Poll question: Wall Street on Main Street

A bill in Congress is proposing to ban hedge funds from owning single-family homes after a decade-long phaseout period.

The idea behind the Democrat-sponsored bill, with the name “End Hedge Fund Control of American Homes Act of 2023,” is to help increase the supply of homes available for purchase to families. 

Senator Jeff Merkley (D-Oregon) said: “You have created a situation where ordinary Americans aren’t bidding against other families, they’re bidding against the billionaires of America for these houses.”

The senator’s web site points to data from 2021 showing growth in Wall Street’s home ownership rates. For example, in 2021, large hedge fund investors bought 42.8% of homes for sale in the Atlanta metro area and 38.8% of homes in the Phoenix area. 

Does this sound like a good idea to address housing affordability, or a bad idea that's addressing the wrong problem?