> We should buy housing to live in, not to extract rent from the suckers that were too late
This is a really biased view of what landlords do. A landlord takes on all the risk of maintaining the home, staying in the home long-term, fixing things when things break, etc. As a renter, being able to just tell my landlord when things break means that much more convenience for myself. Moreover, as a renter, having no incentive to be gentle on my appliances, my landlord actually does quite a bit of stuff (Or pays a lot to have someone else do my stuff, hence creating a job) to make my life pretty darn easy.
This is a really biased view of what landlords do. A landlord takes on all the risk of maintaining the home, staying in the home long-term, fixing things when things break, etc. As a renter, being able to just tell my landlord when things break means that much more convenience for myself. Moreover, as a renter, having no incentive to be gentle on my appliances, my landlord actually does quite a bit of stuff (Or pays a lot to have someone else do my stuff, hence creating a job) to make my life pretty darn easy.