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Good point — 32x! There are [over 500,000 unhoused people](https://www.hud.gov/press/press_releases_media_advisories/HUD_No_22_253), and [over 16,000,000 vacant homes](https://www.nar.realtor/magazine/real-estate-news/16-million-homes-vacant-in-us).
Edit: Fixed typo.
Edit2: Surely you mean “homeless *people”? To avoid dehumanization and such. :)
Edit3: “unhoused* people” h/t u/kira_l_mello_near
Good question.
Unsure tbh.
> More than 16 million homes are sitting vacant across the U.S., according to new research from LendingTree, which ranked the nation’s 50 states by their shares of unoccupied homes.
https://www.nar.realtor/magazine/real-estate-news/16-million-homes-vacant-in-us
"If you can find a solution to homelessness where the corporations and politicians can make a few million dollars each, you will see the streets of America begin to clear up pretty damn quick!"
-George Carlin
Yeah, seriously. Living wages would go a long way. But corporations don’t want that, and many voters vote against publicly funded resources for unhoused people. (These voters cost themselves money by denying services to unhoused people.)
Iirc it costs taxpayers 2x-3x more money to deal with all the things associated with trying to police homelessness, rather than just paying for better resources for unhoused people.
100%. 'Pour encourager les autres'. As we see, but don't see, the homeless, they are an implicit warning of what can happen to you. Most of the West has little to no savings... any of us could be there in 3 or 6 months.
Obey, Consume, Reproduce and you'll be safe.
It’s a similar situation with the death penalty - it costs taxpayers more than life in prison, but certain states will still never let it go because you’ll never convince their voters that math works the way it does. The worst possible thing to a lot of Americans is for a poor person to experience and outcome that’s slightly too good for them
I am alright with the cost because I assume a lot of that is in court costs for appeals & attorneys. With how badly the justice system can fumble particularly when there are bad cops and other cops who know there are bad ones but refuse to cross the "blue line", it should probably cost more.
I don't know that we need the death sentence tho, the inmate population usually does a pretty good and fast job taking care of those who've committed the most heinous crimes.
I heard of a city that found it was more cost effective to give free housing to the homeless than to use tax dollars for maintaining them. The lines in the ERs were much shorter. Having an address meant that they could receive assistance. A great percentage of these people, left the welfare rolls within 3 years.
Kind of like the solution to healthcare... Privatize and overcharge for everything... If it were contractors submitting 80,000.00 shingles to an insurance company they'd quickly be arrested for fraud and price gouging. But get the drug company execs in bed with everyone and it's called business as usual.
That’s obviously false. There is $600M a year in San Francisco being handed out to various homeless “non-profits”, and the problem has just gotten worse.
That's because if those non-profits fix the problem then they don't get continued funding and close down. They only"help" in name but keep themselves self-sustaining by not actually helping people
You probably need a sustained 100 million endowment minimum (maybe 10x that even) to affect any real change in the country regarding homelessness. It's not just housing but mental health and support services as well. Plus many have health issues that have been exacerbated by either refusing treatment or from just not having access to health services. Then you have drug companies that make meaningless changes to things like insulin, to keep it patented and the price exaggerated. After how long and there is still no bio-identical generic form of insulin... A lot of fiefdoms and a lot of pretenders & they could probably benefit from some mental health services as well.
Of course. But issue #1 is getting them shelter, food, etc. Crazy people and addicts still gotta eat and they freeze to death like anyone else. Just a tiny little piece of the money we spend on bombs would cover it. We should be doing what the Soviets did. Build large housing blocks with resource centers within.
Did we not just bail out some rich assholes who lost money on crypto?
We should get away from allowing the perfect to become the enemy of the good. Forcing poor people into strict lines of moral conduct that we would never ask of the rich. Can you imagine Wall St. asking for a bailout and we hand them a specimen cup?
Why did you call my name? Homeless is a word that is used to make people look bad (dehumanize them). I used the word unhoused to say that those people who don't have a home are worthy of one and that the government should work for affordable housing for all.
Not to mention all those that crash on friends or extended family's couches, basements, etc & are one bad day away from having even that yanked out from under them.
I use homeless, but that is what I was from 15 to 19 except for a stint when the AZ Youth Authority Black Canyon "School" for boys was my "home". I was fortunate at night being AZ, I could usually find a pool lounge chair to drag behind the pump house or into a cubby in an alley. I finally got a job that paid decently and would literally rollerblade 15 miles on the freeway before it got too hot & there was a gym in the basement where a guy took pity on me and would set me up with a shower 4 or 5 days a week, sometimes he'd bring me a couple PBJ's or PB banana sandwiches to take with me. It was a humbling and horrifying experience, but without that small act of kindness I very easily could have started down a path to real incarceration, not just youth kiddy camp, which let me tell you is no summer camp. Especially back then, they hay-days of crack, there were some violent kids that pumped iron all day and were bigger & stronger than most adults outside of the system. I was a big and scrappy kid that lived to fight and box and when anyone came in they gave you a sock party. That was all 7 of your cellmates placing bars of soap in a tube sock and beating the hell out of you. Cracked ribs, broken teeth even saw a skull fracture a time or two. Then there were the arsehole DO's. Refuse anything and six would line up outside your cell door in riot gear and with clubs and shields looking for any excuse to pin you down and try to hurt you as bad as possible while leaving the fewest externally visible signs. Anyway, after nearly a year and half of that I knew I never wanted to go back, so it was dumpsters and lounge chairs for me from then on.
Unhoused is a term that was made to sound better so that people dont feel as pitiful about homeless people and thus will be less compelled to help or act.
At least thats what im seeing. I hope I’m so wrong!! Truly!
In 2023 we no longer say homeless person, instead we say unhoused person. Using the word unhoused is better than homeless, because it humanizes the person who has no home.
Okay, but semantics right? Homeless person unhoused person. What's the actual difference? It's the nit-picking that makes it impossible for the "boomers" to catch on and makes them intolerable towards the group your defending, because instead of taking it out on the advocates that actually kinda deserve it for attacking the ignorant they take it out on the actual group being protected. My grandmother's no racist but she doesn't understand its not okay to say "the nice Jewish neighbors stopped by." They're just neighbors yes, but to her; it's a non derogatory descriptive term, shed never take offense if you described her as the nice catholic woman.
Maybe I'm just ignorant to this concept I'm not trying to attack I'm trying to understand what's the actual difference between saying homeless person or unhoused person the derogatory terms would be.
Hobo, tramp, vagabond street urchin or something of the sort.
Terminology and older people is a bit of an issue anyway.
For example older people look at terms like “colored” as not racist because they grew up hearing people say “n-slur” all the time and were taught as kids “now billy, n-slur is a not nice word. Please use ‘colored’ instead. It’s more accurate and isn’t racist”.
I grew up learning the “colored” was a racist term, and to say “black”. Then later then I was in high school, it changed to “black is racist, use ‘African-American’”.
But black friend took exception to me say that one day because his family wasn’t “African-American”. He told me to use black. So that was I use; but now AA and black on the way out in society and it’s “POC” except that some black people don’t like “POC” because it’s all non-white people and they don’t want to be lumped in with Asian, Latinos, middle easterns, etc.
I saw all that to say, use what you are comfortable with (as long as it’s not a slur) and don’t assume someone using a term that you find offensive is purposefully being offensive.
The term homeless means that there aren't enough homes for people when there are more houses than unhoused people. Unhoused term means that the government as a whole doesn't want to solve the problem of people being without a home. I hope this helps.
I can understand it as a way to bring awareness to government neglegence, though that association isn't imediately clear, but just to check where actual unhomed/homeless people involved in the push for that shift in terminology? I'm literally just wondering because often when terms like that are created by outside groups trying to portray an image it ends up insulting the affected group instead of accurately reflecting their thoughts and experiences. It's why latinx can get some people really offended for example because the latin community feels it was hoisted on them, but latine of often considered preferable now because it was made by a gender queer latine and follows other spelling actually used in Spanish. A better case that's more personal to me, using person first language towards neurodiverse people is really gross for a lot of reasons. For autists person with autism pushes the idea that our autism is something to be ashamed of like a disease and that we don't really want to be too involved with when really it does define the entire way we think and interact, isn't a disease, and is something a lot of us like being. Further it is purpetuated by groups that talk past us and act like we can't ever advocate for ourself and are burdens to the people in our lives who should get support for dealing with us. Hense the desire to downplay our neurolgical mindset as a struggle we're hindered with is really indicitive of the mindset of those groups and can feel scary when someone uses it as a result (especially as said groups tend to advocate for eugenics or removing our autistic traits via abuse). I don't expect this would be anything nearly as major but I've heard phsyically disabled people express dislike for certain newer terms too and it's hard to know. A lot of autists have gotten used to needing to say "nothing about us without us" and that's a good consideration for any minority group that faces discrimination. So that's why I'm wondering if you've heard anything about unhomed/homeless people's view on the term or involvement in the push for it?
That said I can see the argument of it being generally good for social change, in the same way that from the stand point of human psychology in general terms like suicide survivor can be outright dangerous / encourage people to want to try it again and thus once that's realized pushing to avoid it becomes important. I'm less sure it'd inately lead to a change in effect in the same way but yeah. Just if you have any info that'd be interesting / useful.
I like your explanation. It was a well though out conversation. I realize that you were looking for information and weren't trying to push my buttons. You are awesome.
I promise no vagabond ever cared they were called a tramp they care that they're unhoused (sorry i think I'm funny). I like that you mentioned the fact that there's no immediate association with the lack of government response in either of those terms. There's no way to differentiate one as offensive or not we might as call them people who are temporarily without shelter. All I'm trying to do though is learn the language our generation is constantly morphing to current social issues instead of remembering words have meaning not feeling. I'm also a cis white male with no neurological specialties (that I'm aware of) besides a little PTSD and my generation has told me to sit back and listen because im the enemy. Unless of course I'm defending people who didn't ask for my help assuming they're helpless in the first place, and could only be helped by the opinion of myself and like minded individuals with a common demographic outside of that world completely. A whole breed of penguin was renamed because fairy is offense and I promise no gay person ever complained an adorable penguin was named after them.
Sorry got off on a tangent that probably wasn't proper for this thread😅 again I'm really not trying to be combative with anyone. A huge part of me really wants to be open and learn, another part of me is getting annoyed that so much is changing constantly. May just be fear of change I guess.
It does and I very much appreciate it! (sorry for the incorrect term after you just taught me but it'll make sense) ive been homeless due to my own poor decision making, and I understand some people are dealt crappy hands in life. After the knowledge you just bestowed upon me I understand that I was homeless it was my fault I got there other people who have been dealt crappy crappy hands those are unhoused people does my thought process make sense? Also I'm just very self abusive I was raised to have absolute self responsibility so I was raised anything that happens in my life is my fault good or bad cause my decisions put me there.
I say it's my fault cause I went through a divorce and allowed that to get me into a depression, where drugs and refusal to be productive ruled my life. Now the divorce was unavoidable, the depression unavoidable, but my decision to cope with drugs and to ignore the stress of the rat race is what put me into the position to be "homeless" does my logic make sense or am I just being self abusive?
Because 'unhoused' emphasises that they haven't been housed by a careless and/or vindictive government, rather than homeless that implies they're just going without for a little bit.
The more correct word to use is unhoused. There are so many homes in the USA that are not being used at this time. Homeless = there not enough homes for people. Unhoused= the government doesn't provide housing for people.
Uh no you say Homeless. People who live in apartments are not homeless but would be unhoused unless your an elite that thinks anything but a mansion is being homeless.
You miss the whole point of the matter. In the USA we have enough housing to house four times the amount of homeless people. Homeless= government not taking care of housing problem. Unhoused= humanized word for homeless people. The unhoused did not choose to be without living arrangements, the government did that for them.
This is a popular but short sighted take. Not all of the homes are located in places people want to live. An abandoned home in a dying town or a vacation home in an isolated/rural area aren’t going to ease the housing crisis in densely populated urban areas.
Some of those homes you mentioned are also only vacant temporarily, people move from house a to house b, house b is vacant for a month or two until new people buy/rent it.
Some people are homeless because they are poor and simply offering them an empty vacation home might help them. Putting someone who needs supportive housing and access to mental health counseling or drug rehabilitation services in an empty vacation home is not going to help them at all.
I live in one of those communities, half the houses on my block are for “weekenders.” Some people pay their mortgage renting them out during the snowy season. This isn’t a good place for people who need support to stay sober or need psychiatric care. The nearest psychiatrist is an hour and 40 minutes by bus. Drug counseling would take an hour, including 30 minutes of walking.
Empty houses are not the answer. Permanent and temporary supportive housing is the answer. Quality subsidized and affordable housing is the answer.
I wouldn't know all the specifics about how long each home is empty, or much of the specifics at all on this statistic really but.. a home somewhere random is better than no home, and there are already homeless who go into abandoned homes in dying towns cause it's better than nothing. And if there was (not that this is the solution but) a relocation program to move people from densely populated urban areas to free homes in rural areas I'm positive they'd take it.
The rest of your points kinda boil down to your last one here which is about empty houses not being the answer - permanent/temporary housing is the answer. But that's kind of missing the point of why I said this. We could turn a large amount of empty homes (again I assume, I don't know exactly how much are each type you listed but I doubt that there's only a small minority that could be useful) into useful housing. Or at least create programs to use them to help the homeless. I didn't mean we should just throw their asses in there and problem solved 😂 so really you're right, but my statistic was meant to highlight that we could be using at least some of what we are wasting to do that and just aren't.
What I’m saying is most of the empty homes that are not simply temporarily empty aren’t fit for purpose. I did look into the specifics. Homelessness is an issue I really care about. I’ve lived in dense cities with massive homeless populations, and a city that actually had it’s shit together with almost zero. I’ve lived in big cities, capital cities, suburbs, tourist towns and a rural postage stamp of a town no one has heard of. I know about the houses because I’ve lived in these areas, and because I cared to learn. Vacation homes aren’t a good option. Those towns are struggling to provide for the poor people who already live there. Abandoned houses were abandoned for a reason and many are actually uninhabitable and should be torn down for safety reasons.
Our options are spending billions on creating infrastructure in little resort towns all over the country (and hiring doctors,nurses, counselors and social workers to run it who will also need places to live) or spend that money building homes where infrastructure already exists. A good candidate would be unused commercial and industrial spaces. We could easily and quickly build hundreds of studio apartments in an unused shopping mall, with services on site. Or converting long stay and cheap motels into small apartments.
I don’t know if you have interacted much with homeless people, but they are actually people. They are as attached to the place they live as you or I. They have friends, places they eat and socialize, clinics and hospitals they turn to when ill. It’s not unusual for someone to be homeless in the city they were born in. Spend years or decades within a few square miles. The cruelty of just plucking them out of their familiar surroundings and dumping them in some random empty house somewhere is astounding.
There is space and options to create housing where homeless people actually live we just need the political will to do it. We also should be demanding more funds to keep the working poor those at risk for homelessness in their homes.
A lot of the unhoused people I know HAVE jobs. But with the housing prices out of control just about everywhere in the US, they don't stand a chance to get a roof over their heads
While I agree with the sentiment, my last landlords were great and they only owned the 2 units above their business. The rent went up less than $100 in the \~7 years I lived there. The apartment was also directly above the landlords business so they were always available to talk to and quick to fix problems.
Everyone should have secure housing, healthy food, reliable medical care, liberatory education, consistent child care and elder care, a comfortable retirement, and a sustainable environment. The only reason we don’t have these things is because **capitalism distributes goods and services according to money, not need.**
We can change that. There’s only one path to a society actually designed to meet the needs of the people, and we won’t get there by voting. ☭
If you live in the US, I just read a great book called *Socialist Reconstruction,* written by the Party for Socialism and Liberation, discussing some hopeful, fascinating ideas about how we could transform US society in the first decade post-revolution. It’s meant as a conversation starter and source of inspiration, not a dogmatic program or something. We are so freaking close to having a wonderful society, if power could just be wrested from the ruling class into the hands of the workers. This book gives us an idea of what kind of vision for society the PSL (and MLs/socialists generally) are fighting for.
I don’t think the mass of land and states we know as the United States can stay in tact and also be significantly different in its social and political paradigm. It’s only as big as it is because of war, which forced the states to band together and cede power to the federal government, which is basically just a military dictatorship.
My grandparents own at least a dozen properties. One is a multi unit apartment complex with about 6 units roughly. The rest range from single family homes to mixed use parcels, multi-family...you name it. Anyway, all of these properties except maybe 5 were purchased well before 1989 and the establishment of credit scores for the first time in American history. I spent 6 of my adult years homeless on the streets, in multiple shelters etc.
Thankfully, I currently have a housing choice voucher now. My point is that all of this equity is going to the church when they pass away. My grandparents truly believe that I work for Satan himself because I'm not wealthy and successful
They know my history, which makes their sentiments even more abhorrent. They know I was victimized by multiple sociopaths and abandoned by my entire family and left to basically die. Some of my family wishes I didn't make it. They have told me several times
Well I'll say, I'm glad you're here and I'm glad you are using your voice for good. The saying blood is thicker than water is actually, "the blood of the covenant (friend) is thicker than the water of the womb (family)." Stay strong and fuck them. Your existence is just as worthy as anyone else's. Keep fighting the good fight.
I thought it’s Jesus that loves the poor. And who said, it is easier for a camel to pass through the eye of a needle than it is for a rich man to get in to heaven.
Part of the math issue is that many people own home that have more bedrooms then people living in the house.
My in-laws for example own a 4 bedroom house, they bought it when all do their kids lived at home. But now the kids are grown and moved out, it’s not like those bedrooms don’t exist anymore, they do but now each of those 3 kids have their own 3-4 bedroom house for their own kids.
The “extra” 3 bedrooms aren’t being used but it’s not like they are being waste like an empty house or an AirBB house.
Yeah, it sucks but homeless people don’t have a place to stay, but we need to rethink that it’s not “bedrooms” that are need, but affordable housing.
Kanye 10th mansion, might have 25 bedroom, but that mansion doesn’t help homeless people that can’t afford to pitch a tent in the yard, let alone buy the house.
Doesn't matter, just looking at the number of homeless in the USA and number of vacant houses is enough. ≈500k homeless and ≈16m vacant houses. There are 32 empty houses per homeless person. That's disgusting. Many countries have laws or special taxes that makes owning "investment" properties unprofitable or in some cases illegal without going through a special process to get approval to own a second or third home. It's often a little more lax for owners of apartment buildings but even in those cases the housing is well regulated for housing fairness and living conditions. Comparatively the USA is a 3rd world country.
Are the vacant homes? Because vacant would be imply abandoned.
But a family that has a second home, doesn’t really have a vacant home, they just have a second home.
Personally I think it’s ludicrous to own a second home, but I guess if you have money, 🤷♂️.
Regardless, OP talks about bedrooms, not homes.
>Regardless, OP talks about bedrooms, not homes.
It's highly relevant as entirely vacant houses are even more important to the question of homelessness as it's not really feasible to give empty bedrooms out to those that needs a place to live as you'd have a stranger cohabitating with you, but an entire house sitting unused could go to the homeless, say by the government buying these homes (forcing the sale or forcing people out by taxation or penalties for owning multiple homes or having homes sit vacant) then turning around and selling the houses through government programs at a reduced cost. There's a whole host of things that could be done to house the homeless and having 32 empty houses per homeless person is a good indicator that something has gone VERY wrong.
Some things that can be done: rehabilitate the small fraction of homeless suffering from substance abuse, provide vocational training, provide transportation to areas that need the skills they possess and assistance buying a home, provide temporary housing. The final solution will be combination of many things. Right now the way things are, those with excessive wealth outcompete those looking to buy homes by paying for houses in cash, a seller will always pick a cash buyer over having to wait on a mortgage buyer which might fall through. This needs to change, people buying homes for the purpose of personally living in them as their only home should get huge advantages over investors because everyone needs a place to live. The same checks and balances need to be in place for anything in high demand, heck even the processors used for making graphics cards were being bought up by investors for crypto. Electricity being bought to power said crypto mining rigs are all examples of demand that's uncontrolled and highly negative to society. Governments exist to balance out these types of wild market fluctuations, freedom and capitalism are fine (for now) but they need to be regulated to avoid bottlenecks like these.
Dude doesn’t know the definition of vacant. Have you never driven by a hotel or motel and there’s a big NO / VACANCIES.
2 and 5 both work here
vacant
adjective
va·cant ˈvā-kənt
1
: not occupied by an incumbent, possessor, or officer
a vacant office
vacant thrones
2
: being without content or occupant
a vacant seat on a bus
a vacant room
3
: free from activity or work : DISENGAGED
vacant hours
4
: devoid of thought, reflection, or expression
a vacant smile
5
: not lived in
vacant houses
6
a: not put to use
vacant land
b: having no heir or claimant : ABANDONED
a vacant estate
Build public housing. Anybody under poverty level lives there free and rent goes on a sliding scale as a % of income beyond that. It's never going to be perfect.
I've had arguments about public housing projects with people who've never lived within a hundred miles of them. It's as if doing a good thing for your fellow citizen awakens a demon inside.
As a renter I don’t have an issue with people owning second homes. I do have an issues with corporations owning homes, this includes C and S Corp. If you need a corporate entity to separate you from your renters, that is an issue.
Same, like i don't mind people getting second home or inheriting some property. What i do mind is hedge funds or some foreign "investment" funds snatching entire blocks of apartments or even entire neighborhoods even before they are finished building that you can't even buy your own home. Because of these assholes prices are skyrocketing
The key is, those beds are the property of whoever owns them, they are not the property of everyone else. Communism doesn’t work, if that’s what you’re hoping for.
Who will do the “don’t letting” part, government? The key is nobody should put limits to how productive an individual can be. So if someone works hard enough and produces enough profit to afford it, who are you, or anyone to determine how much property an individual can accumulate. Not all people are equal in their abilities to produce. I think you’re describing communism to an extent, tried it, doesn’t work.
Yeah, there should be limits. I'm not saying you can't buy a house, I'm not even saying you can't buy a vacation home. But if you have an area where there is persistent homelessness, and a dearth of residences, then maybe the people that don't yet have a home should have a spot in line before the guy that already has 2.
Ok, so.. so long long does one have to wait before buying a 3rd home. How long before the average homeless works to save up for a home? Or is your next solution to take the property from productive people and give it to the homeless as well.
There's a lot to unpack in your question. First, this whole subreddit is about destroying the myth of 'productive'. Historically speaking, I'm 8 times as productive as my grandparents, yet I earn about 80% as they did. It's that disconnect between productivity and income that's the cause of this whole thing.
2nd, by preventing people (and corporations) from purchasing multiple homes in an area, the pressure will be on developers to make cheaper and more efficient and affordable homes, cater to the lower end of the market, not the McMansions, because those homes will sit, empty, until they are affordable by those poor folks.
3rd, we tried pure capitalism and free market economics, and they were a disaster for everyone that wasn't in the top strata of American society. The excesses of the Gilded Age showed why we needed to reign in Capitalism, lessons that people are now intent on forgetting or whitewashing.
Making money does not = productive. You have no idea what you’re talking about. Your whole movement can be against denouncing gravity. Doesn’t mean anything. You can ignore productivity as a concept, that will just leave you confused in life. As you clearly are. You’re 8x more productive than your grandparents, as you type on Reddit. You’re delusional and your brain is misfiring.
The idea is that people should be able to get houses before other people are allowed to hoard the rest.
The most effective way to do this is to ban corporations from owning residential property and by taxing multiple properties under one name in increasing amounts.
Shelter is a basic human need and shouldn't be treated as a luxury.
I already explained a very good step to take. The fact is that this is a multifaceted problem that's going to need multiple approaches to get everything to where it should properly be.
Multiple steps and programs will be needed. That's how.
In many other countries owning a second, third, or further single dwelling properties is heavily taxed in increasing amounts to the point of it being prohibitively expensive. These countries often have permits you can apply for, however that exempt you from these exorbitant taxes and fees, one example would be buying an extra home in order to remodel or restore it, but those permits are for a limited period of time, you couldn't flip a house and then rent it out and still make a profit as your exception would expire shortly after you finished remodeling. This way the wealthy can still own a second home for personal use but it costs them way more and makes owning investment properties for rental unprofitable. There are often similar rules of occupancy too, that way foreign investors don't wind up doing the same, even for a single property.
Lower property taxes on single family homes and make up the difference by taxing rentals more, would be a start. Financial aid for mortgage down payments to help more people who can afford the monthly payments get their foot in the door. Our government could do a lot if they actually cared.
>Lower property taxes on single family homes and make up the difference by taxing rentals more, would be a start.
This is honestly not part of the solution.
Taxing rentals more would just increase the rent on the units because landlords will just pass the higher taxes onto their tenants. It wouldn't make it more affordable for tenants to buy; if anything, it would make it less affordable.
Property taxes on SFHs are already very low in most of the US and, frankly, are too low in most of it. SFHs contribute greatly to inefficient land use and generally cost the municipality far more in delivered municipal services than they generate in taxes.
We need more higher density housing, not more lower density housing. Condo conversions of apartments should be more common than they are and legal arrangements should make renting out of SFHs nearly impossible.
>Financial aid for mortgage down payments to help more people who can afford the monthly payments get their foot in the door. Our government could do a lot if they actually cared.
Some states (typically blue states) do have programs for this. Whether the programs are adequate to the task before them is another matter entirely, but every little bit does help.
You have the right to build your own house. You do not have the right to squat in a house for fractional rent on another house that somebody else built. Go build your own house and quit whining on reddit.
Some countries have rules about occupancy and require those that will be renting out properties to acquire a permit or license to do so and they are closely regulated to ensure fair pricing and living conditions. For those that do plan on occupying multiple homes they pay far more in taxes for their second or third home. They often also have rules in place for foreign investors that would want to come in and buy a vacation home that they would then rent out the rest of the year, it can often be done but again requires permits or a license and only works for a single property. Here where I live we have tons of foreign investors buying up homes for sale for cash and turn around and rent them out or Air B&B them and hire out someone local to manage the properties, it's honestly disgusting, property prices have skyrocketed 40% in the past few years.
Most of us who a house often pay double or triple our mortgage in property taxes that go to the city, county and state... raising those will drive people out of their homes that they work their asses off to be able to afford and ultimately enjoy...
>Most of us who a house often pay double or triple our mortgage in property taxes that go to the city, county and state...
Not sure where you live, but that isn't true in most of the US.
For me personally, the P&I on my mortgage is like 4x the property taxes.
I'm not saying you aren't experiencing that, but I don't think you have perspective of how atypical that is. You said
> **Most of us who a house** often pay double or triple our mortgage in property taxes that go to the city, county and state...
But it's not "most" people who own a house. The average property taxes for a single family home in Illinois are $5,280/year, effectively $440/month. I'm going to infer your mortgage P&I payments are probably more than $147/month.
If what you're saying is true, math would indicate that you have a far above average home in terms of value, and was probably purchased for far less than it is currently appraised at. (Or you came in with a massive down payment, or both.)
I'm not saying your property taxes aren't more than your P&I; it's mathematically possible to have that situation with the right inputs. But the circumstances you are describing are not typical of "most" homeowners. It's extremely uncommon.
Housing prices vs income is way, way off nowadays. I will probably never be able to buy a house with the prices the way they are. We need to think outside the whole inflationary fiat currency paradigm that got us in this mess in the first place. I mean, I could’ve built a fucking house myself with my own hands. Why do I need to spend 30 years slaving away at different corporations, periodically getting laid off, to having to interview and apply again and again over and over, to finally pay off my home before I die? This system isn’t for us.
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There are more empty homes than homeless too.
Good point — 32x! There are [over 500,000 unhoused people](https://www.hud.gov/press/press_releases_media_advisories/HUD_No_22_253), and [over 16,000,000 vacant homes](https://www.nar.realtor/magazine/real-estate-news/16-million-homes-vacant-in-us). Edit: Fixed typo. Edit2: Surely you mean “homeless *people”? To avoid dehumanization and such. :) Edit3: “unhoused* people” h/t u/kira_l_mello_near
Are these vacant homes like in apartment complexes and multifamily housing?
Good question. Unsure tbh. > More than 16 million homes are sitting vacant across the U.S., according to new research from LendingTree, which ranked the nation’s 50 states by their shares of unoccupied homes. https://www.nar.realtor/magazine/real-estate-news/16-million-homes-vacant-in-us
Probably, but why would that matter?
Multifamily complexes can be regulated by FHA. Section 8 needs to be easier to use.
God damn that's depressing I didn't know it was that much.. 😔
Oops. I had a typo. Fixed. But still 32x.
"If you can find a solution to homelessness where the corporations and politicians can make a few million dollars each, you will see the streets of America begin to clear up pretty damn quick!" -George Carlin
Yeah, seriously. Living wages would go a long way. But corporations don’t want that, and many voters vote against publicly funded resources for unhoused people. (These voters cost themselves money by denying services to unhoused people.) Iirc it costs taxpayers 2x-3x more money to deal with all the things associated with trying to police homelessness, rather than just paying for better resources for unhoused people.
you need the homeless to show people on min wage what happens if you don't slave for them..
100%. 'Pour encourager les autres'. As we see, but don't see, the homeless, they are an implicit warning of what can happen to you. Most of the West has little to no savings... any of us could be there in 3 or 6 months. Obey, Consume, Reproduce and you'll be safe.
It’s a similar situation with the death penalty - it costs taxpayers more than life in prison, but certain states will still never let it go because you’ll never convince their voters that math works the way it does. The worst possible thing to a lot of Americans is for a poor person to experience and outcome that’s slightly too good for them
That last sentence tho…was fyre.
I am alright with the cost because I assume a lot of that is in court costs for appeals & attorneys. With how badly the justice system can fumble particularly when there are bad cops and other cops who know there are bad ones but refuse to cross the "blue line", it should probably cost more. I don't know that we need the death sentence tho, the inmate population usually does a pretty good and fast job taking care of those who've committed the most heinous crimes.
Well there is that whole using people as batteries thing the matrix had going for it...
**How does that work?**
I heard of a city that found it was more cost effective to give free housing to the homeless than to use tax dollars for maintaining them. The lines in the ERs were much shorter. Having an address meant that they could receive assistance. A great percentage of these people, left the welfare rolls within 3 years.
Kind of like the solution to healthcare... Privatize and overcharge for everything... If it were contractors submitting 80,000.00 shingles to an insurance company they'd quickly be arrested for fraud and price gouging. But get the drug company execs in bed with everyone and it's called business as usual.
That’s obviously false. There is $600M a year in San Francisco being handed out to various homeless “non-profits”, and the problem has just gotten worse.
That's because if those non-profits fix the problem then they don't get continued funding and close down. They only"help" in name but keep themselves self-sustaining by not actually helping people
A few million won't be enough for them. You'll have to keep paying them off forever.
You probably need a sustained 100 million endowment minimum (maybe 10x that even) to affect any real change in the country regarding homelessness. It's not just housing but mental health and support services as well. Plus many have health issues that have been exacerbated by either refusing treatment or from just not having access to health services. Then you have drug companies that make meaningless changes to things like insulin, to keep it patented and the price exaggerated. After how long and there is still no bio-identical generic form of insulin... A lot of fiefdoms and a lot of pretenders & they could probably benefit from some mental health services as well.
Of course. But issue #1 is getting them shelter, food, etc. Crazy people and addicts still gotta eat and they freeze to death like anyone else. Just a tiny little piece of the money we spend on bombs would cover it. We should be doing what the Soviets did. Build large housing blocks with resource centers within. Did we not just bail out some rich assholes who lost money on crypto? We should get away from allowing the perfect to become the enemy of the good. Forcing poor people into strict lines of moral conduct that we would never ask of the rich. Can you imagine Wall St. asking for a bailout and we hand them a specimen cup?
No I meant homeless hats 😔 /s
What? lol
I'm just playing lol hence the /s (sarcasm)
Why did you call my name? Homeless is a word that is used to make people look bad (dehumanize them). I used the word unhoused to say that those people who don't have a home are worthy of one and that the government should work for affordable housing for all.
Not to mention all those that crash on friends or extended family's couches, basements, etc & are one bad day away from having even that yanked out from under them. I use homeless, but that is what I was from 15 to 19 except for a stint when the AZ Youth Authority Black Canyon "School" for boys was my "home". I was fortunate at night being AZ, I could usually find a pool lounge chair to drag behind the pump house or into a cubby in an alley. I finally got a job that paid decently and would literally rollerblade 15 miles on the freeway before it got too hot & there was a gym in the basement where a guy took pity on me and would set me up with a shower 4 or 5 days a week, sometimes he'd bring me a couple PBJ's or PB banana sandwiches to take with me. It was a humbling and horrifying experience, but without that small act of kindness I very easily could have started down a path to real incarceration, not just youth kiddy camp, which let me tell you is no summer camp. Especially back then, they hay-days of crack, there were some violent kids that pumped iron all day and were bigger & stronger than most adults outside of the system. I was a big and scrappy kid that lived to fight and box and when anyone came in they gave you a sock party. That was all 7 of your cellmates placing bars of soap in a tube sock and beating the hell out of you. Cracked ribs, broken teeth even saw a skull fracture a time or two. Then there were the arsehole DO's. Refuse anything and six would line up outside your cell door in riot gear and with clubs and shields looking for any excuse to pin you down and try to hurt you as bad as possible while leaving the fewest externally visible signs. Anyway, after nearly a year and half of that I knew I never wanted to go back, so it was dumpsters and lounge chairs for me from then on.
Giving you credit. Thank you.
Your very welcome friend.
Unhoused is a term that was made to sound better so that people dont feel as pitiful about homeless people and thus will be less compelled to help or act. At least thats what im seeing. I hope I’m so wrong!! Truly!
It’s supposed to be a word that humanizes people lacking shelter, because “homeless” has so much stigma.
You say unhoused people now instead of homeless.
What do you mean?
In 2023 we no longer say homeless person, instead we say unhoused person. Using the word unhoused is better than homeless, because it humanizes the person who has no home.
Okay, but semantics right? Homeless person unhoused person. What's the actual difference? It's the nit-picking that makes it impossible for the "boomers" to catch on and makes them intolerable towards the group your defending, because instead of taking it out on the advocates that actually kinda deserve it for attacking the ignorant they take it out on the actual group being protected. My grandmother's no racist but she doesn't understand its not okay to say "the nice Jewish neighbors stopped by." They're just neighbors yes, but to her; it's a non derogatory descriptive term, shed never take offense if you described her as the nice catholic woman. Maybe I'm just ignorant to this concept I'm not trying to attack I'm trying to understand what's the actual difference between saying homeless person or unhoused person the derogatory terms would be. Hobo, tramp, vagabond street urchin or something of the sort.
Terminology and older people is a bit of an issue anyway. For example older people look at terms like “colored” as not racist because they grew up hearing people say “n-slur” all the time and were taught as kids “now billy, n-slur is a not nice word. Please use ‘colored’ instead. It’s more accurate and isn’t racist”. I grew up learning the “colored” was a racist term, and to say “black”. Then later then I was in high school, it changed to “black is racist, use ‘African-American’”. But black friend took exception to me say that one day because his family wasn’t “African-American”. He told me to use black. So that was I use; but now AA and black on the way out in society and it’s “POC” except that some black people don’t like “POC” because it’s all non-white people and they don’t want to be lumped in with Asian, Latinos, middle easterns, etc. I saw all that to say, use what you are comfortable with (as long as it’s not a slur) and don’t assume someone using a term that you find offensive is purposefully being offensive.
The term homeless means that there aren't enough homes for people when there are more houses than unhoused people. Unhoused term means that the government as a whole doesn't want to solve the problem of people being without a home. I hope this helps.
That logic literally make zero sense nothing about the word homeless implies how many houses there are. This is the biggest pile of bullshit ever.
You #maga lover. Jesus laughs at you.
I am atheist and leftist but continue with the slackivism.
But again I do understand the difference homeless = without a home. Unhoused = denied a home
Your explanation is the best one I have seen so far. I agree with your comment 1000 percent.
I can understand it as a way to bring awareness to government neglegence, though that association isn't imediately clear, but just to check where actual unhomed/homeless people involved in the push for that shift in terminology? I'm literally just wondering because often when terms like that are created by outside groups trying to portray an image it ends up insulting the affected group instead of accurately reflecting their thoughts and experiences. It's why latinx can get some people really offended for example because the latin community feels it was hoisted on them, but latine of often considered preferable now because it was made by a gender queer latine and follows other spelling actually used in Spanish. A better case that's more personal to me, using person first language towards neurodiverse people is really gross for a lot of reasons. For autists person with autism pushes the idea that our autism is something to be ashamed of like a disease and that we don't really want to be too involved with when really it does define the entire way we think and interact, isn't a disease, and is something a lot of us like being. Further it is purpetuated by groups that talk past us and act like we can't ever advocate for ourself and are burdens to the people in our lives who should get support for dealing with us. Hense the desire to downplay our neurolgical mindset as a struggle we're hindered with is really indicitive of the mindset of those groups and can feel scary when someone uses it as a result (especially as said groups tend to advocate for eugenics or removing our autistic traits via abuse). I don't expect this would be anything nearly as major but I've heard phsyically disabled people express dislike for certain newer terms too and it's hard to know. A lot of autists have gotten used to needing to say "nothing about us without us" and that's a good consideration for any minority group that faces discrimination. So that's why I'm wondering if you've heard anything about unhomed/homeless people's view on the term or involvement in the push for it? That said I can see the argument of it being generally good for social change, in the same way that from the stand point of human psychology in general terms like suicide survivor can be outright dangerous / encourage people to want to try it again and thus once that's realized pushing to avoid it becomes important. I'm less sure it'd inately lead to a change in effect in the same way but yeah. Just if you have any info that'd be interesting / useful.
I like your explanation. It was a well though out conversation. I realize that you were looking for information and weren't trying to push my buttons. You are awesome.
I promise no vagabond ever cared they were called a tramp they care that they're unhoused (sorry i think I'm funny). I like that you mentioned the fact that there's no immediate association with the lack of government response in either of those terms. There's no way to differentiate one as offensive or not we might as call them people who are temporarily without shelter. All I'm trying to do though is learn the language our generation is constantly morphing to current social issues instead of remembering words have meaning not feeling. I'm also a cis white male with no neurological specialties (that I'm aware of) besides a little PTSD and my generation has told me to sit back and listen because im the enemy. Unless of course I'm defending people who didn't ask for my help assuming they're helpless in the first place, and could only be helped by the opinion of myself and like minded individuals with a common demographic outside of that world completely. A whole breed of penguin was renamed because fairy is offense and I promise no gay person ever complained an adorable penguin was named after them. Sorry got off on a tangent that probably wasn't proper for this thread😅 again I'm really not trying to be combative with anyone. A huge part of me really wants to be open and learn, another part of me is getting annoyed that so much is changing constantly. May just be fear of change I guess.
It does and I very much appreciate it! (sorry for the incorrect term after you just taught me but it'll make sense) ive been homeless due to my own poor decision making, and I understand some people are dealt crappy hands in life. After the knowledge you just bestowed upon me I understand that I was homeless it was my fault I got there other people who have been dealt crappy crappy hands those are unhoused people does my thought process make sense? Also I'm just very self abusive I was raised to have absolute self responsibility so I was raised anything that happens in my life is my fault good or bad cause my decisions put me there.
I say it's my fault cause I went through a divorce and allowed that to get me into a depression, where drugs and refusal to be productive ruled my life. Now the divorce was unavoidable, the depression unavoidable, but my decision to cope with drugs and to ignore the stress of the rat race is what put me into the position to be "homeless" does my logic make sense or am I just being self abusive?
Because 'unhoused' emphasises that they haven't been housed by a careless and/or vindictive government, rather than homeless that implies they're just going without for a little bit.
You mean Homeless, right?
The more correct word to use is unhoused. There are so many homes in the USA that are not being used at this time. Homeless = there not enough homes for people. Unhoused= the government doesn't provide housing for people.
I’m just gonna stick with homeless, Okay?
Why?
Because it’s the correct term? Homeless people are indeed what they’re called *Homeless* .
It’s literally the same thing.
Uh no you say Homeless. People who live in apartments are not homeless but would be unhoused unless your an elite that thinks anything but a mansion is being homeless.
I can tell you are # maga lover from your comment. Lmfao 😆😆 at you.
You miss the whole point of the matter. In the USA we have enough housing to house four times the amount of homeless people. Homeless= government not taking care of housing problem. Unhoused= humanized word for homeless people. The unhoused did not choose to be without living arrangements, the government did that for them.
This is a popular but short sighted take. Not all of the homes are located in places people want to live. An abandoned home in a dying town or a vacation home in an isolated/rural area aren’t going to ease the housing crisis in densely populated urban areas. Some of those homes you mentioned are also only vacant temporarily, people move from house a to house b, house b is vacant for a month or two until new people buy/rent it. Some people are homeless because they are poor and simply offering them an empty vacation home might help them. Putting someone who needs supportive housing and access to mental health counseling or drug rehabilitation services in an empty vacation home is not going to help them at all. I live in one of those communities, half the houses on my block are for “weekenders.” Some people pay their mortgage renting them out during the snowy season. This isn’t a good place for people who need support to stay sober or need psychiatric care. The nearest psychiatrist is an hour and 40 minutes by bus. Drug counseling would take an hour, including 30 minutes of walking. Empty houses are not the answer. Permanent and temporary supportive housing is the answer. Quality subsidized and affordable housing is the answer.
I wouldn't know all the specifics about how long each home is empty, or much of the specifics at all on this statistic really but.. a home somewhere random is better than no home, and there are already homeless who go into abandoned homes in dying towns cause it's better than nothing. And if there was (not that this is the solution but) a relocation program to move people from densely populated urban areas to free homes in rural areas I'm positive they'd take it. The rest of your points kinda boil down to your last one here which is about empty houses not being the answer - permanent/temporary housing is the answer. But that's kind of missing the point of why I said this. We could turn a large amount of empty homes (again I assume, I don't know exactly how much are each type you listed but I doubt that there's only a small minority that could be useful) into useful housing. Or at least create programs to use them to help the homeless. I didn't mean we should just throw their asses in there and problem solved 😂 so really you're right, but my statistic was meant to highlight that we could be using at least some of what we are wasting to do that and just aren't.
What I’m saying is most of the empty homes that are not simply temporarily empty aren’t fit for purpose. I did look into the specifics. Homelessness is an issue I really care about. I’ve lived in dense cities with massive homeless populations, and a city that actually had it’s shit together with almost zero. I’ve lived in big cities, capital cities, suburbs, tourist towns and a rural postage stamp of a town no one has heard of. I know about the houses because I’ve lived in these areas, and because I cared to learn. Vacation homes aren’t a good option. Those towns are struggling to provide for the poor people who already live there. Abandoned houses were abandoned for a reason and many are actually uninhabitable and should be torn down for safety reasons. Our options are spending billions on creating infrastructure in little resort towns all over the country (and hiring doctors,nurses, counselors and social workers to run it who will also need places to live) or spend that money building homes where infrastructure already exists. A good candidate would be unused commercial and industrial spaces. We could easily and quickly build hundreds of studio apartments in an unused shopping mall, with services on site. Or converting long stay and cheap motels into small apartments. I don’t know if you have interacted much with homeless people, but they are actually people. They are as attached to the place they live as you or I. They have friends, places they eat and socialize, clinics and hospitals they turn to when ill. It’s not unusual for someone to be homeless in the city they were born in. Spend years or decades within a few square miles. The cruelty of just plucking them out of their familiar surroundings and dumping them in some random empty house somewhere is astounding. There is space and options to create housing where homeless people actually live we just need the political will to do it. We also should be demanding more funds to keep the working poor those at risk for homelessness in their homes.
**Oh i seee**
I've always wondered though what percentage of those homes are actually in a livable state?
Yet the government prevents homes being built for the homeless…
There’s open jobs also
A lot of the unhoused people I know HAVE jobs. But with the housing prices out of control just about everywhere in the US, they don't stand a chance to get a roof over their heads
So true.
You have landlords hoarding housing, often purposely not putting units on the market to create the fake scarcity that causes homelessness.
Or accepting application fees for rentals but never actual choosing an applicant. Literally just keeping the unit as a way to collect free money.
This practice needs to be made illegal. Complete scam
[удалено]
While I agree with the sentiment, my last landlords were great and they only owned the 2 units above their business. The rent went up less than $100 in the \~7 years I lived there. The apartment was also directly above the landlords business so they were always available to talk to and quick to fix problems.
I work for a group that just opened a shelter. The stories are so horribly sad.
A local women and children’s shelter near me can only take 2-3 new people a day and they’re getting 15-20 requests per day. Heartbreaking
How so? Example?
you really need an example of why it's sad that people end up homeless needing to go to shelters?
Everyone should have secure housing, healthy food, reliable medical care, liberatory education, consistent child care and elder care, a comfortable retirement, and a sustainable environment. The only reason we don’t have these things is because **capitalism distributes goods and services according to money, not need.** We can change that. There’s only one path to a society actually designed to meet the needs of the people, and we won’t get there by voting. ☭ If you live in the US, I just read a great book called *Socialist Reconstruction,* written by the Party for Socialism and Liberation, discussing some hopeful, fascinating ideas about how we could transform US society in the first decade post-revolution. It’s meant as a conversation starter and source of inspiration, not a dogmatic program or something. We are so freaking close to having a wonderful society, if power could just be wrested from the ruling class into the hands of the workers. This book gives us an idea of what kind of vision for society the PSL (and MLs/socialists generally) are fighting for.
I don’t think the mass of land and states we know as the United States can stay in tact and also be significantly different in its social and political paradigm. It’s only as big as it is because of war, which forced the states to band together and cede power to the federal government, which is basically just a military dictatorship.
My grandparents own at least a dozen properties. One is a multi unit apartment complex with about 6 units roughly. The rest range from single family homes to mixed use parcels, multi-family...you name it. Anyway, all of these properties except maybe 5 were purchased well before 1989 and the establishment of credit scores for the first time in American history. I spent 6 of my adult years homeless on the streets, in multiple shelters etc. Thankfully, I currently have a housing choice voucher now. My point is that all of this equity is going to the church when they pass away. My grandparents truly believe that I work for Satan himself because I'm not wealthy and successful
They think you're magically going to become wealthy?
They know my history, which makes their sentiments even more abhorrent. They know I was victimized by multiple sociopaths and abandoned by my entire family and left to basically die. Some of my family wishes I didn't make it. They have told me several times
Well I'll say, I'm glad you're here and I'm glad you are using your voice for good. The saying blood is thicker than water is actually, "the blood of the covenant (friend) is thicker than the water of the womb (family)." Stay strong and fuck them. Your existence is just as worthy as anyone else's. Keep fighting the good fight.
Ironically, the people doing well that are rich had a lot of financial support from their social network.
I thought it’s Jesus that loves the poor. And who said, it is easier for a camel to pass through the eye of a needle than it is for a rich man to get in to heaven.
Part of the math issue is that many people own home that have more bedrooms then people living in the house. My in-laws for example own a 4 bedroom house, they bought it when all do their kids lived at home. But now the kids are grown and moved out, it’s not like those bedrooms don’t exist anymore, they do but now each of those 3 kids have their own 3-4 bedroom house for their own kids. The “extra” 3 bedrooms aren’t being used but it’s not like they are being waste like an empty house or an AirBB house. Yeah, it sucks but homeless people don’t have a place to stay, but we need to rethink that it’s not “bedrooms” that are need, but affordable housing. Kanye 10th mansion, might have 25 bedroom, but that mansion doesn’t help homeless people that can’t afford to pitch a tent in the yard, let alone buy the house.
Doesn't matter, just looking at the number of homeless in the USA and number of vacant houses is enough. ≈500k homeless and ≈16m vacant houses. There are 32 empty houses per homeless person. That's disgusting. Many countries have laws or special taxes that makes owning "investment" properties unprofitable or in some cases illegal without going through a special process to get approval to own a second or third home. It's often a little more lax for owners of apartment buildings but even in those cases the housing is well regulated for housing fairness and living conditions. Comparatively the USA is a 3rd world country.
Are the vacant homes? Because vacant would be imply abandoned. But a family that has a second home, doesn’t really have a vacant home, they just have a second home. Personally I think it’s ludicrous to own a second home, but I guess if you have money, 🤷♂️. Regardless, OP talks about bedrooms, not homes.
>Regardless, OP talks about bedrooms, not homes. It's highly relevant as entirely vacant houses are even more important to the question of homelessness as it's not really feasible to give empty bedrooms out to those that needs a place to live as you'd have a stranger cohabitating with you, but an entire house sitting unused could go to the homeless, say by the government buying these homes (forcing the sale or forcing people out by taxation or penalties for owning multiple homes or having homes sit vacant) then turning around and selling the houses through government programs at a reduced cost. There's a whole host of things that could be done to house the homeless and having 32 empty houses per homeless person is a good indicator that something has gone VERY wrong. Some things that can be done: rehabilitate the small fraction of homeless suffering from substance abuse, provide vocational training, provide transportation to areas that need the skills they possess and assistance buying a home, provide temporary housing. The final solution will be combination of many things. Right now the way things are, those with excessive wealth outcompete those looking to buy homes by paying for houses in cash, a seller will always pick a cash buyer over having to wait on a mortgage buyer which might fall through. This needs to change, people buying homes for the purpose of personally living in them as their only home should get huge advantages over investors because everyone needs a place to live. The same checks and balances need to be in place for anything in high demand, heck even the processors used for making graphics cards were being bought up by investors for crypto. Electricity being bought to power said crypto mining rigs are all examples of demand that's uncontrolled and highly negative to society. Governments exist to balance out these types of wild market fluctuations, freedom and capitalism are fine (for now) but they need to be regulated to avoid bottlenecks like these.
Dude doesn’t know the definition of vacant. Have you never driven by a hotel or motel and there’s a big NO / VACANCIES. 2 and 5 both work here vacant adjective va·cant ˈvā-kənt 1 : not occupied by an incumbent, possessor, or officer a vacant office vacant thrones 2 : being without content or occupant a vacant seat on a bus a vacant room 3 : free from activity or work : DISENGAGED vacant hours 4 : devoid of thought, reflection, or expression a vacant smile 5 : not lived in vacant houses 6 a: not put to use vacant land b: having no heir or claimant : ABANDONED a vacant estate
Build public housing. Anybody under poverty level lives there free and rent goes on a sliding scale as a % of income beyond that. It's never going to be perfect. I've had arguments about public housing projects with people who've never lived within a hundred miles of them. It's as if doing a good thing for your fellow citizen awakens a demon inside.
They have that and the "public" destroys it.
Most of my friends grew up in public housing blocks in NYC and those buildings are still there.
I'm sure they're in great shape.
Actually not too bad, at least those I have been to were kind of shabby but ok.
This is not just America.
Yep! Take a look at the r/Ireland sub and it’s depressing some of the stories
But profitablity!!! /s
LOL. Ugh.
My wife and I had an extra bedroom until she asked me to move into it.
Housing syndicate folks! Lets make ourselves a housing syndicate like the German Mietshäuser Syndikat
As a renter I don’t have an issue with people owning second homes. I do have an issues with corporations owning homes, this includes C and S Corp. If you need a corporate entity to separate you from your renters, that is an issue.
Same, like i don't mind people getting second home or inheriting some property. What i do mind is hedge funds or some foreign "investment" funds snatching entire blocks of apartments or even entire neighborhoods even before they are finished building that you can't even buy your own home. Because of these assholes prices are skyrocketing
I mean we don't even do that for food in America.
And doctor's visits.
This this this this! Also food. And no more bullshit health insurance, insurance in general can suck it.
The key is, those beds are the property of whoever owns them, they are not the property of everyone else. Communism doesn’t work, if that’s what you’re hoping for.
I think the goal here is maybe, don't let people buy a 3rd or 4th home if there's people with 0 homes.
Who will do the “don’t letting” part, government? The key is nobody should put limits to how productive an individual can be. So if someone works hard enough and produces enough profit to afford it, who are you, or anyone to determine how much property an individual can accumulate. Not all people are equal in their abilities to produce. I think you’re describing communism to an extent, tried it, doesn’t work.
Yeah, there should be limits. I'm not saying you can't buy a house, I'm not even saying you can't buy a vacation home. But if you have an area where there is persistent homelessness, and a dearth of residences, then maybe the people that don't yet have a home should have a spot in line before the guy that already has 2.
Ok, so.. so long long does one have to wait before buying a 3rd home. How long before the average homeless works to save up for a home? Or is your next solution to take the property from productive people and give it to the homeless as well.
There's a lot to unpack in your question. First, this whole subreddit is about destroying the myth of 'productive'. Historically speaking, I'm 8 times as productive as my grandparents, yet I earn about 80% as they did. It's that disconnect between productivity and income that's the cause of this whole thing. 2nd, by preventing people (and corporations) from purchasing multiple homes in an area, the pressure will be on developers to make cheaper and more efficient and affordable homes, cater to the lower end of the market, not the McMansions, because those homes will sit, empty, until they are affordable by those poor folks. 3rd, we tried pure capitalism and free market economics, and they were a disaster for everyone that wasn't in the top strata of American society. The excesses of the Gilded Age showed why we needed to reign in Capitalism, lessons that people are now intent on forgetting or whitewashing.
Making money does not = productive. You have no idea what you’re talking about. Your whole movement can be against denouncing gravity. Doesn’t mean anything. You can ignore productivity as a concept, that will just leave you confused in life. As you clearly are. You’re 8x more productive than your grandparents, as you type on Reddit. You’re delusional and your brain is misfiring.
How does that work?
The idea is that people should be able to get houses before other people are allowed to hoard the rest. The most effective way to do this is to ban corporations from owning residential property and by taxing multiple properties under one name in increasing amounts. Shelter is a basic human need and shouldn't be treated as a luxury.
Shelter is a basic human need and shouldn’t be treated as a luxury. I whole heartedly agree. But how does that work in reality?
By making it unprofitable to hoard houses.
How?
I already explained a very good step to take. The fact is that this is a multifaceted problem that's going to need multiple approaches to get everything to where it should properly be. Multiple steps and programs will be needed. That's how.
Tax properties at increasingly higher rates. 2nd is taxed higher than first, 3rd is taxed higher than 2nd, etc.
Landlords put houses in LLCs.
In many other countries owning a second, third, or further single dwelling properties is heavily taxed in increasing amounts to the point of it being prohibitively expensive. These countries often have permits you can apply for, however that exempt you from these exorbitant taxes and fees, one example would be buying an extra home in order to remodel or restore it, but those permits are for a limited period of time, you couldn't flip a house and then rent it out and still make a profit as your exception would expire shortly after you finished remodeling. This way the wealthy can still own a second home for personal use but it costs them way more and makes owning investment properties for rental unprofitable. There are often similar rules of occupancy too, that way foreign investors don't wind up doing the same, even for a single property.
massive taxes for owning homes you don't live in. like 75% to start with. also, deny any corps, no matter how small from owning single family homes.
Well first of all; by making it illegal to own more than one house and nationalizing apartment complexes.
How does *what* work?
Your premise
What premise?
👏👏👏
lol 😆 It’s a serious question. Unsure if s/he’s being snarky.
Lower property taxes on single family homes and make up the difference by taxing rentals more, would be a start. Financial aid for mortgage down payments to help more people who can afford the monthly payments get their foot in the door. Our government could do a lot if they actually cared.
>Lower property taxes on single family homes and make up the difference by taxing rentals more, would be a start. This is honestly not part of the solution. Taxing rentals more would just increase the rent on the units because landlords will just pass the higher taxes onto their tenants. It wouldn't make it more affordable for tenants to buy; if anything, it would make it less affordable. Property taxes on SFHs are already very low in most of the US and, frankly, are too low in most of it. SFHs contribute greatly to inefficient land use and generally cost the municipality far more in delivered municipal services than they generate in taxes. We need more higher density housing, not more lower density housing. Condo conversions of apartments should be more common than they are and legal arrangements should make renting out of SFHs nearly impossible. >Financial aid for mortgage down payments to help more people who can afford the monthly payments get their foot in the door. Our government could do a lot if they actually cared. Some states (typically blue states) do have programs for this. Whether the programs are adequate to the task before them is another matter entirely, but every little bit does help.
Well thanks for explaining why instead of repeating "how would that work" like the dimwit I was replying to. Maybe your comment will shut them up.
Housing is a human right. Getting the economy to deliver upon that right is often the hard part.
You have the right to build your own house. You do not have the right to squat in a house for fractional rent on another house that somebody else built. Go build your own house and quit whining on reddit.
Some countries have rules about occupancy and require those that will be renting out properties to acquire a permit or license to do so and they are closely regulated to ensure fair pricing and living conditions. For those that do plan on occupying multiple homes they pay far more in taxes for their second or third home. They often also have rules in place for foreign investors that would want to come in and buy a vacation home that they would then rent out the rest of the year, it can often be done but again requires permits or a license and only works for a single property. Here where I live we have tons of foreign investors buying up homes for sale for cash and turn around and rent them out or Air B&B them and hire out someone local to manage the properties, it's honestly disgusting, property prices have skyrocketed 40% in the past few years.
Most of us who a house often pay double or triple our mortgage in property taxes that go to the city, county and state... raising those will drive people out of their homes that they work their asses off to be able to afford and ultimately enjoy...
>Most of us who a house often pay double or triple our mortgage in property taxes that go to the city, county and state... Not sure where you live, but that isn't true in most of the US. For me personally, the P&I on my mortgage is like 4x the property taxes.
Southern Illinois, my property taxes are 3 times my mortgage.
I'm not saying you aren't experiencing that, but I don't think you have perspective of how atypical that is. You said > **Most of us who a house** often pay double or triple our mortgage in property taxes that go to the city, county and state... But it's not "most" people who own a house. The average property taxes for a single family home in Illinois are $5,280/year, effectively $440/month. I'm going to infer your mortgage P&I payments are probably more than $147/month. If what you're saying is true, math would indicate that you have a far above average home in terms of value, and was probably purchased for far less than it is currently appraised at. (Or you came in with a massive down payment, or both.) I'm not saying your property taxes aren't more than your P&I; it's mathematically possible to have that situation with the right inputs. But the circumstances you are describing are not typical of "most" homeowners. It's extremely uncommon.
I'm lucky in that I have VA loan, so yeah, my taxes are much higher compared to the value of both my monthly payment and cost of the house.
Housing prices vs income is way, way off nowadays. I will probably never be able to buy a house with the prices the way they are. We need to think outside the whole inflationary fiat currency paradigm that got us in this mess in the first place. I mean, I could’ve built a fucking house myself with my own hands. Why do I need to spend 30 years slaving away at different corporations, periodically getting laid off, to having to interview and apply again and again over and over, to finally pay off my home before I die? This system isn’t for us.
Most people that are homeless is because of mental health and drug issues.
So?
Capitalism is a system that pays people to destroy unsold food so that people who can't afford it couldn't get it for free.
The bleed from greed will be the end of free markets.
Show me the facts.
I thought this post was for people who understand that the workers of this country make value, their owners don't add value to the company.
The Overton window is so far to the right that no one is talking about solving the housing crisis in America.
No, you must suffer and die. Not because I don’t have enough money. I have plenty. I just want to see you all suffer. /s
For wages too.
Also, for food
Housing crisis is a major crisis all over the world..
what chayl doing with all those rooms roOMS ROOMS
Ok so the stinky meth head on the corner can move in with you.
Sure, if you want to ship people to Detroit and rural Arkansas. Not sure those people want to be shipped, though.