[jjk166]

Yeah but who pays for the developers?

Besides initial construction you also have maintenance, acquiring tenants, property management, renovations and improvements, etc.

If a company has the means and desire to do all this themselves, there's nothing stopping them from buying the land themselves instead of renting, but it's generally more efficient for a business to focus on what they are good at and leave the real estate issues to a company that specializes in it.

[feet]

Sounds to me like the landlord is just a useless middleman. Do we really want those?

[solveit]

Sounds to me like they're deciding what to do with the land, and then taking on the risk for whether the developed property is economically viable. They should be taxed for the value of the underlying land, but they are absolutely not useless middlemen.

[feet]

"Taking on risk for whether the property is economically viable" is a funny way of saying "bought a house that a normal person could have purchased and instead charges them a marked up rent"

[chucksta]

What's stopping all these businesses from building their own buildings and cutting out the middle man?