Do you support social housing?

CLAPTON

MrsE wrote: »

http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_home_ownership_rate

Not if you compare it to similar eu countries, like Germany, France, the Scandinavian countries for instance.

or similar cultural countries like Norway, Australia, Canada, Finland, USA, New Zealand

but what's a couple of percent ?

Loughton_Monkey

BigAunty wrote: »

.....
Yes, there is a home owning culture that originated from Thatcher's desire to promote homeownership (or destroy social housing depending on your politics) but many european countries, including prosperous ones, have a culture of renting but they have stronger tenants rights, longer contracts, usually much cheaper rent...

Germany is a bit like this, but they operate a totally different model. They see rented housing primarily as something to be paid for. This country sees it primarily as something the state should provide with a huge subsidy - or even better pay the lot!

They have hardly any planning rules either, other than basic common sense 'fit in' with the local area. Or put another way, just get some land, and no reasonable proposal to build on it can legally be turned down by the council.

Hence housing is (compared to UK) not particularly a big "issue" with them. Anyone can have one - bought or rented. They probably view geographic mobility as desirable. Hence house prices don't really go up (or down) much so there is less 'investment' involved, and of course rents can't mushroom with house prices (as they do here).

It could well be that UK could eventually merge more towards this sort of model, but we would need to say goodbye to the "green and pleasant land" concept. And we might need to see the concept of 'social housing' go, to be replaced by a novel concept of paying commercial rents and subsidise the renter on a few rare occasions.

And, as you say, tenants (if they pay their rent) cannot be evicted except under special circumstances.

So a totally different model that could not really be applied here without 'throwing away' the bulk of planning permission, 'throwing away' the general UK model of housing subsidies while introducing tough rules for landlords... and preferably about 16% more land area would help.

Transition arrangements would be mind bogglingly difficult if not impossible. People like farmers sitting on 'agricultural' or rural land would all become millionaires overnight as their land would be ripe for building. BTL landlords would be selling their houses like hot cakes. Losers, as usual, would be those who rely on taxpayer funding to give them a home until such time as mega-landlords crawled out of the woodwork to supply all the rented homes at commercial rents for 100% secure tenancies.

BobQ

BigAunty wrote: »

Actually, that's a good point. I'd love to see mass social housing built but want the Right to Buy scrapped as it just led to the best properties being sold off, thus helping to turn less desirable estates into ghettoes. Apparently, a third of all RTB properties in Westminster eventually end up in the hands of landlords. I believe Scotland has, or will, scrap the RTB.

I agree we should build social housing. I see nothing wrong with the right to buy in principle since a mixture of owned and social housing in a street creates a better social mix.

I do object to heavily discounted sales of social housing for political reasons. We should allow people to buy at the market rate or perhaps with a small discount to encourage home ownership, but we should build another house to replace one sold so the discount should be limited to make that affordable.

I also think that occupation of the property should be reviewed periodically (say every 3 years) to ensure household income was not above a set limit and under-occupation was not an issue for all new tenants.

grizzly1911

CLAPTON wrote: »

you make a very strong case for building more properties

less so for preferring the country to sink to save the odd asset and even less so for your distain for democracy.

people genuinely wanted to buy their own homes just like you

Plutocracy.

The odd asset. You no doubt have many "odd assets" worth 10s, if not 100s of billions.

If they were so desperate to buy their own home then should have done just that. Save up the deposit, borrow the money and go buy one from the private stock or get one built.

Don't worry taxes can't be used to pay for housing stock for the use of those in need but it can be used to buy houses for landlords.

grizzly1911

Loughton_Monkey wrote: »

Germany is a bit like this, but they operate a totally different model. They see rented housing primarily as something to be paid for. This country sees it primarily as something the state should provide with a huge subsidy - or even better pay the lot!

They have hardly any planning rules either, other than basic common sense 'fit in' with the local area. Or put another way, just get some land, and no reasonable proposal to build on it can legally be turned down by the council.

Hence housing is (compared to UK) not particularly a big "issue" with them. Anyone can have one - bought or rented. They probably view geographic mobility as desirable. Hence house prices don't really go up (or down) much so there is less 'investment' involved, and of course rents can't mushroom with house prices (as they do here).

It could well be that UK could eventually merge more towards this sort of model, but we would need to say goodbye to the "green and pleasant land" concept. And we might need to see the concept of 'social housing' go, to be replaced by a novel concept of paying commercial rents and subsidise the renter on a few rare occasions.

And, as you say, tenants (if they pay their rent) cannot be evicted except under special circumstances.

So a totally different model that could not really be applied here without 'throwing away' the bulk of planning permission, 'throwing away' the general UK model of housing subsidies while introducing tough rules for landlords... and preferably about 16% more land area would help.

Transition arrangements would be mind bogglingly difficult if not impossible. People like farmers sitting on 'agricultural' or rural land would all become millionaires overnight as their land would be ripe for building. BTL landlords would be selling their houses like hot cakes. Losers, as usual, would be those who rely on taxpayer funding to give them a home until such time as mega-landlords crawled out of the woodwork to supply all the rented homes at commercial rents for 100% secure tenancies.

Does Germany suffer from a north south divide or is the economy and thus demand spread across the country?

Road_Hog

CLAPTON wrote: »

there is a shortage of properties in general due to planning controls and government imposed costs

No it isn't, it is because under NuLabour since 1997 we allowed in 4 million people (and continue to do so under ConDems).


We don't have the housing stock, we are now building on flood plains and we don't have enough jobs, especially for our youth. England is already the most crowded country in Europe (bar Malta) and we're now importing another 500,000 Roma and Bulgarians and this doesn't take into account the illegal immigrants we have.


If we continue with this mass unfettered immigration, we are never going to have enough homes. Anyone that watched benefits street on TV, (which was filmed last year) will have seen the 14 or so Romanians living in one house who were working on the black market.

vivatifosi

grizzly1911 wrote: »

Does Germany suffer from a north south divide or is the economy and thus demand spread across the country?

East west divide. But if you look at Germany, there are a number of important cities. You have Berlin, but this was not the capital pre reunification and has roughly half the population of London. Plus a number of smaller but important cities in their own right that are distributed throughout the country. Main ones being Hamburg, Munich and Koln (sorry can't do umlaut on tablet) which have populations round about 1 million. Plus other smaller but still important cities such as Frankfurt, Stuttgart, Essen, etc, all of which have a population over half a million.

Going back to the question of east/west divide, here's some interesting background...

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/europe/germany/10198308/Germany-faces-east-west-divide-for-decades.html

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/europe/germany/10003467/Berlin-satellite-image-reveals-stark-east-west-divisions.html

http://theeuroeconomy.blogactiv.eu/2013/12/06/mental-divide-between-east-and-west-persists-in-germany/

http://open.salon.com/blog/lost_in_berlin/2012/06/27/is_there_still_such_a_thing_as_east_germany

vivatifosi

In answer to the OP, in principle yes, but not as a right for life. It should be closer to a safety net as personal circumstances change over time. I am also quite taken by the argument of michaels, that you subsidise the individual, not the property.

Kennyboy66

vivatifosi wrote: »

In answer to the OP, in principle yes, but not as a right for life. It should be closer to a safety net as personal circumstances change over time. I am also quite taken by the argument of michaels, that you subsidise the individual, not the property.

By and large if you look at government spending, we do sudsidise the individual or family through housing benefit, the bill for which seems uncontrollable.

The biggest attraction for people who seek social housing is;

1) Security of tenure
2) Quality and size of rooms & not being at the whim of a disinterested landlord.
3) Cost for those not receiving benefits (who are the minority).

We have to accept that not everyone will be able to afford their own home - in most areas of the country someone on the so called 'living wage' would have no chance, never mind those on minimum wage.

The market simply hasn't provided enough new rental homes for decades - it has simple shifted existing stock from home ownership to BTL, and this is partly because the tax system has encouraged it.

vivatifosi

Kennyboy66 wrote: »

We have to accept that not everyone will be able to afford their own home - in most areas of the country someone on the so called 'living wage' would have no chance, never mind those on minimum wage.

The market simply hasn't provided enough new rental homes for decades - it has simple shifted existing stock from home ownership to BTL, and this is partly because the tax system has encouraged it.

Mostly I agree with you. The key problem is a housing shortage, meaning that lack of supply keeps prices high. However I also think that the fact someone can't afford a house in a particular area should get social funding for one.

For example... I can't afford to buy a house in most of London, but that doesn't mean that the state should fund me to live there. Similarly there are parts of Hertfordshire where I would live to live and have strong family ties, but I can't afford to buy there either. Again I don't see it as the role of the state to help.

However I know this is not a straightforward issue. Pragmatically, I can see the arguments for and against social housing. What I can't see is why housing supply is allowed to be so choked off, a different question, but the crux of the matter.