2M federally-funded homes AND $25 k to first gen homeowners!.

@wildgrass said
$335 million is clearly, obviously way way more than it costs to build a floating dock, by orders of magnitude.

Some military contractor in Fairfax Virginia, the wealthiest county in America, pockets the millions cash in difference. So you see, the dramatic excess in military spending is indeed stepping into the lives and finances of Americans. The only difference is tha ...[text shortened]... rmint spending, just don't give it to the young family struggling to scrape together a down payment.

@AverageJoe1 said
A general 'liberal confusion' pops out as I read this. You write this, ...follow me here...as if it is the military contractor's fault. You are aware that business will always charge whatever they can get. Human nature. My nature, frankly. So a bunch of YOUR elected reps sat around the table with the contractor and hammered out, negotiated, the deal.
So, your re ...[text shortened]... rich contractor's fault. Do you think it is, or are you honed in on disgust for his being so rich?

What I'm trying to say, Joe, is that it is real hard to sympathize with your meager $25,000 for a down payment argument when the government wastes so much money in much much larger amounts every single day.

Clean up the mess in the military budget and you might have my attention.

@AverageJoe1 said
Two separate Giveaways:

So people who started out with nothing just simply end up with something all by saying their parents did not own a home....that, they will be first generation homeowners.
The govt will GIVE these people, who have to do nothing, 25% of the cost of a $100k home.
Does this seem a normal way to run a country? Marauder and MB need not reply ...[text shortened]... e pay for free tuition?

https://homebuyer.com/learn/25000-first-time-home-buyer-downpayment-grant

@AverageJoe1
Again showing how much you ABSOLUTELY hate giving anyone ANYTHING, and BTW, the average cost of a house is now in the 300's, so what you can get for 100k is not going to be a mansion, more like a 1 bedroom townhouse with twenty more just like it all in a row and my guess is there will be ZERO homes for 100K and if they are listed for that, they would be extreme fixer uppers missing such details as a roof or something.

" the median price of an existing home was $393,500 last month, an increase of 4.8% from a year earlier. That was the highest March price on record. Rising home prices coupled with mortgage rates stuck at elevated levels means Americans are still dealing with a tough housing market."

https://www.cnn.com/2024/04/18/economy/us-homes-sales-march/index.html

Joe hasn't got a clue about present realities.

@no1marauder
Less than Average Joe1 says all it takes now is less than 4% down. I find that hard to believe, so you pay 400K for a house and put down 4K? We put 4K down on a frigging CAR and hint, it was not a caddy. So 395K left over the house payment would be in the vacinity of 3K a month and what, 7 % interest per year, So 30 years X 7%, doubles the price, so that 400K house ends up costing more like 800K total.

@sonhouse

An essay...

It’s odd that we don’t recognize a right to live somewhere.

As children, we have a right to live with our parents, but when we turn 18, we suddenly have no right to be anywhere. Welcome to adulthood! Keep moving, citizen. Renters can be kicked out for non-payment or at the end of the lease. If we buy with a loan, the property can be taken away from us if we don’t keep up payments. If we own a place outright, it can be taken away for unpaid taxes.

None of us will ever own a home that can’t be taken away from us.

It’s a strange aspect of our existence that although we can’t be thrown out of our country, we can’t STAY any particular place within the country without paying someone. Unless we meet someone else’s criteria, we have to wander. We recognize the right to live, but only as semi-nomads. Homelessness is not so much a bug as a feature.

Now, let’s not be alarmist: most of us avoid being put out on the street for the entirely of our lives, but it does take considerable effort. We have to get rent money together. We have to avoid foreclosure. We have to pay property tax. I guess one can get used to anything, but it’s a bizarre and rather primitive situation.

When we think about human rights, isn’t one of the most basic the right to a home? This seems as basic a right as eating. What does it mean to recognize the right live, but not the right to live anywhere? Our home is a place where we can take shelter, get out of the rain, stay warm, sleep. Home is where we lock the door. Home is where we put our belongings. Home is our refuge. How can anyone maintain themselves and be a productive member of society without a home? Who can hold down a job without a place to hang their clothes or take a shower?

We have made being permanently housed hard. It’s hard to get a home and hang onto it until you die. Home prices are high, and while a thirty-year mortgage payment may be a little less expensive than rent, you have to have a large down payment to make that happen. And then what if you lose your job? Now you have to sell. Maybe the market is good, maybe it’s not. People have been known to live permanently in campgrounds or in their cars. People find they can’t afford to live anywhere except in flood zones. Houses get condemned and must be vacated. Fires and hurricanes and storms leave people suddenly homeless. Are we really content being semi- or serially homeless?

Now, it’s true, some people like to change residences often. Fair enough. With the advent of “working remotely” a return to nomadism has appeal for some. But with all the land bought up, we have to rent space to be roamers. And what if we don’t want to move? How did we as a country get ourselves into this situation?

==== Historical Background
Again stepping back in history, the idea of territoriality, which means excluding individuals who are not in “our group” from a geographic area, is a natural concept among many animal species. However, it is not universal. Many animals have a nomadic lifestyle – bison, deer, birds, and some humans. But for several thousand years, humans have veered more and more strongly into defining and defending territoriality – first at the level of the group (sovereignty) and then allowing some land to go over to being held privately by individuals (ownership). Sovereignty means that a visitor to someone’s private land has the same rights as if they were standing on public land – their rights don’t change. Private property ownership is not sovereignty since owning land doesn’t mean you can dictate your own law.

Still, private land ownership is a popular idea. Private property is important for businesses and capital ventures. When individuals own their own land, they feel safe, secure, comfortable. They can make sound business decisions about their future. They can invest knowing that they will not have to move. Private landowners also tend to take better care of their properties (not always, but usually). Anyone who owns farmland has a tremendous incentive to keep that land fertile and productive, and building owners usually want their buildings to remain in good shape.

== Administration of Private Land
There should be few restrictions on what can private landowners can do with their property. The rationale is that if there is ENOUGH public land, there is little reason to restrict private owners. The concept of “Do as you please as long as you don’t harm, impose on or place others at risk without their consent” applies.

Suppose I want to put solar panels on my roof, grow vegetables in from of my house, collect rainwater, build a granny flat over the garage to rent out, and sell home-brewed cider out of my garage on Friday and Saturday nights?
In most areas of the country I will suddenly have problems, not necessarily with my neighbors, but with government – people who are supposedly protecting everyone’s rights, including mine. Even though none of these things directly harm my neighbors, I will have people showing up at my door telling me I can’t do that.

First, the HOA will tell me my solar panels are unsightly and vegetable gardens in from of my house are ‘not allowed’. Then the EPA will order me to stop collecting rainwater because it is ‘interfering with streams and rivers’. Then the Town will tell me I am violating zoning laws against accessory dwelling units. And then several different agencies will show up to tell me I can’t sell alcohol!

None of my actions harms anyone, actually others benefit. And everything I want to do is legal – somewhere. But because government over-regulates our society, an innocent private landowner can sometimes be treated like a criminal.

Any time someone wants government to restrict a neighbor, they should be forced to show that what the neighbor is doing ACTUALLY harms them. Enforcing laws based on preferences is wrong because that interferes with individual liberty. Government should only intervene when neighbors do something which violates another’s rights, for instance when a stream that flows from one property to the next is blocked or diverted, or if noxious fumes or invasive weeds or noise from one property impinge.

And let’s consider the fact that our perception of rights changes over time. Unlike in the past, people don’t necessarily want new nuclear power plants (perceived risk) or hog farms (risk of pollution) built next to the yard where their children play. In certain countries, buildings on a property cannot block the sunlight shining into a neighboring window – an interesting idea, but not current in the US (see MPU #10 – public land buffers). Finally, some are beginning to realize that wild animals which wander between properties are not owned, so landowners must take care not to harm those species except in cases of menace. You don’t own the butterflies – so don’t kill them!

=== The Supply of Private Land
There is large demand for private property and continually increasing populations lead to higher and higher prices for land. We have run up against the limits of land as a finite resource. Immigration and a growing population creates demand for more land and housing – but there isn’t any more land. For many people, it is now prohibitively expensive to own a home.

One solution to this problem would be to convert more public land to private use, but since anywhere from 30% to 50% of land should probably remain public to protect our rights (see MPU #10), we have to look at other reasons that private land has become too costly: restrictions, taxes, and speculation.

=Restrictions=
Zoning restrictions often prevent owners from re-purposing private land in a better way. In many cities, properties which are zoned commercial can’t be re-purposed as residences. While some zoning may be reasonable (e.g. hog farms), there are also less legitimate reasons, for instance when single-family homeowners don’t want apartment buildings built near them (e.g. NIMBY). There is no right “not to be next to apartments.” More public land BETWEEN private properties (as proposed above) would help alleviate this problem.

=Taxes=
Real estate taxes are complicated, and abusive tax breaks have been created by governments at the behest of aggressive lobbyists. Many find that holding onto property they don’t need benefits them from a tax perspective (e.g. commercial property depreciation is complete nonsense. Most properties INCREASE in value over time, not decrease!) This adds to property shortages.

=Speculation=
In the US, but also worldwide (especially in large cities), many properties stand empty. The owners live elsewhere, pay minimal property tax, and wait for the value to go up. We also have many foreign actors and corporations buying American properties as investments. This can be a hedge against inflation (NB. The government inflating our currency makes this problem worse: see MPU #7). The more prices rise, the more people buy properties and hold them, often empty, which adds to the housing shortage.

When the right to own MANY homes comes in conflict with the right to own ONE home, we must decide which right it is most important to protect.

One possible solution to this situation would be progressive property taxes. Property tax rates should be lowest on one home, and then rise exponentially on second, third, fourth homes etc. As long as tax rates apply equally and in the same fashion to everyone, this would not violate equal protection. But landlords, corporations and foreign owners with a lot of properties or land might find they need to sell. This would drive down prices and create opportunities for home buyers.

Americans have been told that their home is “their biggest investment,” but this is a piece of propaganda promoted by the US real estate industry. A home is a cost center, not a profit center. Homes pay no dividends. They generate no profit unless they are rented out. Like paintings, they may go up in value or down, but they are much more a speculative venture than a true investment. In fact, they are the opposite since, unlike artworks, they cost significant money to maintain. No one should want more home(s) than they intend to use, and government “encouraging” people to own homes with tax breaks and by creating corporations that buy up mortgages has vastly distorted the market.

=== Homestead
Let’s recognize a new right: We have the right to live in a place we own until we die.

Government should never be able to throw us out of a home that we own free and clear. No one should ever be removed from a property for not paying property tax.

Again, this is not to say that there are no such a thing as eviction. Rental and mortgage contracts are between individuals and must be enforceable. Someone who loses their “temporary” home can find last-resort shelter under other means, although it may not be super comfortable (see MPU #5).

But our relationship with government is different. Someone who can’t pay their tax should only be unable to bequeath their property. The land will go back to the public after the current owner dies (10 years for corporations) very similar to how eminent domain should work.

Once government meddling has ceased (inflation; over-restrictive zoning; tax breaks) and housing prices have dropped, we will see many more private homeowners who can be certain that they can never be forced out of their homes in their lifetimes. This would be an excellent development for our society.

Both private and public land are needed to protect our rights.

#MorePerfectUnion #MPU #MPU11

@wildgrass said
What I'm trying to say, Joe, is that it is real hard to sympathize with your meager $25,000 for a down payment argument when the government wastes so much money in much much larger amounts every single day.

Clean up the mess in the military budget and you might have my attention.

The post that was quoted here has been removed

@wildgrass said
Because you support a blank check (out of your taxes) for military spending, that's how we end up with a $335 million floating dock. Again, you could buy more than a million floating docks on Amazon for this price.

Taco bell could airlift 600 million tacos to Gaza for that price.

What if we used your hard earned dollars to buy 70 foot yachts, 500 of them, brand new, a ...[text shortened]... ating dock? Hopefully the military contractor threw in a free pair of waterskis to sweeten the deal.