Won't somebody think of "young people"? (Edit: and No, older people aren't "to blame")

[Droogs]

half of English land is owned by less than 1% of the population....no wonder it expensive to buy a house



Take the housing crisis: so many people are now stuck in the vicious rent cycle, it is one of the greatest causes of in work poverty, with so many people having to pay out a substantial amount of their salary for rent, there is not enough left for food and energy.

A radical solution would be land value tax

have a look at it....its a potential solution
https://www.landvaluetax.org/

You think you have it bad. 94% of Scottish land is owned by 8 English people

try putting up with that, esp when your homeless regardless of age

 

[Jelly]

Excluding the south east, the ratio of house prices to average salary are very similar now as they were when I bought my house 40 years ago.

Whilst I'm not entirely convinced this would hold for a number of more deprived regions in the UK, even if it shows in UK aggregate figures it misses a bigger factor:

Both rents and mortgage deposit requirements have strongly outpaced salary growth (considering my parents bought with a 0% deposit mortgage, I can legitimately claim it was infinitely easier for them to buy a house); those two impacts combined have made it much harder for young people to get access to the housing ladder.

Both put in the effort (a levels, degree, professional qualifications, chartership) of getting into a (real) profession.

That's not reflective of the experiences that everyone in their position has though, there's a definite elements of good fortune required

I'm in my mid 30's, have a Masters, hol professional registrations and Charterships in more than one field, and generally have all the "markers of esteem" that a highly successful professional is expected to have...

However due to an unlucky career choice, during one of the periodic oil industry crashes I got made redundant twice in a short amount of time, then took a huge pay cut to move to a different role and industry just to have some kind of employment still.

That then had a bunch of knock on impacts in my personal life which left me in very poor financial shape.

After spending 6 years trying to scrimp money together towards a deposit whilst living with the stress of very tenuously finances, I recently managed to buy a house thanks to a bequest from a grandparent...

At which point I discovered that I'm several hundred pounds a month better off than I was in the private rented sector (and trust me it wasn't anything fancy I was renting), and am finally able to save regularly and pay down the capital on debt which I picked up trying to keep my head above water back when I got made redundant.

I have a number of professional colleagues in their mid-late thirties who are only now looking to buy their first homes for similar reasons, and feel very privaleged that I'm in this position, knowing that as things stand some of my staff who are who are significantly less well rewarded than I am may never have that opportunity.

Be grateful your son's have had the stability to make a real go of things, because it's terrifying just how easily things can go badly wrong even when you're doing everything "right".

 

[RobinBHM]

Re. your second point, I have a real problem with the emotive language "crisis..vicious..poverty" and the ideas behind it

I think thats a little unfair -youve taken 3 words out of context.
In work poverty is not an emotive term, its a factual term used to describe a sector

crisis and vicious are fair words to describe the housing problem.

From my post you may have got the impression Im a a raving socialist but Im mostly centrist but cynical of both sides.

 

[Selwyn]

there is the slimmest glimmer of light...which is:

Every previous pandemic has led to social change.
The UK has both the pandemic and brexit which will massively shape the future.

All I can say is: if things get really bad in the UK, it might be a catalyst for political change

We currently have a massively broken political system and that needs to change for future generations.

My guess is this country needs to change FPTP to PR
And this country needs to stop party donations and lobbying....it results in billionaires being able to influence policy
In short we have a parliamentary system that enable the rich to influence policy to ensure the wealth stays with them.
half of English land is owned by less than 1% of the population....no wonder it expensive to buy a house



Take the housing crisis: so many people are now stuck in the vicious rent cycle, it is one of the greatest causes of in work poverty, with so many people having to pay out a substantial amount of their salary for rent, there is not enough left for food and energy.

A radical solution would be land value tax

have a look at it....its a potential solution
https://www.landvaluetax.org/

The reason it is expensive to buy a house is because of the planning laws and supply of money. Its not to do with who owns the land as much as how much land is made available to build on. Most land is agricultural usage - you cant really do a lot with it except farm it until it gets into a local plan

 

[RobinBHM]

A healthy rental market is almost certainly "a good thing" for a country/economy.

I dont agree on the basis that this country, housing and land is used as an investment. that means that renting freezes out people from buying a property whilst building an asset for the landlord.

I do agree with your point in countries like France where houses are often rented and housing is for living in not for making money out of.

 

[RobinBHM]

The reason it is expensive to buy a house is because of the planning laws and supply of money. Its not to do with who owns the land as much as how much land is made available to build on. Most land is agricultural usage - you cant really do a lot with it except farm it until it gets into a local plan

planning is partially the problem but ultimately the major house builders land bank and carve up the market to keep prices high -most of their profits come from house price rises.

Land with planning is not a particularly limiting factor actually, there is plenty of land available

There is a good solution to lowering house prices: good old fashioned council houses

 

[billw]

The problem as I see it is that we have become a NOW generation, everything must be available now, saving up for something or doing without does not come into the equation, I know of one family that are on the poverty line/hand out, but they all have mobile phones even the five year old who is one of seven children in the family.

Driven by the elder generations need to become richer, give the next generation stuff now and lend them the money to have it. Win win for those selling the stuff.

 

[Jacob]

Forked from the How would you rate the UK's handling of this pandemic? thread as I think this is worthy of a seperate discussion.

On that aforementioned thread, the same talking point keeps coming up:



Now, speaking as a young person...

There are lots of things stacked in favour of the older generations and the impact of lockdown is miniscule compared to:

• The distortion of the housing market into an investment vehicle, effectively pulling up the ladder on young people's access to housing security.
• Maintaining the pension triple lock whilst systematically reducing real-terms financial support to working age people in poverty.
• Economic policy which prioritises the realisation of short term gains in the markets over the kind of long term organic growth which would support meaningful wage growth for adults of working age (and espwhich keeps pace with inflation.
• The consequent systematic restructuring the UK economy in such a way that access to well paying jobs with prospects of significant career development are increasingly out of reach for a majority of young people (at all levels of education but especially for those without a university degree).
• The impact of successive changes to the funding of higher education which have consistently reduced access and teaching quality, whilst increasing the financial stress and debt burden.
• Disproportionate infrastructure investment in the South East, where the population is disproportionately older and wealthier.
• Failure to make any meaningful attempt to address the impact of second homes on access to the housing market for young people in rural areas.
• Failure to control the impact of right to buy on social housing stocks, or prevent the transfer of social housing into the private rented sector at grossly inflated rents.
• Continued and increasingly dismissive and scornful treatment of young people who attempt to raise these issues, (or any other political issues which they feel deeply about) in the UK's (frankly abysmal) print media.

So I guess we're collectively innured to just getting screwed for the benefit of older people these days.

Which leads lots of young people to be very cynical...

Cynical enough in fact to question:

​

Why is it that so many of the very same people who seem unwilling to acknowledge, let alone address any of those difficult issues which are having a massive impact, who suddenly have our back over the impact of lockdown?​

​

Answers on a postcard, please.

Agree with all that. I am old and many of us would also agree. No need to turn it into an anti-ageist thing!
There are such things as "Young Conservatives" you know. Strange creepy mutant creatures. They turned before they got old!
Re Selwyn's befuddled incomprehension of the housing market - he could do a bit of homework? Start here perhaps: Home Truths Review - by Simon Bain | The Young Money Blog

P.S. Not too late to chip in to my Shelter fund raiser - link below:

 

[Woody2Shoes]

I think thats a little unfair -youve taken 3 words out of context.
In work poverty is not an emotive term, its a factual term used to describe a sector

crisis and vicious are fair words to describe the housing problem.

From my post you may have got the impression Im a a raving socialist but Im mostly centrist but cynical of both sides.

Part of the difficulty I have with these loaded words is that they are often used by those who want to build more badly designed houses in the wrong locations - which actually won't solve the (perceived or otherwise) problems with different types of housing tenure and with the poor (functional/technical/aesthetic/environmental) quality of much of our existing/new housing stock. There is adequate housing for all those of us who need it - there is no crisis - but that's not to say that improvements can't be made.

 

[Woody2Shoes]

I dont agree on the basis that this country, housing and land is used as an investment. that means that renting freezes out people from buying a property whilst building an asset for the landlord.

There's nothing intrinsically wrong with investing in property/land, or with renting it. The point I was making is that what has distorted the market over recent decades is the much increased availability of lending (and a culture shift where people perceive that "rent is wasted money", partly because of that).
PS The other point I made still stands - "a healthy rental market is a good thing" - not everybody (even those who have the finances available) wants to buy.

 

[Selwyn]

Agree with all that. I am old and many of us would also agree. No need to turn it into an anti-ageist thing!
There are such things as "Young Conservatives" you know. Strange creepy mutant creatures. They turned before they got old!
Re Selwyn's befuddled incomprehension of the housing market - he could do a bit of homework? Start here perhaps: Home Truths Review - by Simon Bain | The Young Money Blog

P.S. Not too late to chip in to my Shelter fund raiser - link below:

Not befuddled at all. I'm saying that land with planning gets a massive uplift in value. You can have two fields in a village one worth £1000000 acre and another worth £10k acre depending on planning. Even an old codger like you should be able to see that.

The other thing is of course the supply of lending has changed over the years which drives prices up.

Modern houses are cheap to build and very often they are crap too

 

[Jacob]

Not befuddled at all. I'm saying that land with planning gets a massive uplift in value. You can have two fields in a village one worth £1000000 acre and another worth £10k acre depending on planning. Even an old codger like you should be able to see that.

The other thing is of course the supply of lending has changed over the years which drives prices up.

Read the review I linked to. You are correct, but the problem is that the increased value all goes to profit for the owner, not to the community.

 

[Selwyn]

Read the review I linked to. You are correct, but the problem is that the increased value all goes to profit for the owner, not to the community.

I have read that book before. I never mentioned the local community.

 

[Jelly]

Agree with all that. I am old and many of us would also agree. No need to turn it into an anti-ageist thing!

I wasn't aiming to be ageist so much as anti-hypocracy when I posted.

Whilst I meet a lot of people in your boat (older, but can see very clearly the issues or directly impacted by them) in my own local area...

However on the internet and especially when I travel further afield for work, I do notice a lot more people in general but particularly of the older generation have a quite jarring "I've got mine" attitude that leaves me quietly seething.

There are such things as "Young Conservatives" you know. Strange creepy mutant creatures. They turned before they got old!

I literally spat my tea out laughing!

I've met a few in my time and your description is apt.

 

[doctor Bob]

I know agricultural land is valued at £10k/ acre ish. However try and buy 1-5 acres on the edge of a village for that price, doesn't happen.
I have 7 acres I'm trying to get planning on, I'd happily let the community fund the £100,000 I may have to spend on a para 55 application (very high risk) and repay them double or triple if we got planning.

 

[Mickjay]

delivery drivers on zero hour contracts working 12 hour shifts to make the rent

That's a generalisation too. My next door neighbour, a white van delivery driver in his own house, took delivery of a 70 plate Audi a7 yesterday. It may be on 'tick', I neither know nor care, but he must be paying for it in some way. Very nice it looks too!

I forgot to add, he and his wife are about 30 with a young child.

 

[Jacob]

I have read that book before. I never mentioned the local community.

I meant community in the widest sense; "society" etc.
The basic prob is that land and property trading is not sufficiently taxed and/or regulated and has become an investors dream. Basically a dead cert and prices rise as high as the market permits. Rents and prices are as high as they can possibly be in terms of demand. Prices were inflating before Thatcher but she gave it a boost with council house sales and no council house building. Recipe for a perfect storm - massively attractive to dodgy foreign money etc etc!

 

[Jacob]

I know agricultural land is valued at £10k/ acre ish. However try and buy 1-5 acres on the edge of a village for that price, doesn't happen.
I have 7 acres I'm trying to get planning on, I'd happily let the community fund the £100,000 I may have to spend on a para 55 application (very high risk) and repay them double or triple if we got planning.

Not that high risk - you'll get your money back one way or another, but extremely high profit possible. As I said it's a speculators' market, unconnected/unrelated to housing needs.
PS Still fund raising for Shelter - see link below!
What about 7 acres of low cost housing to be run by a housing association for people with housing needs?
n.b. Don't have a builder doing your app - you need a smart alec town planner/architect

 

[Jelly]

There's nothing intrinsically wrong with investing in property/land, or with renting it. The point I was making is that what has distorted the market over recent decades is the much increased availability of lending (and a culture shift where people perceive that "rent is wasted money", partly because of that).

PS The other point I made still stands - "a healthy rental market is a good thing" - not everybody (even those who have the finances available) wants to buy.

I would agree that the rental market is not fundimentally bad, but I'm also firmly of the opinion that it is not functioning well at the moment.

A part of that can in turn be tied back to financial deregulation, both in lending markets making buy-to-let a much more widespread practice, but also in the general promotion of speculation in wider economy with the associated spread of an expectation of high returns (something which always ends badly in the end).

However the depletion of social housing stocks (especially now these stocks have begun to be fed back into the private rented sector) is also a major driver for the dysfunction of the rental sector today, which helps to distort the whole market.

 

[Jacob]

You think you have it bad. 94% of Scottish land is owned by 8 English people

try putting up with that, esp when your homeless regardless of age

I've never understood why the Scots didn't rise up after the clearances. I guess there weren't many left. But the same families own the land now, do the same thing (hunting, shooting, fishing, sheep) as though nothing has changed since the 19 century.