Then "professional renters" will appear, one person renting and living in a 20 room apartment, and the actual rent money will come in a convoluted way from the billionaire.
The uk already has a fairly progressive property tax call stamp duty and many councils in the UK have property taxes (or at least our equivalent called council tax) for empty properties. The problem persists not because of billionaire investors but due to:
- Easy capital access in the form of cheap buy to let mortgages. Easy access to leverage mean property out performs pretty much every other investment and much of the middle class can afford it.
- Lack of regulation on tenancies. Very very easy to kick people out and up the rents.
- General shortage. The uk simply doesn't build enough houses. This is made worse by many jobs existing primarily in London / many graduates not realising that there are opportunities outside of London.
Stamp duty is not a proper property tax because it's only paid on transfer of the property. I'd quite happily abolish it in favour of a true annual valuation-based tax. Besides, it's quite easy to evade: have the property be owned by a shell company in an opaque jurisdiction. Sell the company.
Stamp duty is only levied at sale, that is hardly the same thing as is usually understood by property taxes. Council tax is absurdly regressive (intentionally so).
And make property taxes progressive. The first 100k in value is tax free, then a higher rate on each progressive 100k.
Make it so locals love it when a billionaire buys property in their neighbourhood and doesn’t live in it.