I would wager much of the “tacti-cool” market stuff to not perform.

I’m not an expert.

The only way that happens is if the rent is too high.

That’s not the only way. It’s not even very likely. If they are looking for too much rent and can’t get it they will lower their ask rather than sit there month after month getting nothing. Too high rent is the most easily fixable situation conceivable.

Other explanations include things like: it’s owned by someone who is elderly and due to their health or other problem they simply aren’t managing it actively or are even incapacitated and can’t make major decisions. Perhaps the owner died and the property is in the probate courts, which can take years.

Also, the presence of squatters doesn’t necessarily indicate it has been vacant for a long time.

Squatters could move in the day after the property becomes empty. Really it depends on when it is noticed the house is unoccupied.
Sometimes houses can't be sold for months because of legal BS (happened with my moms house).

For there to be squatters, the landlords had to have this property open and unrented for a while.

Huh? A squatter is most commonly simply a former renter who stops paying without moving out. The property is not vacant at any point.

Counterpoint: some people would rent an Airbnb and stay after the two weeks they rented, effectively preventing the homeowner to return to their homes after a vacation. There's little legal recourse to speedily remove them, as two weeks of occupation requires a lengthy judicial process to evict them (IIRC in California).

I dislike rent seekers too, but it happens to people with only one home as well. They think they could put their home to use while they're not there (effectively reducing the problem of real estate under occupation), only to be exploited.

I disagree, though I know I'll get roasted for it... Landlords do serve a purpose to a point. Not everyone wants to own property. Owning property ties you to a particular place, makes it difficult to leave. If you know you want to stay in an area for the rest of your life, or even just the next 10 years, absolutely, you should be able to buy, and not being able to is a societal failure. But if you don't know where you want to spend the rest of your life, you still need shelter now, and renting provides that, and when you decide to go somewhere else, it's relatively easy. One of my bigger regrets in life was feeling pressured to buy a house in 2005... Just in time for the subprime mortgage crisis. I had a traditional mortgage, but nonetheless, my house went from $150k to <50k in months. I was stuck. Couldn't sell without coming up with extra money to pay off the mortgage, but I wasn't in as bad shape as some people, I could afford the payments, so I couldn't justify walking away, just had to wait for it to rebound, which took another 5 years roughly. Had I been renting, I would have been able to leave much more easily.

I'd definitely claim exception there in cases when someone travels often. Picture a guy who's going to study at the nearby university for one year, but isn't going to put down any roots in the city.

But yes, I acknowledge that's a comparatively uncommon case to most renters.

Eh, bounty hunting is an entire industry.

So are all kinds of private security.

Wouldn't be that hard to just create some new class of crime that can legally be dealt with by people or agencies with the proper licensing, then shunt off encampment clearing to basically PMCs.

Then you just tie in existing apps that city governments or police put out, to report encampments, tie that into a conctracting system.

Its the most neoliberal solution to homelessness that can exist, therefore, just give it a couple years.

Works well with the prison industrial complex too!

Trump did say, and has been, settting up massive internment camps for the homeless.

Why not spread some of the money around to some new enterprising startups? Helps make it not look like a no bid contract situation.