Who is being “forced” to rent? Are you forced to rent in Encinitas because you dont WANT to buy in Spring Valley?
Yes Texas does have land… nothing but land. It also has high humidity, is HOT as all hell, and has no features… no mountains. You have two months of decent weather and then it is either hot as hell or very cold. You cannot go to big bear to snowboard and then drive to the beach in the same afternoon. Perhaps that is the reason why people pay 216k for nice spread out there.
Last time I checked, the one axiom of real estate that still holds to be fairly true is location. To be angered at the established wealthy people of this country and portend that they are “forcing” you to rent by gobbling up all the precious homes in Carmel Valley or Encinitas is understandable. However to think you are somehow entitled to live in these or any other areas is something I disagree with. If you can afford to live there but CHOOSE not to, then that is okay, and good for you for not choosing to pay the crazy fees. However you are not entitled to live there any more then a slacker is, or anymore then a high priced attorney is.
When it boils down to it, the laws of supply and demand hold true. So it is okay to demand that the wealthy should not get to own property in desireable areas then is it also okay for the wealthy not to own turd homes in crappy neighborhoods for section 8 rentals?
You may love to bring up the Texas comparison but also there is inherent unfairness as well. While there is no income tax you will pay 2-3 percent property tax. So a poor person with little to no income gets killed owning a home. A guy with a decent income pays much less proportionally of his paycheck to own his home then a poor man does.
Finally and still left unaddressed is that the golden age of a govt controlled system still doesn’t address the limited desireable areas. In a price controlled situation, who would get the home in a nice area? Would it be a lottery? Would it be a govt official? Would it be a friend of a friend? When a family gets a nice home in a nice area why would they ever sell at all?
Again, I don’t have answers right now but I don’t think that all the wealthy people are buying up homes and stealing all the inventory from nicer areas. I think that conversely, the nicer the neighborhood, the less you have wealthy people buying homes and making them rentals.
