its more economical to write them off as a loss for taxes than renovate
There’s a simple solution for that. If a house sits empty for more than six months, it becomes the property of the city. Maybe add a provision that lets the owners surrender unoccupied houses willingly in return for a small flat compensation. Problem solved.
Becoming the property of the city will be a nightmare to deal with. Instead just crank up the property tax to 25% of the property value per year for any year the property is empty more than 6 months.
That’ll fix the issue almost immediately.
It’ll also force rents lower because you can’t afford to wait for a tenant who can pay exorbitant rents.
In the Netherlands we used to have people who broke into empty houses and lived there. Now we have “anti-kraak” rentals… basically if you’re going to leave a place empty for a long time you do short term rent (like a month or two) so that it doesn’t sit empty.
The government steals property all the time, it’s just called eminent domain. And to be fair, these aren’t Ma and Pa Kent who own these apartments - it’s almost all enormous companies worth multiple billions of dollars, keeping those $5k/year apartments at that price point because OCCASIONALLY someone will make enough to rent one. I think “hey either it needs to be rented out in some capacity within six months or we’re gonna take it and do it for you” is a good solution - sure, it’s Tammany Hall government all over again, but since that seems to be the only thing that corporations respond to now, it’s a good solution.
Complex problem, but your right abou not beingt the ma and pa owners I can’t math today, but if a tax write off is going to be the more profitable option, you’ve got a LOT of other high tax high earning income coming in.
There’s a simple solution for that. If a house sits empty for more than six months, it becomes the property of the city. Maybe add a provision that lets the owners surrender unoccupied houses willingly in return for a small flat compensation. Problem solved.
Becoming the property of the city will be a nightmare to deal with. Instead just crank up the property tax to 25% of the property value per year for any year the property is empty more than 6 months.
That’ll fix the issue almost immediately.
It’ll also force rents lower because you can’t afford to wait for a tenant who can pay exorbitant rents.
In the Netherlands we used to have people who broke into empty houses and lived there. Now we have “anti-kraak” rentals… basically if you’re going to leave a place empty for a long time you do short term rent (like a month or two) so that it doesn’t sit empty.
Forcing people to lose money to restore a lame asset or they steal your property… Yeah that won’t fly.
That’s the fun part. It’s not ‘stealing’ when the state does it.
Uh, I hate to break it to you, but this is exactly what’s happening in places to get land for data centers.
https://fortune.com/2026/07/19/data-center-eminent-domain-public-use/
The government steals property all the time, it’s just called eminent domain. And to be fair, these aren’t Ma and Pa Kent who own these apartments - it’s almost all enormous companies worth multiple billions of dollars, keeping those $5k/year apartments at that price point because OCCASIONALLY someone will make enough to rent one. I think “hey either it needs to be rented out in some capacity within six months or we’re gonna take it and do it for you” is a good solution - sure, it’s Tammany Hall government all over again, but since that seems to be the only thing that corporations respond to now, it’s a good solution.
Complex problem, but your right abou not beingt the ma and pa owners I can’t math today, but if a tax write off is going to be the more profitable option, you’ve got a LOT of other high tax high earning income coming in.
When you say “won’t”…