Matt Miller: Rent Control and Why NYC has 50k "Ghost Apartments"

When I was young(ish) and stupid(ish), I leaned left(ish) on such things.

Then JQ got it into her head to renovate an old house downtown. We turned it into a duplex and lived upstairs. Then we renovated another house and rented out both halves of the duplex for a couple of years.

The experience completely changed my mind about this stuff.

If more people had been landlords, fewer people would lean left on these issues.

Short version: though the duplex brought in a lot of money, I pushed hard to sell it, and JQ finally agreed. We've been shed of it for a couple of years now, and JQ (though initially ambivalent) agrees it was the right decision.

renting is a lot of work, a big pain in the ass, and carries with it a lot of risk. We still had the duplex during lockdowns, and were very lucky that both sets of renters worked for the state. If rent had dried up for either unit, we'd have been screwed. As in ruined.

And one set of bad renters--of which there are many--can just about ruin your life.