Well well....there's a shortage of "affordable" housing?

lynzpower

SammyD

What if you earn under that , ie hubby earns 16k wife works part time earning 4k they have a baby.

What happens to them?

RHemmings

Hereward wrote:

That’s one of the problems with their expectations: they want a "decent" house. If they lowered their sights a bit, then they would be able to afford a house. OK, it might not be in a "good" area, but everybody has to start somewhere.
Exactly, previous generations were willing to put up with cramped conditions/poor housing, just so the could live near to their work. In addition, the modes of transport available in the past were not a s fast, or efficient, as today, so living near your place of work was vital.

My whole point is that current generations are just as willing to put up with cramped conditions/poor housing as previous generations. But people in like-for-like positions in salary would have to accept much more cramped conditions/poor housing than previous generations. You can't deny this, look at the real house prices of today compared to the past. Houses were far cheaper in the past, and past generations had to make far fewer compromises to afford them.

I have yet to see a law that states that people should be able to own their own home. If people want a property there are plenty of options currently open to them. The government could provide shelter for everyone in big tents: there wouldn’t be much privacy, but then they only need to provide shelter not privacy. Those who want privacy should have to buy their own shelter.

Why should there be government support for everyone having access to an education and health care, but not housing? No-one's suggesting that the government should pass a law guaranteeing everyone a home. But I believe the government should pass laws making property an unattractive financial investment, to prevent the social effects of cycles in the housing market causing extreme social problems.

pigeonpie

We are middle-aged FTBs and if our flat purchase goes ahead will be hocked to the eyeballs. Our 'expectations' are 2 beds and a bit of space in a safe area with some green space in London, nothing more. We sold our small, terraced London house in the mid 90s for £151 000 of which 1/3 was mortgage. That house (with just the kitchen done up) with its giant 20ft x10 ft 'garden' sold for £535 000 2 years ago (£10k more than the asking price, the agent said). Our crime: to work abroad thus falling off the UK property ladder. No-one in the mid 90s expected property prices to go so ridiculously high & they are that high because people continue to pay them. At my age do I want to own my own home? Yup. It makes me angry that we can't without mortgaging ourselves up to hell and back. Don't want to buy 'affordable' housing out of London and spend thousands of £s p.a on railfares plus the exhaustion of commuting gets worse as you get older. I want to live in London and live within my means with some disposable income. Increasingly difficult unless you rent forever (aka chucking what miserable chance of a pension you have into the Thames) which is lousy as you keep having to move, or buy in a grot area where your quality of life is not great. As it is, we hardly ever go out.
Affordable? Don't know what it means either!

Hereward

RHemmings wrote:

Why should there be government support for everyone having access to an education and health care, but not housing? No-one's suggesting that the government should pass a law guaranteeing everyone a home. But I believe the government should pass laws making property an unattractive financial investment, to prevent the social effects of cycles in the housing market causing extreme social problems.

Education and health care enable the economy to continue to grow and provides future generations with benefits that outweigh the costs of provision. Capping the price of property would have not such effect, as landowners would cease to be willing to sell their land for buildings, especially as there would be not economic benefits to builders in their construction. The cap would just act as a barrier to further investment in property, so even the current housing stock would deteriorate, but no new housing would be built.

lynzpower

Homeless provision for a family can be up to £600 per week in one room, paid for & adminstered by the taxpayer

Dont tell me that doesnt affect the economy

Hereward

lynzpower wrote:

Homeless provision for a family can be up to £600 per week in one room, paid for & adminstered by the taxpayer

Dont tell me that doesnt affect the economy

The provider of the room gains £600 from the taxpayer, but has to pay taxes on this money, so the economy grows slightly, and so does the taxes payable through the multiplier effect. Capping of property prices would ensure that such provision was no longer available as the providers would not gain as much economic benefit of providing “cheap” housing to the poor. As I stated earlier the government could provide such accommodation in large tents, or in the case of London, the Millennium Dome; however, most people do not think that this type of accommodation is acceptable.

Gorgeous_George

All housing is affordable - but not necessarily by all the people. If houses were not affordable, they would not sell.

There will always be people on low pay who cannot afford a house. The answer is to rent or find a better paid job.

There'll be those on good pay who choose not to buy a house. They choose to rent.



GG

ollyk

aderbyshirelad wrote:

RH

I think "objectionable" is a little strong? I truly wasn't meaning to be. But, yes I do believe a lot of people's expectations are at fault. The "I want-it-now" generation is probably a discussion for another time. I know a great many couples who ARE making sacrifices (not going out, not buying the latest playstation game, not buying new clothes, walking to work - in fact leading exemplary MSE lives) to buy the house they want, where they'd like it. They do this in the knowledge that they could go and buy something somewhere else, but they've made a choice to save.

I have a 3 year old daughter. My Oh works nights. I work days. We never spend time together as a family no choice for obvious reaons. we don't buy any luxuries. We are not in debt. we are NOT elegible to very much in the way of tax credits, as we both earn a little too much. We rent. we desperately try to save, and have done so for some time. We have comparitively very little in the way of savings.

Realisticly, we are soooo far from being able to own a house we don't even think about it any more. I would love to know what sort of mortgages people are talking about when they say "we are on combined wage of 50k and as FTBers can afford a property of 180K" This is really pushing it at current rates and I find rather worrying to say the least.
We would like a small two bedroom property but the prices for basic properties round here are far beyond our 3.5 times salary calcs.
I for one will only be happy when house prices have fallen to a 'reasonable' level - by that I mean where I can pay for my house using a repayment mortgage of reasonable (read historical average here) % to income, and leave enough room for repayments if Interest Rates hit 7% - lol I ain't hoping for wage inflation any time soon!. I certainly am not going to one of many new FTB's who find themselves effectivly renting their properties off the bank. I always thought this site was to protect against such money wasting :rolleyes:

I too find your post quite objectional, and rather ignorant too.

ollyk

Gorgeous_George wrote:

If houses were not affordable, they would not sell.
GG

Does that apply when banks actively encouraging poor borrowing practices?

headcase

Thought of joining the conversation. When we bought our first house in 1991 the purchase price was £49500 for a 3 bed semi in leeds. A two fixed @ 12.95%. as soon as moved in had negeative equit for 5 years. In 1997 had house valued at £77000. Sold house in 2004 for £130000 and on market today at £145000. Also experience mortage broker since 1989. Up until 1998 all lenders lent about 3.25% of first income and 1 second or 2.5% joint. As interest rates were going down the lenders thought of lending more as can afford it. Hence house prices increased. The lenders now ( the biggest ) do not have a lending limits and also exclude all credit cards and loans. All there after - is lending money..... as defaults are about 0.5% of all loans.
It is gross bad lending of lenders to lend this amount of money to people and buy to let market. The person who bought our house in 1994 was buying 10 in one go as buy to lets !!! Then he had problems withbthem. I rememeber neg' equity and friends who handed in keys and there are still been chased for loses then. I think its going either a big fall or no increases for ages. Its happened before and it will happen again. People have to live somewhere. They should release loads for land so can build on and capped the amount of lending to buy to let ( pack of cards ) landlords and bring back normal income lending.