*per unit

And outlaw Air bnb, why build an apartment when you can just build condos and make the place into an overpriced pseudo hotel with no cleaning service

Why not crop off the reddit advertisement

Tax empty properties owned by corporations.

Ban foreign investors from buying up properties.

Increase taxes on non-primary, non-secondary properties dramatically (so if you own a home and a vacation house, you’re fine, but you’ll pay way more in taxes if you own more than that).

Release federal funds earmarked for subsidizing the mass construction of low and middle income properties that must be sold at below market rate in order to qualify for the subsidy.

Re-evaluate zoning laws nationwide to make it easier for residential housing to be built into areas that it currently makes sense but is forbidden due to draconian zoning laws propped up by NIMBYs.

Sorry if any of the above hurt your bottom line in the end, but it’s more important to ensure that everyone has a place to live than it is to protect the “ownership as a means of passively generating wealth” model we are currently living under. The line cannot go up forever.

I don’t know about the US but Canada’s population has been skyrocketing at about 12-15% increase per decade. Yet we’re building houses at an unbelievably glacial rate. This is totally unsustainable.

Here’s the real problem: the household wealth of most Canadians is tied up in the real estate values of their homes. Governments are afraid to unleash a building spree because that bubble will burst and destroy the wealth of the middle class. Instead, the current government is deeply committed to growing the population and the economy through immigration. But this will only put more and more upward pressure on the housing market. The middle class gets richer, housing gets less and less affordable, and immigration resentment grows.

Don’t tax anything remotely to do with building and owning property. Tax the fuck out of owning empty property