High house prices rising in working class areas, is it fair and is there anything that can be done?

zagfles

[Deleted User] said:

Just imagine living in somewhere like Portsmouth. Working class, low wages, and that house would cost £350k.

The whole housing market is broken and there is no way to fix it.

There are ways to fix it, trouble is they would be political suicide, as previous evidence shows rising house prices are popular with the less numerate (ie the vast majority of voters )

propertyhunter

It's true. Politics props up the housing market. 

OP - I used to think like you, but now after 7 months searching wish we offered what was being asked of one that I loved because now prices are 5-7% higher. I've learnt the hard way.

You can't predict the future - the housing market could fall tomorrow - but try to think longer term. Also, just make sure you can afford it at the time you buy it. If it's not this one - there will be another eventually - and this is what keeps us going. Inflation will be on your side too if wages eventually increase because that will erode your mortgage debt (hopefully this happens, but it's not happening right now).

Shaztastic3000

Sounds like you should move to a South American socialist country 

Mineral1

I don't quite understand, you can't afford a house at 190k why not buy one that's cheaper, you don't have to buy a new house and if it's hiding defects you're worried about you should probably aim to avoid a new build anyway as they are riddled.

zagfles

Shaztastic3000 said:

Sounds like you should move to a South American socialist country 

We're already in a socialist country as far as the housing market goes. Far too much state intervention in the housing market, it's what caused all the problems.

Getting_greyer

They not providing public goods. They're providing private goods. Stuffs expensive unfortunately.

I don't think there's much you can do about companies making profit on private property.

I guess you could organise all the FTBs in these working class areas to boycott buying new homes until the prices come down?  Hoping that noone else jumps in beforehand.

Lobby the government to legislate price ceilings? Electoral suicide.

Stand for public office and nationalise housebuilding?  Long shot.

Enter the market as a housing developer and set your own ethical pricing. Big start up costs.

propertyhunter

I can see prices stabilising because there is an underlying lack of supply and high demand. What stops them going even higher is the increased cost of living, brought about by higher energy prices and higher interest rates. However, if they extend borrowing to even more multiples of salary (as proposed), then prices will just be stoked higher and higher. People will be crippled with servicing a debt and working for longer, or having less disposable income. 

user1977

Shaztastic3000 said:

Sounds like you should move to a South American socialist country 

I suppose the weather would be better than Newcastle. 

Bonniepurple

There’s a big difference between what people want and what they can actually get - and not just in terms of housing.  I’d love to have a cleaner, but right now that money is going towards the mortgage and the ever rising bills.  In a few months it might be different.  

We never intended to climb the property ladder.  We started off renting a 2 bed, then buying a shared ownership house that had been repossessed.  We had to pay for ALL the repairs, despite only owning 25%.  From there, an inheritance allowed us to by a place with dodgy 60s decor, and a promotion allowed us to buy a really, really nice 4 bed. 

I quite agree that there is a shortage of genuinely affordable homes for people.  There’s many, many reasons for this - Right to Buy, councils not getting enough from central government to provide services, let alone build houses, developers with enough clout to get around planning restrictions, people living longer, more single people etc etc.  Perhaps if people voted with their feet and refused to buy new build properties from developers who don’t follow the rules, then things may improve in the long run.  However, that would involve people shunning incentives such as Help to Buy - which boosts the amount that someone can afford.

There’s no easy answer.  If there was, it would have already been found.

[Deleted User]

Shaztastic3000 said:

Sounds like you should move to a South American socialist country 

Prefer the Nordic ones. Problem is, brexit makes moving there much harder. Stuck here now.