Comment by PlunderBunny

> Building more large, expensive homes that are gobbled up by investors or people 'parking' money isn't going to help people that need cheap dwellings to actually live in.

Investors that gobbled up properties are renting them to renters (assuming it isn't on airbnb) to pay their holding costs (mortgage, tax, maintenance), since they are by definition investors. They actually increase the pool of property for renters, keeping rent price lower, which fights rental inflation. This does drive up purchase price for the home itself, but that's a separate topic.

Same with people parking money, why would they be leaving the homes empty when they could rent it out for additional cash flow?

It's been demonstrated over and over again that building high end housing does have an impact on the prices of lower end stuff.

It is of course likely to have a greater impact to build lower cost stuff, but blocking a development because you don't like the sort of houses they want to build is more or less stupid (it's not like a developer is going to do a project there is no demand for, and that demand is probably already looking elsewhere near the proposed development...).

Maybe there should be an occupancy credit, like a clean energy credit. Empty property holders can buy it from occupied property holders to compensate for the higher property tax burden.

That’s not how it works. New housing, even if luxury, provides options for wealthier people to buy who otherwise are forced to bid up the price of older homes and remodel it to their liking. New housing starts an immediate chain reaction where wealthier people vacate older housing in less desired areas for the new homes, thus putting downward price pressure on older homes. Our current problem is that for the last thirty years we have banned most new construction, resulting in a shortage of new homes.

We saw this dynamic play out during the pandemic when news cars were delayed due to supply chain constraints, and the price of used cars shot up.