Housing

I am noticing more houses being built in certain areas. One of the main issues is that they are completely unaffordable for most people and often they are much higher in price then the houses already in the same location.

We need more council houses, but councils and successive governments seem unwilling to do anything about it. They want a quick pay check alongside developers
 
This is a textbook example of market failure.

Certain politicians want to leave everything to the market. Housing in the UK shows that this is madness. The problem can only be solved by significant state intervention.

Sadly, we don't have politicians with the bollocks to do it as it would upset a lot of powerful vested interests.
 
BrianW said:
This is a textbook example of market failure.

Certain politicians want to leave everything to the market. Housing in the UK shows that this is madness. The problem can only be solved by significant state intervention.

Sadly, we don't have politicians with the bollocks to do it as it would upset a lot of powerful vested interests.
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State intervention is indeed the only answer because the property market actually isn't a supply and demand market, housing is wholly dependent on access to finance. The housing market slows when that access slows. We've just seen it in recent years as higher interest rates have bitten a chunk out of housing growth.

Many people talk of building more houses but supply really isn't the issue because have you ever heard of a buy-to-let landlord who struggles to find a house to buy to rent out? However, there will be hundreds of thousands who can't find the 5-10% deposit for a mortgage. Building more houses doesn't change anything for these people, it will only do that if land values go down and that's never going to happen. Nobody sells land for less, instead they keep it until the time is right.

A window of opportunity here is that most people can afford the monthly repayments as rent payments are usually more than mortgage repayments so help with the deposit is perhaps key. This is where lenders and the BoE could help but they don't and that only leaves the government to implement some form of schemes.

I suppose more council houses are another solution but how many people are bursting to rent a council house? It also begs the question which is most people who work full time and earn above the minimum wage wouldn't be eligible for a council house anyway. Those who are eligible will certainly have bigger worries than saving for a house deposit.
 
inbetween said:
State intervention is indeed the only answer because the property market actually isn't a supply and demand market, housing is wholly dependent on access to finance. The housing market slows when that access slows. We've just seen it in recent years as higher interest rates have bitten a chunk out of housing growth.

Many people talk of building more houses but supply really isn't the issue because have you ever heard of a buy-to-let landlord who struggles to find a house to buy to rent out? However, there will be hundreds of thousands who can't find the 5-10% deposit for a mortgage. Building more houses doesn't change anything for these people, it will only do that if land values go down and that's never going to happen. Nobody sells land for less, instead they keep it until the time is right.

A window of opportunity here is that most people can afford the monthly repayments as rent payments are usually more than mortgage repayments so help with the deposit is perhaps key. This is where lenders and the BoE could help but they don't and that only leaves the government to implement some form of schemes.

I suppose more council houses are another solution but how many people are bursting to rent a council house? It also begs the question which is most people who work full time and earn above the minimum wage wouldn't be eligible for a council house anyway. Those who are eligible will certainly have bigger worries than saving for a house deposit.
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Why dont councils buy up shitty houses and then do them up? There’s loads that go up for auctions could that not be cheaper than building them?
 
Blue Maverick said:
Why dont councils buy up shitty houses and then do them up? There’s loads that go up for auctions could that not be cheaper than building them?
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have you seen how much funding the Tories took off councils? Libraries and swimming baths closed - schools falling down and some even going bankrupt. Councils were encouraged to be more "entrepreneurial" to generate wealth with their funds. Never ends well.
 
Another problem is people have mortgaged themselves up to the eyeballs trying to buy a half decent house, so any fall in prices will piss off a lot of voters. A tricky situation created by years of neglect once again
 
bluethrunthru said:
have you seen how much funding the Tories took off councils? Libraries and swimming baths closed - schools falling down and some even going bankrupt. Councils were encouraged to be more "entrepreneurial" to generate wealth with their funds. Never ends well.
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Labour could reverse that possibly? It’s going to take 3 terms in office to even show a glimmer of hope, unfortunately people want instant results these days and it won’t happen and they just vote those dicks back in as they have short memories
 
Blue Maverick said:
Why dont councils buy up shitty houses and then do them up? There’s loads that go up for auctions could that not be cheaper than building them?
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The problem again comes down to values.

The housing problem is worse where population density is highest and where population density is highest the values are highest. As a result a really shitty house in London can go for as much as £300k but that's where houses are needed most.

If the country is short of say even 100,000 houses and let's say the average house price of those shitty houses was £100k (it'll be far more) then the government needs to find at least £10bn and that doesn't include the price of doing each one up.

The easiest solution is to forget all of this because it'd be far cheaper for the government to just pay people's deposits for them and gift them the equity. My deposit was £25k which would be a damn sight cheaper than the government forking out for a £100k do'er up'er.

However, fairness now comes into play because how is it right that so many people now get their deposit for free whereas muggins here had to save for 5 years?
 
bluethrunthru said:
have you seen how much funding the Tories took off councils? Libraries and swimming baths closed - schools falling down and some even going bankrupt. Councils were encouraged to be more "entrepreneurial" to generate wealth with their funds. Never ends well.
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They then did that and lost it all investing in stupid concepts like Iceland banks and other collapses.

The whole system is broken and out of control. It's only benefiting banks and hurts everyone else.
There's loads of stuff that needs fixing, rent caps, house price caps, building shit loads of proper council homes, compulsory buying rogue landlord's properties for £1, halving of property value (it's all a fake market anyway). It will take decades to fix unfortunately and will cause pain to a generation but you have to start somewhere and fix it for future generations.
 
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