We have this system in the U.K. largely and it hasn’t really fixed the problem, because now even these house shares are incredibly expensive. In London you can be looking at well over £1000 per month for a bedroom and access to a shared kitchen and bathroom. Licensing is required for what are here called HMOs (houses in multiple occupation) to make sure that properties are safe. But increasing the remit of licensing has meant people selling up the rental properties too because the market isn’t bearing the additional cost of complying.

Basically the solution is to density and build more housing in areas of high demand but it’s not unusual to hear of people arguing that this won’t fix the problem and that the answer is rent controls and additional restrictions and taxes on landlords.

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loeg 3 days ago | parent | next [-]

You can't make this kind of conclusion. You haven't refuted the counterfactual -- homelessness would be higher without those measures in the UK.

No one who thinks we should legalize roommates and SROs is opposed to building more housing / densification; they're complementary.

	▲	physicsguy 3 days ago \| parent [-]
		Oh, no, I totally agree with you. What I meant is that there are people in the UK at least that think that we should restrict the ability to have these HMOs and that they don't want further construction, at least of certain types. You see it all the time in the news media here - they'll interview someone complaining about rent, suggest that rent controls should be imposed, but also that they don't want the new development down the road because it's "luxury flats" and they can't afford those either. "Luxury flat" these days means a two bedroom apartment which 20 years ago would have been considered small.

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s0rce 3 days ago | parent | prev | next [-]

I dont think we have restrictions here (SF Bay area) and a room in a shared apt/house is in many areas even more expensive ($1500-2000).

	▲	lazyasciiart 3 days ago \| parent \| next [-]
		There’s pretty significant restrictions in most of the Bay Area. But even without restrictions, for decades the SF board of supervisors was actively demolishing SROs and trying to make housing more expensive so they had a better class of residents. https://ccsroc.net/s-r-o-hotels-in-san-francisco/
	▲	bbarnett 3 days ago \| parent \| prev [-]
		The most expensive real estate on the planet is in the bay area, and as with any dense urban area, it's all about what the market will support. Forced open bidding would make one big difference in pricing. But those high salaries just make everything more expensive.

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heldrida 3 days ago | parent | prev [-]

True, rooms in London for GBP 1.3k, sharing a house with other 3 or 4 strangers!