Will New Laws Actually Lower Home Prices?

This is episode number 363 of The Homeowner Show. Well, whether you're DIY or looking to hire, we're here to help you find the best information and options for you and your home. My name is Kevin Hackett, and here with me is Craig Williams.

Hello, hello, hello, and welcome to The Homeowner Show. We are so glad that you could join us for another live episode here in our fly-ridden studio. Man, we have done battle tonight.

We have, we have How many do you think we've killed?

Uh, about 25. Yeah, at least.

I think that that is on the low end, but nevertheless, we've had an infestation.

Oh yeah.

Yeah.

Not even sure why. Well, 2 weeks ago we had— I was out of town for 2 weeks and a rat exploded in the studio.

Whoops. You know, as they do.

But I don't think that had anything to do with this. So we got— that was cleaned up. I mean, a couple weeks.

Yeah. Yeah.

I mean, we just walked in tonight and there's just flies everywhere and it, there's no smell. No, we don't even know what happened.

No, there's just flies. And, and, and there's a, we also found a giant spider web.

Yeah. That was doing nothing.

Nothing. It was the most useless spider web ever. Yeah. So anyway, um, well, I'll tell you this. Mm-hmm. I'm on a roll.

You're on a roll.

I'm on a roll.

How are you on a roll?

Well, so, uh, last week we talked about my fridge, right? Right. So, uh, the day after we recorded that show, my mother-in-law comes to me and she goes, hey, the golf cart's not working.

Uh-huh.

And I was like, what?

Can nothing go right?

And what'd you do to it? Seriously?

Yeah.

What'd you do to it? Uh, she's like, I don't know. It just like, it just, it, it's like it doesn't have any juice to it. And I was like, well, maybe it doesn't have any juice.

I don't know.

Let's go find out.

Plug her in.

Yeah. Sure enough, the, the charger was dead.

Oh.

And I was like, okay, is it the— because it's an electric golf cart, so it's either the batteries or the charger. Because the way those things work, you plug it in and it's got to get something back before it kicks on, right? So it's, it's dead. So I go home and like take it home. I, I, uh, don't tell my wife, I opened the thing up on our kitchen island. And, uh, first of all, we're safe here.

She doesn't listen.

No, she does not. She never has. 363 episodes in, she's never listened to an episode. Uh, it, it was gross inside there.

Uh-huh.

It just like, like dust and leaves, like that just had gotten in the— right, in the casing. And, uh, long story short, there's 2, there's 2 circuit boards in there. One of them was blown. I didn't know that at the time, but I found a guy on YouTube who was like, hey, you know, you could replace 2 of these boards with this one board on Amazon for $25. Oh, there you go. And I'm like, well, Bill, we'll see. I replaced one of them, took the one of them out, and I was like, that thing is— I mean, that thing is done. Uh, I'm gonna show you a picture here because you're gonna be like, whoa. Um, when I, when I saw it, I was like, all right, that's That's probably not a good

circuit board.

No, no. Yeah, that, that did not.

I don't know if you can, uh, see that at all. That's what the circuit board looked like. That black thing at the bottom there, it's caked in ice. That's supposed to be blue like that one. It's not. Anyway, um, yeah, replaced 2 circuit boards with one, $25. Plug it back in, started humming.

Nice.

I mean, I'm on a roll, man. I'm like, what else can I fix? Like, I'm a, I'm a fixing machine. Yeah, you know.

Well, I mean, like, this is the thing is we've been telling people for a long time, like, this is how you use these tools.

Yes.

I mean, it is. The repairmen should be a little concerned about their jobs, but like, there's always going to be people that don't have the time to do this.

Right.

It's still kind of fun to learn how to do it.

Well, that's the thing, man. Like, I've been having fun.

Yeah.

Like, I'm sitting there going, man, what's the worst that could happen? But because, I mean, those chargers are like $300, $400.

Oh yeah.

They're expensive. And so I was just like, what's the worst that happens? Like, if it— if I can't fix it, I'll either take it to a place who can fix it, which is what I would have done anyway, right? Or I would just buy a new one.

Mm-hmm.

And I was like, for $25, man. And as soon as I saw that board, I was like, I promise you, this is the problem. And I mean, it was, it was so easy. I mean, not only did the YouTube video show me exactly how to do it, but like the instructions were like, take this wire and put it here, take this wire and put it here. And as soon as I did that, I mean, it was— it— I changed it out in about 15 minutes.

That's awesome.

So yeah, yeah, really, really awesome.

So I— similar, similar thing for me.

Yeah.

Uh, the, the mini split in the studio got a hole in the drain line.

Yeah.

Uh, just outside the door here and was, uh, I think last time we were here it dumped a bunch of water.

It did? On the outside?

Yeah, just on the outside of the door.

Yeah.

I was like, well, that's not good. Can't run that until I can get that fixed. And so I, I called and got a quote and it was, it was like, I don't wanna pay that much money.

Yeah.

So I looked up the parts that I needed and like, I went and picked 'em up. It was $25. Yeah. I knocked the whole thing out and, and like I, I did, I used AI. I was like asking in the size of the, and like, and make sure I got the right kind of hose and yeah, all that kind of stuff. Um, it, it took me like 20 minutes.

Yeah.

To knock the whole, I mean, like once I had all the parts here, now going to the store, I mean, if you, if you include that, sure. It took me like 2 hours.

Sure.

Um, but still walking the aisles of Home Depot going like, okay, I need this part here and I gotta walk over here and get this part over here. And okay, because they don't put the stuff that actually makes sense together.

No, of course not.

Um, and I was picking up some other stuff which we can, we can talk about later. I got a, I got a Shop-Vac and then a stick vac for the house.

Okay.

Um, cool. But well, we can, we can get on that later.

By the way, that was a really funny, uh, Babylon Bee I saw just the other day. It said Mary and Joseph knew Jesus was the Messiah whenever he only made one trip to Home Depot. That's one of his favorites. Yeah. Anyway, it's pretty good. Yeah.

Uh, so, but dude, I am, I am suffering with a spider bite right now.

Really? Yes.

So I had, I actually had this happen, uh, about 2 years ago on my left leg.

Ah.

And I, I know exactly what it is. I got bit by a brown recluse. Oh no.

Again.

Oh. Um, and thankfully I don't have like a really bad reaction to it.

Okay.

Um, but, and it, it, I just need to go see the doctor and get the antibiotics that I need. That's, and that's apparently how you deal with these kinds of things.

Mm-hmm.

I don't get like the necrosis.

Oh, good.

Um, but what happens is I get, there's like, um, I get like a fever bump underneath my skin.

Oh, it's really hot.

It gets super hard and hot.

Oh yeah.

And it makes my leg really stiff and anytime something touches it, it hurts like all get out.

Yeah.

And it just started yesterday hurting.

Mm-hmm.

I've seen, I've known I've had the bump for a while and I was like, ah, I think that's a spider bite, and now it's just starting to fever, and I'm like, suck.

Yeah.

So, and it just, it, it makes it painful to walk.

Oh, I'm sure.

But like anything that touches the back of my leg just feels like fire.

Oh.

It's just tender like that.

Dude.

Um, so, and I've gotta, I've gotta go work all day tomorrow, but I've gotta find time to go stop by the urgent care. And, uh, well, and the last time I did it, I went to urgent care and they gave me some antibiotics and it didn't work. Oh, and yeah, and I went to the doctor because I thought it was a clot. That's what it felt like.

Okay.

Felt like a clot.

Yeah.

And I was like, that's not good. No, I need to, I need to like get that checked out. And so they gave me— they weren't willing to say it was a spider bite, so they gave me something. And then I went to— this was, this was the part that was crazy, man. We went to Universal Studios and I did all 3 days at that park with that fever blister on the back of my leg.

Oh, wow.

And it being stiff.

Oh.

And my wife was like, just go to the ER. And I was like, I'm not missing any of this with my kids.

Yeah.

It's like, I'll suffer through it. Right.

I'll lose my leg before I—

That's right. It's like, it's not taking me down. That's right. Um, so I, but I, I did, I went to a, I, I found an urgent, urgent care near the park and went and saw this guy and he goes, you wear boots most of the time?

Mm-hmm.

And I was like, yeah. And he goes, dude, this happens to truckers all the time that wear boots. And then he, he goes, the spiders always bite 'em right there. He goes, I know exactly what this is. Really? Yeah.

Wow.

And I was like, sweet, now I know what this is. And he goes, you just need this. And I was like, oh, okay. And it cleared it right up.

Cleared it right up.

So I'm crazy. I've just gotta go do that.

So yeah. Well, uh, the, uh, the, the crazy thing is like, uh, did, so one of your, one of your guys came over and was doing some, uh, wasp killing at my house. Did he tell you what happened? No. Yes. He got stung by one.

Oh, did he really?

Yeah. Well, he said he did. And like, okay, so here's what happened. I, I had gone inside because, uh, I don't remember. I came out and he was like, I'm gonna spray them first and then I'm gonna, you know—

Were they like all gathered up outside?

Yes.

Okay.

They were all gathered up, and which he said happens a lot. They just kind of guard that opening.

It's kind of like when beers are beer— when bees are bearding.

Okay.

It's very similar.

Okay. Yeah. So, uh, he's like, I'm gonna, I'm gonna spray them first just to kind of knock them out and I'm gonna go up, fog the attic. Great. So I went in, uh, oh, I know, I, I had to— I've got 2 screws in my, um, attic door. Attic door. And so I was like, I'm gonna go take care of that, come back out around the corner, and dude, I see him full-on running away, like, like doing this, like, like thing like this. And, and, uh, and he's like, he's like spraying every once in a while, and he's just like— and I'm like, dude, he You've got like, oh, are you all right? I'm like, you all right? And he was like, oh, I think, uh, man, one got me. It got him on

the face.

Oh, that sucks.

And then, but then he was like, thankfully, like, they don't, they don't tend to bother me too bad. But he, he kept like, you know, like feeling at it and everything. But then later he's like, honestly, I don't, I don't know if it actually got me. I think it landed on me, but I don't think it actually got me. But I was like, dude, like, If it didn't— I know he's lucky. I mean, 'cause the face is the worst. The face is the worst. And, uh, which is where they always like to sting me. Yeah, of course.

I've gotten stung in the eyeball, man.

What?

Yes.

Oh, that's gotta be the worst.

Getting stung in— well, here was the thing is I was, I had gone out to west, western Texas, like towards San Antonio.

Okay.

And I was meeting this Italian beekeeper on a flatbed truck. Oh, um, and it was like one of when I first got into beekeeping.

Yeah.

And, and so I, uh, I drove past him and like they just have boxes and boxes of bees on the back of this truck.

Right.

And so I drive past him and I was like, okay, I'll be smart. I'll drive past him. I'll go down a little ways. That way I can get out, put my bee suit on, and then go up and meet him and, and see where, you know, how I can load my bees up. I take one step outta my truck and like one, like literally makes a beeline and tags me in the eyeball.

Oh my goodness. And I'm like, just like, son of a—

I'm like doing like, yeah.

Yeah.

And so I get back in my truck and I'm just like, ah, this is, this is the absolute worst. So I, I finally was like, all right, I gotta get out. I gotta put my bee suit on. I gotta, gotta man up 'cause I've already paid for these stupid things.

I'm gonna take my bees and go home.

Yeah. So I, and so like I basically had to like drive home like a pirate. 'Cause like the left-hand side of my face was all swollen up. Uh, looked like sloth.

Uh, so good, man. Bad, but good.

It's, it was the worst.

Well, uh, yeah. Well, so one other question I've got. I drove into your neighborhood. Mm-hmm. And I saw a sign out that said your water is safe to drink.

Yeah.

What's the story there?

Well, we had a, we had a scare with the water quality.

Oh.

Um, and it basically like the, the Hayes Utility Company comes out and tests the water on a regular basis.

Right.

I forget what it was they found in there. It's basically, there's a contaminant that makes it look like fecal matter has crossed over into the freshwater.

Oh.

And so they just, you know, and it's still got chlorine and all that kind of stuff in it, but they tell you just to boil the water just to be safe.

Sure.

So that happened for like 24 hours.

Okay.

And then they came back and they said, hey, the testing was wrong. Go back to drinking the water.

Okay.

So that's— So you're good. That's all. And so like, just because we have a lot of elderly people that live in our neighborhood that probably aren't on their phones and they're, Yeah. Tablets and computers and all that kind of stuff, check— checking their email and the Facebook page.

Right.

So it's just easier to put a sign out and be like, hey, water's safe to drink now. Sure.

Makes sense.

Because otherwise they'd probably just keep going on boiling the water if they needed to. Um, yeah. So, but that, that happens. We, I mean, cuz we don't, there's only like 200 houses.

Yeah.

It's not too many in this neighborhood.

Yeah.

So, um, man, what was, It seemed like there was something else I wanted to talk about. Okay. Did you, did you see the whole deal with the WNBA?

Yeah.

Having to have the emergency meeting?

Yeah.

What'd you think about that? One, did you watch the video of the guy that declared?

No.

For the WNBA? No.

I saw like, I saw pictures of the dude and like—

He's like a, he's an NBA player.

Yeah, he is. And he's like got huge arms and stuff. Like the dude looks like, I watched it.

It was funny. It was obviously tongue in cheek.

Yeah.

Um, but, but they also had to like take him seriously, right? Because that was their policy.

Of course.

And, oh, so funny. I think that video had like 2 or 3 billion views.

Oh my goodness. That's insane. That's crazy.

Oh my gosh.

Yeah, he was a big dude.

Well, and I mean, like, somehow the WNBA has found its way into like relevancy.

Well, I know why.

Well, Caitlin— was it Caitlin Clark?

Yeah.

Well, I mean, that's, that's part of it. And then you've also— is it Sophie, uh, Cunningham?

Yeah.

That was, to me, that was the one that was like, oh, like people really, uh, resonated with, with that whole situation where she was pointing the finger.

Yeah. Well, they— yes, they did. But Caitlin Clark was a phenom before she got into the WNBA.

Oh, she was a college phenom.

I mean, yeah. And so I think I think that's the thing that has really sparked everything. But then that incident wound up being a big deal.

Well, then she was involved in another incident, I think night before last.

Oh, was she?

Where the gal like clocked her in the head.

Oh wait. Yeah, I actually, I did see that. Now that you say that, I did see that.

But, and then claimed it was white privilege.

Exactly. Well, yeah. Uh, and I also saw a Babylon Bee about that one too, which she said something about her white privilege feels like something. And it was, uh, Yeah, pretty dumb, but yeah, but hilarious.

How dare we as 2 guys sit here and talk?

Yeah, exactly. On our podcast. On our— yeah, in a studio.

My favorite thing when people can't argue with what we're talking about, like when they have no position, they'll be just like, I wish they wouldn't make microphones so cheap. And then I'm just like, go buy one and find out.

They're not cheap. They're not, especially decent ones.

No.

No.

See, that's so— and it's such like a pedestrian, sophomoric response to something that you disagree with.

Yeah.

I wish it was more expensive for you to do what you're doing so you can't do what you're doing. Well, why don't you actually just like take a position?

Yeah.

Like make an argument.

Yeah. I found the Bablog Bee. Do you want me to read it?

Oh yeah, absolutely.

It's a little, uh—

A little racy?

Yeah. All right.

We didn't write it.

It's a lot racy, actually.

We're just reporting the news.

Caitlin Clark explains that white privilege feels weirdly like getting beat up by giant Black lesbians. Yeah, it's not a little racy, it's a lot racy.

That's never happened to her.

Exactly. Oh man. Anyway, Babylon Bee, dude, for the win. Oh my gosh, they're so funny. Yes, so funny. And they're just like—

they—

the thing is, like, the Babylon Bee used to put stuff out like once a day or whatever. First of all, it was like once a week. Then it was like once a day. Now it's like they're putting stuff out left and right. And it's fire. It's all of it. It's so good.

All of it is so good. Like, even if, even if like that doesn't like resonate with you or you think that that's rude.

Yeah.

It's still true.

Yeah, it's still true, man. It just, yeah, you just gotta laugh, man.

Uh, so anyway, but anyway, um, we wanted to just briefly hit on, because this is We've been talking about housing affordability for, it's, it seems like a couple, couple years now.

Yeah.

Um, and you know, if you've been listening to the show, you kind of know our position on it. Yes, they're expensive, but can you figure it out? 100%. You can figure it out if you really wanna buy one. Yeah. Suck it up and, you know, get something that's not necessarily maybe in the neighborhood that you want. Yeah. You know, buy something that's a little bit cheap with less options on it. Buy something simpler.

Right.

Um, especially if you're single, like why do you need like a 3-bedroom, 2-bath house. Buy a 2/1.

Right.

They're, they exist and they're pretty cheap and, like, pretty roomy for, like, a single dude, single gal.

Or duplex even.

Yeah. I mean, like, these, these things are doable if you're willing to be creative.

Right.

And maybe your credit isn't even that great. You can still make it happen. You just gotta have the conversations with the right kind of people.

That's right.

Like, we, like, we, we've gone over this ad nauseam.

Yes, we have.

So, but What we've been hearing the whole time is, well, if BlackRock would just get out of the way, if these large conglomerate corporations would just stop buying all the housing, then the price, price of housing would go down.

Right.

So we've actually had legislation that came in, I believe it was July 11th. It was the 21st Century Road to Housing Act.

Okay.

And I just kinda wanna go through the timeline here so we all know what we're talking about. It was initially, it was an executive order aimed at stopping Wall Street from competing with Main Street homebuyers.

Oh, okay.

Okay. So in January, January 7th, Trump posted on Truth Social pledging to do something about this. Okay. On January 20th, Trump signed an executive order titled Stopping Wall Street from Competing with Main Street Homebuyers and directed federal agencies to limit large institutional investor purchases of single-family homes. On March 12th, in 2026, the Senate passed Bill 89-10, having already cleared the House. Okay. So that, that, that means it already had gone through the House and then the Senate went ahead and passed it. And then June 23rd, Congress passed the final act prohibiting large institutional investors from purchasing single-family homes going forward.

Okay.

And then in July, which I believe was July 11th, in of this year it became law. So here's, here's what it said. It says large institutional investor, those institutions are no longer able to own more than 350 single-family homes.

Oh, okay.

And there are exceptions.

Okay.

Which they make sense when you hear them. There's exceptions for new construction, Yeah.

Okay.

There's exceptions for renovation.

Like, like if they're in the process of renovating something?

Correct. Okay.

Yep.

And then there's certain homeownership programs. And then homes already owned before the enactment do not have to be sold off.

Okay, so it's a, they're grandfathered in basically.

They're grandfathered in.

Okay.

So that's, that's where we stand as of right now.

Okay.

So, uh, we've had essentially a month to the day.

Okay. Right.

Because today's the 11th.

Yep.

Right.

Yep.

Um, and housing prices really haven't come down.

Basically the same.

Now you could, you could look at me and say, well, Craig, it's only been a month.

Yeah.

Um, but I'm about to get into some of the numbers and I think that's gonna— anyway, what do you think about all this?

Well, first of all, I like the idea as a whole. I like the idea of these large corporations having the freedom because they've got the capital to be able to just come in and buy up these homes and they're renting them out mostly, or they're flipping them, one of the two.

Right.

And it does make it difficult because they're willing to pay the top price. Right? Because they'd rather have it. Uh, so I, I get, I get the idea. Um, but I, I, I still think that we are in a, just this weird place of we, we have people that are not being qualified for loans because of their income.

Mm-hmm.

And they're not being qualified because of the interest rates. And so you've got, you've got the mortgage company that's going, you gotta have these stipulations in order to be able to qualify for a mortgage from us. And, oh, by the way, you're gonna have to pay mortgage insurance. You're gonna have to do all these things. And so I, I think that's one side of the coin. The other side of the coin is, you know, I mentioned income. Dude, with inflation happening the way it is, Mm-hmm. the income thing is not gonna get fixed anytime soon. Because there's no way, there's just no way you're, you're an employer. There is no way employers can keep up with, with raises at the rate of inflation.

I mean, it's just virtually impossible. When inflation is 6 to 8 to 10% per year, would you be able to pay your employees that much raise every month, every year?

No.

And I, I don't know really anyone that is. And so you're going, I'm fighting this losing battle of trying to get Qualifiable. And so I, I think that is one side of this coin of why people are having a hard time, you know, getting into a mortgage, which means that there are, there are few people that can buy certain types of homes. Therefore, these people are not willing to sell their homes because they can't get into another home that they really want to get into because they can't sell it for what they want to. And, or what the market says they should be able to sell it for. And it, so there's not enough homes on the market. And so we've got this, it's like this, I don't know, this weird

graph that we're trying to fit this into this slot of like, I need to be able to sell homes at a reasonable rate and people need to be able to buy them, uh, at a reasonable rate.

Mm-hmm.

And so I, I think all that's true. So I— long story short, I think that I like the idea of limiting these companies.

I'm not opposed to it.

I'm not opposed to it. Here's the thing, I don't think it's going to fix anything.

I, I totally agree with that sentiment.

But I would like to think it's going to fix it, but I think you're— I think you're aiming at the wrong target is the problem.

Yeah, so here's, here's, here's the big number that just made me make up my mind. How much of the market do you think that these institutions own? Like if you could throw out, if throw out a number of percentage.

I'm guessing it is less than 5%.

Okay.

Am I anywhere close?

Ish. So it's about half a percent.

So it's, it's even worse than I, I mean, I was trying to give it some margin here.

6% of the entire housing market in the US. So if you think that by limiting them based off what they already own, not— it's going to change the— it's not. No, it's, it's not even going to touch it.

Yeah.

And so, like, while I think it's a good thing, now what I, what I do think this does is it gives, it gives us some teeth because, yes, I don't think it's going to affect the market countrywide. However, I do think that these corporations are specifically targeting certain areas.

Okay.

And it's going to limit their ability to affect those areas.

Okay.

And, and that's, that's been the main argument that I've heard on this, that as to why this needed to happen is like, yeah, it's not going to affect like Missouri and North Dakota and Wyoming. It's not, it's not going to affect all that.

Right.

But what it is, is there's like small towns in Kansas and Oklahoma and in Texas and Florida and maybe even California. There's, there's places that they are able to affect it because they can go in with a lot of money and buy up and scoop up a bunch of houses in an area.

Which—

In a specifically targeted area, rather than like a wide berth of homes across the country. And so it gives, it gives us some teeth to limit their ability to come into those areas. Now, You know, if, if that company just decides, you know what, uh, we're gonna pick on South Carolina.

Mm-hmm.

They can all get together and still do that.

Well, that's, that's one of the things I was gonna say is like, you know how easy it is to form a corporation? Right. So what is the, what is the, what is the limitation to 350 homes per what?

Per corporation.

I can have 20 of those.

Right.

So I can still buy as many as I want to. I just can't put them under one corporation. Correct. So that's not really changing anything. It's just, it's more red tape for people to have to go through to get them number one.

To get to where they want. Yeah.

But that doesn't mean that they can't go out and buy.

Yeah. Because I was, I was even looking into this going, well, is it, is, does this law only apply to publicly held corporations?

Okay. Good. Yeah.

Good question.

And it doesn't.

It's very broad.

Yeah.

And it's because they, I think they anticipated that move going, okay. Like, you're gonna, you're gonna try and end around us by setting up this corporation and this corporation, which, I mean, honestly, it's a pain in the butt.

Sure it is.

To do that. But yeah, like, if you have enough money, who cares?

And if, if you've got enough money, you've probably got people that can just— I mean, honestly, you just make a phone call. I, I, I know I can easily just make a phone call, an LLC gets set up for me.

Yeah.

It's so simple.

But I mean, like, how many— well, this is actually— let's, let's just ask the question.

Okay.

Hang on here.

I, I think— I just think that we're, we're Again, I think that the target is the wrong target. If we're trying to, as a country, trying to make homes more affordable, then I think we got to figure out a couple of things. I think we got to figure out how can we change the rate of inflation so people can catch up. And I think we also have to figure out a way for interest rates not to keep people from getting a mortgage. Now, we're still in pretty historically low interest rates, you know? Right.

So according to Gemini, which not the best news. I mean, like, I'll, I can, I'm happy to ask other ones, but like BlackRock holds shares in roughly 5,500 to 5,700 companies.

Yeah. So that, look, I mean, if you want to own 2 million homes, do it. You're just gonna have to do a lot of corporations.

What I'd be interested to know is, did they write the law in such a way as to where these governing companies can't manage, you know what I'm saying? Like, they have all these assets under management. Can each one of those individual assets, depending on how much they own of each one of those, own 350 residential properties? Yeah. You know, and then, you know, here's the thing is once you get past 3 kitchens on a property, it's no longer residential.

Right.

It's multifamily.

Right.

That's a whole different thing.

Yeah. So you can, if you, if you wanna go in and start buying up triplexes, quad, quadplexes.

Yep.

You know, that doesn't count. Doesn't even count.

I would assume it doesn't count. I mean, I haven't read the entire law, but like, it's, it's very specifically saying residential properties. And at least here in Texas, when you get past 3 kitchens, it's no longer residential.

Interesting.

So it's, you know, because we actually, we ran up against that. We were getting, uh, this property, um, what do you call it?

Appraised.

Appraised.

Yeah. Okay.

And the gal that came out and did it, and she's like, you don't have a third kitchen, do you? And I was like, not technically.

No. The answer is no. The answer is no, no, no.

I was like, why? I was like, because I'll make it to, right?

Give me a sec.

Yeah. Which, I mean, according to her, the thing that constitutes another kitchen is a stove.

Really?

Yeah. Oh, so like, if you have, if you have 3 stoves in 3 different rooms of, of a property or 3 different stoves in 3 different buildings, then that would constitute a multifamily and it would change the valuation of the property.

Interesting.

And part of that is, uh, you can't, uh, you can't purchase a multifamily with an FHA.

Okay. Well, that makes sense.

I, it, it, to me, it's kind of weird because like, I know that there's lots of like single-family residential properties that have 3 kitchens.

Yeah. Well, yeah. I mean, for sure there, I mean, depending on what kind of house you got.

You're right.

I mean, Yeah. It, I mean, there are lots of homes that have like mother-in-law quarters. Mm-hmm. That has its own kitchen.

Yeah.

And then maybe a basement that has a kitchen.

Well, you know, but like, but circling back to the law, man, like, here's the thing is this passed back in July and you and I can both reason and, and know enough about the housing market to kind of go like, this really isn't gonna do anything. I would've expected the optics of it because this is what everybody's been crying about for 2 years.

Right.

Or probably longer than that, actually. I would've assumed that the optics of it would've at least shifted the market a little bit.

Yeah.

And it hasn't.

Uh-uh.

Nothing's changed. Nothing's really changed. Like housing affordability has not gone, like, I don't even know how, how would you say that? Housing, your ability to purchase a house has not changed up or down.

No.

Like interest rates haven't changed all that much. The prices of the house, the prices of the housing is starting to come down just a little bit.

Well, I think we're in a place where you can at least negotiate a little bit.

Yeah.

Yeah.

That, and that's about it. Yeah. It's, it's not like it's take it or leave it prices anymore.

No.

You got a little bit of wiggle room. Um, but also most people don't care or mind leaving it on the market for a while.

Right. Right.

You know?

Yeah.

So, and one of the other things about the, cuz I was, I was looking into whether or not, uh, David Weekley is publicly or privately held.

Which is it?

It's privately held.

Oh, okay.

Um, cuz, and that's when I started going down the path of like, okay, does this apply to Do you have it?

Or do we do it? Yeah. Yeah.

And so, because I think that's why those exemptions exist, because those guys are building thousands of homes.

Oh yeah.

And, and so like, you have to allow—

Mm-hmm.

So here's what's gonna be interesting. So they can't have residential rental properties in their portfolios. Is that going to force them and/or encourage them to move into new construction?

I would think so.

That could actually be a really good thing.

It could be because especially in certain areas, I mean, again, if you could, if you could figure out a way to go, look, we, we have to have a certain number of homes in the $100,000 to $200,000 range. Mm-hmm. Whatever that looks like.

Right.

And I don't, I don't know how you would do that. Maybe from a, that may have to be local government trying to figure that out. Mm-hmm. But you know, then you get these companies coming in going, we can do that. I mean, we've been doing that for forever. They're gonna be, you know, small 3/2s. You know, they're gonna be, you know, 1,400 to 1,600 square foot. Right. But you could do it.

Yeah. We, I mean, we have 'em right down the road from here. I mean, like, you can, you can buy a 3/2. It's real little.

Yeah.

But you can buy one for around $200,000.

Right. Yeah.

$240,000.

Right.

I mean, and sometimes a little bit less than that.

Right.

Um, so, I mean, they exist.

They do.

It's just not your dream home.

Yeah.

But, like, it's a place to live. It's a place to build equity.

Well, that, that's the thing. And, and again, we, we've, how many times have we harped on this? Like, if you just don't want to have the maintenance of a home, I mean, if we're sitting here going, oh, this went out, that went out, we were trying to fix stuff to save money, you know? Yeah. It, it's part of it. But the reality of it is, uh, you're building the opportunity to get into something you want later. Right. If you, if, if that's your goal.

And I, I, I, and I, I don't think you would do this either, but I'm not even making the argument that a house is like the world's best investment. I don't, I don't think that it is.

No.

Um, it's not, it's not the worst.

No, it's not.

Yeah. And, and so like, if you, if you suck at saving money, it's a good place to stick it.

I agree.

Um, so, but yeah, I mean, I wouldn't say I can't afford it should be the excuse to not Because even, even the tiny 3/2 that's not far from here, it's still going to be bigger than most apartments. Of course.

And you've got, you don't have a person smoking weed next to you. Yeah.

Or, you know, raising rats.

Yeah.

Or cultivating bedbugs.

That's right.

It's like, there's, there's all sorts of reasons not to live in an apartment from, from my perspective.

I agree.

Um, like, look, you want to like the worst pest control you've ever had in your life, go live in an apartment.

Mm-hmm.

I mean, I, even if they're luxury, man, those guys don't wanna spend money on that stuff.

No, they don't. And they won't.

No.

Like, I guess you could, could you, can a per— can a resident in an apartment do their own?

It's tricky.

Okay. Because I was gonna say that there's probably something to that.

Yeah.

Yeah. And because I would, I would want, I would want it even if they're not gonna do it for me, cuz I don't wanna see the roaches, you know? So could you? Yes.

Companies like me don't want to mess with it because they—you—you never know when you're going to get a crazy living next door that will come, you know, come rapping on your door saying, "You gave me cancer," you know, or whatever. Like, you poisoned me, and it's like I don't want to deal with that.

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Like, like I was just treating this one over here, and then she's like, "No, I came through the walls," and yeah, got all my Cheerios.

Why aren't you eating Honey Nut?

Yeah, sure. Yeah.

Regular Cheerios nut.

You'd have never tasted it if you had a little sugar on there.

That's right. No, I, I, I just think that there, again, when you start policing these types of things from a government standpoint, it's just another piece of red tape for someone to figure out a way around.

It is. It is. I mean, the people that want to do it are going to do it.

Yeah.

And end of the day.

They are.

So, and again, I don't disagree with it. I mean, like, I think it's a good stopgap, but it's the same as most other regulations. It disincentivizes people at the bottom from getting into the game.

Yeah.

Because they don't have the means to play the game.

Right.

And I mean, like, you can, people talk about this all the time, and regulations are the rich people's way of keeping poor people out of business.

Absolutely. That is 100% true.

So that doesn't mean that regulation's bad. No, it just means that's the reality. The more regulation you put on, the less ability that the poor have to actually get into entrepreneurship.

That's right. So, and it's the way that, I mean, honestly, and we, we've talked about this before too, and it's frustrating for people that just, you know, their, their only means of income is a W-2 job is, you know, they're like, oh, we're paying all the taxes and the rich people don't pay taxes. And it's like, well, Sorry. The rich people are incentivized to own businesses.

Mm-hmm.

And they own businesses to save their— to shield themselves from taxes. And so you're right. That's exactly right. It's one of those zero-sum games of how are we ever going to move up? But I think that there are ways that I think the government could figure out how to help people get into homes. And they've tried with other things, but I don't know, I just don't think this is the end-all be-all. Yeah.

Not yet. I think this, 'cause you said that, and I was listening to a story about how bad it is in Great Britain right now. Oh, really? And apparently a very, very, and I think this is, I think it's Lakshmi Mittal is the guy that recently left Great Britain, and I think he went to United Emirates. But I was— this guy I was listening to said that because he left, the amount of taxes that he was paying, and the reason he left was because he wanted to move his business out of Britain, but he specifically wanted to leave and take all of his income with him. And he's a billionaire.

Okay.

And they said the amount of taxes that he was paying, it's gonna take over 450,000 80,000 citizens to make up the amount of taxes he was paying. Holy cow. So that's how much, that's how much tax revenue Great Britain just lost by pissing this dude off. Wow. And chasing him out by, by, by following the tax the rich, tax the rich, tax the rich. Okay. You can, you can keep taxing them, but eventually they're just gonna leave.

Right. Because they can.

Because they can. And there's always going to be someplace, another country, another state that is saying, come on, buddy. Mm-hmm. We'll take care of you. Yeah. And they don't mind going there for a time. Sure. Till they piss them off and then they'll just go, they'll find another one.

'Cause who cares? They, they, there's nothing keeping them there. No. I mean, really, I, I, and I, I, I realize even as I say this, I realize that there are people probably listening to this right now going, that's so stupid. I'm not even saying I disagree with you, uh, because I'm disagreeing with you. But, but I will say that those people, anybody that owns a business, uh-huh. is being incentivized to not pay taxes.

Yes.

They just are. And, and if, if you— I will also tell you this. Okay? Please hear me. If you own a business and you're paying very much taxes, you're doing it wrong. You're just doing it wrong. You need to find— you need to find a tax planner because you're doing it wrong. You find a good— Read the tax code. Read the tax code.

Well, if you wanna find out what they're asking you to do.

That's right. I mean, look, AI can help you. at least come up with some tax incentives. But, um, it's, it's one of those things where, again, you're looking at people with low income. They don't have, they just don't have the ability to change their situation. Uh, and honestly, even if they decide to own a business, it's not going to change overnight. So, um, but yeah. Um, Very interesting.

Yep. We'll see what happens.

Yeah. Well, all right. Well, thanks, uh, for listening to the show. I think that's gonna do it. And, uh, we appreciate you listening to us tonight. And, uh, like always, we appreciate your support by sharing our— what is this? Podcast. There you go. Our video, our stream, our reel, whatever it is that you find on YouTube, on Facebook, leave us a like, a rating, a review, all those things. Wonderful. Till next time, we'll see you later.

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