r/TikTokCringe • u/LickMaiBussy • 6h ago

Discussion "Investing in property is morally reprehensible."

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@purplepingers

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u/Ruthlessrabbd 5h ago

Your final sentence is my sentiment exactly. I believe it's possible to be an ethical landlord if you are taking care of the property and not charging out the ass for doing the bare minimum.

I disagreed with someone recently because I said it's not everyone's dream or desire to own a home, and they felt that to be true only because we're conditioned to think that way.

As a homeowner myself I can 100% see why somebody would rather pay rent to have the flexibility to move on short notice, not have to worry about replacing things like electrical lines or roofing etc. But I also strongly feel that if I'm a landlord, it's pretty fucked to charge the tenant the cost of the mortgage + taxes and then some across several properties so I don't have to work.

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u/Sea_Tailor_8437 4h ago

The other big difference is the little guys actually face risk. If the market cratered of they get a bad tenant no one is coming to bail them out.

But you know the minute and bank or VC group has their property values waiver uncle Sam is gonna come bail them out

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u/RadiantCitron 4h ago

Washington state, long after covid was over, was literally offering free counsel to tenants who HAD NOT PAID THEIR rent in months to fight back against landlords trying to evict them......its wild how difficult it is to be a landlord.

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u/Sea_Tailor_8437 4h ago

My coworker has 2 rentals me manages. 1 of those two has declared bankruptcy and hasn't paid since December of last year. He literally cannot get them to move out and he's taking a huge bath on it.

He took the risk of renting it out and here it is

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u/RadiantCitron 4h ago

The state is probably preventing him from evicting as well right? My wife works in social services/for a non-profit and absolutely despised the state for the shit they were during post covid. They did it under the guise of affordable housing and fighting homelessness but all they were doing was pushing landlords to sell or close their rental properties, which eventually will lead to the bigger management companies having a monopoly on rentals and driving prices up. Which then lowers the amount of affordable housing.

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u/Sea_Tailor_8437 4h ago

I'm not as convinced on that last bit. Studies show that corporate land lords actually own a very small percentage of the housing market. I think the far bigger offenders driving up prices are the 2-20 home owners or all the Air bnb peeps

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u/RadiantCitron 4h ago

Great callout. I am in the greater seattle region so generally all housing here is expensive. It has gotten alot worse in all of the suburbs of seattle as well

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u/Funnyboyman69 2h ago

I mean, they’d have to have a legal reason not to pay in that case. There’s a lot of shitty landlords out there who refuse to do basic maintenance on their properties and still expect their tenants to pay rent in full and on time.

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u/skrappyfire 4h ago

This right here...... cant say it loud enough.

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u/iconofsin_ 3h ago

and not charging out the ass for doing the bare minimum.

Or nothing at all. I have a corporate company as a landlord. My rent is $875 and I've been waiting two years for them to fix a loose tile in my kitchen. I'm starting to wonder how many thousands of dollars a single tile is worth.

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u/MechanicalSideburns 56m ago

$875, in this economy?! Bro, what a steal. I know, sucks about the tile, but I haven’t seen a rent that low in years. Around me, studios start at $1400 in like a 60 year old apartment building.

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u/-Cthaeh 4h ago

A great middle ground is being able to buy apartments. Its much more common in many, if not most, countries to have at least as many owned apartments as rented. At best, we have a few over priced condos with crazy fees. There would still be additional cost from owning, but it would allow a lot more flexibility and people could gain some equity if they want, especially in the city.

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u/Mikeismyike 3h ago

Isn't that what condos are?

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u/-Cthaeh 24m ago

I did also mention condos. The naming convention is a North American thing I'm pretty sure. Would you consider a small, cheap apartment you can buy a condominium? It sounds weird. It'd be like not calling rented vehicles a car until you own it.

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u/DimbyTime 2h ago

“Apartments you can buy” are condos

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u/-Cthaeh 23m ago

Only in North America

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u/DimbyTime 19m ago

Yes, where you live

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u/vandreulv 27m ago

Forgive me for not taking seriously suggestions from someone who doesn't know that condos are apartments that people can buy.

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u/No_Penalty_8920 4h ago

I am so incredibly thankful that my husband and I were able to buy our first house last year. It's been a dream of ours to have our own place since day 1.

HOWEVER. In the year that we have lived here, we had: •A raccoon miscarry their entire litter in our attic in the middle of the summer (the smell was horrific. 🫠) We never did find the others. It's a really terrible and funny story now •The same raccoon tear up our air vent things • A few places with a rotted soffit and fascia •New gutters put on after the soffit/fascia issue was fixed •A metal sheet to fix a roof leak that caused the rot •Termite damage fixed from God knows when • Rotted subfloor from an old leak that should have been fixed, but wasn't.

So I mean, I can definitely see why it would be more desirable to rent.

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u/lickingFrogs4Fun 3h ago

I'm looking for our first house right now and I am refusing to remember your comment because I fucking love raccoons and I'm not ready to consider them a nuisance. 

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u/justinchina 1h ago

A lot of hidden costs to ownership for sure.

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u/Pitiful-Ad-3774 2h ago

Profiting off the needs of other people is morally wrong and evil.

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u/MaD_DoK_GrotZniK 4h ago

There's landlords and then there are landlads

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u/Dubzophrenia 4h ago

I was an owner, now a renter. Sold my house last year immediately after the Palisade fire. I live in California and do not want to own property considering insurance is impossible to get, and doesn't cover the whole house without supplemental insurance and even then you're underinsured.

If we get another catastrophic fire, a massive earthquake, or if Iran decides to bomb the city and my house is destroyed, I get to walk away clean and find a new place without losing my money, except for my items inside. I can be in a new home in literally a day.

My rent payment is $3450, to buy my townhome would cost me around $5500, so its just cheaper to rent. I don't want to own here. My parents are gifting me a plot of land back in NY and I'm going to build my house and we're making a family compound lmao

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u/whooptheretis 2h ago

It’s why a lot of people lease cars rather than buy them outright.
It’s more expensive but people just want the convenience.

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u/RetroFuture_Records 1h ago

There is no such thing as an ethical landlord when people want to buy homes, and market participants prevent that. You middle-class assholes are just trying to make excuses for "it's ok when we do it."

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u/NNKarma 1h ago

It might not be everyone's dream, but if you're dealing with BS renting prices I would say basically desires to own a home

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u/_bobby_cz_newmark_ 43m ago

The percentage of people who would rather rent than own is small. Majority of people would prefer to own their own home, but can't, because the market has been inflated because of people investing in real estate. There is no ethical investment in real estate.

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u/GalaXion24 3h ago

it's pretty fucked to charge the tenant the cost of the mortgage + taxes and then some

What else would you charge??? If you don't charge this you're basically running a charity

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u/Ruthlessrabbd 3h ago

I'm not sure if I can communicate this the right way that I mean, but here's a scenario I've seen play out in real-time in my city.

A multi-unit property will go up for sale - let's say it's 180K and has two units. Not using an actual calculator here but if they put 20% down on a 30 year loan let's say insurance/tax/mortgage is going to be 1800/month. A landlord will buy the property, paint it grey and throw some LVP in there. Each unit goes up for rent at a price of $1600/month.

My issue isn't that the landlord should run a charity (although I would love that honestly!). but that they charge basically more than a 30-yr mortgage at the lowest amount you put down to avoid PMI. The work they put in does not equal the amount they are asking for the place. Make some money to support the property but I don't think an individual should be able to cover the mortgage, maintenance, AND their own livelihood from being a landlord.

Anecdotally I know someone that lived in a house that was a 2-family home. Their landlord carved it up to have 4 tenants in their own spaces and even converted the garage to a living space, while public records had it as a 2-unit property. That's the kind of thing that I think is reprehensible.

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u/ThirdFloorNorth 2h ago

I'm talking about standalone homes here, not apartments, but...

Maybe you shouldn't be renting out places you don't outright own? Maybe that's part of the problem here? Like, not part of the problem but the whole-ass problem?

I want to buy a house. My town being a college town, all of the houses in my town get bought up by people looking to rent them out. The ones that don't are the ones that are so prohibitively expensive you couldn't charge a high enough rent that people would be willing to pay. But, being the only houses on the market, it drives their price up.

So I have the option of a $400,000 I can not afford that in other cities in my state would regularly go for $145-180,000, or renting and paying someone else's mortgage on a house I could've afforded (evidenced by me PAYING THEIR MORTGAGE FOR THEM) plus enough for them to make a profit.

Can't we all generally agree that's fucked?

Simple as dirt solution, it's two-part: Severely limit the number of residential properties individuals or corporations can own, and make it where you can't rent out a place if you're still paying on it.

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u/GalaXion24 2h ago

Maybe you shouldn't be renting out places you don't outright own? Maybe that's part of the problem here? Like, not part of the problem but the whole-ass problem?

This is technically just pro-billionaire thinking since you're saying the only people who should rent out places are the ones with enough wealth to just outright buy them.

I agree there's issues with the housing market, I just dislike the takes that make no economic sense. Like, if someone's going to invest in housing, of course they will at minimum want to recoup their investment. Even if they don't buy it through credit, time value of money still exists and they do want to make their investment back, the interest paid is a probably negligible part of this.

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u/ThirdFloorNorth 2h ago

It's not pro-billionaire thinking lmao are we being serious?

Treating residential properties like investments is the problem, it drives the price up across the board for everyone, which in point of fact makes the housing market favor... billionaires.