in this case, killing property tax won't help. the core of the rent issue is that properties are being bought up as investments for their value, rather than for rental income. that's why no landlords are willing to lower rent, because if they do it reduces the property value and actually loses the money.

what needs to happen is they need to be losing money when the properties are not actually rented out. replacing their income tax with a property tax based on number of rented units and what they're rented at would drive the local economy to solve this problem.

getting rid of property tax will just be more incentive for them to hold on to their investment properties without actually renting them out.