- cross-posted to:
- housing_bubble_2@lemmy.world
- cross-posted to:
- housing_bubble_2@lemmy.world
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Replace Christian with person
You can’t be a good anything and be a landlord. At least if we use the moral meaning of “good”.
You could only ask for as much rent as you need to cover the expenses for whatever you’re renting out.
Okay, but why do we need the landlord then? We’d just need a custodian.
I mean… yeah, pretty much. I don’t want to deal with maintenance or the legal stuff, so I’d be willing to pay someone to deal with all of that. Not the outrageous rates that rent usually goes for, typically.
Because you can’t afford to buy a property? So you need someone else to do it for you and then pay them a service fee for living in their property.
There’s a lot of smaller victories to win before we can have the big victory of outlawing landlords, so we should fight those first imo.
I am not a landlord. Yet.
When i do buy a 2nd property I do intend to rent it out at a reasonable price - and I have no guilt over doing so because all of our country’s private property is being bought up by foreign “investors” driving up the cost of ownership and rents while leaving properties unoccupied. It’s disgusting and I’ll fight it directly when I can afford to.
I’m not completely against the concept of renting. But imo the property should be owned either by the inhabitant of it, or the state. And then the state employs a custodian in charge of repairs and administration (you know, the only useful aspects of a landlord), while renting it out for a low price. And in order to keep prices a s low as possible, maintenance is supplemented by a tax.
The problem with private landlords of one or two extra properties, while they’re often not morally bankrupt, is that they tend to be wholly inept at the custodian part. Plus, if properties are all owned in small numbers rather than organized on the large scale, that’s just very inefficient.
That does sound like it would be of benefit but I’m not sure how realistic it is to set up a system like this and it work for everyone - would the government just start buying property off people? Would that crash or balloon the market? How do you ensure that families aren’t priced out of moving home either by higher property prices (from the government buying up everything) or from a catastrophic crash caused by no one wanting to buy property as investments?
Also how would the government provide attractive housing options across the economic spectrum across the whole of the country? Sounds like a monstrously large government department would need to be formed, which amongst other things would be very inefficient and goes against the objectives of the government. Take for example state health care- there is only one tier of care, and if you want anything better you pay for it privately. If we had the same for housing but didn’t have the private option then in all liklihood the government would be thrown out and the next one would be the one who promises private housing. Because like it or not, the middle class doesn’t want to live like the working class.
As I said, there a lot of battles to win and I think this anti-landlord stuff is just short sighted because there is no realistic solution that could be implemented today even if a country was willing - which it isn’t. Instead we should focus on fighting the smaller fights that would lead us towards the utopia: rent control, taxation, foreign “investors”, empty dwellings, single-family properties etc…all of these things could be vastly improved today for the benefit of everyone except those leaching on society.
You could still have different prices, albeit lower ones. Renting then becomes part of a resources allocation game. If you want a bigger/more luxurious home, you pay more and have less for other things. If a fancy house isn’t so important to you, you can get a cheaper one and have more money left for vacations, fine dining, cinema, etc.
As for the efficiency, that government department could take lessons from big property owners and organize like them, only with state subsidies and without profit goals. That way, the middle class, by virtue of having more money, could still afford better housing. Also, I don’t want the middle class to live like the working class, I want the working class to live like the middle class. Also also, there’s no “middle class”, only parts of the working class that got lucky. But they’re fundamentally still beholden to their employers’ whims.
Incremental change withing the current system is good and important, but we nonetheless have to discuss the big break that has to occur at some point, and what comes after. Incremental change can only take us so far.
The issue with that is that you’re still making money on a human right. That property is gonna gain value and eventually you’ll be able to sell it for more than you bought it for, all on the back of the tenants. Unless you’re planning to give the tenants the house when they pay the value of it but at that point there’s no reason for you the own it to begin with.
I’m confused. Are you saying people shouldn’t have to pay for housing? For food? For electricity?
They’re providing/enabling the human right. Why do you describe it as if they were making money off of necessity without trade and giving?
I’m saying landlords are parasites and there’s no way to excuse what they do as a good thing or necessary.
“they’re providing/enabling…”
WOAH there, pardner.
They don’t PROVIDE anything.
They hoard a finite resource for financial gain. Full stop.
They do though? They provide a place to live that you can move into way faster than you can if you were buying it. They cover the maintenance costs, and some even provide properties that are fully furnished.
I agree that they hoard properties for financial gain but they do provide something.
Mfw someone owns literally anything
THEY ARE HOARDING A FINITE RESOURCE.
Even coops own a finite resource. Literally everything is finite. Literally why there is an economy and why you don’t farm all your food.
Is every landlord the same? Are they all big companies out for profit? Or what?
Yes. I would say people shouldn’t have to pay for the basic necessities required to live. Why should anyone live with the threat of homelessness and starvation?
Because it takes time and resources and create and maintain housing… who will pay for it, and why is it the landlord’s fault instead of whoever isn’t taking that responsibility (government???).
That’s a good goal, but leaves open how it can be implemented.
They’re providing/enabling the human right.
You are literally saying that your human rights should be privately owned by somebody else. If that’s the case, why even bother with human rights?
You gotta separate the concept of a right from fulfilling them.
You can have a human right. But that alone does not answer how it is fulfilled.
The right is not owned. It can’t be.
You gotta separate the concept of a right from fulfilling them.
Says who?
If a human right only exists on paper it’s not a right - it’s a buzzterm for political racketeers to throw around. Fulfilling a “bill of rights” is the core part of the (so-called) “social contract” between the liberal state and it’s subjects - if it’s merely “fulfilling” those by pretending they exist, the existence of the liberal state - and liberalism itself - becomes irrelevant and unjustifiable to the subjects.
If a human right only exists on paper it’s not a right
A right is a right. It doesn’t just disappear.
My landlord didn’t pay for nor make the land my place is on. Nor the place I reside on. Yet he jacks up the rent every march as soon as he can, as much as he legally can.
My landlord doesn’t clean the lots, doesn’t clean the public bathrooms, doesn’t do anything but come on by to complain about the lots he doesn’t improve.
How he is providing anything but less money in my family’s bank account, and an headache to everyone he complains to?
Yes.
You can’t be a good anything and be a landlord
A good parasite?
That’s an odd spelling of “capitalist”.
I thought that was the normal spelling of “capitalist.” 😉
TheyreTheSamePicture.jpg
I think you could be a good Dalek and a landlord
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You can actually be a good landlord. In theory. But at the point where you actually become a good landlord, it’s more of a public service than something you actually make money on.
But at the point where you actually become a good landlord, it’s more of a public service than something you actually make money on.
Why is that a but? They’re still a landlord, right? I really don’t get the attempt of separation of the same thing.
Because most people don’t get into real estate to do public good. Most people get into real estate, become landlords, to make money off people’s need for land and housing. It’d be like trying to whitewash criminality because vigilante heroes exist. Yeah, vigilantes might exist and are technically criminals, but that’s not really the core conception of “a criminal”.
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Because if you’re a landlord as an individual, a a human being, you’re not what people mean when they say “landlord”. You rent property - you can do that with a conscience, but that doesn’t deserve the title of landlord
The term “landlord” refers to people who own homes as a business - people who create layers between them and the people they affect, bureaucracies or sheer numbers they can min-max without guilt.
That subtle difference is everything
How do you call an individual that rents you a place then?
https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/landlord
A person that leases real property; a lessor.
I really don’t see the distinction. And while I’m not a native speaker, I’ve never heard nor think this is a common distinction or understanding.
Landlord is singular. It does not sound like a company or manager.
Context matters - the person I rent from is my landlord, but that person is not primarily defined as a landlord. They rent out a couple properties, but they have a job - being a landlord is not their career
You can call them a landlord (and they can call themselves one in certain contexts), but in the larger systematic context someone who rents out a room obviously is categorically different.
The line is blurry, but honestly I don’t think it matters if you rent out your basement, your old house, or even a few houses. At some point it becomes a full time job (for someone), and that’s where I think the line is
And as far as companies, the landlords are the ones who own the company holding ownership.
It can also refer to the company itself as it’s a person legally (unfortunately). It’s not used that way in everyday conversation
But in everyday conversation it’s normal to refer to the manager of the management company as your landlord, which is often an employee of a company that oversees bookkeeping and maintenance hired by the actual owners
Ultimately, I think it’s important to fight for this distinction because language changes with use. By dragging in everyone who owns a second property or rents a room, we draw a line on the wrong side of working class people and their family who aren’t the problem
Are you the same person that always claims they know very nice police officers whenever someone says “ACAB”?
I’m familiar with some positively pleasant police officers that help around the local elementary school. All the adults and kids love them.
That doesn’t make me reject ACAB though. I don’t know what those cops have been up to in the 99% of their working hours where I don’t see them. Normally nice people do horrible shit all the time even without qualified immunity!
And even if they are as squeaky clean as cops be, the saying isn’t “a few good apples purifies the bunch.”
I fully believe that there are copsswho are nice people. But systemic issues don’t go away by individuals not being dicks.
All Carsalemen ARE Bastards.
I say defund the dealerships.
Your lifetime of experiences does not consistute a meaningful sample size when compared to everyone else’s. It can leave you feeling or believing something completely different than everyone else, for good reason, but that doesn’t make it true.
Most landlords own property because it is a vehicle for wealth growth. And if someone owns something because it makes them money every year they are likely attempting to or interested in maximizing that return. That means cheap maintenance, little to no improvements, and an increasing price tag like an investment vehicle instead of a decreasing price tag like a consumable good.
If landlords were systemically good, if the overwhelmingly majority of landlords were good, rent would go down every year as the building and utilities get used - only going back up after real meaningful renovations.
My last flat had an awful kitchen design, very aesthetic but a nightmare to actually cook in. Can you imagine living in your own home and hating something you Interface with everyday multiple times and not changing it despite knowing you have the money and skills to do so? I can’t. But because I have a landlord, because people have landlords they are stuck with the decisions of someone who either makes absolutely or relatively bad decisions all the time. My current flat the bathroom is a nightmare to live with because a quarter of the room is a bathtub and yet there’s no place to put your toothbrush or plug in a water pick/hair dryer/razor. I’d happily change the entire bathroom, renovate it to include a decent sized shower, add electrical outlets and kitchen sink that isn’t just a bowl - but again I can’t because that isn’t putting money into my landlords pockets and because they’re not planning on living here ever again (if they ever did) they don’t care how it is to live in. That’s what being a landlord does to someone naturally, it’s understandable but the reality is you care less about a place you’re not living in, you’re spending a lot of money for a place you’re not living in so you want to make that money back so you can improve the place you are actually living in so you’re naturally getting more stingy and cheap at your other properties, and over time the incentives of the system realign your values and behaviors.
No, I don’t think your lifetime of “good landlord stories” is a meaningful data point to change what the overwhelming majority of people experience every day of their lives nor the systemic logic/reality of the situations. Good people can become landlords with good intent but they can’t stay good and be a landlord because being a landlord is inherently an anti-productive thing to be in society - overtime the incentives change people into doing things that hurt others for their own interest.
If people actually followed the teachings of Jesus, it would be a very difficult world. Christianity is supposed to be socialist as fuck.
Landlording is fine by christian teachings but making a profit and getting rich by it is a bit iffy
It wouldn’t be difficult at all. In fact it would be a true utopia.
Problem is gods aren’t real and human instincts prefer selfishness and tribalism over “socialist” ideas.
Humans love the idea of socialism until it comes down to “us vs them” then socialism is the greatest threat there is.
That’s not true. You’d have to gauge your eyes out for lusting after a woman. And women? They aren’t allowed to reject their husband’s sexual advances. Which doesn’t sound extreme until it turns out hes got a scat fetish.
Hyperbole is a rhetorical device.
Accept its existence or die.
The first part of your argument kinda supports mine.
Jesus said if you can’t quit staring at, or keep your fuckin hands off women, cause you’re so pathetic about attractive women, gouge your eyes out and cut off your hands. Cause you’re the problem.
As for the second part was that something Jesus himself preached? Or is that more of that Paul dudes bullshit?
I don’t care who wrote that down. None of it was written by jezus anyway.
I had a good landlord, so they’re definitely out there. Mine didn’t raise my rent more than $50 in a decade of living there, and was pretty great and quick about repairs. I am sorry others have had the experience they’ve had, and I think it’s more to do with private equity buying real estate, or some kind of landlord with 10+ units etc. I think the mom/pop landlord with the odd house they rent out when their family isn’t using it are pretty chill. I am sure there are examples to prove me wrong though
You’re right, there are good examples out there. The point is they’re statistical anomalies not the rule. Landlords by and large serve very little societal purpose.
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When a house is an investment that grows in value society attempts to maximize scarcity, fewer houses or higher demand means more growth in their value. But imagine we lived in a society where we had more houses than we need, a surplus, because we valued housing people whenever they needed housing and we knew roughly how many houses we needed to do that.
You could move anywhere and find a house to own at a cost you could afford. Imagine housing wasn’t a massive store of value such that multiple bureaucratic steps were created to nickle and dime the transaction. Buying a home could be easy.
You could find a vacant house or one that has leaving owners, inspection papers were regulated and up to date, you could buy it off of them using your money or a loan from the government, and you could move in just like if you were renting.
You don’t have to save up for money to buy a home in a society where housing people is a priority. Housing would be cheaper, cost of living would be lower, purchasing power would be higher, and we could have methods in place for transitioning ownership without requiring a lump sum of cash cause no one’s expecting a massive windfall immediately. Ya know, loans.
Living on the street would be a fictional concept, encouraging homelessness is a societal choice - we could house everyone on the streets within the year if we wanted to. Does that mean long term hotels wouldn’t exist? No. That’s an actual service being provided.
I’m just saying, if landlords served a purpose we could enable that service as a society but if housing wasn’t an investment vehicle it’s pretty clear the number of landlords would plummet over night and we’d quickly realize relatively few people liked the “service” they were receiving.
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Well I wouldn’t describe myself as a capitalist per se. I don’t believe there’s infinite resources but I do believe there are better, more efficient ways of distributing them - especially with housing. We definitely live in 3d space, I don’t really know what this comment is referring to or it’s use.
Probably a bit of both, insane and delusional, but I also think imagining a better solution requires a smidge of both.
Again, your loan comment doesn’t make much sense to me because you failed to contributing a meaningful comment - you could elaborate but I suspect you don’t believe government financing is a thing? Or that interest rates can be zero? I’m not really sure, but I can elaborate my original concept - because I’m not an Internet troll and I genuinely want people to imagine and work towards a better future.
Houses are expensive products, we can agree on that, even if they weren’t investment vehicles it takes a team of people months to construct a good house and a lot longer for an apartment or larger complex. Since everyone should be able to own their home, pretending for second we went so far as to abolish the concept of renting, we would need people to be able to afford housing immediately upon becoming an adult and choosing to live somewhere else. Normally we think of this as rent, we pay someone else’s mortgage with our money because we didn’t have the capital to purchase it directly in the past. I. My proposed future, there’d be no landlords to pay mortgages for, so we’d take out our own mortgage to pay for our housing.
Now I think this is where people imagine today’s mortgages and systems being imposed on an 18 year old and think that’s foolish. That’s why i clarify housing as a product instead of an investment vehicle is cheaper, and housing as a right or a goal of society means mortgages aren’t for profit. So someone buys a home that costs less than todays home using a loan who’s interest is less than todays interest - likely the first from the previous owner, construction company, or the government and the second from some level of government.
It’s how loans work but instead of for profit they’re for the betterment of society. We do this all the time for various reasons today. The PPP loans being forgiven is one example, so is 0% student loans, and if the government wanted to charge 1-2% interest for a good reason we have historical precedent to that as well. Idk what about this is so hard to understand for you but hopefully this helps. :p
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if they don’t serve a purpose, then where are we supposed to live when we’re only staying in a place for a few months or years?
A non-market housing unit. Basically, a non-profit org that only charges the actual cost of the housing & maintenance.
People think the oxymoron is between ‘Good Christian’ and ‘Landlord’.
When it is in fact between ‘Good’ and ‘Christian’.
It’s not the people, it’s indoctrination. They’re just as much of a victim as anyone else.
I’m keenly aware of that as I have recovered from religion.
The fact remains that being a Christian is at odds with being a good person. Bigotry is baked in to Christianity. If you want to cherry pick the good parts, that’s great, but it doesn’t erase the suffering which is still being perpetrated due to the explicit wording in the bible.
There are warlords in Africa who justify enslavement because the bibles explicitly permits it, and never makes any effort to clarify that slavery should no longer be permitted.
You would think that at some point, God would want to convey to everyone that slavery was a symptom of the times, thousands of years ago, and is no longer permitted as of the New Testament, but that never happens.
Christianity was invented by landlords, maybe not the Christ parts specifically but the rest for sure
Ianity was invented by landlords
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That’s the neat part. Housing doesn’t need to be a commodity, it can be a right.
There is no difference. Many people here just do not like the concept.
Oh, are we ready to talk about the morality of options and stocks?
Fought over since before most “commodities” existed , and maybe most religions -at many scales from the world, to countries, to a sopt by the river bank, or the comfy chair in the living room - including by various human and non-human species.
Pursuit of economic and political power though control/acquisition of land just has so much glorious and colourful heritage; it’s no mere pleb of a commodity .
Something most everyone could use just a little bit more of.Not everyone could use more cars and tangerines.
cars and tangerines have a generally more competetive market of sustitutes.
Land doesn’t really have substitues.If i could build a house/farm out of tangerines without any land needed, i’d get your point,
