Question is if makes strides to take losses. He has ownership in this stupid game being played - hopefully he uses the leverage to say “look, I own property and I’m working against these other landlords to act in the favour of the majority”.
Nobody can call him out for some stupid “easy for you to say when you don’t have any rental properties”
I have maintained critical support for Singh despite being significantly to the left of him. I have appreciated that he has made significant progress for working people with the supply and confidence deal despite the relatively weak electoral position held by the party.
That aside, this is the sort of thing to make me question judgement. The NDP has the fewest landlord MPs by a wide margin which is a significant public image victory. Having the leader of the party connected to owning rental properties like this is a huge own goal that would have been very easy to avoid. There are a lot of other places Singh’s family could have placed it’s wealth and made a fine return, it didn’t have to be this one.
“but see how you did 1% of the shit we did” is a common, cheap republican trick.
You can’t both-sides this one.
Personally I have no problem with him being a landlord, but when he blames the housing crisis on “greed” instead of the very obvious housing shortage that enables the greed, it’s worth noting the hypocrisy.
Except that the housing shortages are vastly exacerbated by greedy landlords buying up the housing supply.
It’s literally like we have a water shortage and instead of just taking what they need, landlords decided well fuck you guys I have more my money so I’ll buy your water before you can and lease it back to you at a profit.
The “greed” goes all the way up to financial and monetary policies that influence the price of housing. It would not be that hard to tank the real estate market and make it essentially worthless to investors for anything other than being a fucking roof over your head. It is for the benefit of investors and property owners that prices are allowed to soar and it is a consequence of intentional decisions from the ruling class, who benefit from this situation.
I truly don’t understand the greedy landlords restrict supply thesis.
Why isn’t this a phenomenon we see everywhere? Why is it only the last few years? Haven’t landlords always been greedy? Why is housing currently cheaper in Calgary or Edmonton than Vancouver?
These are all very simply explained using principles of supply and demand. It’s now illegal to build apartments in 80% of the land in our largest cities, of course there’s a housing shortage.
We have just gone through a period of historically cheap debt. It became possible for landlords to leverage their existing properties to obtain new ones at a rate that was extremely uncommonly high. There has been a massive leap in wealth disparity.
Why isn’t this a phenomenon we see everywhere?
It is.
Why is it only the last few years?
It’s not.
Haven’t landlords always been greedy?
Yes that is why the literal textbook definition for a drain on the economy is a “rent-seeker” as in a rent seeking landlord. When you buy an assett and then just lease it back to people for profit, you are a leach that makes things more expensive while providing no value to anyone.
Like I said, in the 70s the Ontario Liberals dropped the price of houses by 30% just by taxing landlords and getting some of them out of the market, and that’s before the ballooning of landlords and investment properties in the past 50 years.
When you buy an assett and then just lease it back to people for profit, you are a leach that makes things more expensive while providing no value to anyone.
I don’t understand this view. A person buys a house and wants to rent it out. Are they supposed to take a loss on the property just to make a cheap home for someone who is renting? Are you (collectively, not you specifically) expecting that rental properties must be some altruistic lower than buying cost thing for renters at the expense of owners?
For context, I own a house. I rented it out for a while and am intimately aware of how much it costs to actually be a responsible landlord.
I don’t understand this view. A person buys a house and wants to rent it out. Are they supposed to take a loss on the property just to make a cheap home for someone who is renting?
Oh wow, a landlord who doesn’t understand the concept of breaking even, i.e. not profiting off those poorer than you. What a surprise!
If you’re renting out your own personal home while you rent a different home there’s no real issue, but if you’re buying an investment property, renting it out at a profit, and not keeping it as nice as you keep your own home, then you’re just being a rent seeking leach that’s providing no value to society. You’re just enriching yourself on the backs of people poorer than you. It’s literally the same thing as Nestle buying up drinking water rights and then selling the people back their bottled water at a profit.
