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Posts published in “Day: January 27, 2026”

Across the divide on housing

Across the divide on housing

January 27, 2026

Bet you couldn’t come up with a controversial topic which finds President Donald Trump and Oregon’s Democratic U.S. Sen. Jeff Merkley on the same side. Well, more or less.

And not only one, but one with implications for the Oregon Legislature.

But here we are: Concern about mass big-money purchases of residential property.

President Trump on Jan. 7 said something widely unexpected (in itself not a rarity): He would support a ban on big institutional investors buying single-family houses, as an approach to apply downward pressure on housing prices. His proposal was not much more specific than that. It has not been followed up since, and the administration has been mostly silent about it.

Some members of Congress said they were interested. At least one Republican senator, Bernie Moreno of Ohio, said he would propose legislation in the area. But more Democrats, including Elizabeth Warren of Massachusetts, said they have been pushing for limitations on big-money buys of housing stock for some years, often meeting Republican resistance.

The senator most identified with the issue, though, is Merkley of Oregon, who for several years has focused especially on mass buys of real estate by hedge funds.

In October 2024, he offered a proposal that “bans hedge funds from owning single-family homes and forces hedge funds and other large private investors to sell their inventory of single-family homes to families who don’t currently own a home. If the hedge funds don’t, they are required to pay a substantial tax penalty that funds a down payment assistance program.”

How much impact corporate, institutional and wealthy buyers are having on the cost of housing has been hotly debated. Institutional investors (including hedge funds) may account for less than 5% of purchases according to some studies, but investors of other kinds may represent a quarter or more of all house buyers in expanding markets. Some studies in places like Atlanta have put the number as high as a third.

Of course, many people who live in the houses they buy also own them in part as a long-term investment, but that’s a different category and tends to have less effect on raising prices.

The effect of corporate and other big-money buying comes not just from adding to competition for houses, but more from driving up prices, since such investors could afford much higher prices — almost the sky’s the limit in some cases — than average home buyers could manage.

Only a small percentage of middle class home buyers can afford house prices a half-million dollars or more, but those sales points have held in place, and in some active markets continue to rise. Wealthy investors and institutional buyers are among the few market segments that can afford them; absent them, some of those higher prices might drop.

Members of Congress like Merkley and Warren have been interested in the subject for a while, but it is not the only place action could take place. It can happen, and might even be more locally effective, at the state level.

Housing prices last year became a hot campaign topic in one of Oregon’s border states, Nevada. It might yet find its way across the border.

In Nevada, a Democratic legislature has proposed a string of ideas aimed at limiting housing costs, several of which were vetoed by the Republican governor. The subject has become a centerpiece in the 2026 gubernatorial campaign there.

Late last year, Nevada legislators proposed Senate Bill 10 which was intended to set a ceiling on all corporate purchases of homes in the state to no more than 1,000 total. Advocates noted recent studies showing connections between high number of investor purchases of homes and rising home prices.

The bill failed by a single vote, but the idea is sure to return before long.

The same concept could be picked up in Oregon, as early as this year’s short session. Odds are that no such complex legislation would make its way through to passage so quickly, but it would be put on the table, for review over the year (and in campaign season) and teed up for more thorough action in 2027.

Such measures would not not be a complete fix for the problem, of course. The sheer amount of residential housing in Oregon needs to be increased (something the state has been working on), and that’s an essential element to providing more affordable housing for more people.

But houses are unlikely to become more affordable if big-money buyers with few limits on price keep putting higher floors under housing prices. It’ll be up to the legislature to do something about that.

This column originally appeared in the Oregon Capital Chronicle.

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And the wreckage continues

January 27, 2026

Television coverage only hits the highlights and newspaper coverage concentrates on the new atrocities without following up on the continued development of earlier practices and the devastation that is following it. This means that things are even worse than one might imagine, and with no respite in sight.

Trump has placed incompetents in charge of most of the agencies. The criteria for appointment is loyalty to Trump rather than knowledge or understanding of the work to be done, and actual experience is immaterial.

Trump changed the name of the Department of Defense to the Department of War and placed an incompetent in charge. The new secretary is performing as expected. He is demoting and running off women, blacks and Jews from all levels of military leadership, reversing the steps to eliminate discrimination in the military that have been placed into effect during the last 100 years.

Further, Trump has gutted the Department of Education and eliminated large chunks of the Department of Health and Human Resources. He is ending programs for treatment of a list of life threatening maladies and has reversed the government support for early inoculation of children against the worst of childhood diseases. He has turned the Department of Justice into a personal weapon by bringing some of his personal enemies into court on “Trumped up” criminal charges. Over loud objections, he changed the name of The Kennedy Center to the “Trump-Kennedy Center,” with the result that a number of entertainers pulled out of scheduled appearances.

His domestic efforts to seize and deport any foreigner found anywhere in country has astonished and appalled a great number of us.  Contrary to his campaign promise that he would only seek out criminals and similar undesirables for adverse immigration efforts, he has instead tasked the immigration forces to proceed against the easiest of targets. Long-time residents and business owners, fully employed workers found in their workplaces, children, students, and the aged make easy targets for horrendous treatment by what has become a modern gestapo.

We have known for years that our immigration laws and procedures are broken and in desperate need of a massive overhaul. And yet, as the years go by, our Congress has failed to reach a solution that will satisfy the two major parties. The result has been a deadlocked Congress with a broken system of immigration that continues to grow worse each year. This has resulted in a huge number of immigrants in the grey area of incomplete process living in our country and being within Trumps’ target area for summary deportation.

The hardships befalling the hapless families occasioned by the summary deportations is appalling. Trumps’ actions in this area have generated huge demonstrations in all areas of the country, with the massive indications of disapproval falling upon deaf ears. There is no solution in sight, nor any indication that Trump intends to let up on his actions.

Despite the experience of the 1930s, and the cautionary warnings of every one of Trumps’ economic advisors, Trump is beginning to impose general tariffs on all imports. He continues to claim that these tariffs will be imposed upon the foreign shippers in the face of the plain fact that tariffs are always paid by domestic payees – initially by the domestic importers and passed on to domestic user through higher prices.

Our trading partners are beginning to impose counter tariffs, as expected, which will worsen the impact of it all upon our population. The tariffs and counter tariffs are beginning to produce the expected result of shortages in certain critical areas, the failures of smaller importers and exporters, increased prices in most areas, and widespread panic and uncertainties everywhere.

In his latest endeavor, he has announced an intent to acquire the island of Greenland. This huge and largely desolate area is mostly within the Arctic Circle and uninhabitable. It is at present a protectorate of Denmark. Denmark has indicated no interest in giving up their interests and Trump has threatened the imposition of punitive tariffs unless they comply with his wishes. The result is an expected tension between the United States and all of its European allies, especially those within the North Atlantic circle of countries.

All have responded to Trumps’ threats of increased tariffs with promises of counter tariffs, placing. domestic shippers in an uncertain future. Foreign trade is grinding to a standstill, bringing seaports and  large areas of trucking to a halt and with other results beginning to flow through the system into all levels of the economy. Some might say that one cannot imagine how the situation could become any worse.

But all one had to do to fully expect what is happening to us all is to have listened to Trump before the election. None of what is happening today is any surprise. Trump announced every one of his actions in advance and during his campaign. All one had to do to understand where he is coming from now is to have paid attention to what he promised during the campaign.

What to do? Does anyone believe that the disastrous consequences are going to stop on  their own, or that Trump will change direction in any area where he is presently looking?

The only recourse now is impeachment. But unless a sizable handful of Republicans in the Senate agree to jump ship, the action would be a waste of time. Only if the Senate changes in a substantial manner is impeachment a practical solution.

At the present time, there is no doubt in anyone’s mind that the Republican majority in the Senate is a complete block to any vote on impeachment. It takes a two-thirds vote to convict, meaning 67 Senators. On the best of days, it is unlikely that enough Republicans would join he Democrats to provide this many votes to impeach. A decent majority may be expected with a few Republican votes, but not a two thirds majority.

Even if the Democrats take control of the Senate in the next general election if 2026, and reach a majority of the Senate, there still will not be enough Democratic senators.to assure a two-thirds majority. Some Republican Senators will have to step out of their party stance and join the Democrats if Trump is to be impeached
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What’s that you say? Fat chance?

Probably true. There are few Republican Senators expressing any interest in jumping ship and joining the Democrats in their endeavors. While a Democratic congress will slow Trump down, it will still take a new election to chase him from office and set up any real relief.

Stay tuned. It is going to get much worse before it gets any better.