limiting the number of houses a person can own would make housing affordable

i dont actually support this, because of freedom and all. but i dont know what would happen if this law was implemented? id think the cost of a house would plummet and it'd be affordable to own a house for almost everyone who works full time.  what do you think would happen? 

Why would this affect the supply of houses? If people are not allowed to own multiple homes, where is the incentive to build multiple houses? 

People don't just wake up one day and say "I will build a house." There needs to be a reason to do it.

i didn't say limiting the number of houses to just one per person.  renting should still exist and that means some people need to own more than one house. i'm open to ideas on how many houses a person could own. 

There is one and ONLY one way to lower the price of housing and that is to raise the supply of housing.

What are your ideas on how you would increase the supply of houses if you were in charge of the world?

well i would definitely designate a lot more places where people can throw down a cheap trailer and live cheap

That sounds like a good start.

theres already enough housing its just that most of them are vacant and too much money

Because property owners love losing money from yearly property taxes and depreciation maintenance of course. Rich people are so dumb.

you clearly have no idea what your talking about

If we really cared about housing people, then housing would be free for all.

Similarly, if we cared about feeding people, then food would be free for all.

And the list could go on.

But that just ain't how people function.

People are instinctively selfish and slaves to money.

And now slaves to devices.

I wonder why?

When is the last time you decided to build a house for someone?

My bad , rich people are smart for losing money from empty houses.

Have you ever payed taxes on property you owned? Do you even own a house? Have you done any research into the costs of owning a house?

Just as there should be no limit to the amount of money someone has - because the money supply itself has no limit, neither should there be a limit to the number of houses one person can own. How does limiting owned homes one person can own help the price of a home? There are eight factors that contribute most to the value of a given home:

1. Comparable sales, the relative prices of similar recent sold homes in the neighborhood

2. Location, location, location

3. Usable size/space of home

4. Age / condition of the home

5. Upgrades

6. Local market, a larger area than the comps in neighborhood - see #1

7. Economic indicators

8. Interest rate

Note that among these, who currently owns the home, or how many homes they currently own is of little value because their locations probably differ, which adjusts everything else.

Exactly.

Unfortunately I'm as constrained by social convention as everyone else is.

I was simply pointing out that:

On the one hand we can presume to care about affordable housing.

Whilst on the other hand we are not really prepared to consider the  aspirations of all.

Natural hierarchy dictates....Perhaps out of a greater evolutionary necessity.

Just a hunch.

How about a more pragmatic approach, like offering an incentive to get a professional to build you a house instead of waiting for it to fall from the sky?

For sure...That's the current approach, and therefore what currently defines pragmatism.

And the system that I conform with.

Though "incentive" is not necessarily  necessary.

But "incentive" is what defines natural hierarchy.

Fortunately I have a comfortable enough niche within that hierarchical system.

And I will hopefully be OK for another 20 years or so.

So I will continue to stick a few pounds into the charity box to assuage my conscience.

Not that I have a conscience that requires much assuaging.

There would be a large inventory of housing sold as quickly as necessary for people to comply. This would probably wipe out a lot of middle class wealth. There wouldn't be enough qualified buyers for those mortgages. That's why people rent generally. You'd probably start to see a lot of seller financing. The landlords wouldn't be responsible for maintenance anymore as they'd be mortgage holders. So, there'd probably be a lot of properties becoming dilapidated as renters-turned-owners neglect the houses because they can't afford things like HVAC systems and roofs.

This would only work with luxury mansions, in general the mass-estate property moguls actually out-trade their competitor because they sell lower for the same property quality and location than their rivals. They can afford to do this because not everything rests on the profit of one property at any particular time for them.

What you are saying is truer for luxury mansions but clearly the poor can't afford them regardless.

 Also just so you guys know, Blackrock has gobbled up much of the privately owned property due to the eviction moratorium. And now this?

Why do you guys let DC dictate policies that aid Blackrock? Ignorance or dogged obedience?

If there’s a huge housing shortage, then either the people who are born are either going to be packed into houses, or are going to be homeless.

As the average number of people per home is going down, and the homelessness rate is high, but isn’t enough to make much of a difference. 

Companies like Blackwood are a comparative drop in the bucket, and the hilarious suggestion that eviction moratoriums is going to have a big effect, is a rather weird suggestion; but I guess if one wants to engage in blame madlibs, no problem.

The problem isn’t really the lack of housing; it’s the lack of the right type of housing in the right place. And the problem, fundamentally is actually the government listening to the people.

Specifically, if you own a house in a nice neighbourhood; a developer coming and building new units in that area will increase supply, and thus lower price. And that dilutes the value of existing homes - and the people there don’t like that so tend to oppose those types of building.

Alternatively, is that the homes that are built have to be smaller and less desirable to fit more houses into a desirable area.

Locations where that is not a big problem - out of town, not as accessible, far from work; have bigger houses for cheaper, but there comes a point where it’s not practical any more.

It’s very much the case that people may buy a second house to rent as an investment; which drives up competition for houses but decreases the cost of rental, but I don’t think that’s actually a big part of the house prices.

Locally for me where I am, house prices were crazy last year as families from a large expensive metropolis figured out that the property they can buy in a smaller city is better located, larger and cheaper - and if telecommunicating, being in an area for their own enjoyment is better than location with respect to work.

This is, Anecdotally, one of the reasons I’ve heard people I know give for why they’ve moved from San Jose to Austin

There's a housing shortage because:

A. There are to many people.

B. Because housing is viewed as a capitalist asset rather than a human right.

Sad but true.....Some people can only expect to live in a cardboard box....And some people expect that some people must live in cardboard boxes.

Social hierarchy dictates.

And very few genuinely care.

I actually agree with this to an extent. Last time I was in Hawaii I felt sick thinking about how many locals can’t afford housing because of rich mainlanders buying vacation homes that they live in a month or so a year. In a lot of touristy places (like Fredericksburg, Texas or Ouray Colorado) vacation homes and short term rentals make prospects for home ownership nightmarish for locals. It’s hard for Joe Average to compete to buy a home that could instead be turned into a business  bringing in tens of thousands a year. 

That said the greedy rich people buying up property narrative isn’t the majority of the problem. What people are really paying for when they buy a house is good neighbors in pleasant surroundings. High prices are part of what selects for the “good neighbor” part. The bigger culprit is the continuous centralization of jobs in the US into a handful of metro areas that only have so much land an hour outside the city center. Eventually you run out of places to build. Sure you can build high rises or whatever but it just isn’t what people want, at least not most people. But I’m hopeful that work from home or more flexible working hours and days might mitigate this a lot by allowing people to live further out of they choose. 

Also the cost of homeownership in the US at least is a problem but kinda exaggerated outside of really high cost of living areas like Boston or coastal California. When people buy a house what they are really looking at isn’t the sticker price but the monthly payment, which is lowered quite a bit by rock bottom interest rates. Where I live housing prices have exploded but when you adjust for interest rates the cost increases isn’t as extreme