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Comment by IkmoIkmo | Hacker News Reader

I don't see the contradiction, could you explain?

If "rental supply drops", that means the people who own apartments they don't live in won't let them out. If they don't let them out, they're subject to the anti-empty-apartment laws.

The problem is that there can be NO new rentals on the market, because you can’t buy a home and rent it out. If someone is renting out a property and then decides to sell it, that is one less rental on the market that can’t be replaced. Any house that is bought can’t be rented out ever, so there is no new rentals.

No, the owners who are grandfathered in rub their hand in glee, as over time only own-to-occupy buyers are allowed, thus the supply of rentals goes down and rentals become more expensive, thus making their rents higher and more lucrative.

The answer is to reduce the centralization of jobs and other factors that cause everyone to want to live in Amsterdam, e.g. building out Lelystad or Buitenveldert. To a certain extent, COVID and WFH has started doing that.

I lived in Amsterdam in 1999 and house prices there seemed quite reasonable to me compared to Paris where I was coming from, but of course many things may have changed in two decades.

> thus the supply of rentals goes down

You're sort of "begging the question" here.

> The answer is to reduce the centralization of jobs and other factors that cause everyone to want to live in Amsterdam

Obviously I'm not against that happening but it's not either-or.

> but of course many things may have changed in two decades.

Oh, you have no idea. It was hard to even get the owners to get back to you, because they'd already accepted an offer; and I was being asked for 1,500 EUR - 1,650 EUR/month for a bedroom+living room apartment. And while that wasn't in Diemen or Bijlmer, they weren't in posh super-central locations.

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