JC Political Thread - For All Things Political Part 2

[Reaper]

If anything we should have more owner builders as it increases competition in the market and gets more houses bullt. My parents (along with a young me who was roped into it) built their first house in the late 1990s.

Yeahnah. Unqualified people having a crack at building what is a very complex 'thing' nearly guarantees a drop in overall standards. Just a tip for you: Overall building isn't particularly profitable, particularly now. Every week more and more are going under and there are plenty to come. Some were badly managed and should go but there are also a fair amount of great builders who were just victims of circumstance and have gone under as well.

Old man has always been a “do it once and do it right” kind of person so built a solid slab double story brick with a steel frame. That place isn’t going anywhere in a hurry and I’d be surprised if there were any cracks in the slab to this day.

Your father sounds the exception to the rule. Pitty you didn't learn more from the experience.

Sure, but it would be easy for a dodgy builder to add more cheaper foam instead of expensive concrete.

Actually it's not but go on.....

I‘m sure a lot of that kind of fraud or “error” does go on in house builds where the owner doesn’t give a fuk (landlords). The only times I’ve heard of cracked slabs is in build to rent houses where (presumably) the person paying for the build doesn’t really care (or bother inspecting themselves) as it’s just something they are renting out.

I've seen a lot of dodgy/wrong stuff but that isn't one of them. Waffle pods come in hights of 165, 225 or 300mm Getting anything but those sizes is a real fuckaround even if it's possible at all. Certainly not worth the effort. Putting higher pod in than what is required will be picked up by the building surveyor during his mandatory inspection. About the only opportunity to cheat is to reduce the cover (thickness) of the slab at the top but that means resetting all of the boxing involved with the job after the inspection. Say you wanted to halve the slab thickness from min 100mm to 50 - that's a saving of around 11m3 on a 225m2 slab. That adds up to around $2000. Less the day delay and resetting everything for 4 or so guys, all of a sudden the "savings" end up to be less than $1000 with a shitload of risk attached to it.

Further, around 60% of developments (100% if flood zone or heights close to max are involved) require a land surveyor to certify FFL's before a occ cert is issued these days. If somebody has cheated it'll 100% be found then. Put simply your conspiracy theory is unfounded and not plausible what so ever.

 

[J_D 2.0]

You do realise that literally anybody who decides to sell land (including governments) the world over has that goal??? I'm sure there are a few exceptions but they are few and far between.

Sure but a government also has an alternative objective of making sure people are housed. The private company has no objective that anyone is housed, just that they obtain maximum profit for what they sell.

Have you actually seen how the Japanese society works? Yes it has it's attractions but for most of the population they may as well be robots doing what they are told.

Who said we all have to behave exactly like the Japanese do?

There is the ongoing utility benefit of it's use which was the point in the first place. Further, if that up front investment hadn't been made, the beneficiary would have had to rent space under another carport for that time at a (probably) higher cost over time so there was a monetary benefit ongoing as well.

No different to home ownership - Up front (much) higher cost in ownership vs lower (but ongoing) cost of renting but no ultimate ownership. Given a long enough time horizon you will spend more on rent than the house is worth. Many choose this option for various reasons, others don't really have a choice.

Sadly for those without the choice, they are getting hit the hardest by the current situation and crazy ideologies like yours are making matters worse.

What, my extreme ideology that everyone should be entitled to shelter? I wasn’t aware that was an extreme ideology.

I don't recall ever saying that although you are very good at lobbing evidence which entirely goes against whatever point you are trying to make.

Sure you did, arguing that SMRs are actually a thing because China and Russia have them.

You clearly have little understanding of how much it costs to build things. Roughly speaking it's a 50/50 split between cost of materials and labour in building (actually this extends to most manufacturing). For something like that, markup will be somewhere between 20 & 30%.

In case you can’t tell the $100 was a joke. But there was literally a few sheets of tin a bit of guttering, two uprights and a crossbeam (the other side is bolted to the house). Hardly a metric shittonne of materials justifying a $10k plus price tag.

You don't need a professional builder to install it - just get a owner builder permit although with the lack of knowledge you have demonstrated I recommend you pay somebody who knows what they are doing to carry out the job.

Or would you prefer somebody with zero experience and qualification just puts up whatever they think will do the job without any design or oversite to check that what they are building is safe?

That‘s it, play the man and not to ball. Argument is inconvenient to your own income so cast aspersions on the person arguing against you.

“It is difficult to get a man to understand something when his salary depends on his not understanding it.“.
Upton Sinclair.

 

[Reaper]

Sure but a government also has an alternative objective of making sure people are housed. The private company has no objective that anyone is housed, just that they obtain maximum profit for what they sell.

Yet they still strive to get the most they can for each piece of land

Who said we all have to behave exactly like the Japanese do?

Dunno - you were the one that bought their way of living up.

What, my extreme ideology that everyone should be entitled to shelter? I wasn’t aware that was an extreme ideology.

Maybe a bad choice of words on my part - your supposed solutions to the problem will cause near the exact opposite of the desired outcome.

Sure you did, arguing that SMRs are actually a thing because China and Russia have them.

My memory is hazy but I don't recall ever typing those words. That said, yes, you are right, SMR's are actually a thing. Glad we have that straight

In case you can’t tell the $100 was a joke. But there was literally a few sheets of tin a bit of guttering, two uprights and a crossbeam (the other side is bolted to the house). Hardly a metric shittonne of materials justifying a $10k plus price tag.

You are batting above your average today. Now you mention it, most of your posts are a joke. Once again, my bad.

That‘s it, play the man and not to ball. Argument is inconvenient to your own income so cast aspersions on the person arguing against you.

Re-read what I posted. I explained the process but you managed to comprehend only one small part of it. I am entirely happy what I posted was accurate and complete .

“It is difficult to get a man to understand something when his salary depends on his not understanding it.“.
Upton Sinclair.

"it's difficult to get J_2.0 to understand anything at all"
Reaper.

 

[J_D 2.0]

Yet they still strive to get the most they can for each piece of land

Are you sure about that? Developers seem to get some pretty good giveaways from the government.

https://michaelwest.com.au/locals-l...p-sale-of-sydney-land-to-property-developers/

Dunno - you were the one that bought their way of living up.

No, I bought up their alternate treatment of property as a consumer good to live in and not a speculative asset.

Maybe a bad choice of words on my part - your supposed solutions to the problem will cause near the exact opposite of the desired outcome.

That‘s your personal opinion and it’s quite obviously incorrect if your only answer to it is to sledge the person who dares to challenge your own narrative that makes you feel better about your own life.

Cognitive dissonance isn’t something I try to achieve to make myself feel better about what I do. A decent portion of the work I do involves selling product for the coal seam gas projects that export our gas overseas.

That won’t stop me criticising that fact that they pay SFA tax/royalties for our resources or that we should have a gas reservation policy.

Your cognitive dissonance is showing. Even an article on Sky News agrees with my take on developers withholding supply (quote below).

Plenty of other links below to sources that generally agree with my take on things and disagree with your take to just send you some more subsidy money to buy another Aston Martin and the problem will be solved by Friday next week.

Get back to me when you find a source that agrees with your narrative that isn’t biased AF because it’s sponsored by the property industry. I’ll wait.

”First, it is not in developers’ interest to flood the market with supply because that reduces their profits. Private developers have an incentive to drip feed supply to keep prices high.”

https://www.news.com.au/finance/eco...k/news-story/5ec76182fa454a5d608fa70500fa870f


https://stories.uq.edu.au/contact-m...s-how-did-we-get-here-where-to-now/index.html

https://www.unisa.edu.au/connect/en...-keys-to-unlocking-australias-housing-crisis/

https://stories.uq.edu.au/research/2023/10-policies-to-get-us-out-of-the-housing-crisis/index.html

 

[vc commodore]

Are you sure about that? Developers seem to get some pretty good giveaways from the government.

https://michaelwest.com.au/locals-l...p-sale-of-sydney-land-to-property-developers/



No, I bought up their alternate treatment of property as a consumer good to live in and not a speculative asset.



That‘s your personal opinion and it’s quite obviously incorrect if your only answer to it is to sledge the person who dares to challenge your own narrative that makes you feel better about your own life.

Cognitive dissonance isn’t something I try to achieve to make myself feel better about what I do. A decent portion of the work I do involves selling product for the coal seam gas projects that export our gas overseas.

That won’t stop me criticising that fact that they pay SFA tax/royalties for our resources or that we should have a gas reservation policy.

Your cognitive dissonance is showing. Even an article on Sky News agrees with my take on developers withholding supply.

Plenty of other links below to sources that generally agree with my take on things and disagree with your take to just send you some more subsidy money to buy another Aston Martin and the problem will be solved by Friday next week.

Get back to me when you find a source that agrees with your narrative that isn’t biased AF because it’s sponsored by the property industry. I’ll wait.

”First, it is not in developers’ interest to flood the market with supply because that reduces their profits. Private developers have an incentive to drip feed supply to keep prices high.”

https://www.news.com.au/finance/eco...k/news-story/5ec76182fa454a5d608fa70500fa870f


https://stories.uq.edu.au/contact-m...s-how-did-we-get-here-where-to-now/index.html

https://www.unisa.edu.au/connect/en...-keys-to-unlocking-australias-housing-crisis/

https://stories.uq.edu.au/research/2023/10-policies-to-get-us-out-of-the-housing-crisis/index.html

Anyone that has been keeping half an eye on things will know there is a shortage of tradies...

So it wouldn't matter if more land was released to construct homes on, there aren't the tradies around to complete the work. I recently heard about one building company advertising, they'll complete a build in 32 ish weeks....(Can't remember the exact time frame, but I'm fairly confident that's close to the figure)

Importing more tradies from O/S ain't really going to solve the problem either....If anything it'll add to the housing crisis,as there isn't many places available for them to live in...

You also fail to take into account established homes that come onto the market daily.....I seem to recall you mentioning something about investors buying up established homes and not investing in new builds....And the gov't should give incentives for investors to build new homes for investment purposes.....Catch 22....No tradies to build them to start with

Is there any information around why these homeless people can't actually get a house? I seriously doubt it.....That's because there would be a heap that are black listed because all they do is destroy houses, costing landlords a packet....

But hey, as long as those landlords can afford their Aston Marton, it don't really matter what other hits to their hip pocket they get.

 

[chrisp]

Oh geeze... The sooner they outlaw owner builders the better. For every one that does a great job (and there are quite a few), there are many that wind up in a huge mess.

Sounds exactly the same for ‘professional’ builders … ‘for every one that does a great job (and there are quite a few), there are many that wind up in a huge mess’!

 

[keith reed]

Anyone that has been keeping half an eye on things will know there is a shortage of tradies...

So it wouldn't matter if more land was released to construct homes on, there aren't the tradies around to complete the work. I recently heard about one building company advertising, they'll complete a build in 32 ish weeks....(Can't remember the exact time frame, but I'm fairly confident that's close to the figure)

Importing more tradies from O/S ain't really going to solve the problem either....If anything it'll add to the housing crisis,as there isn't many places available for them to live in...

You also fail to take into account established homes that come onto the market daily.....I seem to recall you mentioning something about investors buying up established homes and not investing in new builds....And the gov't should give incentives for investors to build new homes for investment purposes.....Catch 22....No tradies to build them to start with

Is there any information around why these homeless people can't actually get a house? I seriously doubt it.....That's because there would be a heap that are black listed because all they do is destroy houses, costing landlords a packet....

But hey, as long as those landlords can afford their Aston Marton, it don't really matter what other hits to their hip pocket they get.

It was along time ago, probably before most of you were born. I was working on the construction of a pulp mill just north of of Napier (NZ) at Whirinaki. An enterprising chap who knew the supervisor came on the job and put up an advertisement for carpenters in Wellington..

I with a couple of others went there. We worked stupid hours. On one occasion I started at 5.30 in the morning and work unti 4.am the next day. I started at 7.30 the next day and quite obviously was stiil quite tired. The supervisor said you aren't doing to much. My reply was get fucked and then went home and back to bed.

After 3 weeks I was an old hand and when I left after 5 weeks there was only one person who had been there longer than me. In the 5 weeks I was there there was only one carpenter from Wellington.

THe company couldn't get anybody for love nor money. It didn't help thay they had a bad name. They had spent $1,000 on advertising for carpenters in Auckland . That was big money then and the only response they got was from a butcher who thought he might like a change. It cost less ($350) to get someone from England. Unfortunately for them even though they had these people tied to a contract most of them went elsewhere once they got to NZ they could do nothing about it.

 

[Reaper]

Sounds exactly the same for ‘professional’ builders … ‘for every one that does a great job (and there are quite a few), there are many that wind up in a huge mess’!

Well the messes are the ones that get publicity. Certainly those that have fallen over leave a massive mess behind them. As painful as it is, the industry is midst of a big cleanout at the moment which is a good thing.

 

[keith reed]

I worked in the building industry most of my working life. From maintenance to light commercial, housing, high rise and the big stuff. To be fair most of them are genuine people who treat you properly and pay you the right money each week. Unfortunately they are not the ones who make the news.

My concerns with dodgy work have come from the motor trades. I have spent a bucket load of money on dodgy work. Every time something goes wrong they all duck for cover and won't stand by their work. At the moment my ute is in having had to go back because it leaked oil like a sieve. It has been in there 2 weeks next tuesday with one bullshit story after another as to why it is not ready.

 

[Sabbath']

So building public housing would be ill conceived would it? Ironically if the government actually built houses themselves then they would probably actually make money on the sale of those houses on a rent to buy basis.

Not ill conceived but the point still stands that government projects hardly, if ever fit the promised price tag and therefore the fiscal benefits of it happening in the first place.

You also have the risk of expanding the problem which is happening at the moment which is government jobs either sucking up a lions share of the labour force or forcing those outside the sphere to raise their prices to retain or lure staff. As an employee this would be great but as a business owner, or somebody having to pay the increased costs of this, not so much.

It took one guy one day to put up the carport, so hardly a labour intensive process. If I’m generous $1000 would cover the labour cost.

Surely they gave you a price breakdown itemizing the cost and where that $10k was going? Either Queensland (I think you're in Qld?)labour is a third the price of Victoria (possibly due to the reason I mentioned above) or you've got some super gold plated steel?

Sure, I determined that my back was worth more to me than doing the job myself so I paid someone else to do it.

Still should have been about half the price and there still would have been shitloads of profit for the company doing the job.

Price up the steel and aluminium, cut to length, ready to go. Screws, bolts, fixings etc. Concrete. And then get back to us with your assessment.

Or, better yet. If you think the price was double. Why go with it?

I've included the quote I got late last year for a simple 6*6 carport.