Being a landlord isn't work. This is undeniable. If we agree that a job is a task you do for money, it's not a job. If a waiter stops being a waiter, tables go unserved. If an electrician stops being an electrician, electrical systems go unrepaired. If an accountant stops being an accountant, finances go unaccounted. But if a landlord stops being a landlord, nothing happens. That's because landlords make money through ownership, not work. Now, you might ask “Without landlords, who would do all the duties necessary for a residential building to function?”. The answer is that landlords don't do those things; property managers do. The actual “work” of maintaining housing properties, from fixing toilets to collecting rent, is overseen by someone whose job is expressly to do so. If a property manager stops being a property manager, properties go unmanaged. And yes, there are landlords who do these tasks, but that just makes them property managers who are also landlords. They have two roles, but only one of them is a job.
If you think about it, our assumption that property ownership is a job is pretty unprecedented. If someone pays an investor to manage their stock portfolio, buying stocks low to sell them high, do we consider that person as working? No! The investor is working, but the owner of the assets isn't. Both stock owners and property owners can spend their day sipping mojitos on the beach while their employees manage their money sources, and neither is doing a job. The only discernable “thing” that landlords do is pay money to cover expenses, but seeing as housing properties are expected to produce more money from rent than they lose from costs, their presence is still unnecessary. Besides, are we really willing to accept the idea that having a lot of money is a job?
Now that we understand that landlords are useless, lets imagine the practicality of a world without them. Assuming that this world is still capitalistic, people would still have to pay rent, but what would that rent go towards? It would pay for expenses like maintenance, loans, and salary of staff such as the property manager. What it wouldn't go towards, however, is a landlord. This is important since residential property is, first and foremost, an investment. Landlords are therefore incentivized to make the most return on their investment by getting as much of their tenant's rent money as possible. But without a beneficiary to produce a profit for, rent is only as high as is necessary to cover expenses. People would no longer have to subsidize the endless greed of someone else and rents would stabilize naturally. Housing would be a non-profit industry.
But why is removing for-profit housing necessary? Because it's a necessity. At the bottom of Maslow's hierarchy of needs, the most basic requirements for a human being are air, water, food, sleep clothing, reproductive freedom, and shelter. For most of these, we respect their importance. Air is pretty hard to not have, but if you struggle to find adequate water, food, or clothes, there are myriad charities and government programs which are there to provide you with them. Infringement of reproductive rights by NGOs such as religious groups is illegal in most countries and state attempts at doing so are met with international deplore and accusations of genocide. However, shelter is treated not as a basic right but as a business that you must earn the right to patronize. This is not to say that profiting off of shelter or any of the other foundational needs is bad. You should have the right to food and water but not necessarily a 5 star meal and water sourced directly from Antarctica. You should have the right to clothes but not necessarily the latest Jordans. You should have the right to reproductive freedom but not necessarily a supermodel's ovaries/testes. And you should have the right to shelter but not necessarily a waterfront mansion. Profit off of the basic human requirements should only occur when the quality of the requirement is more than basic. But whether or not you live in the most staple or garish of homes, you have to pay. Not only do you have to pay, you pay not based on the actual costs of housing you, but based on the infinite gluttony of the already rich parasite who owns your home. The fact that there are more vacant homes then homeless people is a failure of our society and one that must be fixed as soon as possible