The best answers require a proper question.

My question is what can we do to make home ownership more affordable for the less affluent among us?

My answer is raise property taxes to a quite high level but provide a generous homestead exemption.

If you are not familiar with the concept of a homestead exemption, it exempts a certain amount of the value of a property from taxation if the owner occupies the dwelling. My current home assesses just over $100,000 and we have a homestead exemption of $75,000, so I pay property taxes on about $25,000. People who own modest homes don't pay much in property taxes no matter how high the tax rates go. Our rate must me around 40 mils because I pay around $1000 a year. If they double the property tax rate my taxes would jump to $2,000 a year but for Landlords and owners of much more expensive house would see a much larger increase and this would create a lot of tax revenue. They could raise the homestead exemption to $100,000 and my taxes would actually go down to almost nothing but the tax increase would still provide added tax revenue.

This makes home ownership for modest home very attractive, it would allow more people to buy their own homes and would incentivize builders to build more modest or affordable homes and discourage building mansions. It pushes the balance away from renting toward home ownership.

TEK