Consider watching this video with FreeTube, a nifty open-source program that lets you watch youtube videos while retaining your privately!
Combined with Libredirect, which automatically opens youtube links in Freetube, it becomes really slick and effortless to use.
Freetube is also available on Android!
Direct Youtube Link here, for NewPipe users: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vwn9tmcisFg
What’s their plan going to be when the evictions inevitably go to court? Not trying to make a statement or anything, just genuinely curious what they’re going to do if/when the sheriffs’ deputies start rolling up and drilling out their locks and dragging out their furniture.
From what I’ve been able to find in my short time researching this, many states allow tenets to withhold rent from their landlord if the landlord fails to make a rental habitable.
There are a couple options here.
- You simply stop paying rent entirely. In some states, a failure to make a home habitable is grounds for a tenet to prematurely terminate their lease. The landlord can still try to evict you, but this is often a drawn out process, and the entire time the property will be burning a hole in their pocket. This is ultimately a gamble that the property owner will choose to repair the property as the most cost-effective solution, and to avoid potentially being sued for uninhabitable conditions (but that assumes the tenants can collectively afford to sue them). Also, the tenets could appeal the eviction, citing the uninhabitable conditions to a judge, and hope that the Judge sides with them and negates the eviction despite the lack of paid rent.
- You and your fellow tenets continue to make rent payments to a court, a neutral third party, or an escrow account set up by a local court or housing agency, which withholds payment from the landlord until the repairs are accomplished.. This is legal in many states, which would make the rent strike legally protected, and make an eviction attempt null (as far as I can tell, I’m not a lawyer!)
You’re right, that is what the law says.
But never ever forget, the law is meant to protect people with property first, protect property second, and protect people without property third.
Lastly, police are not at all required to protect anyone, much less follow the law.
You’re absolutely right, and I don’t mean to imply it’s just a matter of the law being there, and the rest will be easy. The deck will forever be stacked against those most vulnerable.
But it does show it’s not a hopeless inevitability, and I think most people just assume it is. We have the tools to fight back, even though it will be hard fought.
Agreed, I didn’t comment to say you’re wrong, just more so “you’re right and” and it looks like you did the same.
Keep spreading the word.
The entire concept of rent needs to die in a fire. It is inherently exploitative. There is no way to redeem it.
Rent needs to be replaced with “private mortgages” or other approaches that return equity to the occupant.
Individuals that need the flexibility of temporary, short-term housing can use “land contracts” rather than exploitive rental agreements. Land Contracts have fixed payments for the life of the agreement: no annual rent hikes. The occupant is considered an “owner” rather than a “tenant”, but only begins gaining equity after three years. The occupant is free to walk away before three years, or renegotiate after.
How do we eliminate renting? We make it less lucrative than other investment options. We increase the tax rate on residential properties to be extremely high. But, we also create a tax exemption for owner-occupants, so your effective tax rate is actually lower on your own home. Landlords are forced to choose between a small return on a rental, or a larger return on a private mortgage or land contract.
With that simple change, landlords will be fighting tooth and nail to convert “tenants” into “buyers”, so they don’t have to pay the excess taxes.
Beyond renting, with this change, lenders are motivated to work with borrowers rather than resort to foreclosure. As soon as the bank initiates foreclosure proceedings, they are on the hook for the increased tax rate.
Yeah, screw all of that. You want to buy a flat or a house, then buy it. Don’t force some weird “solution” that leads to someone having to sell their property or being hit with a tax that basically kills any chance of renting out something.
Whatever this is could just as well be “outlaw being a landlord and force them to sell everything they own at basically zero value”. You call this a “simple change” when it’s anything but simple - it has more holes in it than swiss cheese.
being hit with a tax that basically kills any chance of renting out something.
That is exactly what should happen. It should be practically impossible for an owner to “rent” a property for enough to justify doing it. Landlords should be heavily pressured to convert tenants to buyers.
“Renting” should be confined to commercial activities, not residences. You want to rent out space for a shop, warehouse, office, factory, no problem. This is only for residential property that you are not living in. It should not be economically feasible to rent out such property as an investor, because that practice strips tenants of equity and is the leading factor driving people into poverty.
Go ahead and use your property to generate an income, but do it by charging interest on a loan, not rent.
Renting sucks not good butt. What you’ve just put together looks like an argument for someone who works in real estate law, or on behalf of some government institution dealing with property.
Make it make sense for all of us. You wanna know why computers don’t work well enough? I’ll let you know, but I’m sure you don’t wanna.
Make this make sense.
Post links that can teach us, and if you don’t, I’ll send you down the rabbit-hole that is Microsoft support forums.
Owner occupant credit/exemption. If you live in the home, you pay a much lower property tax than if you don’t live in the home.
This is used in Ohio as a “homestead exemption”. Elderly and disabled Ohioans pay a lower tax rate on their primary residence.
It is used in New York as the “STAR Credit”, to push part of the burden of school taxes from families to investors and businesses.
This is used in Montana as a Property Tax Rebate, where taxpayers can get some of their property taxes back on their primary residence. Montana has also been talking about implementing a “second home tax” which would increase the tax burden on properties that aren’t claimed as a primary residence.
A substantially similar program is used in Oakland as the Vacant Property Tax, which punishes landlords who hold property primarily for financial speculation rather than actual use.
These programs all operate in the same way I am describing. The only difference is that I would phase in a radical increase the effective tax on investors/landlords. I would increase the tax on investors and landlords of residential property so much that they find it more lucrative to switch their investment strategy to “lending” rather than “landlording”. Basically, the only rental arrangements that will continue to exist are 2-4 unit residences (where the landlord-owner lives in one of the units) and roommate agreements.
A “land contract” (sometimes called “contract for deed”) is a sort of “rent to own” agreement that is recorded with the county like a deed. For purposes of the tax exemption I am talking about, the occupant is considered an owner rather than a tenant.
A Land Contract is a type of seller-financing that is available to anyone, including the tenant on whom the landlord is already taking a financial risk. That former landlord is now collecting interest on a loan, rather than rent on a property.
Thanks for explaining that, I’d agree with those changes. I’m cool with housing be a commodity, but only if we don’t have homeless people and it’s affordable. We don’t have either.
FYI I spent fifteen years as a property manager for one of the bigger development/rental companies in the US and represented them hundreds of times in court in four different states. Judges are generally pretty hostile to tenants unless you bring a really solid case, and even then, if the landlord is making an effort to address your grievances they’re most likely going to side with the landlord (in my experience).
Thanks for posting the vid.
What would be really convenient is if you included the YouTube link in your post text. That way I can copy and paste it into new pipe on my mobile device.
Added! :)
Though I should mention Freetube is available for Android as well, and libredirect should work with it, eliminating the need to manually copy and paste links.
Thanks!
