Not sure if this is just ingrained "American Dream" mentality but I want to get away from landlords and buy my own house. Partly this is so I can have my own space to work on my own projects, be messy, grow weed, walk around naked, etc. Lately this is looking like a real possibility since I've paid off my college debt and started saving money for a down payment. I'm also expecting house prices to fall in the next year as the economy implodes.
Despite all that, housing is still really expensive where I live and I probably wouldn't be able to afford a house without a partner or a roommate paying part of the mortgage. My romantic prospects aren't looking too good and I really don't want to be a landlord. And I don't know how I would feel buying a foreclosure. Not to mention I'd be locked into a 30 year mortgage that won't be paid off until after climate change has forced us all to migrate to Nunavut.
Tell me chapos, what's the moral thing to do here? Should I keep renting? Buy a house and try to be an "ethical" landlord? Move in with the next woman I meet after the 2nd date? Go join a commune/cult?
Under chud economics, being a landlord doesn't necessitate rent seeking, since depreciation exists, and doing upkeep on your real estate returns value that was lost with depreciation. In a purely ideal sense, it isn't so bad if you are a very good landlord, but those tend to be far and few in between, especially under the current system.
As far as your job installing security cameras is concerned, that's a much better example of not being so hung up on personal purity tests, since you're clearly stuck in this capitalist mode, and you still gotta live. The issue of personal purity tests would come into play here, but I don't really think any general ideas about that go anywhere, since every individual has to deal with that internal struggle in different ways.
It could be zero sum, or maybe it won't be. I think it's different from something like being a landlord, considering housing is an absolute necessity that is being artificially depleted in order for some to profit.