Had a discussion about Rent control with a Renter who cant afford a good area .

[Matthew Paul]

I was talking with a young couple who were complaining rent is WAY TOO HIGH and we need rent control .  The average for a 1/1 here is $1700 and a 2/1 is $2000 . Now they were complaining , how can anyone afford that much working 2 jobs , paying day care , car payments and groceries .

I had to chime in , I stated Rent Control isnt the answer ,  If you cant afford to live in the better areas you do 1 of 2 things , make more money or move to an area you can afford .  To make things fair , lets have car pricing control , prices of cars are way too high , then grocery price control , day care price control etc .  

They argued in return that those are businesses with overhead and need to make a profit to pay employees and survive . 

My reply to them is what do you think a landlord is ? , they are running a business just the same as the day care and car dealership , they provide a product  and charge what the market will bear to make a profit and pay their employees . NO DIFFERENT . 

I

[Greg M.]

The sad things is that a large majority of people don't understand economics or how business works. 

Years ago one of my renters started talking about the election and asked me my thoughts. I told him that all the propositions on the ballot would likely pass as people are too dumb to recognize the costs. These are propositions like $300M for parks, paid for by a .00015% tax on property for 30 years. We'll have 5-15 of them any given election. 

He told me he was all for them and that they don't really cost that much. I explained that even though they use tiny percentages, it adds up to a lot of money. He responded with one of the most mind blowing statements I've ever heard. He said "Yeah, but I don't own property, so I don't pay property tax. Maybe when I buy a home I'll start to care". 

I asked him who pays the property tax on the unit he was living in and he said I did. I pointed out that the rent he pay covers my expenses and when my expenses including property tax goes up, so does the rent. His mind was blown!