No one should be allowed to own a residence where they do not actually reside.

That alone would change all KINDS of things.

Another interesting proposal I've heard, and quite like is: corporations are not allowed to buy homes. Ever.

They can own them if they build them (which is necessary for organisations that build social housing, for example), but if they sell, they have to sell to people. A bank may come to own a house when the original owner can't pay the mortgage anymore, but if the bank wants to sell the house, they have to sell it to a person. Other than that, any corporation that wants to own houses, has to build them themselves thereby expanding the housing supply, instead of shrinking it by buying existing houses.

@violetmadder @storyworker @shamogan
Yes, I agree. All I’ve tried to convey is that “not wanting to purchase and own a home under capitalism” is not the same as “not wanting a permanent home in the abstract,” and the latter doesn’t somehow justify rentierism.

For example, if you’re not physically capable of maintaining a house and rent instead, you’re paying a landlord rents and probably a salary to hire a worker to perform maintenance. This is not something a landlord is necessary for; the landlord is still just inserted into a transaction between you and a maintenance worker.

There’s a whole universe of mechanisms by which people could live without permanent homes and still not rely on rentier landlords.

@iwein

Private ownership is artificial scarcity.

Aside from any property taxes or cadastral registry, the cost of ownership is effectively zero.

Owning something for someone else is not a service.

(and property taxes are also artificial scarcity)

@iwein@mas.to

@HeavenlyPossum at low scale the costs of ownership are not negligible, and if we remove the speculative value, as we should imo, then owning something for someone else is a service with an associated fair price.

I think the root causes are not the ownership itself, but:

1. Human rights to shelter are not guaranteed properly,
2. Artificial scarcity and unfair prices are allowed.

If the private ownership would be limited, the service of owning shelters should be provided still.

@storyworker @iwein @violetmadder

But even if we take the very narrow view of profit as income over operating expenditures, all rent is profit. The operating expenditure of ownership is effectively zero.

@storyworker @violetmadder @iwein
Even if landlords are operating “at cost,” they are probably acquiring equity.

If they’re not even acquiring equity, they’re probably just really bad at landlording.

@shamogan @storyworker @violetmadder

I quite explicitly said in this thread that not wanting to own a home makes plenty of sense under capitalism, because it entails all sorts of financial and cognitive costs.

That doesn’t mean that being housed intrinsically accrues these costs, and it also doesn’t mean that rentierism somehow becomes good.

@violetmadder @storyworker

It is your business because it is your home and you are financing its costs through your rent while accruing no ownership over it.

@violetmadder @storyworker
Yes, I am making the claim that “the universe provided it” is a nicely poetical metaphor but it doesn’t change the reality of how houses are built or financed.

Are you telling me that no one built your house and no one pays for it?

@violetmadder @storyworker

Your claim is false. “The universe” did not provide you with a roof over your head. It did not suddenly appear. It did not congeal through magic. It did not accrete through natural processes. Someone made it (a builder) and someone financed it (you).

Landlords merely interject themselves into that process to collect rents—a toll, a private tax—off your need for housing.

@violetmadder @storyworker

The universe did not give you a roof over your head. A builder constructed it and you are financing its costs and upkeep.

@storyworker @violetmadder

Medieval serfs were also taught to believe that their feudal lord had provided them the homes that those serfs had built and the farms that those serfs worked.

@storyworker @violetmadder

I am not describing a labyrinth of words and concepts. You are purchasing housing for your landlord, and possibly paying them a salary in the process.

That doesn’t mean you can’t feel gratitude that you are housed. I am immensely grateful that I am housed. That doesn’t mean you can’t have a positive interpersonal relationship with your landlord. I’m not questioning your personal experience.

I would like people to be able to see things for how they really are, and landlording really is a feudal holdover.