Affordable Housing London-Style

MARTYM8`

Graham_Devon wrote: »

And dumped on some other city / town?

Theres no real way of cleansing London of certain people without moving the problem somewhere else.

I would suggest about 25% of Londoners - in the rental sector - could not afford to live there without subsidised social housing or housing benefit. In some boroughs 40% of residents are on HB.

Its only going to grow as well - as rents/prices presumably will continue to rise faster than wages and the have/have not divide grows.

London is pricing out the middle class - soon only the very rich and very poor will be able to live there.

cells

wymondham wrote: »

People certainly have an odd idea of 'affordable' these days!

Its the old mindset of having to work in London. IT makes lots of jobs location independent so people could save an absolute fortune and improve their quality of life if they just got over the 'London' thing......

one of the problems is tax exemption on main residence makes London attractive.

I could an would live outside of London if I could still keep that tax exemption on that house rather than it moving with me

cells

sell off 500,000 council homes in London, relocate the 1.25 million residents to India and give them each £5,000 a year each. They will live like kings and it would save the government a big chunk of cash

princeofpounds

Of course an interesting question is - if 'affordable' housing is being listed at these prices and transacting... who is doing the buying?


Of course what actually happens with a lot of these places is that they are bought by a married couple where one is exceptionally wealthy and the other is a so-called key worker.


Which rather defeats the object, as these couples could almost always afford to live in London anyway at market terms. And certainly if they are buying a million squid flat.


I should have met and married a teacher. Or a dust(wo)man - if they exist.


But, in one sense I don't care too much - providing anyone with housing helps everyone with housing as it's one less person looking. It's just sad we need to go through this pretence and market distortion to make any progress.

lisyloo

Theres no real way of cleansing London of certain people without moving the problem somewhere else.

I agree that long term unemployed people have to be housed somewhere.
Why house them in the most expensive city in the UK?

There are issues in most other parts of the country too (high demand) but I don't think anyone would deny it's as bad as London.

lisa110rry

GunJack wrote: »

not just Londoners I think.....

..we're getting more & more like the 51st State (of America) every day

Would you mind explaining that to me? How long have you lived in the States? (I did for 21 years.)

Most of the people I know who live on Park Home sites are delighted with them. You should see the cars they have and there's very little upkeep and great "community" spirit. Releases lots of cash for nice holidays. When I get to an appropriate age I'll seriously think about buying one on the site in our village.

GunJack

lisa110rry wrote: »

Would you mind explaining that to me? How long have you lived in the States? (I did for 21 years.)

Most of the people I know who live on Park Home sites are delighted with them. You should see the cars they have and there's very little upkeep and great "community" spirit. Releases lots of cash for nice holidays. When I get to an appropriate age I'll seriously think about buying one on the site in our village.

Ok, so it was a little tongue-in-cheek......

....however, "You should see the cars they have and there's very little upkeep and great "community" spirit. Releases lots of cash for nice holidays" and what happens when they've spent all their funds on cars/holidays/watching nascar and drinking beer ( ) ... do they just keel over and die from starvation/cold/disease with no pension, or what?

lisyloo

and what happens when they've spent all their funds on cars/holidays/watching nascar and drinking beer

Have you heard of an annuity?
If you haven't it's a product that provides an income from a lump sum until you die. You are correct that if you do income drawdown from a pot of money you risk running out.

People in the UK/US get supported by the state (as I'm sure you know) so the risk is being on the breadline, not starvation/death.

CLAPTON

Graham_Devon wrote: »

And dumped on some other city / town?

Theres no real way of cleansing London of certain people without moving the problem somewhere else.

Interesting you use the very emotive word 'dumped'

maybe reflect that most of the poor 'Londoners' weren't born in London
and so travelled there from other parts of the UK and from all over the world.

The problem of high house prices in London for people who actually work there won't be creating the problem elsewhere.

GunJack

lisyloo wrote: »

Have you heard of an annuity? yes, of course
If you haven't it's a product that provides an income from a lump sum until you die. You are correct that if you do income drawdown from a pot of money you risk running out.

People in the UK/US get supported by the state (as I'm sure you know) actually I am not familiar with US benefits/state pensions (never looked into it as would never be in a position to need to know, but had assumed minimum level of support if any) so the risk is being on the breadline, not starvation/death.

...and I assume you're not familiar with Jeff Dunham and Bubba J ??