Landlords to blame for Britain's rising house prices

IronWolf

thequant wrote: »

In our new “Virgin voters” series, we listen to what young people and first-time voters have to say about the election issues that matter most to them. This week, following David Cameron’s housing speech, we talk about housing.


http://www.theguardian.com/education/2015/mar/06/virgin-voters-generation-rent-on-the-horrors-of-housing


Ok, Generation Rent, here what has been done for you in the last government.


1) 0.5% base rate (cheaper mortgage payments)
2) Quantitative Easing (even Cheaper mortgage payments)
3) Funding for Lending (even more Cheaper mortgage payments)
4) Help to buy 1 (Government help with deposit on new builds)
5) Help to buy 2 (Government help with deposit on old builds)
6) Abolition of SDLT slab structure (Reduction of Tax)
7) Help to buy ISA (Government giving you physical cash to buy a home!)


Did I miss anything ?


What else can do you expect the government to do for you ? Give you houses for free ?


Maybe they should be called Generation "ungrateful", no government has done more to help people onto the housing ladder than the last one.

How about build enough houses so that rents and house prices don't keep rising well above wages and inflation?

stator

thequant wrote: »

Ok, Generation Rent, here what has been done for you in the last government.


1) 0.5% base rate (cheaper mortgage payments)
2) Quantitative Easing (even Cheaper mortgage payments)
3) Funding for Lending (even more Cheaper mortgage payments)
4) Help to buy 1 (Government help with deposit on new builds)
5) Help to buy 2 (Government help with deposit on old builds)
6) Abolition of SDLT slab structure (Reduction of Tax)
7) Help to buy ISA (Government giving you physical cash to buy a home!)
.

All of which is designed to 'plaster over' the problem that house prices are absurd and unaffordable. Nothing they have done tackles the fundamental problem. There aren't enough houses and there are too many greedy base turds.
ps how on earth could any young person be grateful for a government which gives them a huge debt burden just for going to university that will take their entire working life to pay off.

gazter

IronWolf wrote: »

How about build enough houses so that rents and house prices don't keep rising well above wages and inflation?

Planning policy has slackened enormously though, making getting permission much easier for land building.

Crashy_Time

stator wrote: »

All of which is designed to 'plaster over' the problem that house prices are absurd and unaffordable. Nothing they have done tackles the fundamental problem. There aren't enough houses and there are too many greedy base turds.
ps how on earth could any young person be grateful for a government which gives them a huge debt burden just for going to university that will take their entire working life to pay off.

Wrong. There are plenty of houses, it is just that reducing them in price will hurt the banks and landlords (Tory/Labour party represent them) so anything that can be done to put off the day of reckoning will be done, but there is a limit to the can kicking and we are getting close to it.

IveSeenTheLight

Crashy_Time wrote: »

Wrong. There are plenty of houses, it is just that reducing them in price will hurt the banks and landlords (Tory/Labour party represent them) so anything that can be done to put off the day of reckoning will be done, but there is a limit to the can kicking and we are getting close to it.

Have you not been saying that in your various guises since 1997?

Graham_Devon

thequant wrote: »

Ok, Generation Rent, here what has been done for you in the last government.


1) 0.5% base rate (cheaper mortgage payments) Increases house prices.
2) Quantitative Easing (even Cheaper mortgage payments) Increases house prices.
3) Funding for Lending (even more Cheaper mortgage payments) Increases house prices.
4) Help to buy 1 (Government help with deposit on new builds) Increases house prices.
5) Help to buy 2 (Government help with deposit on old builds) Increases house prices.
6) Abolition of SDLT slab structure (Reduction of Tax)
7) Help to buy ISA (Government giving you physical cash to buy a home!)

Did I miss anything ?

Just the fact that your list helps mortgage holders and investors rather than renters.

IveSeenTheLight

Graham_Devon wrote: »

Just the fact that your list helps mortgage holders and investors rather than renters.

Would you prefer that the government did no assist those trying to get a deposit / cheap mortgage rates?

Graham_Devon

gazter wrote: »

Planning policy has slackened enormously though, making getting permission much easier for land building.

Planning policy isn't the be all and end all. There is plenty of land with planning permission already.

But as a business, why would you intentionally hurt your own bottom line, your own shareholders etc by creating enough supply in order that the price of your goods drop?

The private housbuilders are simply NEVER going to build the supply we need to moderate or reduce house prices. It's like asking Tesco to sell all their food at cost price in order that we get a better deal on food.

Private builders have their place. However, we need state building in order to keep up with the demand. Private builders will never keep up with demand....they would be stupid to do so.

Graham_Devon

IveSeenTheLight wrote: »

Would you prefer that the government did no assist those trying to get a deposit / cheap mortgage rates?

Yes.

Just as I'd prefer right to buy were abolished. Instead of helping one family, that government owned home could help many over its lifetime.

Those cheap mortgage rates and deposit funds are coming out of contributions from all of us. Therefore, the benefits should be felt by more than just a handful of mortgage holders.

TheBlueHorse

stator wrote: »

All of which is designed to 'plaster over' the problem that house prices are absurd and unaffordable. Nothing they have done tackles the fundamental problem. There aren't enough houses and there are too many greedy base turds.
ps how on earth could any young person be grateful for a government which gives them a huge debt burden just for going to university that will take their entire working life to pay off.

A load of them shouldn't be going to university. A load of rubbish universities have sprung up and going to them is utterly meaningless. They should do away with all universities other than the Russel Group - make it much harder to get in and fund the places for all. They can then have private universities if people are not good enough to get in and they can pay £30k a year to do David Beckham Studies.