If the government owned the properties, they'd have the full income from them. The only reason I'd see why they allow private landlords is so they can continue hogging the income when they're no longer in politics.

Furthermore, private landlords ruin the government's ability to do adequate city planning. You have cities like Dublin, a vastly overpopulated capital city, which has extreme low rise buildings all over the city center. And anyone in the country can veto a building scheme, so people abuse it to keep the prices of their own property high or just to sabotage the competition. It's mad. It's so stupid.

I also hate how people keep being forced or refuse to leave the wrong housing type, e.g. strangers forced to live together in family units, which further hogs said family units from families who obviously need them. Old people living alone in very oversized family units, complaining about feeling lonely. Single adults should always be able to live alone. Family units should prioritize families instead of making up prices which can only be afforded by many adult strangers living together. Old people would highly benefit from independent elder housing which isn't oversized and features common areas where they could socialize with each other (a model forced onto the young people, which hurts them, I believe would really benefit the elderly - of course done humanely, since no one should have to worry about bathroom access due to people who live around them etc.).

Post sponsored by my first time living alone, but the apartment is a mess and I fear reporting all to the landlady who is apathetic (e.g. told me to get a cable extender when the power socket isn't working). My water heater has been leaking for ages and only tomorrow I might get someone to fix it. I hate people who simp for (private) landlords. If I owned my housing, I wouldn't fear going homeless and wouldn't had had to move countries!