[testing22321]

Housing can not be both affordable and a good investment.

If we want housing to be affordable ie “limit them increasing” we have to stop people using them as investments.

There are many ways. My favourites are:

- one human can own one residential property. No companies or businesses can.

-or, property tax doubles (or 10x) with every residential property owned.

- no foreign ownership (Canada does this now)

- government can own and rent residential property at no profit. They supply plenty of other basic necessities of life, why not houses?

[bombcar]

It can be both affordable and an investment - it cannot (and will not) perpetually be a market-beating top-tier investment.

All of the items above can have drastic unintended consequences; the way to keep prices affordable is to make sure that supply is always outstripping demand by a bit.

Some examples of unintended consequences:

* I can't add an ADU to my existing property which would add one more dwelling unit

* Subdivision of property is discouraged; combining parcels reduces tax even if no new dwelling units are created

* This might be the closest to doing something though it could substantially discourage non-citizen immigrants (legal or not)

* This has been tried before and had well-documented issues, but might be doable if they can provide a "floor"

[FuriouslyAdrift]

At least in the US, up until the rise of 'flipping' and AirBnB home values typically tracked with inflation. Personally owned real estate was a hedge against inflation and a tax shelter, not an 'investment'.

[testing22321]

> It can be both affordable and an investment

By definition if something is affordable, it’s not a good place to store money with the goal of it increasing.

> All of the items above can have drastic unintended consequences.

Yes, absolutely. These are not fully fledged solutions, but a starting point. Some of them may need an asterisk or two. Of course, unintended consequences are perfectly fine if the final result is better than what we have today

> I can't add an ADU to my existing property which would add one more dwelling unit

Your wife or kid could own it. If you don’t have either of those, you don’t need two homes.

> Subdivision of property is discouraged

Subdivision and sell is perfectly encouraged.

> This might be the closest to doing something though it could substantially discourage non-citizen immigrants (legal or not)

I am a non citizen immigrant in Canada. I just had to bide my time until I became a PR then could buy a house. Perfect.

> This has been tried before and had well-documented issues, but might be doable if they can provide a "floor"

Again, it doesn’t have to be perfect, just better than what we have now.

[deanishe]

> it could substantially discourage non-citizen immigrants (legal or not)

Make an exception for owner-occupiers?

[bradchris]

So like what California did, which resulted in only a couple hundred thousand units over half a decade when they were hoping for/needing a couple million statewide.

Not the mention that ironically, the private owners with the space to build an ADU on their lot are the ones most likely to already be wealthy, and not actually rent it out to anyone below their socioeconomic bracket.

[brazzy]

> one human can own one residential property. No companies or businesses can.

So, in other words, you want everyone who cannot afford to outright buy a house to be homeless?

[testing22321]

Not at all. The government should step on and rent them as rent to own systems. Make no profit

[FuriouslyAdrift]

This is what apartments are for...

[torginus]

Why should housing be an investment?

[HDThoreaun]

Because we live in a democracy and voters want housing to be an investment because they own housing

[testing22321]

The majority of voters would vote to make income tax zero, that doesn’t mean we should accept that simply because the majority wants it.

In the US the majority of voters just voted for a racist, homophobic pedophile convicted felon.That doesn’t mean everyone should shrug and say “it’s the will of the people”

I refuse to believe you would have this attitude if you and your family had to rent drinking water while people profited wildly from it.

The situation is unacceptable and needs to change, irrelevant of what certain people want.

[HDThoreaun]

Sure, I agree, but this isnt a technocracy. If you want the government to change you do need to convince the voters at large.

> The majority of voters would vote to make income tax zero

Im not sure this is true. Most people recognize the taxes are needed for the government to provide services.

> That doesn’t mean everyone should shrug and say “it’s the will of the people”

This is the reality though, it doesnt matter that you or I disagree. Trump is the legitimate president even if he's a racist, homophobic pedophile convicted felon.

[torginus]

I own both a car and an apartment. The former is not an investment and most money people say you shouldn't consider the one you live in an investment.