It's getting tough out there. Feeling the pinch?

tooldle

There has been some forays into free public transport in my area. It has been limited to school holidays and fri-mon but, has been popular with passenger numbers increasing significantly. We have First Bus and a couple of smaller providers. I believe it is our council who are covering the cost of these schemes. 
 The council and the neighbouring authority have recently started to build new social housing. Some is the repurposing of redundant building stock and the rest is new build with renewable energy adaptations. 

I’m old enough to to remember that homelessness was indeed an issue even when social housing stock was abundant and indeed before RTB was introduced. It is a complex issue.
Edited to add, we have housing associations in our area who seem to have continuous programmes of building. Some is affordable housing and the majority are rentals. 

Tahlullah.H

In my area, there was a really beautiful complex of high end flats built, which only the very rich could afford.  They bought the penthouses and top floors with the views etc. The rest of the flats were beyond the reach of the ordinary member of the public, so the builder decided to get some money back and looked to rent the flats.  This then led to a drop in the price, so private landlords bought the others and rented to those in need.  Now, the flats, which were once premium, are now worth a quarter of what they were purchased for, and the whole complex is a sink estate, in that the ones who bought at the top end of the market have also moved out and all the flats are tenanted.

Talking to Housing Standards, they were saying there is an excess of poor quality accommodation in the city, but when tenants report the landlord to them to force repairs, once Housing Standards get involved, the tenant stops engaging.  Asked why, they believe that once H.S's issues a order to the landlord to make repairs, they think this will give them a higher rating on the Housing Register, to enable them to get Social Housing rather having to stay in private rented accommodation.  In their mind, if the property gets repaired, then they wont get a 'council house', so they don't go through with the process of forcing the landlord to act.  And so, it goes round, the tenant living in sub-standard accommodation, never getting the repairs done and the private landlords never having to take action on the repairs.

The days of 'council housing' being somewhere that is a dumping ground for drug addicts, unemployed etc are long gone.  Social Housing is now a desired place to be, sought after and unattainable to most, to the point that tenants would rather put up with sub-standard accommodation in the hope it will boost their chances of getting 'a council house'.

Elisheba

comeandgo said:

Elisheba said:

And just to be really out there, I think the massive rises in housing costs year on year need to end. A property value shouldn't rise above inflation costs, imo. Yes that will mean some people don't get windfalls, but they will still have the value they have paid off. 

What would be the point of taking all the risks involved in owning a property and all the costs involved, repairs, insurance, upkeep, if all you were to get out of it was price you paid plus inflation?  Cant see that one working,
.

If housing rose with inflation, then you would get your investment back. You wouldn't lose any money, but just not get any windfalls. 

Elisheba

I havent heard any rumblings about free or even well subsidised public transport despite it being an obvious way of helping to reduce traffic congestion, improve air quality etc. In my area First bus have not only increased bus fares but have announced that 4 local sevices are being scrapped leaving part of the town and a couple of villages having no bus service including now no service to our  local hospital.

Well no, its not on any manifestos right now, but it is being mooted by think tanks as a response to climate change and the energy crisis. From their heads, to possibly political manifestos sometime soon.
The point being that 10 years ago it wouldn't have been anywhere near the table. 

ladyholly

Unfortunately a lot of things looked at by think tanks never see the light of day even when they are great thoughts. This is one I suspect most political parties would deem as too expensive especially if you consider not only the cost of supporting services but the loss of fuel duty and and the VAT which is not only on the fuel itself but also on the duty.

littlemoney

From what I saw yesterday there is no shortage of money and everyone can afford the increasing price of fuel. I have reached this conclusion after two 20 mile journerys along a dual carriageway. I travelled at a steady 50 mph to increase fuel economy and many cars and lorries came zooming past me doing 60 - 70 mph. No car or lorry stayed behind me for long.

MovingForwards

I have a 'shopper' car and get good fuel use doing 67+ mph on my daily motorway commute. There's loads of us in small cars doing the non-rat-run, opposite direction to the rat run traffic, on the way in and out doing similar speeds.

littlemoney

MovingForwards said:

I have a 'shopper' car and get good fuel use doing 67+ mph on my daily motorway commute. There's loads of us in small cars doing the non-rat-run, opposite direction to the rat run traffic, on the way in and out doing similar speeds.

Most of them weren't small cars. I remember the petrol supply problem in the September 2000. Everyone slowed down to conserve fuel. On the motorway cars were doing less than 50 mph. I had to drive 250 miles at that time and I overtook cars and I wasn't exceeding 50 mph.

Doom_and_Gloom

Got our letter from our electricity supplier today and have basically been doing budgeting since.
Standing charge is going up 9.42p a day.
Our day rate going up 11. 27p/kWh.
Night rate going up 5.74p/kWh.

That acording to them levels out to around £32/month more than what we pay now; close to 44% of our usage is on the night tarrif, mostly coming from the off peak boiler.
The increased cost doesn't sound like much compared to some however we have a limited budget so need to think carefully. This also doesn't take into account the likelihood of going up again at least once this year so I'm trying to 'future' budget. 

We don't use our washing machine on at cheap times (we rarely have ours finish after 9pm and don't put it on until 9am at the earliest) as living in flats means you can hear the neighbours machines going at night and we at the bottom can sometimes even feel it here!
We have complained constantly about the people above us that consistently have theirs on at stupid times, 2am-6am going at full spin (it must be given the intensity) , and now I know we are going to be ignored even more despite the flat agreements prohibiting using such during unsociable hours. I understand people needing to save money however when that impacts negatively on others lives that is not on. No I will not ever use such noisy machines at cheap time in a flat due to the impact it can have on others. My parents are lucky enough to live in a detached home and regularly set their washing machine, dishwasher etc to come on during the cheaper rate they have knowing it can only bother them or my sister who lives with them.

Sorry about the small rant there. Just something that has been annoying us for a while now and with everything going on doesn't look like it will likely stop, especially now.
I don't sleep well due my disability and pain etc so it is very difficult to finally have my body let me sleep and not be able to because of a neighbour having their washing machine going at stupid o'clock that is deemed unsociable hours.OH sleeps better than me but has noticed it also.
To put it into perspective we live very close to a train track and station and have very few problems noise wise from that! 

newlywed

@Doom_and_Gloom I understand your feelings.  We are a ground floor flat and pretty much when any of the upstairs washing machines spin, our radiators and doors rattle! Thankfully they don’t put them on much later than 11pm so far. 

We have economy 7 but won’t put ours on after 9pm (so it’s done by 10) or too early… so we are pretty much missing a saving by being polite to others.  

The neighbour in the adjoining flat(next block) has their kitchen back onto our bedroom and clatters about with the washing up and slamming things into cupboards at 3 am fairly regularly.  They also leave their kitchen window open whilst washing up and shouting to their visitors in the other room… sigh.