A random mix of college-aged kids is one of the worst deals as a land lord because they are guaranteed to be transient. I don't blame anyone who refuses to rent their mansion to them.

Kids whose parents sign their leases and pay their rents will almost never fail to pay rent, and if you do have a problem, their parents are almost always going to save their asses in fear of breaching contract. At least here in Texas, contracts and tenancy laws greatly favor property owners. As you can imagine, there’s the risk of having people damage walls / floors / plumbing, but in my experience that stuff is mostly trivial to repair and that is what damage and security deposits are partially intended to cover. When I was a student I repaired drywall at every place I lived, some minor, some major, and was never charged a dime at move-out. Most new apartments have a standard procedure of repainting between every tenant.

Or they could just do what they are doing now, which is completely legal.

[E: that was before EHT]

regardless, i suspect most of these "college kids are renting mansions" stories omit the "from their rich parent's friends" part of the story.

If your a poor "First Nations" student maybe not so much.

I live in a US region with essentially no population growth, slow job and wage growth, and a lot of vacant buildings and land.

Since the financial crisis ended, real estate price records are broken every year and see neighborhoods that have double through quadrupled in the past 15 years.

At the same time new apartments have gone up, big property companies have formed and consolidated a lot of multi-unit buildings previously owned by small time owners.

I know interest rates, especially on mortgages, were historically low which caused some inflation. But it honestly baffles me how it could be anything but a bubble.

Wait, I don't get this. Do I get paid to take out a mortgage?

It's an extreme expansionary policy designed to keep the economy afloat by making people pay money to keep it in banks. Normally this is done by dropping interest rates below inflation; this is the nuclear option for economies. The fact that they are still stuck on this is not a good sign for what may happen to Europe next recession.

This is one of the inherent limitations of a shared currency: Greece needs expansion; Germany needs contraction. Help one; harm the other. It's very difficult to do the kind of things America (or most other nations) can do with Europe for this reason.

The rate at which the bank gets money from the central bank is negative, and your local bank adds on 1.5 to that (for a variable) rate from what i remember, so overall the rate was 0.8% I think.

So you don't get paid, but you do get subsidized.

> Globe-trotting landlords can avoid vacancy taxes by renting. It’s the latest twist for a housing market down 8.5% from its peak.

The article really just uses "students renting mansions" as two of several anecdotes accompanying the story. The subject of the article is that Vancouver's taxes on foreign owned investment property are pushing down prices on property, and a rental loophole that is also affecting the rental market.

Headlines have always been set by editors to catch eyes and now clicks. I don't think that makes the reporting any worse.

Perhaps a more appropriate title could have been set on HN but from what I understand the guideline is to use the original title.