Guest blog: Shelter's Chief Exec on the rise of unaffordable housing

[JessMumsnet]

This week, to highlight the fact that housing is increasingly unaffordable for many, Shelter published research which showed what our weekly shop would cost if food prices had risen to the degree that housing costs have done over the last decade.

In this guest blog, Shelter's Chief Exec Campbell Robb warns that unless something changes, the next generation will find it even tougher to get a stable and affordable home.

What do you think? Are you struggling to get on the property ladder, with rising rents making it increasingly difficult to save for a deposit - or are you worried for your children's prospects? How do you think the situation could be improved? Post your URLs here if you blog on the subject, or tell us what you think here on the thread.

Off the thread but - just wanted to point out that people make money in lots of different ways.

If it was only in 'hard work' - which is a tired mantra that the better-off people eternally trot out - then all those sweat shop workers in the Far East must be raking it in!!
They can work 18 hour days so how come they are amongst the poorest people in the world?

Having money, owning a second property, being a landlord is not about hard work, its about opportunity, timing and being paid a good salary, good credit rating, getting lucky breaks, having the chance to do training, being a fortunate person - not necessarily hard work.

If a landlord is fed up, they can choose to sell to their tenants with a 'gifted deposit' (an amount included in sale but not paid for). Not many choose to do this. Unlike social landlords, they choose to terminate a contract and force people on.
Buying council houses was a good thing - and it wasn't this that caused a lack, (just huge immigration happening just after and no extra houses provided for them) but perhaps the sale should have a covenant restricting owners letting if they bought at a discount? Then selling would release it into the ftb market for others, protecting it from private landlords who support a drifting population.
BTL mortgages need categorizing and regulating. Different tenants = different needs and responsibilites

It's not taking advantage at all. It is no different from anyone working and being paid for the work or paying someone to sort out their plumbing. People buy and sell things, property is not different. The picture painted on the thread bears no relationship to the private rented sector in most areas. Many private landlords will not let to anyone on housing benefit for obvious reasons which I am sure most people can understand.

Most rented housing is much better quality than it ever used to be and that is almost directly a result of abolition of rent controls, a market which is much more free and the introduction of assured shortholds.

if you go back it was very hard to move out. My grandfather lived with 26 other young men in a boarding house shown in the 1901 census. Now most people in Britain are housed in much better conditions and the state even helps many people with their housing costs.

Housing is different, it is an essential like food, water or medicine and it is no place for speculators.

It is quite obviously the case that buy to let take property values beyond the reach of those who want to buy to use as a home. These priced out families are then forced to pay large rents in exchange for an home with no security of tenure. The high rents ensure they are unable to save for a home of their own.

I share your capitalist leanings but this situation is plainly abhorrent.

XENIA,I think you are missing what others have said, if we had real democracy a lot of buy to let landlords and those who are at the limit with their mortgage would not be supported by low interest rates. We are talking over a million interest only mortgages. We are talking several million all told. I have seen graphs that prove this to be true.As I see it we will either see a devaluation of some proportions , or in the event of a knock in confidence in our ability to tackle the deficit and the ACTUAL DEBT that is mounting by billions each month the government will be forced to raise interest rates.As things are we have quantitative easing which is causing inflation making it even harder for millions of people to get by .We the people who did not take on risky investment are paying to keep buy to let in their soon to be shattered royal like lifestyle

We dont have real democracy because those piggies that have eaten the most slop at the trough have the most clout . They have the most clout because they lobby mps . They pay to get their way by making donations

In letting them eat so much slop at the trough they have let millions in shackles

Like all ponzi schemes this one will fail unless there is a change of direction .

If you read history all the ponzi economies failed. Germany printed money and look where that got them .Build a million homes and you have a real chance of kick starting the economy.

It will bring down the cost of a roof over peoples head too. They might then have some spare money and be able to participate in this economy by having some spending power after basic living costs. Infrastructure roads they would make a mark too. In seventy years I have never seen our country laid so low and people so demoralised

yes as long as the people already here waiting patiently on the housing list have access to them. I object to new houses being built if they are not being built for that purpose.

The lenders decide if they will allow interest only loans for buy to let lenders and for private borrowers buying their home and they have cut back in the recession and require much bigger deposits so that reflect risk, doesn't it? If they thought prices were going sky high they would be rushing out there to offer interest only 90% loans.

I agree that as Lord Young said those with mortgages have never had it so good - whether squeezed middle or buy to letters because base rate is 0.5% and in the past some of us have had to pay 12% or more on domestic mortgages. Those with savings obtain very little interest hence why some look to buy to let and those without who have big debts do not pay much to service those debts so the wise ones of those are paying back capital rather than spending on holidays and meals out.

However the most likely future trend is going to be inflation. I suspect the new Bank of England Governor will take us that way too. Obama today I think is proposing an increase ni their minimum wage. So if we go on a spend spend spend frenzy as a nation then rents will go up much more, wages will rise, benefits well hopefully they will be frozen as the state sector has got far too big.

I don't really see a ponzi scheme about to implode. Householders with negative equity and interest only mortgages tend to stay put for 10 years whilst they get promotion at work or their parents die to sort out their problems.

XENIA, no the reason for big deposit is we are in bigger risk territory.
Again (interest rates are low because banks would fail if at historic % levels) We are paying banks to stay in the business of keeping (solvent)(quantitative easing) (BANK BAILOUTS) bad investment derivative trading (GAMBLING)

Banks lobby (EAT THE MOST SWILL AND GET BONUS FOR FAILURE)

• more swill

Bernie madoff used to borrow from investors but could never pay all the investors because like our government he spent it and he is now in prison.

Sound familiar (we cant pay all our debt) The difference is this is our economy and it's looking like a ponzi scheme from where \i am standing. Million would back me up because they have gone into gold.

Remember it's only a promise to pay on each bank note. When economies falter they can be devalued (ZIMBARBWE) (ARGENTINA) (UK twice ) (GERMANY)

We are just peeping into the door before we have to walk into the.....

yeah basically banks are being allowed to have our money for nothing. to give no interest. it's not just quantative easing on the mortgage payers it's also for the banks. i hadn't thought of that.

so all those millions in pensions and investments and savings that they are running on are being giving nothing in return hence keeping the banks afloat.

We are 13% worse off than we were 4 years ago because of inflation. I would say this to buy to let landlords "since 2000 inflation has probably caused a 30% drop in the spending power of the pound" . So that house that you may sell in the mythical rise in house values market, will buy you less tins of beans to keep you alive when the lunatics get full control of the asylum.

That figure of 13 % worse of comes from today's Telegraph
Their poll of peoples expectations is depressing reading .

Well money does not make people happy so does it matter if they have less? In one survey the people of Keyna were the happiest people on earth.

xenia - oh really?

cool xenia - give away all your money and property then and you'll be positively manic with joy i can recommend some good causes if you need help disposing of all that misery making cash.

I don't write about what I give away but like most people who earn reasonable sums of money and some of what little is left after 52% tax/NI and all the various sales taxes we all pay is of course given away.

I have never really understood those who are jealous of the rich. Why not change your mind set and then be happy at whatever income level you are on? Does it matter if someone has a better car or wife or better looks or more money than you do? Or why not think - wow haven't they done well, I am so proud of what they achieved so I will try to achieve it too. Instead the green scales of jealousy fall over their eyes and they lead lives in sorrow, cross at their lot but doing nothing to change it.

trust me i'm not jealous of you xenia. for me it's more the disgust at people who pretend we live in meritocracy where all it takes is hard work and everything you have is down to your personal achievement.

especially when that then turns them into socially selfish people who want to deny social inequality and create more of it to teach those lazy poor people a lesson.

i personally have not found much of a correlation between wealth and happiness and i've been pretty wealth off and way below any poverty line you name for this country. though it is true to say that fear and anxiety have a massive impact on happiness and living on the poverty line now must be terrifying with the constant treat of lost benefits, inflation, atos etc.

Why do you assume people are jealous. You know nothing about posters finances.
Posters have not revealed any details of any wealth. This thread is about housing. I can tell you this when everybody and their wife are going into buy to let it has to end in tears.. So as well having seen similar economic problems and how they panned out. I think it gives people of my age an edge. I have just been trying to persuade a friend not to buy a second buy to let. Why cant people see that when rates go up there will be carnage. The government in certain circumstances will have no option other than let housing crash.
If the economy had been left to itself we would now be recovering from this downturn. Of course interest rates are being manipulated to avoid a crash in house prices and the people paying the price are not happy with people that are part of the problem (BUY to let landlords)

Money makes being unhappy much more comfortable .

So my vote goes to money to buy gold

Loads amoney lol

I am just trying go get to the core of why some people are unhappy some people have more of something than others, whether better housing, money, better looks or whatever.

The issue is what absolute or relative poverty standard for housing we think is acceptable. My grandfather in 1901 in the boarding house with 26 young men might have been rather cramped.

The English are very keen to own property whereas other nationalities do not have the same views. Renting flats is common on the continent, even for life and even with children. The English prefer their house with garden, home as castle etc.

If tenants would like 10 year tenancies for example where they agreed to pay rent for and stay 10 years (although I suspect many would not be so sure they would want to be there that long) and if there were a market for that they could negotiate that. I can certainly understand why people want the stability of ownership which is why how ownership rates are so much higher now than they were in 1900.

I suppose it is just human nature Xenia.

the core for me xenia is that it is usually at the expense of others. the core is a concern about social justice and a society that works for all.

And I suppose my free market libertarian view would be that instead when others have that is often to the benefit of others. I work 50 weeks a year and have for about 30 years, no maternity leaves etc and at least half of every penny I receive goes back to help the poor in tax. If I let out a property if there were any surplus over expenses then again there is a heap of tax going to help the poor. If I sell it I woudl pay 28% capital gains tax on the gain - again helping the poor whilst also making a home available for someone wanting to rent. I see that as social good, capitalism at its best helping people. I don't see the fact your average buy to letter with their 1 property to rent out as some kind of rapacious nasty thing who is trying to steal money from the mouths of babies.

Xenia , how can it be a free market it's being subsidized by Quantitative easing and interest rates being held down to prevent a crash in property values ,so that the banks don't crash?

Why is it that a crumbly old person like me can comprehend this and others either cant or wont?

The Tulip bubble was just the same it's human greed that fogs the vision and ability to have empathy for others

Put it another way and it's sod the others I am alright