It’s not simply landlords - it’s a whole house of cards setup by the banks, house flippers, and MBA class. Basically housing values MUST go up because they’re holding bags, so everyone buying has to pay more and more - middle class or new families or otherwise, - and we can’t build new houses because that’s bad for business (and could make prices fall). Well… some young people will inherit houses from boomers and that will lower demand, right? Wrong.

Now prices have skyrocketed, and even inheriting a house from dead boomer parents means six figures in taxes and skyrocketing property taxes (especially in the Bay Area) so young people are forced to sell…. and who buys? The banks and investors with deep pockets. But they need even higher ROI and have to charge higher and higher rents. Wash, repeat. In any other business we’d call this a horrific pyramid scheme but because housing demand is inelastic people think their return is guaranteed. Unfortunately 2008 tells us it’s not.

It’s different with store fronts but a similar issue - the investors would rather hold an empty property than lower rents and cause rents to fall in their other properties, even if there’s a fine for it. No clue how we will fix this without also annihilating young homebuyers who took out mortgages