- you can buy a house for cash no questions asked (not 100% sure if this changed in 2006 or not with AML/CTF Act and whether or not real estate agents are bound by it or if they have found a way to ignore it in practice).
- politicians can declare no interest in property, but have their (declared) trust take care of (undeclared) property matters for them.
whole industry looks corrupt, hence my largely negative and aggravated response to anything regarding real estate.
perhaps you are correct.
that supply and demand is the simple formula for determining prices, but if that is the case, there is no incentive to remove barriers on supply. everyone with an interest in the industry is invested in having prices go up indefinitely.
i dont know why people continue with simplistic debates about one or two issues without looking at the larger picture. sure supply and demand. yay. costs of materials and labour. yay. no one wants to look at market manipulation, when its quite possible and in fact likely that is an issue as well. which brings me back to my OP, which i stated in fewer words but you triggered me into writing all this extra crap.
> everyone with an interest in the industry is invested in having prices go up indefinitely.
You're missing a huge group - homeowners. NIMBY homeowners are a huge driving factor in things never changing. They vote against anything that would help the housing crisis because they only care about their home prices (or sorry - the "character" of the neighborhood).
It doesn't even make sense that industry is against building more housing - how do you imagine they make money if they don't do what they make money from - building?
> no one wants to look at market manipulation
because no one (including you) has any evidence it's a significant issue.
your words might not mean much but evidence would. I can only assume that you don't have any otherwise.
> for you have in your possession "an unending amount of data"... show me the power of market forces!!!
see my other comment: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=42515602