Housing Shortage

[bucketowater]

At a public meeting with Tessa Jowell on Saturday there was a discussion about the housing shortage and what to do about it. Tessa seemed keen to explore people's attitudes on the extent to which people would accept limits on private property rights as a solution to this problem. A strong example was shared of a new build block where the low cost housing was all sold and occupied and the private flats were sold but mostly unoccupied.

The parable of the talents would be seem pretty clear that leaving a useful asset like a flat unoccupied would take some explaining. If you lived in a hamlet of 10 families where your neighbour's child needed to set up home with a new wife and an absentee landlord had left the only remaining dwelling locked and empty, you might be quite clear on right and wrong.

I once worked with someone from Copenhagen on a project in Sweden. They wouldn't stay more than one weekend in a row (even though they had a local partner) because they feared a neighbour would tell the council their privately owned flat was unoccupied and the council compulsorily let it underneath them.

What would Londoners put up with?

[DJKillaQueen]

There is some sense in forcing landlords to let property...esp in London where suitable affordable housing is in short supply, that is as long as the property is not the owners primary dwelling address of course.

[zeban]

Would the housing necessarily be affordable though? somehow I doubt it!

[DJKillaQueen]

Well this is where the details might be difficult to iron out. I would think that once a local authority compulsory let your porperty, they may have some control over rent too. Because whether we want to accept that or not, the unprecadented growth in the housing market of the recent decades can not continue as it has done. People in low paid jobs are increasingly finding it difficult to find suitable affordable accomodation in the south. The cut to caps in housing benefit are not imo going to change that situation either.

[Vilmos]

I once heard Charles Kennedy say that if all the empty rooms above shops were let out as dwellings a huge dent would be made in the housing shortage. I started to look up above shops, and he was right! There are more empty rooms than enough above our high street shops that would make good homes for people. Surely a little pressure on shop owners would make these empty spaces available.

[david_carnell]

Vilmos - how do you know they are empty? Or not being used by the shop for much needed storage?

Many rooms above shops are already used as flats.

[James Barber]

Last time I checked Southwark had just over 5,000 empty homes (out of 107,000) and 14,000 people on the housing waiting list.

I had a recent item of casework where a neighbour wanted an empty property to be lived in. After investigatino it transpired the owner visits once or twice a year to fix the garden mess and pays council tax. Truly bizarre. I think the quoted 1 week Swedish model OTT but I can sympathasise with the concept.

Think what a boost if even half of those homes were sold or let to the local economy apart from the quality of life for new tenants and home owners.

[Jeremy]

James Barber Wrote:

-------------------------------------------------------

> Last time I checked Southwark had just over 5,000

> empty homes (out of 107,000) and 14,000 people on

> the housing waiting list.

I may be showing my ignorance here... but where do those 14,000 people currently live?

[Brendan]

The government can?t go buggering about with people?s private property rights. It?s probably illegal but also against my instincts of what a government should do.

They can tax the bejesus out of them for leaving their properties empty. If they do this they either motivate the owner to put the property on the market or up for rent or they get a big chunk of extra income that they can use to build more houses.

I wonder if good old Tessa has any holiday homes or buy-to-let properties of her own. She seems so concerned.

[katie1997]

Most politicians these days seem to have an abundance of 'homes'. If Tessa doesn't cough up, Chris Huhne has 7 of them so perhaps he'd be more than delighted to share the wealth.

[DJKillaQueen]

In some other countries though...private landlords rents are regulated by local authorities. France is a good eaxmple of that and it seems to do no harm there. And the owner would get a rental income from what is making no income while it sits empty.

[Brendan]

Yeah that?s fine if there is a social advantage to it. But regulating a market is a very different thing to appropriating someone?s private property.

[????]

...not your line on the Upper Classes the other day Bren

[Brendan]

Awfully eager to jump to conclusions on my ?line? on the upper classes. There is a big difference between A) owning property in a country and B ) owning the country and allowing people to buy property off you but still maintaining ownership over it.

But then I?m no expert on leasehold, the historical impact of the feudal system on modern property laws and its subsequent social impact in countries in the old world. Although you seem to be so I?ll agree with whatever you have to say on it.

[Jeremy]

I was slightly surprised to hear you say that too Brendan, because of your obvious disdain for property investors. But I agree with you, forcibly occupying a property is probably a step too far.

[Brendan]

I have disdain for people who take a system which should exist to provide all people in society with access to the most fundamental security in life and use it in order to enrich themselves by exploiting others and denying them access to that security. That doesn?t mean I have disdain for the concept of property ownership.

[Ridgley]

Not sure what the solution to this problem, on lack of housing and with the cuts this will make things harder for people to find affordable housing in the capital for give my ignorance but where are they going to put new arrivals from the EU and other countries if there is a shortage. I am a little concern about this as this causes tension in communities who are dealing with lack of resources as it is.

I went with my elderly neighbour to see her housing officer, as we got to the reception area a man was complaining about some repairs that needs to be done there was a Muslim lady standing next to him as the housing officer was explaining to him the procedure he then said ?but if that was the likes of her you would see to it immediately one rule us another for them lot innit? I did not see what happen as I went in with my neighbour in an office to see her housing officer. I also witness something like this in Bermondsey as well.

[Huguenot]

I don't think the answer to racist bigots is to give them what they want.

[Ridgley]

I agree H that why they need to look into this whole system.

[lize1968]

There are 2 organisations I know of who are actively trying to offer solutions to the housing problem - one is Priced Out - has facebook page, the other is the Intergenerational Foundation www.intergenerational.org.uk. Another source is "The Jilted Generation" by Shiv Malik and Ed Howker, both journalists (one for The Guardian and the other for The Spectator).

Until we can encourage older generations, many of whom live on their own in large properties, to down-size (maybe by tax incentives) gridlock will be maintained in both the rental market and buying. Average monthly rents have hit record ?700 a month. Average age of a first time buyer now 37 years.

People in big houses don't realise that their properties are only worth something if they can sell them. If the younger generations can't afford to get on the housing ladder then there will be no one to buy the properties and prices will fall. Hold out is all I can say. Fears of a double dip housing crash in papers today!

[DJKillaQueen]

Ridiculous property prices though are not the result of under-occupation by home owners.

The only thing that will bring property prices down is a shortage of buyers. In the past two decades, whenever that looked likely, mortgage lenders and banks simply changed the goalposts on lending to keep things bouyant. Return to some level of regulation (whatever that may be) would help return the housing sector back to normal market forces.

Keen to look at the arguments presented by the links you suggest though.