Housing was no better before COVID.
tbf this mainly all appears to stem from COVID and is impacting most of the western world
Finding housing in Paris is getting harder – even for young people making good money
While the housing crisis in the French capital primarily affects the most vulnerable, it has become so severe that even young employees with a monthly income of €3,000 are struggling.
lemonde.fr/…/finding-housing-in-paris-is-getting-…
We need more houses but houses have never been more difficult to build
Sheppa@aussie.zone 3 days ago
Eyekaytee@aussie.zone 3 days ago
really? there was a global housing crisis before COVID? You have links to that?
Zagorath@aussie.zone 3 days ago
More supply is part of what’s needed, absolutely.
But there’s more to it than just that. The amount of incentives to invest in housing means more people bidding on a house, which raises the price of the house, which makes housing an even better investment, so more people bid on the next house, which raises housing prices even further. We need to cut that off by strongly disincentivising the use of housing as people’s primary investment.
There are other things that could be done, like a levy on unoccupied homes (including “holiday homes” which might be occupied only a few weeks or months per year) and on unregulated hotels (Airbnb). And better protections for renters. And preventing developers from land-banking or drip-feeding homes onto the market rather than building as much as they can.
Realistically, the housing market is so fucked, we need a mix of all of these.