| ▲ | cluckindan 9 days ago | ||||||||||||||||
No. The global housing crisis is the result of international organised crime owning or operating most of the large construction conglomerates, using real estate as a fiat currency to wash the proceeds from all their illicit business, and (org crime infested) private equity companies cashing in on the former situation, pumping assets by buying up available real estate just to make it unavailable. CRIME is the real reason worldwide for people not being able to afford a house. | |||||||||||||||||
| ▲ | crooked-v 9 days ago | parent | next [-] | ||||||||||||||||
> using real estate as a fiat currency Even if we take your premise as a given, the entire reason real estate is so valuable is that there isn't enough housing in the first place. Real estate is, by its nature, a bad investment; it's only the scarcity of it that makes the value continue to go up exponentially. > buying up available real estate just to make it unavailable There isn't actually any available housing in the first place, at the point of cities even approving projects, compared to the number of people who need housing. That's the problem. The most extreme example is San Francisco, where as of this July the entire city had approved only 16 housing units [1] out of an already comically poor goal of only about 10,000 housing units per year. [1] https://www.newsweek.com/san-francisco-only-agreed-build-16-... | |||||||||||||||||
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| ▲ | qeternity 9 days ago | parent | prev [-] | ||||||||||||||||
This is absurd. Does it happen? Yes. But this is not the primary driver. We turned housing into retirement funds. The median family's wealth is their primary residence. We cannot have these assets depreciate in nominal terms for this reason, and we actually need them to appreciate in real terms for people to have a nest egg. It's awful, but it's the truth. | |||||||||||||||||
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