Residential properties usually have short term leases. You have minimal incentive as a tenant to plant flowers, buy shrubs, etc. You have minimal inventive as a landlord to make the house look any more attractive than it needs to be.

Landlords don't maintain property to the same standard as an individual homeowner, when they do, they use more efficient service models (ie. a single crew with a single set of tools) to do so.

Tenants participate less and have much lower engagement. They have 1 year leases, and have less at stake. In my community, renters participate 60% less in terms of voting. There are 150 members of my local neighborhood association, and per a recent survey, 90% of participants are homeowners. They mostly solicit membership by dropping flyers and advertising in church bulletins. Per census figures, the population of renters is somewhere between 60-70% vs. homeowners.

The last point is that without homeownership, incentives shift to multi-family dwellings because they are cheaper and more efficient. Single family homes for rent are usually an aberration in my experience. As a homeowner in a city that is mostly rentals the per-unit taxable value of a multi-family house is significantly less than a single family.

None of this is true in Germany, so you're arguing a case on faulty premises (like 'x is true under current law, so we shouldn't change the law because x' - ignoring that a side effect, or maybe even a goal, of changing the law would be to make x not true).

"Residential properties usually have short term leases."

Not true in Germany. Most leases are indefinite. As the contractual rent often increases by less than the market there is some incentive to stay put. Also keep in mind that moving in Germany is an expensive proposition as the kitchen is usually not part of the deal.

Germany has a different legal system and tradition. The probability of the US enacting indefinite leases is zero.

1/3 of San Francisco apartments are effectively under indefinite lease.

It's a different story in the US which makes hard to have a comparable conversation unless both parties have intimate knowledge of both environments.

My rent in the US went up $100+ year after year, rent never goes down is the feeling you get and I've never seen or heard of it happening. You never invested anything into the property or building. Buying a home was freedom from that constant rising pressure, moving every 2-3 years to find another move in special and I can finally invest time and effort in my living space.

> Residential properties usually have short term leases. You have minimal incentive as a tenant to plant flowers, buy shrubs, etc. You have minimal inventive as a landlord to make the house look any more attractive than it needs to be.

That's because homeownership is a norm for long-term residents here in the USA. If long term renting were as much (or more) of a norm, an average renter would experience the same incentive to keep the place in an aesthetically pleasing state as an average owner, and landlords would have to make their properties much more attractive in order to have tenants.

Behavior of commercial tenants suggests otherwise.

Can you elaborate on this?

Every office I've ever worked in the continental U.S. was on a long term lease. The organizations I worked for spent large amounts of money to customize work spaces. It is very possible that software firms don't represent commercial tenants, so please give me more information so I can update my viewpoint.

Commercial persons are sociopathic (by definition, pretty much) and don't have concepts of consumption, experience, and pleasure the way real persons do.

I don't actually know the answer to this, but wouldn't you expect everything you say to be true in a society where ownership is the norm and not the case in a society where it isn't?

Your points miss both the financial incentive to make things better for your own asset and long term incentive since oftentimes renting makes one more nomadic. Point by point:

- You might not garden w/ no equitable return on house value (or at least not build a large gardening setup), and landlords feel the same way in reverse (no benefit to them to do anything beyond the minimum once it's inhabited)

- Maintain != improve...BIG difference

- Except you may be more nomadic. Also you missed the GP's use of the word "stakeholder" of which you are considerably less of if you don't own land in the community

- I too don't understand this point...but I think the GP means "multi-family" as in apartments, thereby single-family (i.e. standalone house) is higher "premium" therefore you contribute more. Again, not sure here.

Increasing home ownership lowers economic growth. People tend to move jobs less often and have longer commutes both of which reduces economic efficiency. People also tend to rent places which more closely match their needs further reducing waste. AKA, renting and there is no need for a kids room until you have kids, but when buying you may need to plan for your needs in 5+ years out.

Further, people really do rent the same place for 30+ years when their job and family situation is stable, which incentives similar levels of improvement.

Source?

Housing has driven US GDP growth since WW2 or earlier, so that's a pretty big leap.

Housing != home ownership. Anyway, I have read this a few places, but here is the first link I found. "Regions with higher home ownership created fewer new businesses, had longer commute times, and lower rates of labor mobility." http://www.fool.com/investing/general/2013/05/08/the-deep-do...

Further, GDP is a very short term view of the economy. Daycare is a classic example where going from an informal to formal system nominally increases GDP much more than the net increase in value.

> You might not garden w/ no equitable return on house value (or at least not build a large gardening setup)

The return is the experience and joy of gardening, which occurs whether I own or rent.

> landlords feel the same way in reverse (no benefit to them to do anything beyond the minimum once it's inhabited)

I'm willing to pay more in rent for a higher quality residence. A well maintained garden (or the tools to make one) would certainly count towards quality.

> Except you may be more nomadic. Also you missed the GP's use of the word "stakeholder" of which you are considerably less of if you don't own land in the community

Even if I live in a place for a single week, I don't want to live in a shithole for that week. My experience living in a neighborhood makes me a stakeholder, even if I don't own land there.

When I rented I gardened. I haven't the slightest clue why you believe someone wouldn't garden when they rent. In fact the place I rented I picked because I could garden.

>I haven't the slightest clue why you believe someone wouldn't garden when they rent.

I do. My sister likes to garden, and when she was renting she put a lot of effort into creating a large, beautiful garden.

Then the landlord decided she needed to move her ailing mother closer and terminated my sister's lease. After that my sister didn't bother with a garden until she bought a house.

As a landlord, I'd be pretty unhappy with tenants gardening on my land -- that's just an extra expense as I'd have to maintain it or convert it back when they leave. Maybe if they signed a long lease...

Hence "might" and the parenthetical "or at least not build a large gardening setup". To rephrase, without ownership of the asset, the renter (and landlord after contract signed) is less incentivized to "work the land" for whatever definition of that you have. Sometimes the setup (irrigation, structural changes, etc) is not worth it or not allowed to the renter. Also unfair to use your anecdotal opinion of whether or not to garden to keep from having the slightest clue why other renters might not.