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You're not going to be competing with some evil corporate globalist from London or Hong Kong for a starter home in Ottawa. But even if people are crossing the globe in droves to get an office job and a two-bedroom house--you know, one of those many houses for under $150,000CA--why can't YOU move four and a half hours down the road to do the same thing?
Population increase is not the driver of this. It's increasing wealth disparity and property hoarding by the rich. Population growth has slowed dramatically in the West, and is only kept up by a relative trickle of immigration to keep it from actually shrinking. When you look at the dramatic population growth in much of Canada and the United States during the first half of the 20th century, the cost of housing remained attainable despite the need for housing to be built very rapidly for an exploding population and with less technology than today. Housing is no longer affordable for the middle class, how is this not a crisis? If you're one of the lucky one's and don't think it affects you look at it from this perspective: where's the motivation to work when even full time work can't provide the basic shelter necessities for your family? This could cause a complete economic collapse.
100% correct as far as it goes. You just don't go far enough. The causes of the shortage go beyond mere greed and hoarding by the rich. It's a coordinated effort and it supports multiple globalist agendas, including, but not limited to:
--Plain old greed (as you've mentioned).
--Population control / reduction (one of many strategies).
--Put the global population in highly urbanized areas because it makes people completely dependent on a variety of centralized systems for survival. A rural population is more self sufficient--and therefore more able to resist dictatorship--than an urban one.
--It's easier to put people under constant surveillance in highly urbanized areas.
--Eventually, they'd like only a small elite to be able to own property, not just for financial greed, but for complete control over people's lives. The financial greed of the upper middle class and low end rich is merely a stepping stone to near total control by. Eventually, most of them will not be able to afford to own property, either--at least that's the goal. They want people in government subsidized housing like the former USSR. That way people can much more easily told where to go and what to do.
I live Ontario, Canada so the numbers are in Canadian dollars and reflect where I live but these numbers are very close to the general global housing prices you see in virtually all major metropolitan areas in Western, Central and Southern Europe, Australia and New Zealand and most major cities with global job markets and expatriate communities in the developing world as well.
Well congratulations, you've already engaged in your first backtrack. When you say things like:
- in your metropolitan area (referring to others reading the thread)
- this is the reality of modern middle class life in the Western world.
- thanks to a globalized housing market, much of the developing world is just as bad.
You actually just meant your opinion on the situation where you live in Canada, with a nice vague assertion that those numbers are close to general housing prices in all the other metro areas in developed world.
Sadly you're wrong again. It is demonstrably false that in every metro area houses are half a million and one bedroom apartments in the bad part of town are $1,300-$1,400 per month. Here are some median home prices for 2017 among various MSAs in USA via https://www.kiplinger.com/tool/real-...reas/index.php
You're $1300-1400 seems a little closer there when converted to Canadian dollars, but not when you consider you said that would be an apartment in the worst part of town. What kind of city is it where the median rent price (where half cost less) is in the worst part of town?
Like I said, just demonstrably false. You've started a thread and done nothing but sort it with a false information.
--Eventually, they'd like only a small elite to be able to own property, not just for financial greed, but for complete control over people's lives. The financial greed of the upper middle class and low end rich is merely a stepping stone to near total control by. Eventually, most of them will not be able to afford to own property, either--at least that's the goal. They want people in government subsidized housing like the former USSR. That way people can much more easily told where to go and what to do.
They? Actual policies (here in the US) have promoted home ownership for decades. Property owners are less likely to tear up their cities during unrest. Speaking of which, rural life tends to be poorer and harder than city life. That's the reason people have been moving to cities--completely of their own accord--for hundreds of years. Look at Mao's China or today's Appalachia.
I can do even better than that: my nicer, newer, larger house in Indianapolis cost less than half what I sold the one in Denver for.
My realtor totally screwed up the listing price in Denver. To figure out what it should have been, I looked at similar houses in my neighborhood. Not on the other side of Broadway, not in Beijing or Boston or Belfast, but literally within a few blocks. As they say, real estate is location, location, location.
TIL... the middle class builds a lot of equity (and thus net worth) through owning a home.
Oh wait... no, I didn't learn that today... I've known that since about 8th grade, and it was true for decades before that.
To be quite frank, I'm tired of renters complaining about rents while I build equity in my home. Are some people truly needy? Sure. But there are tons of people under 40 "drowning in student debt" who "can't afford a home" yet still manage to drink craft beer every weekend, cover themselves in tattoos, smoke cigarettes and/or marijuana, and still find the time and money for a vacation or two (even if modest) each year.
And that is all well and good, but let's be perfectly clear that for a ton of people (not all) it is choices being made, whether it be attending private school instead of public school, majoring in art instead of engineering, or leasing a $45k SUV instead of buying a $8k Toyota.
If a 30 year old in 2018 put $2500 into the stock market for each of the last 8 years, it'd be worth about $50,000 now. I can assure you most 30 year olds who are right there on the cusp but can't quite afford a home have spent that much or more on things they didn't really need that were depreciating assets if not outright liabilities.
I was crushed by the recession, was laid off, had to take graduate level courses, etc. to get back on track. But now I am. A little behind, but quickly on my way to being back on track. I own a home, my 401k is mushrooming, and I don't make heaps and heaps of cash. I just work hard and have lived below my means for the last 5 years.
Last edited by steveklein; 11-02-2018 at 12:37 PM..
I live in Oakland California, the heart of the SF Bay Area and 8 years ago you couldn't give away single family homes here...
Every city block had at least one foreclosure... that is how out of favor Real Estate was... a lot of strategic defaults where the owners could afford to stay but chose to walk.
Entire Sections of Detroit it was cheaper to tear down homes as opposed to keeping the infrastructure...
I sold my home in 2005 for 255k and it sold 18 months later for 350k... then Real Estate Tanked and it sold foreclosure for 70k...
People use to be able to buy a plot of land and build... doesn't work that way anymore... it can take years of design review and public hearings costing tens of thousands on plans, fees and site prep just to find out if you can actually build... at least it is this way here in Oakland CA...
Again... a couple of years ago only fools stayed in homes they bought... my how times have changed!
And yes... people are still buying homes... condo, town homes, starter single family... just like they always have...
One under 30 couple just bought their first home... a 1950 rancher... paid 600k for it... she is a nurse and he is a police officer... no family money or silver spoons... both the first in their family to attend college... so yes, it can be done and continues to be done.
They? Actual policies (here in the US) have promoted home ownership for decades. Property owners are less likely to tear up their cities during unrest. Speaking of which, rural life tends to be poorer and harder than city life. That's the reason people have been moving to cities--completely of their own accord--for hundreds of years. Look at Mao's China or today's Appalachia.
I believe US Home Ownership peaked under Bush... it was a goal of his administration and then it was said the crash happened because it was too easy to buy a home...
This is going to be a difficult thread because it is Canadians arguing with US Americans.
It doesn't really matter that much. The laws in a number of different realms are quite similar across many countries. The globalists want the standardization of all systems, including legal systems. It's easier to centralize power that way.
The problem you're talking about isn't global, it's local or regional at worst. It's partly progressive policies making development harder, and partly that some places are hot markets.
The bolded is true, but doesn't cover all facets of the issue.
There most definitely IS a global agenda to have the same "progressive" land use policies to make housing more expensive. Just because they don't announce it on the evening news doesn't mean it's not happening.
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