[leanstartupnoob]

Patrick is obviously smart, but I'm struck by how he's also a pompous know it all. Just look at his answer to someone asking about buying a house with a credit card:

https://capiche.com/q/whats-your-vision-of-e-commerce-in-203...

The main reason people don't use credit cards to buy houses now is due to the credit limit. Someone rich enough to have a $300,000 credit limit probably doesn't want to buy just a $300K house. However... it's easy to imagine the building or construction industry creating a credit card type product for home builders or renovators backed by a credit line sufficient to buy distressed properties.

> Will we see people buy houses online? I mean, clearly yes, we will see that. Will it become dominant to do it without meeting one's counterparty and/or broker? That feels unlikely.

Has Patrick ever even bought a house? Some people might think it's nice to meet the buyer/seller, but the only reason you really get together in the same room is to sign a bunch of paperwork at the same time. As patio might say, "there already exists a non-zero amount of lawyers executing real estate deals without the physical presence of the actual buyer and or seller". I see no reason for the trend to dissipate.

[RayVR]

You are missing the point of credit cards vs long term loans.

> The main reason people don't use credit cards to buy houses now is due to the credit limit.

suppose you want to buy a $500k home. You go to a bank and they offer you 30 years at, say 3.5%.

You go to your credit card provider and somehow get a $500k limit. Your payments looks something like 1 (one) month at 0% or as long as it takes (based on minimum payment) at 16.99%.

Which do you choose?

If you think you can change the economics of the credit card to be closer to the bank, you will end up with many of the same overheads that the bank has, and you will no longer be a credit card. I.e., you will not provide near instantaneous access to a line of credit.

[leanstartupnoob]

The point is that credit cards are just lines of credit. Which typically have the high costs that you pointed out. But there's nothing special about the 16.99% interest rate and many people have cards with special intro rates at 0% lasting for 6-12 months.

I don't see a lot of reasons why we can't eventually have pre-approved 30-yr mortgage credit cards accepted by companies like OpenDoor focused on selling houses.

[lawnchair_larry]

> The main reason people don't use credit cards to buy houses now is due to the credit limit.

No, that is definitely not why.

> Some people might think it's nice to meet the buyer/seller, but the only reason you really get together in the same room is to sign a bunch of paperwork at the same time.

I’ve never heard of this. I’ve never even heard of anyone meeting the buyer/seller for any length of time in a real estate transaction.

[leanstartupnoob]

> I’ve never even heard of anyone meeting the buyer/seller for any length of time

Yes, that's my point. When I bought and sold my house I was in the same room as the other private party. We made chit-chat and it was neat, but there was no reason we had to be there other than paperwork convenience. As paperwork continues to move online I don't see why that is necessary.

[dang]

Personal attacks are not ok here. We all get activated by someone or other on the internet, but please don't post like this to HN.

https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html