Had an old landlord keep my deposit when I moved out just because they could. We left the apartment absolutely spotless and never damaged anything. In fact, we added value by fixing a couple small things. Didn’t matter.

Fuck landlords.

Double property taxes on owners, but give back a property tax credit on owner-occupants, so that the effective tax rate on owner occupants falls, and the only people paying the doubled tax rate are investors.

Statutorily increase the tax rate and credit when owner occupancy is below 80%, and reduce the tax rate and credit when owner occupancy rises above 90%.

Being a landlord is supposed to be a job though. They're supposed to maintain the property and handle property related disputes between the tenant and the community. The problem is landlords aren't held to their obligations and are allowed to treat it as a passive investment. Liability for landlords and their property managers needs to be increased. Require a licence for landlording that can be revoked.

I have to agree with those others who suggest that banning landlords is not the way to go.

However, the power dynamics should be significantly shifted. And if those shifts mean some landlords decide to exit the market? So be it.

1. Tenants should not be able to be evicted for any reason other than: damaging the property, being significantly (maybe 6 months?) behind on rent, the owner or an immediate family member wants to move in, significant renovations are needed (with strong enforcement to ensure these last two are actually done, and not used as a fake excuse). No ability to use evictions as a reprisal for complaining about the conditions.
2. Tenants should be entitled to treat the place basically as their own. That means any minor reversible modification should be permitted, including painting and hanging up photos.
3. No restrictions on pets other than those which would normally come with local ordinances and animal welfare laws.
4. Rental inspections every 3 months is absurd. Maybe the first after 3 months, then 6 months, then annually after that at best.
5. Strict rules about landlords being required to maintain the property to a comfortable condition. Harsh penalties if they fail to do so, as well as the ability for the tenant to get the work done themselves and make the landlord pay for it, if the landlord does not get it done in a reasonable time.

And tangentially, to prevent property owners just leaving their homes without a long-term tenant: significantly increased rates/taxes for homes that are unoccupied long-term, or which are used for short-term accommodation (e.g. Airbnb). Additionally, state-owned housing with highly affordable pricing should make up a substantial portion of the market, on the order of 30%. This provides a pretty hard floor below which privately-owned housing cannot fall, because people should be reasonably able to say "this place isn't good enough, I'll move".

If a property owner is willing to deal with the fact that a home's first and foremost purpose should be to provide a safe and secure place for a person to live, then I have no problem with them profiting.

Wait so is... uhhh how? Like you're literally not allowed to live somewhere unless you own it?? What about short term rentals and vacations? Or is the idea that we live in some kinda socialist utopia where homes are just idk assigned to people via lottery?

So owning a fleet of rental cars is being a social parasite and not a job?

These things are tiring because renting a place is a job and has expenses. I have had some good landlords. Like these two sisters that owned a four flat and lived in the building themselves. Like any job though it can be done poorly. Like this other guy who owned several flats including the 6 flat I was in and did not live there but did live in the area. And then I had an accountant who owned an apartement complex and was great but in another corp owned complex it was aweful. The better ones had folks who were mostly trying not to lose money and were more concerned with having good tenants. The bad ones looked to maximize profits to the detriment of everything else.

Playing the devil's advocate here: Under capitalism, you could also see it as a provision of services where the landlord invests in the means of production (the building) and provides the service of letting people stay there for a certain amount of money. The offered services include the maintenance of the building. If a landlord is keeping a building poorly maintained and/or expects an over the top rent, then this is simply a bad service.

But well, this obviously doesn't work out as soon as you consider a safe place to live a basic human right that mustn't be commodified.

I live in a housing org that has a relatively flat structure and there's no CEO at the top. Individual locations (often a whole block, not just one apartment) elect their own representatives and build their own rules. The central administration, the absolute top level, is a mere 2 hops away from the tenants and you can email them directly. It's not perfect, and is still subject to capitalist issues like land value being inflated, but I feel like it's alright given what we're working with.

Is any investment ever ethical?

landlords should get a real job.

"I am the landlord, I speak for the land:

Just put your tips in the palm of my hand.

What's that? "No tipping," I hear you all bleat?

Then I'll jack up the rent and put you out on the street!"