Conservative tinkering with housing.

As many will know, we are trying to find another home as we have sold this house but it's proving to be very difficult to down-size to a 2-bed property in this area, and this is where we wish to stay.

Opposite from us is a development that was supposed to be finished years ago but it's still grinding on but the thing we have noticed is that all the promises regarding this build have been broken.

It was supposed to have Social Housing - there isn't any.

It was supposed to be for locals, medical staff, Police, Fire Brigade etcetera but we have Italians living across from us - from Italy, not the UK and a woman from Watford; we have asked the developers and there is nobody living in any of the properties that was local, a doctor, a nurse, a Policeman or woman etcetera so we were shafted by the developers, hand in glove with MK Council.

There was supposed to be stipulations about no buy to let and no onward sales within - I think - 5 years but they're changing hands already and several are bought to let.

First time buyers were given a 20% discount so how come they don't have to repay this?

There's one on the market now that's 7 months old, bought with a discount yet it's being flogged for full market value - how come?

Today I saw that the Conservatives want to further relax Planning and bypass the "affordable" irritation for their friends the developers as Dave now reckons £450,000 is affordable in London and £250,000 outside of London.

Add to this the "affordable rent" of 80% of Market value and we have the makings of a disaster for anyone under £77,000 in London or £50,000 outside - so that excludes 90% of those under 30 I'd say and probably 70% of the total of homeseekers!

Is the man mad?

This does precious little to tackle two biggest problems in housing; under-supply, which causes prices everywhere to keep on rising fast, and the real lack of decent housing for the homeless and the poorest or working families, those on zero-hours contracts or those on benefits.

The caring, compassionate Conservative Party is still as blinkered as ever IMHO and yet has the temerity to say they represent the workers!!

It seems to me now that the only course of action is to abandon Corbyn's Labour Party tote de suite and go over to Fallon's LibDems as UKIP seem to have gone so low profile they are invisible.

Comments anyone? stevmk2

Re: Conservative tinkering with housing.

I've been sounding off on the Daily Politics page on fb about this!
Firstly they bring in the "bedroom tax" to make people downsize into what? They make the over 61's exempt so they can live in large properties for possibly another 30 years. They let developers get away with either garden grabbing or ignoring the requirements for building a percentage of affordable rented homes.
What I think they should be doing is building suitable homes for older folk that they would want to move into, perhaps on small retirement estates with care facilities and nursing homes at the centre to ease transition if need be and saving money by having care staff nearby. It may get the housing market moving as folk move out of larger houses and help with care costs too also give families peace of mind.
But nothing like that would cross their minds as they don't have to worry about it!

Re: Conservative tinkering with housing.

No idea what his thinking is on this but from what I heard they are starter homes and so will not be meant for families - unless they're Italian, maybe!!

Also, I thought when local councils granted planning permission there HAD to be provision for a percentage of social housing or am I mistaken here?

As TessA says, there should be more affordable 1 bed housing for those of more mature years that would free up the family homes.

Re: Conservative tinkering with housing.

To quote Mandy Rice-Davies: "of course they would say that wouldn't they???

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england...5210#?foo=bar&

Re: Conservative tinkering with housing.

Hi

I must admit that when I first read his proposals I laughed out loud.

Not funny really, but so typical of our Politicians, they really are so out of touch with real life for the vast majority of people.

It takes years to save up the deposit for a house, and capping them at £250,000 outside London is a joke, most people would be hard pressed to afford one of £150,000.

Re: Conservative tinkering with housing.

Im not sure why people think its the Conservative Party that are constructing the homes? They may encourage new housing development (I think George Osborne is some relation to the Laings family) but they arent making final decisions about fine detail such as the number of social housing included on a given development proposal.
c
Each developmer is supposed to include some in their pitch to the Council, but if costs overrun odd ones get excluded and are sold to purchasers to re-coup costs. Also, no one can discriminate about who buys these new houses. Councils may keep lists and discriminate with a points system who can move into their houses but developers sell to whoever turns up first to buy. Thats simple market forces.

Re: Conservative tinkering with housing.

Some may be misunderstanding Susanne but the current Government has changed Planning criteria already, such as "relaxing" the Section 106 planning agreements and that's had an immediate effect on the levels of Housing, including now the laughable "Affordable Housing".

Affordable Housing was defined by this Government as "social rented, affordable rented and intermediate housing provided to specified eligible households whose needs are not met by the market".

Typical Rentals by Councils were typically between 40% and 60% of average rents in local areas.

After the previous Coalition government reduced the budget spent on affordable housing by 60%, it allowed housing associations to make up for some lost income by charging an “affordable rent” of 80% of normal market rental yet incomes have not risen to accommodate this huge increase.

London’s current threshold criteria for Affordable Housing is where a household’s gross income does not exceed £71k when accessing a home of up to two bedrooms or £85k when accessing a home of three bedrooms or more.

Outside of London I can't find the figures now but it has to be around £50,000 and £70,000 if you look at where I live for example.

Our gross income is about £21,000 but my wife's retired and I work part-time, mainly because that's all I can get.

My neighbours on one side have a gross income of about £65,000 and the other probably similar and neither wife is working apart from voluntary on the one side and occasional on the other and, in this area they are probably typical but are in fact better-off than many in this street.

I've seen houses on the market recently and they're being sold because people can no longer afford the £800 - £1000 pm mortgages as owners have had their pay frozen or cut over the last few years.

Yes, the current Conservative Government may encouraging the building of new homes but the fact of the matter is they've been shamed into action and that's a fact! stevmk2

Re: Conservative tinkering with housing.

I think most of the problem is very few who make the decisions actually understand what it's like to live on low wages if they did they would be building housing that costs a lot less, also they always underestimate the greed of the people building and buying houses as no one seems to be able to resist making a huge profit.

Round here we now have buy to let land lords buying up affordable housing (affordable to who we couldn't imagine as they started at £225,000) and then leasing them to the local council so they can rent them to people on benefit. Doesn't sound like any sort of sound financial planning to me but I only got an O'level in maths perhaps I needed degree level to understand it ?