Shared ownership con. Young lashed to the yoke and regretting every second

ruggedtoast

boliston wrote: »

Can't really see what's so bad about shared ownership - people have said difficult to sell but why any more difficult than selling a house with a 100% share. Surely anything that provides affordable homes can only be a good thing and should be welcomed.

There are a lot of variables but they boil down to buyers paying too much for too little.

Typically when people want to sell they haven't made much dent in the mortgage and the HA may well have raised the rent much more than they expected or thought possible

To sell they will have to pay off the bank and also accept the HA's valuation for their share. This may well not bear any relation to achievable selling prices and the HA will not accept any negative equity.

So unless you can take the hit yourself you will need to find another buyer willing to encumber themselves with all this for an expensive ex new build with a comparatively high rent added on.

You then need for the buyer to fit the HA 's criteria for a tenant or they won't sell and lease to them and you are back to square one .

Shared ownership is a con. None of the liabilities of ownership are shared, they all fall on the buyer - who is straddled with all the disadvantages of owning combined with many of the disadvantages of renting. They get few of the upsides of either.

The government could just make housing affordable for young families by building affordable housing. But why do that when the banks need their pay day and middle England thinks housing is a lottery win.