Today’s links ‘We buy ugly houses’ is code for ‘we steal vulnerable peoples’ homes’: The pervasive, predatory sleaze of Homevestor, “the #1 homebuyer in the USA.” Hey look at this: Delights to delectate. This day in history: 2003, 2013, 2018, 2022 Colophon: Recent publications, upcoming/recent appearances, current writing projects, current reading ‘We buy ugly houses’ is code for ‘we steal vulnerable peoples’ homes’ (permalink) Home ownership is the American dream: not only do you get a place to live, free from the high-handed dictates of a landlord, but you also get an asset that appreciates, building intergenerational wealth while you sleep – literally. Of course, you can’t have it both ways. If your house is an asset you use to cover falling wages, rising health care costs, spiraling college tuition and paper-thin support for eldercare, then it can’t be a place you live. It’s gonna be an asset you sell – or at the very least, borrow so heavily against that you are in constant risk of losing it. This is the contradiction at the heart of the American dream: when America turned its back on organized labor as an engine for creating prosperity and embraced property speculation, it set itself on the road to serfdom – a world where the roof over your head is also your piggy bank, destined to be smashed open to cover the rising costs that an organized labor movement would have fought: https://gen.medium.com/the-rents-too-damned-high-520f958d5ec5 Today, we’ve hit the end of the road for the post-war…Pluralistic: 'We buy ugly houses' is code for 'we steal vulnerable peoples' homes' (11 May 2023)