[greenthrow]

Your argument doesn't really make sense because the problem isn't lack of houses or apartments, there's plenty of places to put everyone. The problem is one of affordability. The costs of stuff that already exists and has existed for ages isn't really tied to the current cost to build, even if we buy the specious argument that all regulation raises costs and those costs are inevitably passed directly to tenants.

[bluGill]

supply and eemand sets rents. You you rent perfecly good existing houses cheap in rural areas. Nobody wants to like there.

There is no reason to think there is enourh room for everyone who wants to like in San Francisco, and statistics prove they heve not been building much. Mean while in other states we find areas of demand where housing is not expensive. Where I live you can rent one bedroom apartments for under $1000, mohe in won't be until spring as the building is still under construction. The owners are planning on starting the next building when this is done. That is what allosing building does.

[throwaway2037]

> Nobody wants to li[v]e there.

It would be better to say that rents are lower in rural areas because there is either more supply or lower median salary.

[wiml]

Supply, demand, and cartels like Realpage.

[eru]

Cartel's can't just magically set prices.

They can withhold supply, and that might have an effect on market prices.

[astrange]

You can't pay the mortgage on a place you're not renting out though, so they mostly can't withhold supply.

It applies more to things like retired people living by themselves in a 3 bedroom house.

[eru]

OK.

Though if they can't withhold supply, how are those cartels supposed to hold up prices, then?

[astrange]

They don't, it's not real.

(Except that they can prevent construction of new units through zoning.)

[tremon]

Ehm, what? Of course cartels can magically set prices. That's what a cartel is for: to make collusion easier.

[eru]

Even OPEC can't magically set prices. Cartels make collusion easier, but you still have to do concrete steps to raise market prices.

OPEC does that via production cuts. Or rather tries to do that.

[astrange]

Real estate has very distributed ownership and none of them are motivated to form a cartel.

The only way they can maintain one is through legal force. Zoning laws are almost entirely that force; they're a way to establish a cartel of homeowners.

[greenthrow]

This is just factually not true. There is plenty of empty homes, apartments and condos to house everyone. There are many units kept empty rather than lower prices. It is a myth that supply and demand sets prices.

[Schiendelman]

This comment makes me really sad; it's someone who wants to help but ends up hurting.

[worik]

There is also the effect of rich people needing a place to stash money and not wanting to bother with tennants

Housing activists in Melbourne have been campaigning about that for years now

I did not believe that was true until I stumbled on it happening. A rich lawyer, a salary far too big to spend, so they collected (empty) houses. They did not care about cash flow

A tax on empty houses in areas with accommodation shortage at worse cannot hurt and at best could free up a lot of accommodation