> There will always be the need for landlords in some circumstances.
Landlords do not need to be private individuals :)
> but the idea of owning investments isn't going to dissolve any time soon and physical assets (homes) are one investment vehicle.
Singapore, a country that scores higher in the Capitalism Index than the US, has no private landlords and all land is goverment owned. You buy your house from the goverment for non market rates, and if you wanna sell it or move elsewhere, you sell it for the price at that point.
It is no longer an investment, and people have more space, smaller rents and an easier way to go through the housing ladder (from starter home -> family home -> retirement home) than in almost any US metro.
Another alternative is Vienna. The Austrian capital has ton of communally owned houses. This means everyone in the block, owns the whole block, therefore the prices are not market prices but fair prices. Despite this houses representing only 40% of the total market, by having a non market offering of housing prices, this cools down market prices and they have some of the most affordable private owned houses in European capitals.
A third alternative is UK 1950's scheme of council housing. A percentage of every new build is done by the goverment and they allocate those houses with reduced rents to its owners. The differece with the modern "social housing" is that is not a block in the ghetto for poor people, but a mixture of houses for everyone in the council to apply. For example The Barbican, a now iconic buulding, was built by the council for high skill workers, lawyers, CEOs etc (with an average rent that would be too high for minimum wage renters). Despite this target audience, they froze rent for 5 years to help families grow and settle into those homes.
There are a million better ways to supply housing than private landlords and letting companies buy entire blocks as investment vehicles.
Landlords do not need to be private individuals :)
> but the idea of owning investments isn't going to dissolve any time soon and physical assets (homes) are one investment vehicle.
Singapore, a country that scores higher in the Capitalism Index than the US, has no private landlords and all land is goverment owned. You buy your house from the goverment for non market rates, and if you wanna sell it or move elsewhere, you sell it for the price at that point.
It is no longer an investment, and people have more space, smaller rents and an easier way to go through the housing ladder (from starter home -> family home -> retirement home) than in almost any US metro.
Another alternative is Vienna. The Austrian capital has ton of communally owned houses. This means everyone in the block, owns the whole block, therefore the prices are not market prices but fair prices. Despite this houses representing only 40% of the total market, by having a non market offering of housing prices, this cools down market prices and they have some of the most affordable private owned houses in European capitals.
A third alternative is UK 1950's scheme of council housing. A percentage of every new build is done by the goverment and they allocate those houses with reduced rents to its owners. The differece with the modern "social housing" is that is not a block in the ghetto for poor people, but a mixture of houses for everyone in the council to apply. For example The Barbican, a now iconic buulding, was built by the council for high skill workers, lawyers, CEOs etc (with an average rent that would be too high for minimum wage renters). Despite this target audience, they froze rent for 5 years to help families grow and settle into those homes.
There are a million better ways to supply housing than private landlords and letting companies buy entire blocks as investment vehicles.