Reply #29: Well.... [View All]

I don't think your brother-in-law "and their fellow sharks", whoever they may be, had any real effect on the housing market as a whole. Such "home flipping" as you call it has always been part of the housing market. It didn't start in 1977 - you just became aware of it then. There is nothing wrong with buying a house, paying for upgrades, and putting it back on the market for a higher price. Those who do that have been branded "speculators" but their impact on overall price is extremely minimal because they control a miniscule portion of the housing market. By far and away, most purchasers are not "home flippers", and buy their homes to live in.

Perhaps your animosity towards your brother-in-law all these years has caused you to have a very exaggerated notion of his effect on other people.

If this is what caused you to label housing as a "commodity" well, that's understandable and rather novel of you, but it's hardly an accurate description.

I have no such "absolute faith in the mythical 'market'". I'm just realistic about it, in a way which does not prevent me from sharing your ideals about those who go homeless, hungry, or without health care. In my experience, problems are best solved when they are most accurately and realistically perceived, which of necessity eliminates exaggeration or distortion of the nature of the problems.

One reality which you obviously dislike, is that corporations are driven by profit, and because of the nature of corporations, they are required by law to maximize profits due to their fiduciary duty to their shareholders. The problems you're concerned about arise because the vast majority of corporations do not appear to possess a social conscience. That's where government must enter the picture and require certain kinds of corporate behaviors, while preventing others. Repukes want no government regulation. Dems like us are in favor of it because otherwise there's no check on destructive corporate rapaciousness. I think we probably agree that governments have been remiss over the years in not imposing and enforcing much tighter curbs. I also think we can agree that one form of rapaciousness which should have been eliminated by government long ago is the predatory lending practice known as "sub-prime" lending. Market forces alone won't cure the problem.

But I still maintain that has absolutely nothing to do with your brother-in-law's "home-flipping" practices. The "sub-prime" problem affects a much vaster portion of the housing market.