Vox demonizes homeownership
August 4, 2021
Vox attacks homeownership in a new article that grossly misrepresents its effects on a neighborhood.
Homeownership “could be turning you into a bad person,” Vox says in its attack on the character of homeowners.
“Homeownership, as it has evolved in the United States, often turns its beneficiaries against progress and change, manifesting as anything from opposing homeless shelters in your neighborhood to blocking transit projects in your region,” the article says.
In other words, homeownership is bad insofar as it makes homeowners less likely to vote for liberal policies or fall in line with Democratic orthodoxies of “progress and change.”
Maybe you want public transit, homeless shelters, and an affordable housing project in your own proverbial backyard because you’re not a “bad person,” as the article would say. Even so, those projects are largely confined to cities and other liberal enclaves, not in the more conservative suburbs or rural America.
The article’s clearly meant for a liberal, city-dwelling audience.
Contrary to what the article says, homeownership is a net benefit to both homeowners and their surrounding community. Unlike a renter, a homeowner owns his home, “the largest asset the vast majority of Americans can ever own,” the article admits.
Homeowners are still “finding themselves the villains in many stories,” Vox says. That naturally follows from the World Economic Forum’s tagline of the Great Reset: “You’ll own nothing. And you’ll be happy” (by 2030).
Homeownership significantly undercuts the Left’s renting agenda. Unlike renting, homeownership builds individual wealth. However, that doesn’t “incentivize homeowners to behave selfishly and antisocially,” as the article says. Rather, it incentivizes community development.
That’s essential in the lower-income urban neighborhoods the Vox article claims to care so much about. Empowering inner-city neighborhoods to rise from renters to homeowners results in these neighborhoods having higher property values, better child outcomes, and more social capital.
Without homeownership in these neighborhoods, they suffer a steep loss in wealth and income. Housing prices stay low when investors buy homes without improving or even maintaining them before moving on.
In 2018, the median period of homeownership was 13.3 years. Residential stability leads to more investment in neighborhood activities and a greater willingness to help address any crime that a neighborhood watch may confront.
Homeownership is a statistical boon for any community, including in the inner city. Compare homeownership to Vox’s cited affordable housing projects, which foster the long-term governmental dependence that the Left wants for racial minorities.