No Stupid Questions

Unless you are by extension making those properties affordable for whomever is leasing or renting, then absolutely it is, yes.

You are part of the society. You cannot escape it.

It's not because you own property (which, if you can, is a wise investment) that you can't see how messed up the system is at the expense of the working poor.

I'd say if they are solely an investment, then yes you are part of the problem. Because you expect a return on your investment and so inherently rent has to be increased to generate the necessary profits.

If you'd live in a house that has more room than you need and rent these out that's fine in my book. But possession solely for profit is one of the main problems of our current economic system.

Yes. Housing is a necessity. It's not a way to gain financial freedom or security. Anyone that participates in the system of commodifying a need in any capacity is a greedy and awful person. You can't be for affordable housing while also having some poor person paying your mortgage and shrugging that "this is just how it is".

Yeah. It's up to you to decide if you care about being a hypocrite though.

Depends on how greedy you are.

It's not hypocritical if you are providing affordable housing for someone.

Despite the kneejerk hate towards landlords lately, which is largely justified due to the extreme levels of rent-seeking behavior evident in today's completely unaffordable rental market, affordable rental housing is actually a legitimate market and there needs to be availability to meet that demand. Renting on its own is not a crime. Some people even prefer it. It can provide significantly more flexibility and less responsibility, stress and hassle, at a lower monthly cost than home ownership IF (and ONLY IF) you have a good landlord, either because they choose to be or because the laws require them to be, which is not so much the case with most of the laws.

So for me those are the dividing lines. If you are not:

• A slumlord providing "affordable" rental housing by leaving your tenants in unsafe, unsanitary, and unmaintained properties.
• Demanding luxury-priced rents for an extremely modest property with no features that can be considered a luxury and no intention of maintaining anything to luxurious standards.

Then maybe it's not hypocritical. And I don't mean just taking the highest price you can find on rentfaster and posting your property for that price because "that's what the market price is" I mean actually thinking about whether that price you're asking is actually affordable for real human beings living in your area.

Basically, if you treat your tenants like actual human beings with the understanding they may be struggling to get by, trying to raise a family, working as much as they can even when work is not reliable, and dealing with all life throws at them, and you don't treat these things as immediately evictable offenses like a battleaxe over their head just waiting to drop, then yes, you absolutely can argue for a cause like affordable housing for everyone -- because you are helping provide it.

If, after contributing to legitimate maintenance expenses and reserves, you are making a tiny profit, barely breaking even or even losing money renting, good. If you are treating it as a cash cow that funds your entire life, fuck you.

Yes. Housing is a human right. Not an "investment". There are literally so many other things you could invest on, but you choose to profit through one of the worst symptoms of inequality.

This will probably be an unpopular opinion but I think the reality is that the choice whether to be a landlord has no effect on the supply of housing and so is almost totally irrelevant to this essentially systemic issue. The only kind of stuff that matters here:

• Supply of housing influencing its cost
• Relative wealth of the poorest influencing their ability to pay for housing
• Other factors (the credit system etc) limiting people's access to housing
• Legal ability to use housing as a speculative investment and store of wealth (ie. low property taxes even if you own multiple properties)

The idea that people would buy property and then provide housing on a charitable basis in defiance of the market isn't realistic and isn't a viable solution to the problem. The only solution is to build the right incentives into the system. Someone can support the latter without trying to do the former.

Yes. That is, if you're actively hurting the availability of affordable housing, that would be hypocrisy. Your economic interests are at odds with your stated ethical stance, which means your ethical stance is unstable.

Owning the property is not the problem: Rent-seeking is. Running it as a managed coöp would be the ethical path forward in that situation.

Hm I'd say not necessarily. That depends on your situation I guess. The question comes down to "would you give up your property for other people to live in?" If you own 1-2 small properties, that's not being a greedy landlord. And it would make it possible for you to give people housing they could afford (while still profitable for you, if you needed it to be).

If you charge insane rents, then you're not only a hypocrite but maybe also schizophrenic. That just sounds like a disconnect.

But it's very possible to "change the system from within", even if that's not my political opinion. If you can buy property, maybe you should. And then rent it to people for an affordable price.

I'm sometimes thinking people should get together and buy mansions to convert into shelters

For many people owning their own housing is the wrong decision. That means somebody else needs to own their housing and that person may as well be you (depending of course on your situation - it isn't for everyone)

It depends on how you are looking at it. Since you called it "Investment properties" I have to assume you plan to maximize profits on it so I would have to say yes it is. However if you are renting the property out for a minimum value and only charging enough to be able to cover costs and the mortgage and maybe a minor income on the side, I don't think it is. Obviously you need to cover expenses for the property or else someone else who won't do the same is going to obtain it.

BUT, if you are trying to maximize return and charging as much as you can, then yes it is super hypocritical to be defending the cause while contributing to the other side of the cause. I still think defending is better than just ignoring it but, yea it isn't helping your case if anyone ever finds out you do.

Yes, that is like being a pacifist but investing in weapon manufacturers. It is easy money and it is attractive, but it is wrong and by making money off of it you become part of it.

Was it hypocritical of RATM to spread anti-establishment messages via a major record label? No, of course not. Systemic change being somehow at odds with doing what you can within the existing system has always been a false dichotomy propagated by those who benefit from division.

Are you renting them for unaffordable amounts? Maybe. But I think you can both live in the world that exists, and argue for a better one.

And I guess if your investment property is affordable housing then you are also walking the walk, right? So no I don't think it's necessarily hypocritical. Likely so, but not necessarily so.

We've rented for much less than it costs to buy a house here, in fact all of the places we rented were like that. Old houses that were paid off, that we did not want to buy, just paid to live in them month to month. Sure we can wish for a better system but sometimes renting is affordable.

If your profit is modest no. Even less so if you live on the property like renting out a room or having a multiflat or coachhouse.

I believe in a baseline level of food, shelter, healthcare, and education being provided to all regardless of means. Plus things like parks, infrastructure, physical safety and security, etc.

But just because I believe that everyone should have enough to eat doesn't mean that I don't believe there is a qualitative difference between that baseline level of sustenance and all sorts of enjoyment I can get from food above that level. A person has a right to food, but that doesn't change the fact I might be able to farm for profit. Or go up the value/luxury chain and run an ice cream parlor, or produce expensive meals, or buy and sell expensive food ingredients. I want schools to provide universal free lunch but I also know that there will always be a market for other types of food, including by for-profit producers (from farmers/ranchers to grocers to butchers to restaurateurs).

The existence of public parks shouldn't threaten the existence of profitable private spaces like theme parks, wedding venues, other private spaces.

So where do real estate investors sit in all this? I'm all for developers turning a profit in creating new housing. And don't mind if profit incentives provide liquidity so that people can freely buy and sell homes based on their own needs.

I don't personally invest in real estate because I think it's a bad category of investment, but I don't think those who do are necessarily ideologically opposed to universal affordable housing. It's so far removed from the problems in affordable housing that you can't solve the problems simply by eliminating the profit.

Solid prompt question OP. I see 116 votes and 116 comments, that’s a legit conversation stater.

It isn't hypocritical, but I'd question why I would invest in something that I would want to lose value from a moral standpoint.

I have investment properties because of a variety of reasons, I need them for my retirement or I'll end up a homeless

I don't think that having a few properties is a problem anyway, I have a problem with the guy owning tens of thousands of properties

If you make even a penny of profit, then yes. Housing should never be something someone does to make money. Shelter is a basic human need for survival.

I feel like it kind of is. There are surely other investment possibilities. Why choose the one you're against?

If you’re arguing for a particular public policy, then it’s not necessarily hypocritical (which isn’t to say it’s good).
If you’re arguing for social change based on personal behavior, then you should lead by example.

If you argue that others should not own investment property for whatever reason but you are a valid exception it's one thing.

If you say that "look at how much money I'm making, tax me harder daddy" it's another.

Methinks it is only not hypocritical under a few circumstances:

• I am renting a place myself and simultaneously leasing out my otherwise primary residence
• The property is my primary residence and is not oversized (so no buying a duplex and renting out one), but I rent out parts of it for roommates/traditional BnBs
• Unique property ownership situations that shouldn't last longer than 6 months (maybe I'm downsizing, maybe house swapping... Not sure)

Any other condition is in principle hypocritical... Although there is probably still a massive moral difference between someone with a severe disability who owns a few rentals to pay for bills vs a professional investor who systematically prices out locals to improve profit margins

I think it depends a lot on the specifics of the situation.

Did you buy a single family home / house that you're living in, and renting out part of to help pay your mortgage? Then it depends on the rent you charge.

If you charge market rates and you can afford to charge less than market rates, or if you hire contractors and maintenance people for the unit that are cheaper / worse than the ones you use for your own unit, then yes, you are being exploitative and hypocritical.

If, however, you treat the unit like your own and charge below market rates then no, you're not.

If you build an addition on your house, or build a laneway house or something, then it's more reasonable to charge market rates for rent because you've actually added new housing to the area, an act that in itself should help to slightly drop rents. Same thing if you buy vacant property and build rental units on it. However, if you continue charging the most you possibly can long after you've made your money back then you're back into the territory of being an exploitative hypocrite.

And if you're just in a hot market and buying up houses / condos, and renting them back to people as is, or just doing the cheapest and shittiest job you can turning them into apartments, then yes you are being a hypocrite. At that point you're just using your capital to buy up a limited quantity item and sell it back to people at exploitative rates. It would be like being stranded in the desert and buying up the remaining water and then selling it back to people for a profit. You're providing no value to society, just using past success to force people into a corner where they have to pay you for a necessity that's in limited supply.

No, not at all.

A parallel analogy I see here all the time: driving cars is bad for the planet. It contributes to climate change. So should you give up your car for the sake of the climate? No - because if you live in an auto-dependent area (which is a lot of affordable areas), then you need a car to effectively live your life. To have a job, go to the grocery store, spend time with friends, etc. The problem is the structures and incentives which don't appropriately dissuade people from driving and provide alternatives. You as an individual giving up your ability to transport yourself will have an entirely negligible impact on the climate while severely hampering your life. It makes total sense to continue driving a car while advocating for better climate policy.

Similarly, owning a handful of rental properties has no impact on the housing market, but choosing to eschew this potential source of revenue could severely hamper your future finances. If you don't buy these properties as rentals, odds are, someone else will. Your noble intentions will lead to exactly the same result, except you are worse off. On the other hand, if you do take action and buy these rental properties and rent them out at a fair market rate, you can be a good landlord - someone who is communicative about issues and prompt about fixing things when they break. And you are stopping a corporate buyer from owning the property and being a shitty landlord. While you do this, you can also advocate for better housing policy, which is the lever to pull to actually solve the problem.