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Comment by 988747 | Hacker News Reader

>> being an asset in a wealthy person’s portfolio

Why wouldn't that wealthy person rent the property out and get better ROI? Keeping it empty does not make sense to me.

Because, depending on local regulations, it can be a PITA to deal with tenants. Receiving rent can also be considered as income, so now you have to deal with the tax authority.

If the main goal is to park the cash somewhere outside the person's country, they presumably have "enough", so they don't want to deal with all this.

With a 20% market increase in a year, you don't have to rent it. Renting a property out always comes with hassle. Many countries have tenant's rights that kick in after a period of time.

I live in Barcelona, and the rental market is crazy. Technically I should be allowed to sign a contract for 5 years, but because of the rights that kick in after 12 months, there's a ton of landlords that only want to offer 11 month contracts.

> I live in Barcelona, and the rental market is crazy. Technically I should be allowed to sign a contract for 5 years, but because of the rights that kick in after 12 months, there's a ton of landlords that only want to offer 11 month contracts.

Same situation in India.

The rental yield is low, taxes are high, compliance is time consuming, and there is lack of legal framework in cases of disputes.

A court case will take a decade to resolve if the tenant claims the property.

The only solution I can see is government provide incentives and security against tenant for landlords or government gets into business of renting by building houses.

If market increases 20% a year clearly there isn't enough being build. Housing really shouldn't be appreciating asset, maybe stay in line with inflation and improved quality, but 20% a year is unsustainable.

Beats me. But I see it everywhere in my home town. I’m actually vaguely acquainted with the agent responsible for the bulk of it. His specialty is selling homes to absurdly rich Chinese. They typically buy sight unseen, his daughter (friend of mine) arranges for some half livable furnishings to be put in place, and maybe 1 week a year tops they’ll visit.

I believe the people are rich enough that the logistic overhead of even having a property manager rent it out isn’t worth it to them. Better to keep it in pristine condition and flip it however many years down the road.

If the property itself is valuable enough? Renting the property out might not actually be worth the hassle. A single bitter tenant can cost a lot of money, from eviction to repairs/damage.

Because they can make a far greater profit by selling the property at a moment's notice, than say renting it out for an year.

I mean, a place where your rental profit is 3k/month, might sell for 100k more than you bought it for, to the next wealthy person who thinks they can make another 100k profit by holding and selling after an year.

Doesn’t that imply that renters are getting extremely good deals?

Is that something you want to change with governmental policy?

Not really. Rents in my current area are in line with my mortgage. So perhaps they're getting better deals than if they had to sell a house and buy a new one every year, but, it's a much worse deal than if they were able to buy a condo and live in it.

It could also be because the on paper rental value is higher than the actual market rate of rental. By renting out you decrease the on paper value which limits your ability to use it in collateral for further property loans. It's why in some city's some commercial property will sit vacant for years without the owner decreasing the rate to get tenants in.

She might want to use the property for herself from time to time.

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