Neither Republicans nor Democrats would do something like this. It would be siding with the people over the stockmarket/Billionaires.
Comment on Grandma is on her own
KoboldCoterie@pawb.social 3 weeks agoI’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.
balderdash9@lemmy.zip 2 weeks ago
Xenny@lemmy.world 2 weeks ago
Been shouting this for fucking ages.
burgerpocalyse@lemmy.world 2 weeks ago
my solution is to destroy all houses, then NO ONE gets a home!!
KoboldCoterie@pawb.social 2 weeks ago
True equality!
cenzorrll@lemmy.ca 2 weeks ago
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.
jumping_redditor@sh.itjust.works 2 weeks ago
seems terrible for people that buy houses that are classified as livable and repair them to the extent that they actually are livable.
Ilovethebomb@sh.itjust.works 3 weeks ago
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.
basiclemmon98@lemmy.dbzer0.com 3 weeks ago
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.
Fredthefishlord@lemmy.blahaj.zone 2 weeks ago
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?
bdonvr@thelemmy.club 2 weeks ago
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.
GregorGizeh@lemmy.zip 2 weeks ago
Not really, but it sounds like your family should rather sell that cabin and spend their money on more importsbt things.
AlfredoJohn@sh.itjust.works 2 weeks ago
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?
rayyy@lemmy.world 2 weeks ago
Simply exempt small homes. For instance, those with less than 1,600 square feet or so.
Vinstaal0@feddit.nl 2 weeks ago
Most people aren’t homeless because there is no house available no.
You want to tax just having that second home
Passerby6497@lemmy.world 2 weeks ago
It’s amazing how I can add the word “affordable” to your statement and you’re suddenly wrong.
You see this as wanting to tax second homes while ignoring that tons of people are homeless because they can’t afford to live somewhere because of shitheads holding onto empty housing as an investment at the expense of the common person.
So yeah, let’s tax any house left unoccupied for more than half the year. If you can afford to have 2 houses, you can afford to pay more for the one you don’t live in so maybe we can free up some of them and lower the cost of housing.
BudgetBandit@sh.itjust.works 3 weeks ago
3 houses could be free (1 home, 1 for summer, 1 for winter)
bdonvr@thelemmy.club 2 weeks ago
Nah fam you got three homes you can pay up
BudgetBandit@sh.itjust.works 2 weeks ago
Don’t forget how many people own three homes in the first place. You might need their votes.
Also, if one inherits their grandparents home and wants to give it their own children but must wait for 2-3 years, they might be forced to sell too.
Passerby6497@lemmy.world 2 weeks ago
If you can afford 3 houses, you can afford the extra tax on 2 or all 3 of them. And if you can’t, maybe you don’t need hat many fucking houses…
thetreesaysbark@sh.itjust.works 2 weeks ago
The problem that there are many homeless outweighs the problem that somebody wants to have a holiday home. Soliving the homeless problem by not solving the holiday home problem is valid.
Zink@programming.dev 2 weeks ago
I think many people (USians in particular) need to have it described to them this simply.
It’s just assumed in so many situations that somebody’s right to enjoy their legally-acquired property supercedes any concerns about the life or suffering of others living in the same system.
BudgetBandit@sh.itjust.works 2 weeks ago
This is true, but if I take the top comment, we have 28 houses/homes per homeless person - subtract the 2 holiday homes and you still got 25