Simply “build” is not the answer. “Building smart” would be a better answer. Build “vertically” instead of “horizontally”. Build 10+ stories residential buildings. And build shopping malls vertically too. Build walkable cities so that people don’t have to rely on cars. Etc.

If you have residences that are an hour away from groceries, even with no empty lots nearby, I think people would find it obviously profitable to buy a residence and convert it into a grocery shop. Capitalism alone takes care of the need to be this smart.

Canada is in worse shape, and doesn't have 30 year fixed mortgages (most are 5 years), and you can't write off mortgage interest expenses. In other words, our homeowner incentives are worse, and yet the house crisis is also worse.

That's leaves what you mention off-the-hop: we aren't building enough. But why? Is it a supply or demand problem? My country is starting to believe it's the latter.

That's right. The states that have the least land-use freedom[0] are some of the worst in terms of housing availability.

[0]: https://www.freedominthe50states.org/land-use

Absolutely! Build more housing, at any price level[0], and rents will stop growing and maybe even come down.

[0]: https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=4629628

If nowhere builds enough, maybe it's not a practical solution?

Also interesting to observe that the places that build by far the most, that is, the places which are most densely inhabited, are also the most expensive (NYC, SF).

I know the counterargument that even NYC simply hasn't built enough. Need to build more, a lot more. But I have to ask, if the #1 densest place in the US isn't dense enough to be cheap (instead of the most expensive), maybe density just can't make it cheap in practice?

Maybe it takes a place like (Isaac Asimov's) Trantor, with buildings miles and miles dense to achieve cheap housing in a dense place? Will there ever be such a place on Earth? (Do we want to live in such a place on Earth?)

I live in the Bay Area and know multiple households making well over $250k who rent largely due to the fact that those who bought 10-20 years ago are paying about 1/3 of the property tax of a new buyer today (even setting aside interest rates).

It hasn't been disproven. There being more vacant homes than homeless people just means that the market isn't clearing, because the minimum price acceptable to the landlord is higher than the maximum price acceptable to the homeless. This could be from any number of reasons, none of which "disprove" the fact that the laws of supply and demand do in fact apply to housing.

As an analogy, there are always jobless people even when there are vacant positions to fill. Why? Because of a mismatch between the price of labor, which is artificially inflated by minimum wage laws and another hundred laws and regulations that make it costlier to employ someone, and the economic value generated by that labor.

And as with many other ways to make a living at the expense of society - such as fraud, theft, and abuse - it should be illegal.

- there is a housing shortage

- as a society, we should make sure that resources are available for the ones who need it most

- people who earn more money, deliver more value to society (not necessarily true of course, but well, capitalism)

- as a society, houses should be available for the highest earners first

Therefore, everyone should increase prices as much as possible. Until you cannot sell or rent to anyone, then you lower slightly until you can.

Who cares if there are vacant homes in downtown Detroit for sale or rent? If you moved there you wouldn't be able to get a job

Of course, this could also result in just rents going up, so maybe also put a cap on that?

There are areas where a lot of housing is being built but most of it is is siphoned off the local-resident market by investors who convert them into AirBnB rentals. So now all this housing stock exists, but only to serve tourists, and the locals can neither rent nor buy a place to live.

Local political leaders tried to pressure the investment firm to lower the rents, but they responded with "fair-market rent, blah blah blah", and nothing changed. The shameful thing is that the web page of the large investment firm (sorry, don't have a link) basically spells out their strategy: "Purchase rental units in small, low-ish income communities. Raise the rent. Profit. Rinse and repeat." The web page boasted about huge returns; it didn't talk about "fair-market rent, blah blah blah".

When developers are well financed there's no counterbalance to this strategy, they can keep these units off the market until the price point is right and drip feed some more, without a cash flow crunch they are not losing money.

I've seen this strategy being used in some São Paulo's neighbourhoods, new developments would sell maybe a tranche of 10% of apartments, after 6-12 months a new tranche of some 20%, then another 6 months and 30-50% would appear, crashing the price of the previous owners. Rinse and repeat.

If that was the case, the point would be an increased supply pushing the price down.

What about them? They make it more feasible to own a home. The rest of your comment appears to favor people being able to own homes, but this comment opposes one of the few things that help make it happen.

> We've basically given homeowners the keys to power to fight back against any and all building developments.

How is that? As a home owner, I didn't get the memo. The local government approves or rejects all kinds of building sites without ever polling or asking anyone outside their agency. Homeowners of the area don't have any input.

I submit that artificial currency inflation is not a good thing as economists claim.