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naraburns  nihil supernum  1yr ago (text post)   29303 thread views

Culture War Roundup for the week of February 6, 2023

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The ONLY reason the middle class has jumped head first into real estate investment is because of the government consistently enacting zoning regulations to deliberately benefit homeowners at the expense of everyone else, which likewise benefits a community’s most consistent voters. Anyone else who borrowed an amount of money 3-4x their salary as part of a 30-year loan, wiped down the countertops, then cried crocodile tears when their “investment” didn’t make them millionaires, would rightly be told they were an irresponsible idiot.

If it didn't cost them half their take home salary they might be a little less defensive, but that's not the system we live in and no one is going to pretend they're already living in the system you propose while you wipe away a significant portion of their net worth, and for many many people this is not even an asset that appreciates all that much. For every person who has seen their house go from $300k to $2M over thirty years there are many more who saw their house go from $300k to $300k over the same time span. It's like social security, we can talk about how in principle it's a bad and wasteful system but people didn't get a choice to participate and it's already eaten huge portions of their income for decades, you're damn right they're not willing to bear the entire burden of reforming the system alone.

Go ahead, find a way to balance the diffused costs so that we can all be better off, but don't just steal my money, distributed it evenly and pretend you didn't. Because we'll take every god damned cent back by force.

Homeowners created the system we live in such that it directly benefits them. So I’m fresh out of sympathy when you play the “that’s just the way it is” card, as though homeowners are blameless victims of circumstance. Again, crocodile tears don’t move me.

Any other investment, caveat emptor is in full effect. But when it comes to real estate, oh no, suddenly we need RULES. After all, poor Real Estate Mogul Wannabe #1,298,745 needs to eat. It’s not his fault they opened a gas station across from the slums he purchased at auction.

I still remember when they opened a perfectly legal Royal Farms across the street from the entrance to my quiet suburban neighborhood. Of course, the high maintenance, self-serving losers in my neighborhood went ballistic. I also remember getting a flier on my mailbox that read, “GOOD CHICKEN MEANS BAD NEIGHBORS.” It’s been 5 years now, and all that happened was I got a very convenient gas stop on the way to work, while the property value has doubled. May the morons I share a neighborhood with get ass cancer.

You're adding more heat than light to the discussion. Tone down the belligerence and the sneering.

I'm sorry, I forgot that I personally went back in time and designed a system where I had to take out a loan for five year's salary. I should totally lose several year's salary for that sin.

Presumably, you do more with your house than look at it and feverishly check its Zestimate every month. Perhaps even live in it.

If you want to complain that houses are too expensive, then that’s a more complicated argument.

Correct, I write a fat check every month for it as well.

Do you have anosmia? Royal Farms reek like the worst blend of gasoline and fried chicken.

I can smell it in the parking lot. Not down the street. Let alone in my home a mile away.

That also was never raised as a concern by my multiple neighbors complaining about it, so I’m not willing to entertain that grievance.

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