Rent and Mortgage Cancelation Act

[Steven Burritt]

Has anyone looked at this proposal from representative IIhan Omar of Minisota's 5th district? What she's proposing would put an end to RE investing as we know it.

[Joe P.]

Really? We're going to rehash this again after it was raised in April? Sigh. Fine.

There was concern that covid would be so widespread and damaging as to cripple the economy permanently. And, if most renters/mortgage holders lose their job due a complete and extended shut down, this bill was aimed at not creating yet another public health crisis by putting renters and homeowners on the street. A bit of an ominous projection, but lets say a meat plant which employs 80% of a town of mostly renters/homeowners shuts down for six months. Most of those people are blue-collar, paycheck-to-paycheck people. This was aimed at avoiding the socioeconomic destruction of that town, for example.

You may not agree with the approach, but it was not meant as a handout (although it is...just like everything else that the government has agreed to provide...it's all "funny money"), nor was it meant to destroy investors. Rents and mortgages would have been paid by government backed relief funds. That means renters get to stay, investors keep paying their mortgages. Not ideal for an investor, obviously, but would have taken care of the primary income and primary expense for the lot of us.

There's a million questions about the bill itself, and nuance is everything. IF covid had been worse than projected from a health and economic standpoint (100-200k deaths), this might have been something you'd see both sides shake hands on. You cant create a second public health crisis by putting thousands of thousands of people on the street.