That's the first argument I usually get as well. I am very much saying end flipping. I don't know what is progressive about that at all. But to be practical, perhaps loosening the profit tax based on how long you owned it makes sense. Perhaps 1% for every year owned? That way you can flip it, live in it 20 years and sell it with inflation adjusted 20% profit?
That's not what people usually mean by flipping, and doesn't address your parent's point. They want to be able to buy property in good condition, and flippers are providing a useful service of increasing the supply of housing good condition.
(I would actually like us to deregulate housing construction past the point where flipping is no longer economic.)
Sellers themselves would be incentivized to make their house in good condition to sell it at a profit. If all they do is renovate then that should be a service to the original seller. If your house is devalued by 20% when selling, you pay a renovator to fix it up and take 50% of profits so instead you only lose 10%. Like you said they provide a service, they could handle the sale as a real estate agent and get more pay as well. My suggestion just means the original owner will retain ownership until an actual person who wants to live in the house buys it.
> Sellers themselves would be incentivized to make their house in good condition to sell it at a profit
Many sellers don't want to do this.
Consider someone who inherits their parents house, 1000 miles away. The house needs renovation.
You want them to uproot their lives or find a "service provider" (1000 miles away) instead of just doing an "as is" sale to someone who will do the renovation and sell it.
Sellers want out. There's no social benefit to making that more difficult.
Flippers are selling for profit so they will not sell until the market is suitable that means an incentive to artificially raise prices because as you point out flippers don't just want out unlike residents.
Many sellers can't afford to do a renovation and even if they can, they don't have the knowledge to do what the market wants. (They can't borrow without both equity and the ability to repay.) They also may not have the time.
Many buyers aren't interested in doing a renovation, and most of the other things apply.
People who renovate for a living do have those things.
You seem to think that holding out for more money is no-cost - you're wrong.
Flippers lose money if they're wrong about the market, so why are you so insistent that it's wrong for them to make money?
Which reminds me, how long does someone have to own something for you to be okay with them selling?
I won't repeat what I said about flippers since I replied to multiple other comments but they would still exist but provide flipping/renovation as a service(see other comments).
People can sell whenever they want, my restriction is the profit margin. I have no problem with that margin being more and more over time so long as that rate is nationally set to be uniform.
Are you going to cap the amount that flippers can lose as well? Why not? And, why should their profit be uniform? (Some flippers are better than others.)
Flipping as a service requires waiting by buyers and/or sellers which costs them money. Why is that a good thing? (A renovation may take 6-12 months.)
That wouldn't be flipping just a side-effect of ownership. Flippers should provide renovation/real-estate as a service with the original owner maintaining ownership until the sale to someone else.
> Flippers should provide renovation/real-estate as a service
That's a general contractor, not a flipper. The key difference is who takes on the risk: if I hire a general contractor and they turn out to be not very good at their job, that's my problem.
Exactly, what I am suggesting is current flippers will guarantee a sale price to the seller, renovate and how much of the profit above the sale price they take is a matter of market/negotiation. They still take on the risk and work on multiple houses they just now have a seller pestering them to sell soon instead of hoard houses until price is high enough.
