House prices

Single parent households by definition are not single occupancy.

Prices are driven up by market forces.
The only thing that would put a lid on it would be if draconian restrictions on overseas buyers, owning more than one property and being anything other than an owner-occupier were introduced (with strictly limited licences for lettable properties to balance with local demand but with high enough costs for landlords that owner-occupier buyers can outbid property investors rather than the other way around)

You can't just reduce house prices by decree, but if you make it so that it's untenable for a landlord to keep a property e.g because they own 10 BTL properties but can only obtain licences for 6 - then a lot more properties go onto the market and so prices reduce organically.

I don’t see why we can’t have a LVT like France?

Or just Up income tax. That's the fairest way and scrap all other stupid taxes

No upping income tax doesn’t solve housing inequality.

I’m sorry, I meant a land tax, the likes of which exists in many European countries where you pay a %rage if the value of your house every year instead of council tax.

Land Value Tax doesn't work in the way you seem to think it works. It specifically ignores the value of the buildings in the land or improvements you have made. Someone with a ramshackle old small bungalow on a large plot would pay the same as someone with a huge executive home. The value of the two houses would be vastly different but they would pay the same LVT.

You seem to think it can somehow be associated with the value of the property which would mean that it actually isn't LVT anymore and would remove many of the benefits of LVT which are around encouraging development.

Why land tax though? My house sits on just under an acre of woodland so I can’t build on it and it provides environmental (wildlife, carbon sequestration, drainage, sound reduction) benefits to the local area. Oh, and I have to pay for maintenance and management of the trees.

But upping income tax wouldn't solve the empty nesters in huge houses issue.
I don't think you need land/poll tax - just reevaluate the CT bands and make them steeper at the very high end.

@BallooningBumblebee

I like the idea of scrapping council tax and having a land tax but I'm not sure about poll tax. That happened before and it was horrendous.

I was 19 when the council tax was Introduced I aren't a pittance and suddenly my
Parents had a huge bill. Ok it was my
Bill but I didn't have the money to pay it.
If it was done there need to be a low earner band and want about newly qualified students
Now that have loans to repay?? Add poll tax to them
Too.

I think a land tax that doesn't matter how
Many live there is better

Or just
Up income tax. That's the fairest way and scrap all other stupid taxes

Maybe we need a cap on value now. A bit like council tax bands

No one can sell over a ceiling price

I notice things are sitting longer Near Me and flats especially unless they are in a fab location.

My house is prob worth a million or just Under we
Bought for 780 but have completely renovated it includes the garden.

I could Move and get a detached house in a new town for about 600 and live of the rest. Or give it to my kids

I'm saving for them. I'm
Simon got get them
A 30k deposit each

I'm lucky

However something does
Need to be
Done. For rents too.

And no stamp duty gets rid of the major cost of moving, and encourages people to move when their current house no longer meets their needs.

You’d pay poll tax and land value tax. It’s the land value tax that’s expensive.

House prices in this country are ridiculous. The only reason I was able to buy was because I was born in the 1970’s. It absolutely enrages me that people think it’s ok as you can get a 40 year mortgage etc. I’d make a hefty profit if I sold mine now. I don’t deserve it. I haven’t worked for it. I feel really sorry for young people now trying to get their own home.

Of course, but I’d wager that buying a flat is not ego driven

I don’t know anyone who buys a house based on ego, thankfully!

This is exactly the answer, spoken by someone who really understands the issues.

Unfortunately it will never happen as wealthy pensioners feel they have the right to rattle around in massive houses paying minimal tax for the rest of their lives, and so won’t vote for it. C’mon Rachel Reeves, do you care about the younger voters? This is what you need to do, get on with it!

(spoken as someone who would get HAMMERED by these sorts of tax reforms but cares about my kid’s future).

But surely poll tax would encourage people NOT to downsize? Since they'd be paying the same on a 1 bed to a 6 bed? Unless I'm missing something here...

Of course, but I’d wager that buying a flat is not ego driven

Get rid of Stamp Duty and Council Tax. Introduce new taxes to raise the equivalent - Annual Land Value Tax and Poll Tax.

Stamp Duty is a daft tax only paid on specific purchases. It acts as a friction stopping people from moving - up, down and geographically for work.

Council Tax based on simple bands created 30 years ago is also daft. Mega mansions pay as much as homes a factor less. Some people avoid it altogether.

Annual Land Value Tax (ignore farms, forestry, etc for now) would apply to the amount of land owned, how it has been developed and its current value (the more your home is worth - the more tax you pay every year). Landlords would pay this tax along with homeowners. Will encourage (not mandate!) empty-nesters to give up large family homes. Second homeowners need to pay on second homes.

Poll Tax paid by every adult living at an address - homeowners and tenants - who benefit from local services. Brings equity when two equal homes are inhabited by one or four adults.

This should organically lower out of control house prices since out of control house prices would trigger corresponding tax bills. Tax bills will significantly increase in more expensive locations - such as Westminster.

A last measure would be to add house price growth management as a BoE target. Raise/reduce rates also corresponding to house prices.

Round by us some people saddle themselves with massive mortgages as the 5+ bed detached is the expectation.

Round by me some people saddle themselves with massive mortgages for a flat but it’s still cheaper than renting.

Tbh people will have to fund private care as there aren’t enough carers anyway, some relatives of mine wanted to stay in their house until they died. The state provided care was woeful, no continuity, unreliable etc so they paid for their own private care.

Housing has become a status arms race. Round by us some people saddle themselves with massive mortgages as the 5+ bed detached is the expectation. Clearly not everyone has to borrow or be burdened by it, but many are.

@jellycatandkittens I think some will be indirect, eg you need that operation but the NHS waiting list is 3 yrs so option is to go to private or wait. And something similar to Teresa May’s tax, including the value of the home when calculating care in the home costs.

DH and bought our first home together in 1991. Three bed semi for £85k. Now worth £450k. It’s our forever home, we have no interest in moving up the housing ladder for the sake of it, it will help pay for care home costs should that be necessary.

The problem with this kind of idealistic thinking is that actually meeting someone's basic needs isn't easy. It is something that has preoccupied humans since the dawn of time and requires a lot of time, energy and resource. The act of building a house uses land, materials and labour. The idea that a house is a basic entitlement assumes that someone else (who?) is duty bound to expend a hell of a lot of effort and resource to build a house for someone that has no obligation to expend any of their effort and resource to do anything at all.

This is the fundamental problem with entitlement. The buck has to stop somewhere with someone or nothing would get done. Someone has to work out in the cold and rain laying the bricks or carting around heavy loads on the building site. Someone has to dig up the earth doing the ground works or even clean the house at the end. They may well all want to pursue more creative and fulfilling occupations too but we need housing (and food and clean hospitals).