Gotta love being characterized as "pro-landlord" for saying, "Housing is a human right and ideally we'd have a system where there are no landlords, but in the system that currently exists, taking on a roommate to help split your mortgage doesn't make you a bad person."
Just like when the site decided I was a transphobe for suggesting that some people might not feel comfortable setting their pronouns, this is one of those allegations I didn't expect to have to address. But of course now that it's its own thread, I get to be the heel that everyone hates.
Oh, see, I thought the parasite part came from settler-colonizers murdering people and stealing large swaths of land that their descendents hoard and monopolize, taking in everyone's money and leaving them with no alternative but homelessness. But I guess the guy who owns 5% of a house getting a roommate to split the payment he has to send to the other guy is the real problem.
It literally doesn't matter what sort of arrangement you get into when the rich control so much of the housing market. If you have less than, like, $100k to your name then you could hardly exploit someone if you tried. You don't move up in class just because you took out a loan.
Like, in your worldview, do you think that renting is exploitative, but that buying is not? Do you think the millions of people who could get a loan and buy a house but instead choose to rent are just dumb and don't have valid reasons for preferring that arrangement? Do you think the system that's set up to exploit you left this big gap where you can just not get exploited if you choose door number one instead of door number two? I don't understand this worldview at all. They've got you every way you turn. As I explained in my first post on the topic, buying in practice is really just another form of renting with a different set of responsibilities, and with the bank as your landlord.
And yeah like I presented a couple real life possibilities I've considered like moving with my roommates and having one of us deal with the down payment and the debt and all that so the rest of us can just rent and not have to worry about it, or a friend offering to let me move in in exchange for free labor, and you didn't have any kind of response to that except retreating into memeland and posting Mao. Which reminds me, have you gone outside, once, like I asked?
Like, in your worldview, mortgage is the same as rent. Lib shit. I agree that we need to figure out alternatives to living situations like you mention, but I’d rather people stop bs’ing themselves with the drawn out arguments in an attempt to separate the ends from the means.
Mortgage is essentially the same as rent. You've got a couple differences, like, you have more autonomy over the property, you are responsible for fixing your own stuff when it breaks, it requires a down payment and you can't walk away from the monthly payments without finding someone to buy the house, and if you stick with it for a very long time, eventually you can actually own it. I don't see how those differences change anything fundamental, essentially, they own it because their ancestors stole it or bought it from someone who stole it, and you need it to survive, so you gotta pay them. They're just different payment plans, when it comes down to it. Would you rather pay for Spotify or buy music? It's a matter of preference.
And the solution is not for proles to find some fancy new arrangement that makes to most of the scraps we're left with, the solution is redistribute what they stole.
Of course landlording is a means of extracting wealth. I never suggested anything else. Another means of extracting wealth is selling a house to someone who needs it to survive. All I'm saying is "The house always wins."
I don't know that you can call renters who could get a loan to buy a house "corner cases." I don't know what the stats on that would be but it seems like that's a lot of people.
Usually when people can actually afford to buy and choose to rent, it’s because they’re staying short-term, e.g. college students or people who move around for work.
And that's what I'm saying that there are legitimate reasons why some people would prefer to rent rather than to own, I don't think it's clear cut, black and white, one option is inherently better than the other.
Most people can’t afford to buy in the neighborhood they rent in, and landlords hoarding land, driving up its price, is part of that.
That's literally exactly what I've been saying, here and elsewhere. The main issue is the people who own entire apartment buildings and buy and sell houses in cash on a whim as speculative investments. Somebody who has a spare room they're using for a hobby that they decide to clear out and offer up as rent is not part of that shit you're describing. Literally nobody would have a problem with someone having a spare room in their house that they don't need, but the moment they decide to offer it as a place to rent, people here start losing their shit and blaming that person for homelessness. And I'm trying to say, if a person who owns 5% of a house takes on a roommate who they treat respectfully as an equal to help with their mortgage payment, they're not the fucking problem. That's the scenario we were discussing when someone was asking about whether it could be ethical to buy a house and take on a roommate to help afford the mortgage. Literally 100% on the same page about the explotiveness and inequality of the system and the need for structural change and redistribution but people are calling me "pro-landlord" because I tried to offer realistic advice instead of just spamming Mao at them.
They're gonna get their wealth extracted from someone and so am I, the wealth that's extracted is just gonna go straight up to the actual bourgeoisie anyway. It's just going into and out of my hands instead of into and out of somebody else's hands. And the other person is no worse off than they would be anywhere else. It's not a problem that can be solved through individual action. If you wanna offer a better deal than market rate, then good on you, but it's only going to benefit the first lucky applicant and I don't see how it's any different than just walking up to a stranger and handing them a $100 bill. Like, cool, but what exactly do you think you're accomplishing, other than feeling good about yourself?
As I said elsewhere, one reason for my perspective was that I had considered moving with my roommates and working out a deal where one of us buys a place and the rest rent. We wouldn't really want to share equity because we're probably not going to stay together forever. I don't see what's stopping us from working out a deal that everyone would be happy with where we trade away equity for a lower monthly payment. I don't see what force makes that so fundamentally impossible, in your eyes. I'd honestly prefer to be a renter in that case so that I wouldn't have to deal with all the shit.
Or another possibility I considered was an offer to live with some other friends and doing labor in lieu of rent. Idk if paying in labor is different than paying in cash to you or not, but in any case, if your reaction to that offer is to roll out a guillotine then you might have developed an ideology exclusively through memes.
It's just dumb, we're all roughly the same level of poor, none of us are suddenly going to stop being poor just because we take out a loan, we couldn't suddenly transform into bourgeoisie exploiters if we tried, it just feels like nobody's actually thinking about the issue from a grounded and realistic perspective and it's all just haha Mao, which is cool and good unless you're trying to analyze things seriously and make a serious decision.
You talking about people getting pissed because of "gaining revenue from mere ownership," didn't Marx literally play the stocks, ffs? This shit is all just ideology and idealism and moral purity. Anyway I feel like I've said my piece and you're not changing my mind because I have practical, real life scenarios I'm looking at, and I don't think I'm changing people's minds because, idk, reasons. We're in agreement on like 99% of the issue anyway. OP is still a coward for making this post and still refusing to engage with me. Good luck dealing with housing in an ethical way, since you seem to think that's possible. I'm taking a break.
Literally the post that started this was a corner case and obviously I'm only defending corner cases and not the system on the whole which I clearly and vehemently oppose.
Ime I run into more people who see corner cases like that on their own and wonder why the left hates landlords and renting so much and why they don't just buy instead, which is why I think it's more important to have the conversation focused on the main structural issues which are more important anyway, and easier to explain. Like if what you're saying is that there are corner cases where it's basically fine but we should just sweep them under the rug so that nobody gets any ideas and just hope nobody notices, that ain't gonna work.
A lot of people wish they could! Many young people have very poor prospects for being able to own a home.
I'm aware. Not everyone is as sympathetic tho, and plus there are cases where people have the option and choose to rent, which makes the argument less compelling.
Now you see, Mr. Stalin, this Kulak really doesn’t have that much grain to hoard, we can’t attribute any famine deaths directly to them. Sure, it might be more functional to just collectivize the land rather than allow a patchwork of “acceptable cases” through, but have you considered that they work really hard on their farm?
Yeah no I have been abundantly clear the whole time that housing is a human right and I've also clearly stated that I oppose the existence of landlords and am only discussing the actions of individuals in a fundamentally broken system, not any kind of ideal. There is no comparison.
Ok, ok, I get you. I said I'd take a break but I continued because things mellowed out some, don't wanna start shit up. I'd be interested to see stats on that (if for nothing else but to add a talking point to my repertoire), but I will say that part of why my roommate and I were talking about buying a place is that it's probably a better deal, admittedly. But then that's where it could be an edge case where one of us could buy and we could work out a deal, and if that's what made sense for us materially I wouldn't want to say no just because of ideology. That's where I'm coming from.
This conversation began with someone who was asking for advice on whether it was acceptable to buy a house and have a roommate to help with the mortgage, and I argued that it was, because I wanted to give serious and practical advice. I don't have a victim complex, this post was a response to an argument between myself and OP, and I just think it's pretty cheeky to paint me as "pro-landlord" when I oppose the existence of landlords and advocate for redistribution. However if someone is looking for practical, real life advice, I will tell them that they can't solve the problem individually and that the house always wins regardless, and that if they're treating them as a roommate and respecting them as an equal, then in that specific situation it's fine. Of course like I said since OP made a separate post, you don't get that context and I'm just the heel, which is frankly probably why OP made the post but I digress. I should clarify that I am not a landlord, nor do I have any desire to be one, I rent a house with three roommates.
Gotta love being characterized as "pro-landlord" for saying, "Housing is a human right and ideally we'd have a system where there are no landlords, but in the system that currently exists, taking on a roommate to help split your mortgage doesn't make you a bad person."
Just like when the site decided I was a transphobe for suggesting that some people might not feel comfortable setting their pronouns, this is one of those allegations I didn't expect to have to address. But of course now that it's its own thread, I get to be the heel that everyone hates.
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Oh, see, I thought the parasite part came from settler-colonizers murdering people and stealing large swaths of land that their descendents hoard and monopolize, taking in everyone's money and leaving them with no alternative but homelessness. But I guess the guy who owns 5% of a house getting a roommate to split the payment he has to send to the other guy is the real problem.
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It literally doesn't matter what sort of arrangement you get into when the rich control so much of the housing market. If you have less than, like, $100k to your name then you could hardly exploit someone if you tried. You don't move up in class just because you took out a loan.
Like, in your worldview, do you think that renting is exploitative, but that buying is not? Do you think the millions of people who could get a loan and buy a house but instead choose to rent are just dumb and don't have valid reasons for preferring that arrangement? Do you think the system that's set up to exploit you left this big gap where you can just not get exploited if you choose door number one instead of door number two? I don't understand this worldview at all. They've got you every way you turn. As I explained in my first post on the topic, buying in practice is really just another form of renting with a different set of responsibilities, and with the bank as your landlord.
And yeah like I presented a couple real life possibilities I've considered like moving with my roommates and having one of us deal with the down payment and the debt and all that so the rest of us can just rent and not have to worry about it, or a friend offering to let me move in in exchange for free labor, and you didn't have any kind of response to that except retreating into memeland and posting Mao. Which reminds me, have you gone outside, once, like I asked?
Edit: The downbear says no.
Like, in your worldview, mortgage is the same as rent. Lib shit. I agree that we need to figure out alternatives to living situations like you mention, but I’d rather people stop bs’ing themselves with the drawn out arguments in an attempt to separate the ends from the means.
Mortgage is essentially the same as rent. You've got a couple differences, like, you have more autonomy over the property, you are responsible for fixing your own stuff when it breaks, it requires a down payment and you can't walk away from the monthly payments without finding someone to buy the house, and if you stick with it for a very long time, eventually you can actually own it. I don't see how those differences change anything fundamental, essentially, they own it because their ancestors stole it or bought it from someone who stole it, and you need it to survive, so you gotta pay them. They're just different payment plans, when it comes down to it. Would you rather pay for Spotify or buy music? It's a matter of preference.
And the solution is not for proles to find some fancy new arrangement that makes to most of the scraps we're left with, the solution is redistribute what they stole.
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Why am I wrong?
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So why doesn't everyone who has the option buy instead of renting? Is buying an objectively better option?
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Of course landlording is a means of extracting wealth. I never suggested anything else. Another means of extracting wealth is selling a house to someone who needs it to survive. All I'm saying is "The house always wins."
I don't know that you can call renters who could get a loan to buy a house "corner cases." I don't know what the stats on that would be but it seems like that's a lot of people.
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And that's what I'm saying that there are legitimate reasons why some people would prefer to rent rather than to own, I don't think it's clear cut, black and white, one option is inherently better than the other.
That's literally exactly what I've been saying, here and elsewhere. The main issue is the people who own entire apartment buildings and buy and sell houses in cash on a whim as speculative investments. Somebody who has a spare room they're using for a hobby that they decide to clear out and offer up as rent is not part of that shit you're describing. Literally nobody would have a problem with someone having a spare room in their house that they don't need, but the moment they decide to offer it as a place to rent, people here start losing their shit and blaming that person for homelessness. And I'm trying to say, if a person who owns 5% of a house takes on a roommate who they treat respectfully as an equal to help with their mortgage payment, they're not the fucking problem. That's the scenario we were discussing when someone was asking about whether it could be ethical to buy a house and take on a roommate to help afford the mortgage. Literally 100% on the same page about the explotiveness and inequality of the system and the need for structural change and redistribution but people are calling me "pro-landlord" because I tried to offer realistic advice instead of just spamming Mao at them.
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They're gonna get their wealth extracted from someone and so am I, the wealth that's extracted is just gonna go straight up to the actual bourgeoisie anyway. It's just going into and out of my hands instead of into and out of somebody else's hands. And the other person is no worse off than they would be anywhere else. It's not a problem that can be solved through individual action. If you wanna offer a better deal than market rate, then good on you, but it's only going to benefit the first lucky applicant and I don't see how it's any different than just walking up to a stranger and handing them a $100 bill. Like, cool, but what exactly do you think you're accomplishing, other than feeling good about yourself?
As I said elsewhere, one reason for my perspective was that I had considered moving with my roommates and working out a deal where one of us buys a place and the rest rent. We wouldn't really want to share equity because we're probably not going to stay together forever. I don't see what's stopping us from working out a deal that everyone would be happy with where we trade away equity for a lower monthly payment. I don't see what force makes that so fundamentally impossible, in your eyes. I'd honestly prefer to be a renter in that case so that I wouldn't have to deal with all the shit.
Or another possibility I considered was an offer to live with some other friends and doing labor in lieu of rent. Idk if paying in labor is different than paying in cash to you or not, but in any case, if your reaction to that offer is to roll out a guillotine then you might have developed an ideology exclusively through memes.
It's just dumb, we're all roughly the same level of poor, none of us are suddenly going to stop being poor just because we take out a loan, we couldn't suddenly transform into bourgeoisie exploiters if we tried, it just feels like nobody's actually thinking about the issue from a grounded and realistic perspective and it's all just haha Mao, which is cool and good unless you're trying to analyze things seriously and make a serious decision.
You talking about people getting pissed because of "gaining revenue from mere ownership," didn't Marx literally play the stocks, ffs? This shit is all just ideology and idealism and moral purity. Anyway I feel like I've said my piece and you're not changing my mind because I have practical, real life scenarios I'm looking at, and I don't think I'm changing people's minds because, idk, reasons. We're in agreement on like 99% of the issue anyway. OP is still a coward for making this post and still refusing to engage with me. Good luck dealing with housing in an ethical way, since you seem to think that's possible. I'm taking a break.
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Literally the post that started this was a corner case and obviously I'm only defending corner cases and not the system on the whole which I clearly and vehemently oppose.
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Ime I run into more people who see corner cases like that on their own and wonder why the left hates landlords and renting so much and why they don't just buy instead, which is why I think it's more important to have the conversation focused on the main structural issues which are more important anyway, and easier to explain. Like if what you're saying is that there are corner cases where it's basically fine but we should just sweep them under the rug so that nobody gets any ideas and just hope nobody notices, that ain't gonna work.
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I'm aware. Not everyone is as sympathetic tho, and plus there are cases where people have the option and choose to rent, which makes the argument less compelling.
Yeah no I have been abundantly clear the whole time that housing is a human right and I've also clearly stated that I oppose the existence of landlords and am only discussing the actions of individuals in a fundamentally broken system, not any kind of ideal. There is no comparison.
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Ok, ok, I get you. I said I'd take a break but I continued because things mellowed out some, don't wanna start shit up. I'd be interested to see stats on that (if for nothing else but to add a talking point to my repertoire), but I will say that part of why my roommate and I were talking about buying a place is that it's probably a better deal, admittedly. But then that's where it could be an edge case where one of us could buy and we could work out a deal, and if that's what made sense for us materially I wouldn't want to say no just because of ideology. That's where I'm coming from.
how is this person getting upvoted
Advocating for scenarios in which it's okay to be a landlord is literally being pro-landlord lol what's with the victim complex?
This conversation began with someone who was asking for advice on whether it was acceptable to buy a house and have a roommate to help with the mortgage, and I argued that it was, because I wanted to give serious and practical advice. I don't have a victim complex, this post was a response to an argument between myself and OP, and I just think it's pretty cheeky to paint me as "pro-landlord" when I oppose the existence of landlords and advocate for redistribution. However if someone is looking for practical, real life advice, I will tell them that they can't solve the problem individually and that the house always wins regardless, and that if they're treating them as a roommate and respecting them as an equal, then in that specific situation it's fine. Of course like I said since OP made a separate post, you don't get that context and I'm just the heel, which is frankly probably why OP made the post but I digress. I should clarify that I am not a landlord, nor do I have any desire to be one, I rent a house with three roommates.