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Housing market

SCNCY said:
Not me, but generally the conversation lately in this thread is that because of investors buying single family homes, it's taking opportunities away from families from owning as opposed to renting.
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At those low interest rates just a year ago, along with FHA programs that only require 5% down or so, I don't fully see this. How much is the property values being pushed up by investors owning rentals? Are we talking 50% or something? Because under the options last year of rates and required down payments, if you couldn't afford then, you probably can't afford anyhow.
 
BCClone said:
At those low interest rates just a year ago, along with FHA programs that only require 5% down or so, I don't fully see this. How much is the property values being pushed up by investors owning rentals? Are we talking 50% or something? Because under the options last year of rates and required down payments, if you couldn't afford then, you probably can't afford anyhow.
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But those investors could be creating more demand, and thus driving up the prices. Those investors are probably looking at the mid to lower end of houses to purchase. Prime area for starter homes and lower income people.

Overall, the discussion is how do we increase housing supply for ownership.
 
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SCNCY said:
But those investors could be creating more demand, and thus driving up the prices. Those investors are probably looking at the mid to lower end of houses to purchase. Prime area for starter homes and lower income people.

Overall, the discussion is how do we increase housing supply for ownership.
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There was a huge push for exactly what you are mentioning in the discussion back in the early 2000s. Remember what happened in 2008? There is a certain amount of people that just can't handle being home owners. One part of home ownership is maintenance. I have been to city council meetings and read several other towns meetings, where government block grants are needed to just get the utilities lines of houses to a safe level. Many of these houses are already paid off, they just can't afford to maintain them. A rental would be better for them, since they know that they pay X amount and there are no major surprises.

I think we need to push to increase the housing supply, whether apartments, new homes, rental houses, whatever, but don't think home ownership is right for everyone.
 
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BCClone said:
At those low interest rates just a year ago, along with FHA programs that only require 5% down or so, I don't fully see this. How much is the property values being pushed up by investors owning rentals? Are we talking 50% or something? Because under the options last year of rates and required down payments, if you couldn't afford then, you probably can't afford anyhow.
Click to expand...

But if you were selling a house and had 2 offers, one from an investor paying cash or a family that will be financing, which do you choose? Because of the investors in the market, families with FHA loans are having to overpay to be considered. Otherwise, it's not worth it to the seller to take on the risk of a loan not going through or the inspections required with FHA loans.
 
Clonehomer said:
But if you were selling a house and had 2 offers, one from an investor paying cash or a family that will be financing, which do you choose? Because of the investors in the market, families with FHA loans are having to overpay to be considered. Otherwise, it's not worth it to the seller to take on the risk of a loan not going through or the inspections required with FHA loans.
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Many times the seller will go with the cash, but while I was appraising houses, I can't tell you how many times, we would tag houses for FHA codes, and the owner was telling us that they chose the buyer since they wanted a family to be raised in their old house like they raised theirs. It happened about a 1/3 of the time I would wager.

The bigger key is to be preapproved, then it's just small code things instead of wondering if the loan would go through.
 
Clonehomer said:
This is true assuming the landlord is charging based on expenses + a set profit. But we are often seeing the rent cost based solely on what the market will bear and have no relation to the expenses. Raising expenses would mean a higher rent only if someone will pay it. And if they were willing to pay more, why wouldn't the landlord just raise rent anyways?

To put it another way, did you see rent go down when the interest rates went down?
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Raising taxes to put a squeeze on landlord profits will help increase the supply of homes for first time homebuyers?

Is this by taking profitability out of the equation for the landlord? That makes zero sense to me.

Thinking of unintended consequences here:
- The landlord stops or delays maintenance on the home to keep profit margin
- Landlords stop maintenance to have the tax assessment fall and keep profits
- Landlords are forced to sell due to the punitive tax situation and corporations with greater scale buy them
- Landlords just raise rents
- Government sees the market will support a higher tax rate and raises it for owner occupied properties also
- Units become multi- generational at a faster pace due to higher taxes and landlords adjusting rents upward to compensate

The landlord will charge what the market supports. Bringing in higher costs through taxes could open a can of worms and lead to run down units or higher rents as the costs are passed on.

But that's just me spitballing
 
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BCClone said:
Many times the seller will go with the cash, but while I was appraising houses, I can't tell you how many times, we would tag houses for FHA codes, and the owner was telling us that they chose the buyer since they wanted a family to be raised in their old house like they raised theirs. It happened about a 1/3 of the time I would wager.

The bigger key is to be preapproved, then it's just small code things instead of wondering if the loan would go through.
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In this market though, the other buyers are completely waiving inspections. That's a huge advantage. In previous times, you'd have a small advantage of a standard inspection vs FHA.

Perhaps that's another point to make. Maybe communities need to require a certain level of inspections at the sale of a house. Just to level the playing field a bit, and more importantly, keep the homes in their community to a minimum level of maintenance and code.
 
Clonehomer said:
In this market though, the other buyers are completely waiving inspections. That's a huge advantage. In previous times, you'd have a small advantage of a standard inspection vs FHA.

Perhaps that's another point to make. Maybe communities need to require a certain level of inspections at the sale of a house. Just to level the playing field a bit, and more importantly, keep the homes in their community to a minimum level of maintenance and code.
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The lack of inspections were because the seller had such great power and a waiting list of buyers. I think we are in the process of switching back to a buyers market or at least an equal market and, I hope, inspections start going back to the way they were before.
 
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BCClone said:
There was a huge push for exactly what you are mentioning in the discussion back in the early 2000s. Remember what happened in 2008? There is a certain amount of people that just can't handle being home owners. One part of home ownership is maintenance. I have been to city council meetings and read several other towns meetings, where government block grants are needed to just get the utilities lines of houses to a safe level. Many of these houses are already paid off, they just can't afford to maintain them. A rental would be better for them, since they know that they pay X amount and there are no major surprises.

I think we need to push to increase the housing supply, whether apartments, new homes, rental houses, whatever, but don't think home ownership is right for everyone.
Click to expand...
You're not wrong, but your reasoning isn't correct either. The reason they can't afford it would actually make renting worse potentially because they are subject to increasing costs. The fact is, we have an income problem in this country. I'm not arguing the opposite here, its not for everybody, I just don't think your explanation hits the right notes.
 
KnappShack said:
Every split level should be burned to the ground
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Grew up in a split level and it was great for a family of 7. It actually had 2 splits plus a basement and allowed us kids to spread out and find our own space.

But it became a drawback as my parents aged as there were 3 short sets of stairs to go from basement (where laundry was) to bedroom level.
 
isucy86 said:
Grew up in a split level and it was great for a family of 7. It actually had 2 splits plus a basement and allowed us kids to spread out and find our own space.

But it became a drawback as my parents aged as there were 3 short sets of stairs to go from basement (where laundry was) to bedroom level.
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The stair situation can be fixed by using gasoline and match
 
isucy86 said:
Grew up in a split level and it was great for a family of 7. It actually had 2 splits plus a basement and allowed us kids to spread out and find our own space.

But it became a drawback as my parents aged as there were 3 short sets of stairs to go from basement (where laundry was) to bedroom level.
Click to expand...

Moved my parents laundry upstairs 5 yrs ago or so. they had a seldom used front porch that we renovated into laundry room getting the water lines through the base plate and up to the porch was the hard part. They have been very happy with the change.
 
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