& renting them back to previous home-owners. Do I have this right? And people aren't out in the streets over this?

I had to sell my mother's house a few months ago after her passing. She lives in a very desirable neighborhood (great schools, beautiful trees, no Mcmansions) so the bidding was a little fierce. I told the realtor specifically, only families who were going to live in the house, no investment rentals. I was willing to take less money because I felt a responsibility to the neighbors who had been our good friends for decades.

We had an offer from a young, "professional" couple. Wanted to pay full price in cash. Um, no.

It's going to be a very sad day when no one actually owns or even hopes to own their house. We will be a nation of renters and people will be far less motivated to keep up or improve their house. Our landlord in the city whenever there is a renovation that needs to be done buys the absolute cheapest fixtures and labor. He doesn't live here so he doesn't care. He's taken what was once a very nice turn of the century building and turned it into a regular old rental with things mismatched and aging. Oh well, we're moving.

They are betting those homes will "increase in value" when they are operating like Slum Lords? Who is going to buy these homes when the rental value has been sucked out and they are dumped back on the market.

And to allow this to happen when there are some first time buyers who could have gotten them cheap and made the repairs themselves. But, they are kept out of the market because they are bought up by these groups to use as rentals.

It's a lot like owning a laundromat. I've spoken to laundromat owners -- they think it's a simple investment, something to bring in extra income, that all they'll have to do is come around after their day job and scoop up the day's take. Then they find how much there is to do in the way of cleaning up after customers, maintenance and replacement of broken machines and bill changers, emergency calls when a machine floods all over the floor ...

Owning rental properties is much the same but an order of magnitude more demanding. You can't just sit back and collect your monthly payments. Things are always going wrong. Good renters expect the properties to be maintained. Bad ones may trash the place and then run out owing three months rent. Or they hang on without paying and you have to sue to evict them. There's always something -- and it's a real temptation for absentee landlords to just ignore the problems as long as they can and let the properties deteriorate.

I would guess the hedge funds and such never intended to be in the rental business long-term. They're figuring on picking up properties on the cheap, getting a few good years out of them without having to pay much on upkeep, and then flipping them and getting out when the housing market returns. And if the bubble never comes back? Well, we'll all be stuck, won't we?

And even now, I read somewhere recently that the vacancy rate for rental houses is twice what it is for rental apartments. And the working poor are being priced out of being able to rent at all. Any day now, you're going to be hearing about the "housing crisis."

This is an example of insufficient and inattentive regulation. If the landlord isn't getting stuff done, there should be a number to call, so the state can send someone out, and lean on the landlord to fix it.

This isn't rocket science.