The rise of corporate landlords in Latin America: The case of Santiago, Chile

In the past years, the tenure patterns of the Latin-American population have tended to move toward the rental market, changing the traditional relationship between finance and housing through homeownership. The incorporation of corporate landlords in the region is creating shifts in the expansion and structure of housing patterns. Institutional financial actors are increasing their investment portfolios by owning and managing residential buildings, transforming them into financial capital assets. This model represents 3% of the housing market in Santiago, expanding a multifamily high-rise model in downtown areas. The article's central question is: How are corporate landlords shaping and transforming real estate dynamics and the housing market in Santiago? The analysis is centered on characterizing who these landlords are, elucidating their financial mechanisms and the main socio-urban characteristics of the model. This paper argues that corporate landlords are changing the Chilean real estate dynamics by expanding new ownership strategies. After a first rental financialization through affluent individuals with wealth who saw housing as a commodification and a way of expanding their assets with low mortgage rates, a second wave in the rental financialization process is occurring in recent years, a shift into a real estate market that is focusing on institutionalized landlords.