this post was submitted on 09 Jul 2025
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Grandma is not the problem. It’s the ~800 billionaires in the US controlling sizable portions of single-family residences through private equity, artificially controlling market prices for maximum profit per sale. Blackstone alone owns 300,000 residences.
Fun Fact: There are 16 million vacant homes nationwide. That’s 28 vacant homes for every unhoused person.
https://ips-dc.org/report-billionaire-blowback-on-housing/
I've said this before (and caught flak for it) but I think the solution to this is to apply a heavy additional tax to vacant homes (as defined as any home that isn't occupied by a permanent resident for more than 6 months a year), and increase the tax exponentially for each residence beyond the first owned by the same company or individual.
At some point, you make it so expensive to keep unoccupied properties that they're better off letting people live there for free than continuing to let them go unoccupied. Use all of the proceeds from this tax to assist homeless people or build new dense housing developments.
"But Kobold, what about soandso with their summer home?" If you can afford a second home, you can afford to pay a bit more tax on it to benefit the public good.
"But Kobold, a lot of those homes that are vacant are run-down, or are in places nobody actually wants to live!" Doesn't matter. If they're vacant, tax them. Use the money to build dense housing in the places where people do want to live. If the place is too run-down to be occupied, the owner can tear it down and do something else with it.
One issue with the holiday home thing, they tend to be in quite remote places where there are very few job opportunities, because that's where people go on holiday.
This part applies. It's not about directly getting a house for the homeless in this case, it's the fact that they can CLEARLY afford to pay more tax.
My extended family in Michigan keeps a hunting cabin that they split costs between 5 people on and can still barely make the mortage... Is that clearly able to afford more taxes?
I'd sacrifice your family's hunting cabin if it helps house more people. Find a sixth person or something.
It's an edge case that shouldn't hold up societal progress.
The added tax revenue would also make the rural places these vacation home are in more sustainable for regular residents. And probably keep local governments and even small hospitals solvent.
It might even alleviate the financial burdens that are making that situation almost untenable for them now as real estate markets are corrected and added tax revenue gets allocated into public benefits that could reduce the cost of living. They may benefit from the proposal even if tax rates get increased on subsequent properties.
No, it shouldn't hold up societal progress. But not being aware of how your policies actually affect people is just plain bad. I agree with progressive taxes on multi house ownership, but you also need to understand that will mean people who are less rich than you think losing them, it's not just people that can afford them. And it's not as far an edge case as you think, I believe
Not really, but it sounds like your family should rather sell that cabin and spend their money on more important things.
I know for the public good this is the right answer but this is not a winning strategy
"Hey you know that activity that you enjoy, that makes the tedium and tests of life a bit more bearable? The one that provides a hub to maintain familial bonds, and adds another source of food that isn't factory farmed or ultra-processed to your diet?
That isn't how you're supposed to spend your money, so stop it."
The key point you're missing, I think, is that the tax would increase exponentially for each additional house owned. The first one could be, say, a 0.5% tax increase, and it could go up from there.
If you're in a position where paying 0.5% extra tax on your hunting cabin split 5 ways will bankrupt you, then I'd argue that it isn't how you're supposed to spend your money. That's "Skip eating out once a year" territory.
Nah, I'm not opposed to the proposition, and understandably any such tax law (if legislated with due consideration) should take into account cases where the effect may be otherwise than intended (or be amended with further subsequent legislation). Corporate squatting is a literal travesty.
I was just a bit baffled at the gall of supposing that the cost/benefit calculation of this kind of lifestyle choice could be up for second-hand proscription.
I certainly don't want to decide for your family how to live their lives, but five parties just so scraping by doing the payments on a hunting lodge seems miserable for everyone involved. Wouldn't it be possible to rent one instead / buy one in a cheaper area / rent out the lodge when not in use?
I also wouldn't consider a lodge in the middle of nowhere a residential building that should fall under those taxes when kept empty to drive up the rent.
Or if housing costs were reigned in via this measure would the costs they are burdened with that make it barely feasible for 5 families to split the mortgage cost on a hunting cabin in a remote rural area be alleviated. Granting them more financial freedom, benefiting society all while still keeping the place thats becoming nearly untenable for them due to outrageous real estate markets?
They can barely split it because they're all broke af not because the house is expensive. The house and land are pretty cheap
Neither Republicans nor Democrats would do something like this. It would be siding with the people over the stockmarket/Billionaires.
Been shouting this for fucking ages.
I say the local government gets eminent domain on any properties that aren't primary residences staying vacant more than a year and/or vacant >75% of the time over 5 years. Make it the owners responsibility to keep someone living under the roof. There will be enough loopholes that it won't be their second home, by maybe by the third and any corporately owned ones they'll start to sweat.
my solution is to destroy all houses, then NO ONE gets a home!!
So you're saying granny would be fine with a 100% return on her investment at $36 for an offer? No? Shocked I say, shocked.
Granny is part of the problem. Not the biggest part of the pie, but still guilty.
Inflation is a thing that exists. Saying that someone is bad simply because they want to update the value of their property is dumb. Also, let's say granny wants to downisze. Should she sell her home for a value way below market and then be unable to buy a smaller home for herself?
Yeah this is honestly just an incredibly short-sighted and stupid take on the issues. Granny is in the same bucket with the young man in that they are both getting played by billionaires. Being mad at her is an incredible waste of energy compared to campaigning for fair taxes on corporation and billionaires. Anyone with less than 10 million net worth isn't really your enemy. Stay focused on winning the class Warfare and not dividing regular people.
If you can provide her with 1960s health care and living costs, she might be willing to sell you her house for 1960s real estate prices.
Would you be replacing her hip for an authentic 1973 mint edition Jefferson Nickel?
You can't go blaming the institutions for the high cost of living when it is very clearly this one anonymous old person who isn't giving this other anonymous young person a sweetheart deal out of misplaced nostalgia.
Okay, but a bunch of them are in the Rust Belt, where de-industrialization eviscerated the economy and caused a mass exodus to the Gulf Coast and the Mountain West in pursuit of lower wage service sector and sales employment.
I suppose you're going to claim that the wholesale restructuring of the manufacturing economy was the fault of a handful of 90s-era Wall Street bankers and Corporate Executives, rather than millions of Boomer-era suburbanites with pocket change in their retirement accounts 40 years ago?
Likely. Fucking. Story. This is just bigotry against the 1% is what it is.
Almost bit the bait lol
🏆
I’ve never subscribed to this generational hatred, as true as it is that the boomers voted for this shit, on account of it’s clearly a deliberate psyop “divide and conquer” campaign. It’s as obvious as the crack epidemic or redlining.
It's hard when you work with a guy like I do. He's 65 and hates absolutely everybody, including his wife, but he's a coward so he's very polite. He requires so much coddling that he spends all day sucking up to everyone for whatever praise he can get then immediately turns around and complains about them. He'll complain about everyone else to the point where they get their breaks and other privileges taken away. Those privileges are also taken from him, giving him more to complain about.
It gets worse, but I'm about to go to bed and don't want to think about that.
That piece of fucking shit. Sorry about the rant. But guys like that ruin everything for everybody.
It seems like that is more of an asshole problem than an age problem
That generation was heavily exposed to leaded gasoline.
When you think about these problems, you have to separate your personal experience from what you observe happening to the whole system.
It only takes a few assholes to ruin the whole system
Nah, I'm happy to bag on anyone that benefits from a system and then pulls the ladder up behind them.
By remaining invisible, the billionaires avoid having the finger pointed at them. We only point at each other.
Guess what that generation bought into and voted for for decades.