Population and Housing

[Acitta]

I see a lot of boomer comments on housing related news articles (don't ask why I read the comments...) stating no sympathy for younger generations, because they have it so easy with 2% interest rates. Back in their day they had an uphill both ways 12% rate! They seem to ignore the fact that, especially with housing, people are only concerned with the carrying cost (mortgage payments) leading to proportional asset inflation.

Gotta stay far away from comment sections my dude. Those places will give you brainrot haha.

Boomers need their internet privileges taken away TBH. Not only did they ruin the world and planet, they've now ruined the internet. Used to be "our" place to unplug (by plugging in) and have fun in a new technology, culture and world but then Web 2.0 dumbed down the internet to the point every dumb boomer in the world is on Twitter or in comment sections saying asinine things.

I am a boomer. I programmed an IBM 360 by typing programs on hollerith cards on an 029 keypunch. I bought my first personal computer in 1979. I built an acoustic modem from a kit. When did you buy your first computer, kid?

[dtkvictim]

I see a lot of boomer comments on housing related news articles (don't ask why I read the comments...) stating no sympathy for younger generations, because they have it so easy with 2% interest rates. Back in their day they had an uphill both ways 12% rate! They seem to ignore the fact that, especially with housing, people are only concerned with the carrying cost (mortgage payments) leading to proportional asset inflation.

Gotta stay far away from comment sections my dude. Those places will give you brainrot haha.

Boomers need their internet privileges taken away TBH. Not only did they ruin the world and planet, they've now ruined the internet. Used to be "our" place to unplug (by plugging in) and have fun in a new technology, culture and world but then Web 2.0 dumbed down the internet to the point every dumb boomer in the world is on Twitter or in comment sections saying asinine things.

If I'm not hearing arguments that are new and uncomfortable to me, then I'm stagnating with my present beliefs than I'm sure are flawed. And trust me, there are far more upsetting places you can (and I do) browse than mainstream media comment sections. They certainly aren't the most informed arguments, but you can find nuggets of truth or a good laugh anywhere...

Despite being an early adopter of both Facebook and Twitter, I've been without social media accounts for almost a decade now (unless you count this forum). Believe me, it frees up a massive amount of mental capacity to deal with things you wish you hadn't read.

You are probably right about the internet having been irreversibly changed from what it was in the early 2000s though, but it had already been a decade of the eternal September at that point, so who am I to complain.

Do we really look down on renters? I know some professional people who prefer to rent, for reasons similar to yours. And I don't think they're looked down on. On the other hand, many people aspire to own their houses (or condos), either to "own" something, or because they believe that it's a fabulous investment. I personally think it's more of the latter and less of the former.

Finally, there is far less variety and selection in the rental market than in the houses and condos being sold.

I don't know if "looking down" is perfectly accurate, but a lot of people have some sort of related sentiment. There is a lot of pressure in my family to own a house, which says at least something about my family's opinion of renters.

And in my opinion is very unfortunate that our society looks down on renters. There can be many advantages to renting. Peace of mind, stability, and flexibility are obvious examples. But they fall apart when legislation and the market conspire to make housing an investment not a home.

...

Renting gives you peace of mind and stability because when the roof on the house I live in right now fails, I don't need to come up with 50k to replace it, nor do I need to come up with 15k for a new combi heatpump. I also have the next 3 years of rent increases locked in the same way a mortgagee would.

I don't agree with the arguments of peace of mind and stability though. Renters don't have particularly strong guarantees of long term occupancy, which basically throws peace of mind out the window. Even with extremely strong renter rights, I can't imagine a scenario where I'd be confident that I could live out my entire life in a rental, which is what I would need for peace of mind and stability. If there is a possibility I have to move on anyone's terms other than my own, I don't have either of those things.

Even your "unexpected" costs aren't entirely unexpected, and can be planned for. To be honest, I'm more confident in my own ability to budget and plan for such expenses and routine maintenance than I am in any landlord.

[ijmorlan]

Gotta stay far away from comment sections my dude. Those places will give you brainrot haha.

Boomers need their internet privileges taken away TBH. Not only did they ruin the world and planet, they've now ruined the internet. Used to be "our" place to unplug (by plugging in) and have fun in a new technology, culture and world but then Web 2.0 dumbed down the internet to the point every dumb boomer in the world is on Twitter or in comment sections saying asinine things.

I am a boomer. I programmed an IBM 360 by typing programs on hollerith cards on an 029 keypunch. I bought my first personal computer in 1979. I built an acoustic modem from a kit. When did you buy your first computer, kid?

https://dilbert.com/strip/1995-06-24

Yeah, I don’t think boomers as a group are really the problem here. If we’re going to blame anybody, it’s all the random people who don’t know anything about how it works, don’t care to learn, and who are pandered to by ill-considered features from people who should know better. For example, the way browsers are moving in the direction of hiding the actual URL of the page. Browser makers, as technical people, should know better.

[ijmorlan]

Renting should does not have to be a bad thing. In a reasonable housing market, renters can pay the carrying costs of a home, and don't have to come out behind owners. This was true for at least some of our history and also the history in other places.

The problem is our housing supply, not whether it is owned or not.

Yes, you make a lot of good points. I should just clarify that I don’t think it’s bad to rent; it’s just my guess that no mortgages would lead to substantially all the housing stock being owned by large landlords. I think it’s desirable for typical people to have a realistic chance of being able to choose to rent or buy, so based on this I prefer the housing stock to be owned more widely. But I don’t look down on people who rent and I’m not that interested in the specific fraction of people who end up buying vs. renting.

[robdrimmie]

comment sections saying asinine things.

Like baseless ageist comments?

[danbrotherston]

I am a boomer. I programmed an IBM 360 by typing programs on hollerith cards on an 029 keypunch. I bought my first personal computer in 1979. I built an acoustic modem from a kit. When did you buy your first computer, kid?

https://dilbert.com/strip/1995-06-24

Yeah, I don’t think boomers as a group are really the problem here. If we’re going to blame anybody, it’s all the random people who don’t know anything about how it works, don’t care to learn, and who are pandered to by ill-considered features from people who should know better. For example, the way browsers are moving in the direction of hiding the actual URL of the page. Browser makers, as technical people, should know better.

Ugh...Scott Adams.

Anyway, I actually disagree with this point. We should develop technology to be more user friendly and more accessible. I don't have to know an internal combustion engine works to drive a car. I shouldn't have to know how the underlying technologies work to use the web.

Obviously it is a grey area discussion of whether a URL should be underlying technology or part of the user experience, but given how my parents have been using computers and the web for decades, still fail to understand what a URL is, I'd say there's a reasonable argument for it being an underlying component.

These things also change over time. At one point using the command line was the "user friendly" way of using a computer for people who didn't understand programming.

But this is a fairly large digression.

I certainly don't think you folks look down on renters, but tomh asked if people look down on people for renting, and yeah, they definitely do. I have experienced it. There is an expectation that you will own your home when you have the means, and if you don't then it's because you have failed to gain the means.

And yeah, the selection really is better in owned homes...it's just one more way that owned homes are prioritized.

[plam]

And yeah, the selection really is better in owned homes...it's just one more way that owned homes are prioritized.

Was definitely true in KW in 2008. I don't know whether it's still true, since I haven't really been in the market. It is true that you generally don't have to move if you don't want to, if you own your own residential real estate. Montreal less so.

NZ has perhaps even more of a "owning real estate" culture, and what's more, people tend to buy second, third, and more properties as retirement savings, renting these properties out. (I think this is misguided, but the whole country doesn't seem to think so). That happens to some extent in Canada too, but not quite as much, I think.

[ijmorlan]

https://dilbert.com/strip/1995-06-24

Yeah, I don’t think boomers as a group are really the problem here. If we’re going to blame anybody, it’s all the random people who don’t know anything about how it works, don’t care to learn, and who are pandered to by ill-considered features from people who should know better. For example, the way browsers are moving in the direction of hiding the actual URL of the page. Browser makers, as technical people, should know better.

Ugh...Scott Adams.

Yes, I’m well aware that he has turned out to be a huge disappointment in his public attitudes. But we should all be able to separate the person from the first few years of Dilbert, which were hilarious. He’s one of many public figures who would do well to just close their Twitter accounts, or at least get an editor.

Anyway, I actually disagree with this point. We should develop technology to be more user friendly and more accessible. I don't have to know an internal combustion engine works to drive a car. I shouldn't have to know how the underlying technologies work to use the web.

Obviously it is a grey area discussion of whether a URL should be underlying technology or part of the user experience, but given how my parents have been using computers and the web for decades, still fail to understand what a URL is, I'd say there's a reasonable argument for it being an underlying component.

These things also change over time. At one point using the command line was the "user friendly" way of using a computer for people who didn't understand programming.

One purpose of URLs, explicitly called out in the early RFCs which defined the Web, is to be able to share a web page with somebody by writing down the URL on a piece of paper (literally, “napkin”) and giving it to them. Getting rid of URLs is like getting rid of page numbers from books, because “math is hard”; it removes important functionality and makes the technology harder to use. Nobody is saying that people should have to be able to set up a DNS server in order to use the Web.

Anyway this is just an example. Essentially I’m blaming the technical elite for creating a culture which encourages the non-elite to stay ignorant. A better culture would be one in which people can learn just as much as they want; the baseline should involve more basic awareness of the technology without needing in-depth knowledge to use, meaning it would be less magic and more just sophisticated, meaning that people would be more able to jump in and acquire more knowledge when and where it is useful to them. Making things easy and allowing people to get things done without knowing how to re-build the engine, so to speak, is definitely a good thing overall.

I think a similar situation exists in political discussion, where media often don’t do much to encourage understanding. For example, nobody should ever say anything on TV about government finances if they don’t understand the distinction between debt and deficit. Somebody operating at that level of confusion cannot possibly have anything meaningful to contribute to the discussion.

I certainly don't think you folks look down on renters, but tomh asked if people look down on people for renting, and yeah, they definitely do. I have experienced it. There is an expectation that you will own your home when you have the means, and if you don't then it's because you have failed to gain the means.

Although I myself can’t recall noticing this, I definitely believe you.

[danbrotherston]

Ugh...Scott Adams.

Yes, I’m well aware that he has turned out to be a huge disappointment in his public attitudes. But we should all be able to separate the person from the first few years of Dilbert, which were hilarious. He’s one of many public figures who would do well to just close their Twitter accounts, or at least get an editor.

Anyway, I actually disagree with this point. We should develop technology to be more user friendly and more accessible. I don't have to know an internal combustion engine works to drive a car. I shouldn't have to know how the underlying technologies work to use the web.

Obviously it is a grey area discussion of whether a URL should be underlying technology or part of the user experience, but given how my parents have been using computers and the web for decades, still fail to understand what a URL is, I'd say there's a reasonable argument for it being an underlying component.

These things also change over time. At one point using the command line was the "user friendly" way of using a computer for people who didn't understand programming.

One purpose of URLs, explicitly called out in the early RFCs which defined the Web, is to be able to share a web page with somebody by writing down the URL on a piece of paper (literally, “napkin”) and giving it to them. Getting rid of URLs is like getting rid of page numbers from books, because “math is hard”; it removes important functionality and makes the technology harder to use. Nobody is saying that people should have to be able to set up a DNS server in order to use the Web.

Anyway this is just an example. Essentially I’m blaming the technical elite for creating a culture which encourages the non-elite to stay ignorant. A better culture would be one in which people can learn just as much as they want; the baseline should involve more basic awareness of the technology without needing in-depth knowledge to use, meaning it would be less magic and more just sophisticated, meaning that people would be more able to jump in and acquire more knowledge when and where it is useful to them. Making things easy and allowing people to get things done without knowing how to re-build the engine, so to speak, is definitely a good thing overall.

I think a similar situation exists in political discussion, where media often don’t do much to encourage understanding. For example, nobody should ever say anything on TV about government finances if they don’t understand the distinction between debt and deficit. Somebody operating at that level of confusion cannot possibly have anything meaningful to contribute to the discussion.

I certainly don't think you folks look down on renters, but tomh asked if people look down on people for renting, and yeah, they definitely do. I have experienced it. There is an expectation that you will own your home when you have the means, and if you don't then it's because you have failed to gain the means.

Although I myself can’t recall noticing this, I definitely believe you.

We replace page numbers in books with hyperlinks. The point is, we have better, more user friendly system.

Almost nobody writes down URLs. And even if you did, you could still use it. Why is it "important functionality" to have the URL visible all the time?

Forcing esoteric technical details into people's face isn't encouraging people to be ignorant, it's allowing more people to use a system and lowering the barrier to entry. Keeping those features can be a form of gate keeping.

Nobody is stopping you from understanding URLs, or how to rebuild an engine. Well, except for companies like Tesla. I'm much more concerned with anti-consumer behaviour than pro-consumer, and making a user interface more streamlined and better focused on tasks that the user actually does with information they need is a pro-consumer action. If HTTP servers stopped accepting standard URLs and started only working with certain proprietary browser systems, that would be a problem.

[ac3r]

Gotta stay far away from comment sections my dude. Those places will give you brainrot haha.

Boomers need their internet privileges taken away TBH. Not only did they ruin the world and planet, they've now ruined the internet. Used to be "our" place to unplug (by plugging in) and have fun in a new technology, culture and world but then Web 2.0 dumbed down the internet to the point every dumb boomer in the world is on Twitter or in comment sections saying asinine things.

I am a boomer. I programmed an IBM 360 by typing programs on hollerith cards on an 029 keypunch. I bought my first personal computer in 1979. I built an acoustic modem from a kit. When did you buy your first computer, kid?

Back when Cyrix was rocking the x86 market. RIP Cyrix, they had some good processors.

Anyway, my point isn't that boomers are actually bad, it's just that a good portion of them aren't willing to own their generations mistakes or acknowledge how drastically the world has changed which I was commenting on in regards to a post talking about that they often have no sympathy for young people who now live in a drastically much more challenging world than the one they grew up in. In many ways they had an easy life whereas youth today...not so much. And as a result, it gets annoying hearing them talk down to people about how they're lazy or need to work harder, which we hear a lot of now because technology is now so simple it allows any old person to post their nonsense online. Kids went ahead and created that entire short lived "OK boomer" meme as a way to reply to something that is so ass backwards the only way you can reply to it is to just sarcastically acknowledge it.

comment sections saying asinine things.

Like baseless ageist comments?

Don't take it so seriously, I'm sure you understood what I meant. Most boomers are fine. Some are even super self-aware and surrealist like the YouTuber Featureman. But there's a certain group of them who say really dumb shit. Someone doesn't even need to be of that generation, it's more a term to describe certain points of view that people have.

[Acitta]

I am a boomer. I programmed an IBM 360 by typing programs on hollerith cards on an 029 keypunch. I bought my first personal computer in 1979. I built an acoustic modem from a kit. When did you buy your first computer, kid?

Back when Cyrix was rocking the x86 market. RIP Cyrix, they had some good processors.

Anyway, my point isn't that boomers are actually bad, it's just that a good portion of them aren't willing to own their generations mistakes or acknowledge how drastically the world has changed which I was commenting on in regards to a post talking about that they often have no sympathy for young people who now live in a drastically much more challenging world than the one they grew up in. In many ways they had an easy life whereas youth today...not so much. And as a result, it gets annoying hearing them talk down to people about how they're lazy or need to work harder, which we hear a lot of now because technology is now so simple it allows any old person to post their nonsense online. Kids went ahead and created that entire short lived "OK boomer" meme as a way to reply to something that is so ass backwards the only way you can reply to it is to just sarcastically acknowledge it.

Like baseless ageist comments?

Don't take it so seriously, I'm sure you understood what I meant. Most boomers are fine. Some are even super self-aware and surrealist like the YouTuber Featureman. But there's a certain group of them who say really dumb shit. Someone doesn't even need to be of that generation, it's more a term to describe certain points of view that people have.

It is not that there are good reasons to criticize some people, the problem is making blanket statements as if they apply to a whole group, whether that is people born in a particular decade or people having some other minor characteristic in common like skin colour or sexual orientation. We make arbitrary groupings of people and then claim that they are all the same when they are not.

[nms]

To bring this thread back to housing, I wondered what would happen to the housing market if:
1. All existing mortgages were canceled immediately and houses valued at whatever had been paid for in the mortgage to date.
2. All housing would be price restricted and only sellable for the equivalent of what the owners had paid for it in the first place, perhaps indexed to inflation.

The goal: allow homeowners to not still be paying off their mortgage in their retirement years.

The banks (and all securities that are invested in mortgages) would take a hit for sure, but the housing market would be cooled pretty quickly.

I realize that this would be a pretty heavy-handed way to cut house prices, but it was an interesting thought when considering that the vast majority of the housing stock that was built over the last 100 years is selling for prices well above what they might have been allowed to increase in value due to inflation.

[tomh009]

To bring this thread back to housing, I wondered what would happen to the housing market if:
1. All existing mortgages were canceled immediately and houses valued at whatever had been paid for in the mortgage to date.
2. All housing would be price restricted and only sellable for the equivalent of what the owners had paid for it in the first place, perhaps indexed to inflation.

The goal: allow homeowners to not still be paying off their mortgage in their retirement years.

The banks (and all securities that are invested in mortgages) would take a hit for sure, but the housing market would be cooled pretty quickly.

That would be a hit of something close to $2T: Canadians have a lot of mortgage debt. If the banks had to write off all their mortgages, it might potentially cause a collapse of the banking system. So, I do think this is a non-starter, as much as it is an innovative idea.

Aside: First, this would reward people who maxed out their mortgages and penalize owners who made the effort to pay them off -- and penalize renters as well.

And, further, having $500K mortgage debit on a $1M property when you retire is really not a huge problem as you can either sell the house or get a reverse mortgage in order to access the equity.

[ijmorlan]

To bring this thread back to housing, I wondered what would happen to the housing market if:
1. All existing mortgages were canceled immediately and houses valued at whatever had been paid for in the mortgage to date.
2. All housing would be price restricted and only sellable for the equivalent of what the owners had paid for it in the first place, perhaps indexed to inflation.

The goal: allow homeowners to not still be paying off their mortgage in their retirement years.

The banks (and all securities that are invested in mortgages) would take a hit for sure, but the housing market would be cooled pretty quickly.

I realize that this would be a pretty heavy-handed way to cut house prices, but it was an interesting thought when considering that the vast majority of the housing stock that was built over the last 100 years is selling for prices well above what they might have been allowed to increase in value due to inflation.

“Take a hit”?

Yes, I think confiscating $1.4 trillion just in Ontario (according to https://www.fsco.gov.on.ca/en/understand...iness.html) would definitely result in the lenders taking a “hit”. It would probably bankrupt them. This amount is about 3 times as much as the total market capitalization of the Big 5 banks.

Obviously, this would kill the credit market for many years, until a new government can successfully convince prospective lenders that their loans won’t be confiscated.

And it would do nothing to cause housing to be built, which is what is actually required. Instead, the economic chaos would have unpredictable but certainly very bad effects on the construction industry and everything else.

Remember, high prices are a symptom, not the disease itself. You don’t cure a runny nose by blocking the nostrils.

Now just for fun, let’s think about what a typical property owner would do under these rules, assuming they went into effect and pretending the economy still existed. Since they would not be permitted to sell for full value, they probably wouldn’t sell but would instead rent. Just because there is a rule saying they can’t sell for more than a certain amount doesn’t mean their property doesn’t have the same intrinsic value it had before, so renting it out whenever they would have sold would a way to realize the value of the property. Incidentally, this is also why banks used to give out toasters and why one has to suck up to the landlord to get an apartment in Manhattan.

So I think the number of properties changing hands would be tiny. Instead, their existing owners would rent them out indefinitely. It would become effectively impossible to assemble land for development, meaning it would be difficult to build new apartments in place of lower density housing.

[panamaniac]

Just to note that the taxpayer would take the hit, as government would be obliged to make the banks whole.