This is not your grandparent’s gentrification, but rather a hyper-gentrification fueled by concentrated wealth driving up land and housing costs, expanding short-term rentals, and treating housing like a commodity to speculate on or a place to park wealth. The billionaires are displacing the millionaires, and the millionaires are disrupting the housing market for everyone else.
Our report found that billionaire-backed private equity firms have wormed their way into different segments of the housing market to extract ever-increasing rents and value from multi-family rental, single-family homes, and mobile home park communities. For instance, Blackstone has become the largest corporate landlord in the world, with a vast and diversified real estate portfolio. It owns more than 300,000 residential units across the U.S., has $1 trillion in global assets, and nearly doubled its profits in 2021.
Wait, is this why I get about 1-2 random calls a month asking if I want to sell my house, no-questions-asked, for like 30% above market rate?
I’ve told them politely, but firmly, to fuck off every time because I highly suspect that’s the case.
It’s always “Hello, am I speaking to Patrick {LastName} at {address}?” so they’ve obviously gotten my name/address from property records and somehow cross referenced that to my phone number (which I do not give out).
I’ve had people come up to me while I’m getting out of my car in the driveway. Seattle is something else.
The report this article is based on: https://ips-dc.org/report-billionaire-blowback-on-housing/
Predatory billionaire investors have bought up an unprecedented share of single-family homes, apartment buildings, and mobile home parks to extract more rents from already economically squeezed residents.
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For instance, Blackstone is the largest corporate landlord in the world, with over 300,000 residential units across the United States. Blackstone owns 149,000 multi-family apartment units, 63,000 single-family homes, 70 mobile home parks with 13,000 lots, and 144,300 beds of student housing in 205 properties. Blackstone also recently acquired 95,000 units of subsidized housing.
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Corporate landlords and their billionaire investors are targeting communities of color in particular with rent increases and high rates of eviction. Their actions exacerbate race, gender, and economic inequality, as displacement harms the most economically vulnerable people in our communities.
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