this post was submitted on 15 Feb 2024
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Canada’s housing crisis isn’t being caused by foreign investors. It’s being caused by investors, period | Ricochet (ricochet.media)
submitted 9 months ago by [email protected] to c/[email protected]
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[–] [email protected] 23 points 9 months ago (1 children)

it's not going to be politically feasible until a lot of homeowners feel a lot of pain and give up on the idea of housing as an investment

This is the biggest issue. It's fine to say we need to stop treating houses as investments, but most people own houses and it is their largest investment. Yes, billionaires and megacorps are profiting off it too, but if the government passed legislation tanking the prices of houses, the billionaires would be fine. Everyone 50+ who was getting ready to retire will loose most of their life savings. It needs to be a slow process, unless we're all ok going through a market collapse like 1990s Japan

[–] [email protected] 22 points 9 months ago (2 children)

but most people own houses and it is their largest investment...

While this is currently true, it's going down each year.

Between 2011 and 2021, homeownership declined across Canada and overall, there were 2.5% fewer Canadians living in owner-occupied homes in 2021 compared to a decade earlier.

So over the course of ten years home ownership went down 2.5%, but population went up from 34 million to 38 million. This quite literally isn't sustainable.

Everyone 50+ who was getting ready to retire will loose most of their life savings

So at a certain point we have to ask, what's worse, two generations who don't own homes, or one generation loses it's life savings.

[–] [email protected] 15 points 9 months ago* (last edited 9 months ago) (1 children)

I'm a member of a generation whose wealth is tied up in home ownership. I say let 'er rip!

We can't keep putting off a fix forever, so the earlier we tackle it, the better. No matter what we do, someone has to suffer, at least a little bit, so get it over with.

There is also plenty of money available to help ease the suffering if only we had the courage to tax properly.

It also might not hurt to let the institutional lenders and the investment class just eat some losses.

[–] [email protected] 12 points 9 months ago (2 children)

With 38% of our federal politicians having real-estate investments or being landlords, and the rate of ownership amongst canadian politicians being twice as high as the general population... They literally have skin in the game.

[–] [email protected] 4 points 9 months ago

I'm surprised it's only 38%, that seems too low honestly.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 9 months ago

Yup, no spine and maybe no ethics. Sometimes you have to do what is right, regardless of the consequences to yourself. Every ethical person knows that and every ethical person with a spine sucks it up and makes it happen.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 9 months ago (2 children)

This is one of the issues with democracy: people vote in their own interests. Perhaps I should be more specific: this is the problem with democracy in a culturally fragmented nation. Without shared values and a sense of camaraderie, people don’t vote altruistically, but self-interestedly. They don’t care about their neighbours because their neighbours don’t care about them. I live in Denmark now which is very culturally homogenous and people do vote altruistically. They vote for higher taxes because they know their neighbours share their values. They identify with each other like a loose family. This is one of the drawbacks of multiculturalism which is rarely discussed.

[–] [email protected] 7 points 9 months ago

I am absolutely with you on the fact that Canada has a very individualistic culture (another drawback of our southern neighbours?), but I tend to diverge when you blame multiculturalism. I would think that other, more macro pressures (history, economic model, popular culture, political stability and wealth inequality) might be more influence on wether or not a population has social values or individualistic ones.

Source? I'm just spitballing here...

[–] [email protected] 4 points 9 months ago

This is one of the issues with democracy: people vote in their own interests.

I vote for pro 2SLGBTQ+ issues, and am none of those things, so how does that square exactly? I vote for help for the unhoused, but am housed, how does that square?

this is the problem with democracy in a culturally fragmented nation. Without shared values and a sense of camaraderie, people don’t vote altruistically, but self-interestedly.

You seriously need to back this up with something, you can't just say 'we're culturally fragmented, have no shared values' as some sort of 'known'.