every possible cost along the way so you can more horde wealth, buy more homes and get fat at other people’s expense.
Nobody that wasn’t bleeding renters would try and look reasonable by saying “corporations shouldn’t be able to own too many houses”.
The people complaining are not the ones who should be ashamed.
Yep, the house I got lucky on and am saving for my kid to move into in a year makes me scum of the earth.
Correct😎
Lol. What a shit take. What is my kid supposed to do for a house? Pay market price in a year? How does that solve the supply issue again???
I love how you guys are just reactionary and don’t ever think any steps ahead about what the result of your propositions would be…just landlord bad. Free house good.
I’m a huge supporter of social welfare programs and limiting the num of houses ppl can buy so if u think I’m the enemy, buddy you’re fighting the wrong battle.
Why can’t your kid just pay rent? You made renting sound so cool.
We don’t need Capitalism any longer. We can do better.
I don’t disagree but what we need is stability. So far capitalism has given the US that. If you’re proposing a different system fine just make sure that while we move to it the perceived wealth of the country doesn’t take a hit and after it is implemented do the same.
I don’t think it is possible from here. What we really need is loads more regulation and Corp criminals going to prison to start.
The US was never stable, and I don’t agree either that Capitalism is.
What is your definition of stable? What has been moreso?
Largest gdp and arguably most stable economy of scale on the planet what are you talking about?
See this is what I’m talking about. Just devoid of reality
Coal Wars, Conscription, Red scare, Segregation, Civil Rights Oppression, Violence, Drug War, international chaos and war.
What are you talking about?
Do we not have a stable economy? Are u kidding rn? Name one that is doing better.
Fewer people starve, are homeless and suffer unjustifiable working conditions in particularly Western Europe than in the USA.
Capitalism is the only reason you exist.
They said, not even knowing where I’m from. There are people who would be dead without Soviet Authoritarianism.
And somehow that’s not what I’m advocating.
A LOT MORE people would be alive and well without Soviet Authoritarianism or any other flavour of socialism/communism.
Still not what I’m advocating.
Well, would I be very far wrong to say that you are from Canada? Perhaps people are less ignorant than you think.
Lol Chairman Mao is proud of you!
Yes, the only two options are capitalism and full on Chinese dictatorship communism.
So, this is a testy thread, but if you have a specific idea of what you do want I’m very interested. Capitalism is a weird solution but other than old-school communism (which was honestly a series of kludges masquerading as a solution) I’ve yet to hear another solution described in detail.
You should examine the social and economic structures of the Anarchist governed areas in Ukraine and Spain during their respective civil wars.
It wasn’t a given that Socialist movements should be Authoritarian. Lenin bears most of the blame for that (the bastard); Marx some.
I actually have looked into that. From what I can tell they never really had a well-defined economic structure, since building up the economy bigger isn’t a consideration when fighting for your existence, and used a market system for basic purchases of supplies. Modern Rojava is the same way.
The Republicans were pretty close to winning from what I’ve heard, and if I could see parallel universes what they would have settled on after a victory would be one of the first few things I’d be interested in.
Sure, they used mixed economics.
The main point is that used mainly collectivist economics, and did so without establishing authoritarian societies.
You misspelled Chinese dictatorship capitalism
There is also Soviet communism, Cuban communism, and North Korean communism. I’m sure one of those countries will happily welcome you with lovely high quality public housing.
I own my home. I’m just not a scumbag leech on society like you guys.
Do you think you’ll get to keep your house under communism?
Do you think I’m pro communist? I’m not from hexbear or Lemmygrad buddy.
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Without landlords, nobody would need to rent in the first place.
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The geniuses on this site think that if the government is your landlord then you don’t have a landlord. Basically they want a form of communism. Public housing has it’s place but as someone who has rented in the past it’s not the sort of housing I’d choose unless it’s a last resort.
In any case, VERY STRONG DISAGREE that the only rentals should be government run or co-ops.
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I disagree with you strongly but props for a clear policy and honesty. Too many centre-left liberals show up to scream “decommodify housing” but with no follow-through about what that means besides handwaving about the evils of moneyed interests. Imho, communists are wrong, but at least they’re consistent and coherent and unambiguous.
Attacking landlords is textbook communism. Straight by the book. The red guard is in full force on lemmy.world.
Landlords were one of the biggest targets of the classical economists. Mill, if I remember correctly, had some choice words about them.
Gobble Trump’s cock.
I mean I get the hate to some extent. I’ve been on both sides of this coin so I can see how both sides feel squeezed.
Some are good, some are bad just like everything in life.
This isn’t an attack on a specific landlord though, it’s a variation on the Land Reform Movement. Except instead of country land for the revolution it’s city properties to be used for 15 minute cites.
My point is that large corporations are the issue not someone with an extra house or two.q
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