See first to understand the context of this post here: https://www.biggerpockets.com/forums/44/topics/251...
I want to see homeownership evolve to fit our current lifestyle and desires. Will home ownership in its present form ever disappear? I highly doubt it; but currently there are really only two options: buying or renting. Why don't we have a third, fourth, and fifth, hybrid models?
How do we combine the best of both worlds? After a little thought here is a first model that I came up with. This isn't perfect; only a first iteration I want to propose so we can start this conversation.
I do feel incredibly confident that with companies like Air BnB and VRBO already disrupting the hotel industry; and Uber and Lyft disrupting the car industry we will continue to see tectonic shifts in the way we make decisions on whether to own, rent, or simply have access to essential components of daily life.
The current model(s) of housing will have major competition in the very near future.
Listed below are some of the major pros and cons with renting or buying and how they could look in a new model:
Owning a Home As An Investment: What if living in a community gave you access to some of the profit and loss of the owning company as a whole? Instead of the worth of your home being tied directly and solely to your dwelling could you spread out some of the risk by it being tied to a larger community and potentially thousands of dwellings all over the county and potentially world?
This wouldn't give you all the potential appreciation if you bought at the perfect time, rode the cycle to the very top of the market and sold; but you would still enjoy a steady rate of return or equity capture that would give you much greater peace of mind. I'm sure the millions of folks who lost their homes in 2008 would have loved something like this!
Being Able to Customize Your Dwelling: This could be solved in two ways: First, have different communities with different house sizes, styles, etc. You would then have a base you liked to work off of. Second, offer a set of customization options that could be moved around to different houses. These wouldn't be tear down the walls and change the floor plan, but for many people switching out fans, faucets, and paint colors is as HGTV as they want to get!
Flexibility and Ease of Movement with a Rental: Once you were living within the companies network of properties you could move from community to community once your "commitment period" (for lack of a better term) was up. For example you're living in Dallas and starting a new job in Portland Oregon. The company has a community and houses in both locations. You simply move; and only incur the hassle and expense of that actual process. No more waiting for months for your house to sell, no stressing about quality and not knowing what you wanted. These would all be taken care of for you.
Another huge benefit is your investment into the company would continue. No worrying about not understanding a new real estate market and where the best area to buy is. Your risk would be dramatically spread out.
Maintenance & Upkeep: To ensure a standard of excellence was maintained the company would have to take care of maintenance and upkeep on properties. I think you'll find very few homeowners that want the responsibility of taking care of every little problem in their dwelling. Handing this off to someone else sounds like a dream come true! Maintenance costs would also be dramatically lower with large amounts of volume. No getting price gouged by "Joe the Plumber". This benefit would obviously be reflected in how much you pay every month; but I don't think this would be as scary as it initially sounds because of the ability to have full time staff taking care of your communities.
I'm going to pause here because I really want your thoughts and feedback. Does this sound doable?
There are a few other unusual benefits that I think could also be incorporated into this model that people today would love; and I'll explore those next time.
