Many Real Estate agents have large housing portfolios

Bretrick

Bretrick

Well-known Member
Location
Perth Western Australia
I have heard of Estate Agents with portfolios of 20 homes, and more.
Is this morally the correct thing to do?
Is it not akin to insider trading?
They know how to milk the system. They get in very early, sometimes even before the owner advertises.
With large portfolios they have instant equity as collateral. Their rental properties pay for their next purchase.
My solution?
Licenced Real Estate agents to own one investment property.
This could be extended to the general public as well. One investment property per person.
Free up housing stock so everyone has a chance at home ownership.
 

It's called free enterprise. The alternative is socialism. I found this on a website (can't remember which one):

"Socialist governments, those that directly manage their nation's social and economic affairs, often direct what kind of work people have to do and also limit the opportunity for many people to own businesses. As a result, these countries also limit what you can purchase. In a free enterprise system, you are allowed to spend your money in the way you want."

It may be annoying that the housing market has less to offer in the way of available homes for sale in a particular area, but if the government gets involved in how much a person can own, that to me is scary.
 
Think its simply investing in what you know. They say you should never invest in what you don't understand. They have to put out a lot of money to buy the houses the same as a broker would have to put out a lot of money to buy what they feel are "good stocks".
 

I hear you Bretrick. We have this mess in California with property bought up by foreign investors and kept empty while people seek and need housing. While people fear socialism (OMG public schools, roads, bridges, fire department) there can and should be some kind of regulation because it is harming people while others get rich. It's greed.
 
Should everyone who has more than one home be forced to sell all except their principal residence? Where does the line get drawn? What about those that live in homes that are far larger than one or two people need? It's a slippery slope - and I think it's best to avoid giving the government any more control, especially since they abuse the power they already have.
 
As of January the first of 2023, the Canadian Federal Government has declared that foreign private buyers cannot buy residential or commercial properties for the next two years. This is to ensure that Canadians have the opportunity to purchase such properties first. A number of Canadian cities have passed local bylaws that tax vacant homes at between 5 and 10 percent a year, of the retail value of the home. This is to encourage the owners to get tenants in the home. linkCanada’s Foreign Buyer Ban Begins in January - British Columbia Real Estate Association (bcrea.bc.ca)
 
If a realtor is misleading the sellers so they can get the property first or at a lower price, then it’s wrong. Often realtors are landlords.

Years ago friends were the first ones looking at a vacation property. The realtor told them it was overpriced and just wait. Then the realtor’s partner bought it the next day.
 
Jules said:
If a realtor is misleading the sellers so they can get the property first or at a lower price, then it’s wrong. Often realtors are landlords.

Years ago friends were the first ones looking at a vacation property. The realtor told them it was overpriced and just wait. Then the realtor’s partner bought it the next day.
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Crooks crooks everywhere.
 
I was under the impression that realtors only acted as an agent in home purchases. I guess a good deal is hard to pass up though.
 
Chet said:
I was under the impression that realtors only acted as an agent in home purchases. I guess a good deal is hard to pass up though.
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Oh no, they buy also. I worked with a woman who was married to a realtor who had investment properties. The properties were sold as part of the divorce settlement. They had been married for years, adult children, so she was entitled.
 
It's not individual real estate agents it's real estate or businesses with even more in their portfolio.

Alot of real estate agents make their regular money renting out especially when they have poor sales they're getting income. And they get tax write offs on expense and upkeep.

The property management that run many of these rentals can be an issue because they'll only do what they are told so unless every t crossed and i dotted will they work with you.
 
Bretrick said:
I have heard of Estate Agents with portfolios of 20 homes, and more.
Is this morally the correct thing to do?
Is it not akin to insider trading?
They know how to milk the system. They get in very early, sometimes even before the owner advertises.
With large portfolios they have instant equity as collateral. Their rental properties pay for their next purchase.
My solution?
Licenced Real Estate agents to own one investment property.
This could be extended to the general public as well. One investment property per person.
Free up housing stock so everyone has a chance at home ownership.
Click to expand...
I've heard congressional people are notified of sweet deals (insider trading) yet it happens.

Employers will write the position and tailor it to their friends. Or already approved choice. So the advertising of open job is lies.

Not going to happen. Free Enterprise.
 
Remy said:
I hear you Bretrick. We have this mess in California with property bought up by foreign investors and kept empty while people seek and need housing. While people fear socialism (OMG public schools, roads, bridges, fire department) there can and should be some kind of regulation because it is harming people while others get rich. It's greed.
Click to expand...
If you only knew what socialism really was....
 
Disgustedman said:
If you only knew what socialism really was....
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2018 we were in Brasov, Romania.........stayed at a town centre airbnb in the process of total renovation.......it initially belonged to her great grandmother, or even her great great grandmother, but the young woman who owned it had only just received title in her name after an exhaustive court case.

The building had, before she was born, been 'appropriated' (for the good of mankind, dontcha know), by the (cough, cough) 'People's Government' and turned into a veritable pig sty.
 
Disgustedman said:
If you only knew what socialism really was....
Click to expand...
Well... My nut of a mother was from Dresden Germany. So she had family behind the block. (I don't know details but I guess she traveled to the west after the war, married an American GI and that's how she got to the U.S.) We went to East Germany when I was in High School. We made it to Karl Marks Schadt, my mother called it by what she knew it by, Chemnitz. And what it is called now again.

We never made it to Dresden due to car trouble. I won't get into the details but we had to go back to West Germany to get the rental car repaired and we all had to put up with my mother. She did make it to Dresden again, twice. Once before the eastern block fell and once after. I remember distinctly the border crossings. Especially when we left. Trucks with soldiers going over them and sliding mirrors on wheels under them. I remember my mother commented "I guarantee you that all these men (the truck drivers) have wives and children, they aren't sending single men out of the country. They want to guarantee they will come back." Made sense.

Anyway, we spent the weeks in West Germany and the day before we flew out of Frankfurt we went to a park. My mother was talking to two woman for a time and after they said goodby my mother said "oh I know where they are from..." They were from a town in East Germany. I said "then why are they here" my mother responded "because they are on pensions, they don't care if they come back." So I say "are they going to go back?" and irritated my mother responded "of course they are going to go back, they have their children and grandchildren there." I didn't say anything else, I didn't talk back to my mother but I remember thinking "I wouldn't go back for family and give my freedom up." Granted my family is a mess but I knew then at 15 or 16 that my freedom would have been more important than any people and living in that dreary nightmare.

I was also an Israel Kibbutz volunteer in the mid early/mid 80's. I guess that was socialism. But I loved the dining hall and there was always someone to sit smoke and talk with. Not the isolation I lived since.

So I might know more than you think. And I remember other stuff but these are some. But wasn't the eastern block communism. I know my mother hated it and said she never thought she'd live to see it's end.
 
Nemo2 said:
2018 we were in Brasov, Romania.........stayed at a town centre airbnb in the process of total renovation.......it initially belonged to her great grandmother, or even her great great grandmother, but the young woman who owned it had only just received title in her name after an exhaustive court case.

The building had, before she was born, been 'appropriated' (for the good of mankind, dontcha know), by the (cough, cough) 'People's Government' and turned into a veritable pig sty.
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This is something similar to what my mother told me when she went back to Dresden Germany (her niece lived in the suburbs) there was a large house that had been turned into an orphanage. Family of the former owners wanted their house back. Not like it was then but restored to what it had been. One of them was an attorney and apparently they were not backing down. My mother's niece said it's a big thing in town, in the papers and everything.
 
jimintoronto said:
A number of Canadian cities have passed local bylaws that tax vacant homes at between 5 and 10 percent a year, of the retail value of the home.
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That is an interesting idea. Hopefully some consideration is give to homes under renovation and those that are offered but for which buyers/renters cannot be found.

One defense of property tax based on valuation is to provide an incentive for owners to put their property to the best possible use. In a way this seems to be a version of that.
 
Remy said:
I was also an Israel Kibbutz volunteer in the mid early/mid 80's. I guess that was socialism.
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Might have passed you on the road.....I was unable to cross into Israel from Syria in 1963, so we just headed east into Iraq.

My first R&R from Riyadh (Easter 1982 as it turned out...who knew?) though I flew into Cyprus and met up with my late wife who'd just flown in from Toronto.

Took the (no longer operative apparently) ferry to Haifa and rented a car.

After spending a couple/three days in Jerusalem, (we had limited time available), headed towards Masada.....picked up two young German guys, (who had been working at a kibbutz).........on the way....when we left there they were part of a long line of hitchhikers trying to get back to Jerusalem.

We said we were heading down to Ein Gedi and then across to the coast......"Get in"

Stumbled into Gaza just south of Ashkelon, (they'd heard someone not that long before had tossed a grenade into a car full of nuns....that I don't know about), guys standing around fires in 45 gallon drums....."Let's get outta here!"

We dropped them of in Ashdod and they said they'd been in Israel about six months and had seen more of the country in the time they'd been with us than the rest of their stay combined! :ROFLMAO:
 
Alligatorob said:
That is an interesting idea. Hopefully some consideration is give to homes under renovation and those that are offered but for which buyers/renters cannot be found.

One defense of property tax based on valuation is to provide an incentive for owners to put their property to the best possible use. In a way this seems to be a version of that.
Click to expand...
The problem has been foreign buyers from ( mostly main land China ) who buy large residential homes in our major cities, but don't live in them. They are simply parking their money here. The "empty house tax " has been very good at forcing them to get tenants in to their big houses. Houses that are being renovated would not be subject to the empty house by law tax. Trust me the idea of any property for which "buyers or renters cannot be found " is just not happening in even small towns in Canada. We are welcoming over 400,000 new people here every year, so housing is a top priority now. The Province of Ontario ( where I live ) has a plan to build a half a million new homes in the next 5 years. Jim B.
 
perChance said:
Should everyone who has more than one home be forced to sell all except their principal residence? Where does the line get drawn? What about those that live in homes that are far larger than one or two people need? It's a slippery slope - and I think it's best to avoid giving the government any more control, especially since they abuse the power they already have.
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I did write they would be able to have one investment property.
 

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