The silver bullet to fix the housing market

Generali

chucknorris wrote: »

How does that work Gen?

IHT exemption as discussed but also the fact that the EU will now pay farmers not to make food. **crass idiocy smilie**

michaels

JamesSmith2000 wrote: »

Domestic buildings cover just 1.1% of land.

Non-domestic buildings cover another 0.65% and roads make up 2.2%. Just 4% of English land is actually built on.

96% of land in the UK is not built on.

That 96% is made up of gardens (about 5%), water (about 3%). The rest is ‘green space’.

If England’s 20 million homes cover just 1.1% of its land, you could increase the housing stock by 20% – 4 million homes – and only build on another 0.2% of land. Surely, we can find the space to do this.

Even if you give each home a large garden, you’re still talking less than 1% of English land to increase the housing stock by 20%.

Fly over the UK and you see acre upon acre of barely used land.

http://moneyweek.com/the-silver-bullet-to-fix-the-housing-market/

It is that sort of crazy talk that will stop us looking at the real solutions such as tinkering with mortgage availability, taxing the supply of rented accommodation and building high-rise rabbit hutches on former chemical factory sites far away from where people actually want to live.

What you see as empty land is as already mentioned, Mr & Mrs Smyths inheritance scheme, Tarquin and Arabella's paddock, The Nibyolds country views and indeed bits of the countryside only ever seen by Stanislav when he is out driving the tractor and a few commited dog walkers and ramblers who drive in their 4x4s in order to go for a walk there rather than in the countryside adjacent to their homes.

Thrugelmir

JamesSmith2000 wrote: »

The rest is ‘green space’.

The UK already spends billions a year on food importation..........

CLAPTON

Thrugelmir wrote: »

The UK already spends billions a year on food importation..........

indeed so which is largely because UK people choose to eat foods that don't grow here and of course the EU pays farmers for not producing food
what about a heavy tax on food imports?

Thrugelmir

CLAPTON wrote: »

what about a heavy tax on food imports?

To serve what purpose? The UK has a finite amount of growing capacity.

alberty

Ultimately we need a transport system that makes it viable to live outside of London. Like an internet of people.

Generali

CLAPTON wrote: »

what about a heavy tax on food imports?

Better still, how about a heavy tax on very stupid farming policies? That was, taxpayers could get their levies given to the EU back again.

Generali

alberty wrote: »

Ultimately we need a transport system that makes it viable to live outside of London. Like an internet of people.

This already exists: there is a pretty decent train service running to many places outside London: Kent, Surrey, Essex, Hertfordshire etc. The only trouble is you aren't allowed to build new houses there.

moneyinmypocket

Builders will only build if people can borrow what they need from the banks.

HAMISH_MCTAVISH

princeofpounds wrote: »

Wouldn't surprise me if money week journalist saw it here.
.

As it turns out, that's not a million miles away from what happened....

The numbers were raised in several threads on here, exported from here to hpc by a poster that is on both sites, and then noticed by Frizzers on hpc who is real life is Dominic Frisby the author of the article in Moneyweek.

Small world....:D