Quote:
Originally Posted by josef
I can't blindly accept the simplistic idea that if only Philly had more homeowners, it'd be better off. . . . (Like just because people own homes in various parts of the city doesn't mean they stay clean and they're awesome, pro-civic people, right?
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The most run-down neighborhoods in Philly typically have extremely high levels of home-ownership. In fact many of the vacant, tax delinquent, wrecked houses throughout the worst slums in this city are owned not by speculators (though many are) but by dysfunctional groups of heirs who are too confused to be able to properly care for or dispose of the property.
I agree with the economic maxim that Philaw stated, in general, but at the detailed level, certain circumstances need to be in place: a person will take care of his property
if he has sufficient resources and
if the property has meaningful value. Take away either circumstance and chances are an owner-occupied residence will be less well-maintained than a rental.
In fact, sometimes a rental property my be better maintained in poor neighborhoods because the rental property has
some basic value by virtue of the fact a third-party is willing to pay to live in it which implies that the renter is earning at least some income and has some choice and initiative as to where he live.
This is not necessarily true for many owner-occupied homes where the owner bought it and paid it off decades ago and is essentially living for free in the property on a very low fixed income.
This set of of circumstance is common in many older working class or impoverished urban or rural communities.
Then you end up having, as we do in Philly, thousands of owner-occupied homes occupied by very poor, long-term, economically immobile residents who haven't the resources to keep up their property and even if they did, might choose not to because the property has extremely low market value due to the comparative crappiness of its condition and the neighborhood in which it is located.
Then you get entire neighborhoods of poor homeowners who are trapped in their properties simply because they cannot even afford to move/live/rent anywhere else.
Renting is often done due to lifestyle choice, rather than socio-economic circumstances. Younger, high skilled, high paid, but mobile people will often rent rather than own. Less mobile people, because of age, trade or family ties, etc., will often try to own, regardless of income level.
I think it might be reasonable to suggest that when homeowners are on average wealthier than neighboring renters, owner-occupied properties will be better maintained. But when renters, due to lifestyle choices and mobility issues, are wealthier on average than local homeowners, rental properties will be better maintained.
On average, in the aggregate, perhaps owner-occupied properties are in better shape than rentals, but I would not be surprised if, on average, the most poor-condition, low-value housing segment tends to be owner-occupied (by very poor owners in very low market-value communities).
In otherwords, I'd imagine that the distribution of owner-occupied housing in terms of condition and value is very wide with "fat tails" at each end, whereas I'd imagine the rental housing distribution is relatively narrower and higher with skinnier tails at each end.
The long and short of this being, in my mind, that in moderation, Philly benefits (obviously) by an influx of mobile, higher earning renters that push the replacement of low-value, under-utilized owner occupant housing with higher value rental property.
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