We use taxpayer money to pay farmers to destroy crops and livestock to insure prices stay within range. So why not do the same for housing, pay banks money to destroy unoccupied/foreclosed homes and implode condos as well and the US Government takes ownership of the land title. Banks would be flush with money and the drop in available housing will cause prices to go back up as well. As banks now flush with money and no longer holding the property they can now loan this money which will increase the velocity of money helping jumpstart our economy and raise asset prices. The empty land could then be sold to local counties for use as landfills,parks,prisons,schools,etc. The removal of the imploded homes etc.. and this repurposed land will also bring about new jobs as well.
Right, let's just nuke every other aspect of the economy to save the precious housing market and keep prices elevated so every working stiff literally slaves his life away just to pay off the mortgage note. Fucking brilliant. I got a better idea. Let the housing market collapse and return it back to a sideshow in the US economy, where people are incentivized to live in the place and not leverage the entire economy of this one sector. It would clear out all the dead weight parasites that feed off this sector as well.
Good post. The politicians in the US and Europe have turned to real estate because it is the easy way out to show economic growth and get re-elected. In some countries, this growth is artificial wealth creation by just re-pricing real estate up for tax purposes, helping the state increase tax revenue while putting a pressure on prices. Actually, this is the mechanism that destroyed Greece and nobody talks about it. Politicians there used real estate exclusively as a tool for growth, basically allowing banks to lent up to 120% of value to people who did not even qualify for a loan and then raising pricing for tax purposes annually so they could pay their armies of public sector workers who vote them in government. This drove many companies listed in exchanges to get involved in real estate and they abandoned their traditional commercial business. A 500 sq. ft. apartment, 35 years old, in an area with low quality of living would be priced at 500K. Just an increadible scam. Politician's scam.
Yes, this is exactly right. Perhaps, the same can be said for Spain, as I had read about a similar property bubble with banks up to their eyeballs in bad debt and massive overbuilding (over speculation). It is an entire food chain of parasites that are supported by this reckless fiscal policy from the mortgage brokers to the appraisers to the realtors, on down the line. I don't begrudge the hard labor that goes into construction, but I do despise the lobbyist groups that continue to push forward their agenda to just promote perpetual bubbles with no abatement in pricing. People seem to forget that the "end user" of such prolific scams are the working class who dedicate an enormous amount of labor towards paying for these bloated stucco crapboxes. Throw in the property taxes as well that feed the public sector pigs. So, no, to the original OP, I'd suggest anything but your solution. We must starve this despicable beast that is trying like hell to enslave all future generations under the guise of "affordability" and/or "saving current homeowners" from feeling the pinch of an overpriced piece of shit house losing value. Instead, your solution is simply another generational bailout. Casting the weight of continued monetization and bailouts onto all non homeowners or future generations of homeowners just to save the hide of this current generation of assholes and miscreants who feel entitled to the massive paper wealth that some of them were lucky enough to accrue in their properties.
Let's just package these crappy mortgages into securities and sell them off as tranches to institutional clients. Swing and a miss. Timing's off again.
Completely agree with denner & intradaybill. Leave housing alone. Leave it alone. Enough screwing around with housing already! If anything, the mortgage deduction pie ought to be taken away (like in Canada) so that the market can eventually return back to a "normal" supply/demand market. Not one based on tax deductions, 100% financing, house flipping tv shows, now bankruptcy auctions, etc.
The problem is not that houses are too cheap now. The problem is that houses were too expensive 3 or 4 years ago and fools bought them anyway.
That requires the right suppot from the powers-that-be: extremely low interest rates, "too big to fail" gentlemen's agreements from gov't to big banks, loans to the noncreditworthy in the name of political correctness, etc. Oh wait.
HERD lesson: (Housing: vaaaaast majority yearn for it to come back) Beat up on underarmed people, yeah so easy, but suffer thru' withdrawal agony from decades of credit and housing binge, no siree, americanos can't do it. Bring the housing market back so they can go back on heroin and get back into high gear on stupidity & materialism again? Figures! That's why the BEAR MARKET IS STILL IN ITS INFANCY BEARMARKET is over when the Cancer is cured and fin. and family values overshoot the start of bubble, i.e. 1966-80. current definition of an american? ... an idiot who voraciously and vociferously buys stuff with money he doesn't have - to such an extent that it became a bedrock of personal finance. And add this to solidify it ... and expects this to last forever and yearns to get it back so he can go back to his normal way of living beyond his means Man who binges on snatching kisses when young, kisses snatches when old.