Right to buy to be extended

Graham_Devon

CLAPTON wrote: »

We have a shortage of homes for all the people ; the solution is to build more and not to reserve some for a undeserving class.

That "undeserving class" you speak about will include nurses, police, shop workers, field engineers etc etc.

Not everyone in Housing Association properties are without work. Indeed, they need to be working to be able to use RTB.

TheBlueHorse

surely every house sold is money into the coffers? Surely every tennant that buys, means another scrounger on subsidised rent is removed from the equasion.

All the Govt need to do now is stop housing for everyone - except the disabled. Everyone else can make their own arrangements - especially young girls who get themselves up the duff at 16. No need for a free flat for them.

Moby

Some people would buy their houses at a discount IF they can get a mortgage. Suddenly, and it will come, interest rates will rise, and rise and rise. Just like the last time. These people will be forced either to sell for what they can get, just like the last time, or be repossessed, just like the last time and watch their homes being sold at bargain rates to those with property "portfolios" who will then rent them out for as much as they can squeeze out of the market. Result, some people end up poorer than before, in a house further down the housing ladder than before watching "Homes under the hammer" seeing their previous home new owners making anything from 8 to 10 % on their investments.

Right to Buy = removing property built by taxpayer funds, selling it off cheaply, while simultaneously degrading the ability of LAs to build any more social housing.
Most of our housing stock is now in private hands and what little we have managed to build up through Housing Association activity (associations which became necessary as LA building dropped so dramatically) is to be sold off as well.
This is the most stupid of all their stupid, uncosted policies.
Iniquitous, corrupt, short sighted, selfish behaviour.

TheBlueHorse

interest rates do not need to rise and rise and rise. Eventually they will settle back at around 4%. That is the norm. Not 0.5% nor 8%. Interest rates will be low for YEARS and YEARS. Probably never getting above 6% in the lifetime of anyone aged 20 or above.

Jason74

I know there's a lot of competition for this title, but this may well be the most stupid policy proposed by any mainsream political party ever. Regardless of what posters here disagree on, pretty much all of us agree that we have a problem with lack of homes. This policy creates all sorts of long term problems around supply of affordable homes. Just a small sample include.

1) Regardless of what politicians say, the reality has been that right to buy homes have not been replaced on anything like a 1 for 1 basis. There's no reason to believe that the situation would be any different for Housing Association RTB.

2) This kind of policy creates potential major issues in terms of Housing Assoications raising capital to build homes. Housing Associations are social businesses that raise capital for investment like any other. Being forced to sell assets at less than their true value is of course likely to be extremely negative for their ability to borrow to build.

3) What RTB shows us, is that it is a benefit to the people who take it up, at a wider cost for society in the longer term. In some London Boroughs, something like half of all propertie sold under RTB are now in the private rented sector. The majority of these households receive Housing Benefit at a far higher cost to the taxpayer than if the homes had remained as social housing.

4) Housing Associations are not part of the Government. Going down the road of forcing independent organisations to sell assets for much less than their true value is a major infringement in terms of property rights. Some posters on here have described things like the Mansion Tax and rent controls as being like something out of North Korea. Well in terms of interference in how people and businesses use their own assets, this is a far greater infringement of property rights than any of those measures. Put another way, what would people's thoughts be if we proposed that private landlords should be forced to sell to their tenants at a discount ?.

So no doubt about it for me, this truly is a bonkers policy. But politically, there's no getting away from it, the Tories have played a blinder. If they get the policy through, the long term effect will be the weakening of social housing, and more people in insecure private renting (the worst possible outcome from a social point of view of course, but one that suits the agenda of a smaller safety net) while the Tories can claim to have helped people into homeownership. And if the policycan't be implemented in practice (which is quite likely given the obstacles involved), they can talk about how left wing vested interests have stopped them helping hard working families.

So a win win for the tories politically, but a disaster in terms of long term social policy. Of course, the very fact that such a policy is being proposed shows the depths to which our politics have sunk, and to be fair, the Tories are by no means alone in being guilty on that score.

Generali

Who pays for Housing Associations to provide housing at below market prices? Do they get preferential access to land or planning permission for example?

Jason74

Graham_Devon wrote: »

That "undeserving class" you speak about will include nurses, police, shop workers, field engineers etc etc.

Not everyone in Housing Association properties are without work. Indeed, they need to be working to be able to use RTB.

All true of course. But in truth, you're wasting your time trying to have a sensible debate with Clapton about housing issues . You know the old line "never argue with an idiot, he'll just drag you down to his leveland beat you with experience". I made a decision a while back not to engage with Clapton as there is just no point, and am enjoying this board a great deal more as a result.

Generali

TheBlueHorse wrote: »

interest rates do not need to rise and rise and rise. Eventually they will settle back at around 4%. That is the norm. Not 0.5% nor 8%. Interest rates will be low for YEARS and YEARS. Probably never getting above 6% in the lifetime of anyone aged 20 or above.

5% was the average base rate for the life of the BoE up to 2007. Having said that, interest rates much above 3% were unusual when the UK still had specie money (gold and silver money).

mystic_trev

Seems like a daft and desperate measure by Cameron to cling on to power, and I can't see it working.

On the plus side, over on HPC they're treating this like Christmas come early :rotfl:

Bitter lemons all round!

CLAPTON

Graham_Devon wrote: »

That "undeserving class" you speak about will include nurses, police, shop workers, field engineers etc etc.

Not everyone in Housing Association properties are without work. Indeed, they need to be working to be able to use RTB.

lets say it is true that there are nurses, police, shop workers field engineers etc.

why was a particular nurse, police officer, shop worker etc selected for the privilege of having a subsidised house for life?

were they more deserving than their colleagues, lucky ?

why do their colleagues have to pay more than them : are they less deserving?