House building targets scrapped.

[socialmedia23]

www.theguardian.com/politics/2022/dec/05/sunak-backs-down-on-housebuilding-targets-after-pressure-from-tory-mps

I am surprised there isn't a thread on this already on a parenting forum because this really does threaten British preferences and social norms. Most british people want to live in a house with garden. I was just on a thread where a poster was trying to decide whether she should downsize from a house to a flat in her preferred location and the prevailing consensus was that flats were no good for babies, should have a house with garden where the children can play in etc etc. This isn't the norm in many countries in the world, but it appear to be the norm in the UK outside London. However, what this norm depends on is LAND. in cities where there is generally less opposition to building, they tend to build flats due to the high cost of land.

The reason why so many British people live in houses today is because there was a house building boom in the 1930s and then the 1950s where they built lots of houses. Including ex council houses with gardens in the 1950s. I own a 1930s flat and when i read local history, it was literally opposite an actual farm. So while it is suburban london today, it was considered quite a rural area when it was built and completely different in character; today I am a 2 minute walk to a dry cleaners, a bakery, a small local supermarket/deli, a breakfast place and a 15 minute walk from a tube station that takes me to central london within 20 minutes.

So scrapping house building targets would mean that the future houses for the young Britons of today would not get built while the population is increasing. As every area would be able to object to housebuilding if it 'has an impact on the local character'. If this was the case in the 1930s, my flat would never have been built. And perhaps I wouldn't have been able to afford to stay in London as the only properties available would be Victorian workers cottages, flats above shops and grand mansions.

I think that this does not bode well for young people. As my friend said, if he did not have the means to buy property, he would definitely leave the UK. This could potentially engineer a London style housing crisis even in affordable regions of the UK. Never mind about houses for young families, I think 50% of the population would be struggling to rent. I read a stat that 25% of renters are either returning to the family home or would do so within the next year. This is the situation in 2022; how much worse would it be in 10 years time?

And no increasing mortgage rates would not help with this. You need the supply.

@yoyy you are misunderstanding me based on my persistent sarcasm. OPs daftness has infected me. Your posts have been eminently sensible. I seem to have pissed you off, based on a misunderstanding when I agreed with you using the world 'ludicrous' meaning the OP, not your post!

Oh, I was thinking of low numbers of children but yes, I see that a lot of areas, it's a case of private schooling.

anyway OP, it sounded to me like you are saying "housing is too expensive so let's build on green space". Yes, expensive housing is a problem for all of us but starting your thread with ageism and blanket statements about who should do what, and strange comments about fields you think are pointless, didn't make me feel like you were posting in good faith.

yes, housing is mad but people have a lot less power than maybe you think. After 20+ years of trying to influence things, I have pretty much abandoned my efforts.

to those still making an effort, I salute you.

Most of the flats I see built anywhere around here (SW London) are aimed at what they like to call ‘young professionals’, not families with children.

And any new houses will typically be far too expensive for most people to buy, and mostly won’t be available to rent anyway.
Any new housing needs a good percentage of homes that are both affordable and suitable for families. I don’t necessarily mean houses with gardens, though to me that’s preferable for young children - but also flats that are big enough - not the bog standard 2 bed with a kitchen shoved in at one end of the living room and nowhere to put anything.

most of the wealth & power is held by the older people, they will cling to power till the bitter end, the govt will just keep on doing what the old set in their ways people want, otherwise they'll get voted out

@SamphiretheTervosaurReturneth I don't think it's coming across...😆

Lord save us from "energy and vision".

@EmmaAgain22 there are low numbers of children though..., There are more over 65s than u15s

@SamphiretheTervosaurReturneth i'm not offended don't worry 😉

sorry, that was a cliched turn of phrase🙏
I shall focus on improving my words and what have you😁

I do, any local, anywhere. Urban, rural. The same thing is happening. People are being displaced as much by lack of finances as choice.

The mega rich flock to London*. Displaced Londoners move as far out as they need to to make their finances work. Displaced locals move on displacing other locals and on and on. Until towns like ours have 3-tiers of living. Wealthy, moved in, money went further. Move ins and locals who have work, earn well, are comfortably off. Locals and displaced others with low/no income who can't afford to move on and have to make do, sometimes with very, very little.

Local Plans should have been in place decades ago, with more emphasis on maintaining communities, family groupings, affordable houses. Then no one diaspora would be the cause of many others!

*other metropoli are available

Not disputing it. Just saying the dominant age groups change over cycles as children grow, adults have more children, the eldest die etc.

I just feel like people have discussed the same issues since I was a teenager....meanwhile the population grows, we get told it will solve problems...it doesn't.

I didn't want to sound ageist but the thing is that the vast majority of people who are homeowners and live in those areas where there is space for gardens are older. Most homeowners are older. It sometimes seems to me that older people don't really care that younger people can't afford to buy homes; they just think that they can give money to their kids to buy their homes and all would be well. After all, thatcher said there was no such thing as society.I was trying to make the point that not having a younger population in the area you live in has detrimental effects on older people, including the home owners.

I don't think we should necessarily build on green space; as i said i own a flat and have zero desire to leave London. However I thought that since British people want houses so much, something has to give. i am not sure where else are they going to magic up all these house as i am fairly sure you can't convert old churches and shopping centers into houses.

'pologies!

Sorry, I just mean I have had enough of town planners with their "energy and vision", deciding that no one needs to use a bus but everyone needs Uber delivery and higher speed internet.

@EmmaAgain22 respectfully I don't think you understand. Our population is getting older & then it will shrink. Population growth in the west is largely down to longer life expectancy. It's a huge demographic shift for the UK & has massive implications.

Respectfully, I think we disagree about what constitutes a problem and about what brings quality of life. But that's okay, we are not in charge and trying to run a Cabinet together 😂

I’m not sure how many ‘British people’ you’ve actually spoken to!

Generation after generation have been able to afford a decent family home on one wage - until the government keep introducing smaller and smaller homes (flats) for more than the money our grandparents paid.

Basic one wage family could afford a house with garden. Why should our children accept a one bed flat in a bad area - on two wages and 35 year mortgage? How is that right?

The elderly have worked for their properties - should they sell up at a feed IOM if the price for some builders to transform them into tiny flats? Where they’ll be no parking, no schools and no doctors etc available?

The flats are causing the cities to become over crowed and quite frankly horrible places to be - who wants to walk 4 miles from one end to the other? What’s wrong with wanting everything local and on your door step including your own children and grandchildren?

It sometimes seems to me that older people don't really care that younger people can't afford to buy homes
I think they care....but they care MUCH more about maintaining their own standard of living and and enjoying the (unearned) wealth bestowed upon them by the housing bubble
human nature I guess?

The elderly have worked for their properties
hmmm, but isnt it more a case of unearned wealth bestowed upon them by the housing bubble?

Respectfully, I think we disagree about what constitutes a problem and about what brings quality of life.

What are you talking about?

my flat was built in 1933 so I am not sure how it is a new thing. the first flats were built in London in Kensington and they were built for middle class families and individuals.

My DH is British. his mum bought a 1 bed flat in z3 north london when she was 27 and her husband was 6 years older. We also bought our flat in z3 north london at 27 and 29 respectively. She bought a 3 bed terraced house 6 years after she bought the flat, we could afford to buy that house today as it is in the same price bracket as many of the larger flats I am looking at. I don't actually know anyone in my DH's mum's friend group who didn't start off with a small flat in London even in those days!

Why families can no longer afford a house with garden on one wage- well the world has changed. In the past, 1 pound converted to 5 dollars in my home country's currency. Now it is 1.7 dollars to a pound. It is why i moved to the UK, it was cheaper to study here than to study in the USA and Australia. Most of my mum's colleagues bought investment properties in London. Can you imagine what kind of discount they got when it fell from 2 dollars to 1.7? There is a growing middle class in Asia and they can all buy properties in the Uk. in my home country, 85% of the housing stock is government housing (so it can only be sold to citizens who don't own a private property). Basically what is ridiculous is that my parents cannot buy 85% of the property in their own country but can buy 100% of the property in the UK as long as they have the money for it. We could ban foreign ownership of property but it wouldn't make much of a difference as many of the houses bought for investment are owned by companies so who is going to drill down to the beneficial ownership of properties.

So if you can't limit foreign investment and you don't build, what this is going to lead to is a lot of pain for the ordinary people in the UK. At least if you build and you place a caveat that only UK residents can buy a property, it may ease some of the supply shortages. Even if you don't personally want to live in flats, different people have disparate needs. Limiting the building of flats is not going to get you a house. Conversely it may mean the opposite. If i couldn't afford a flat in suburban London, i would have taken my 400k elsewhere in the country and probably that would buy me quite a decent property in the north. There is a market for every property and it is better for housing supply generally if there are more homes (as long as it is not sold on for investment purposes).

what this is going to lead to is a lot of pain for the ordinary people in the UK
I've heard that they have some 'incendiary' solutions to this kind of thing in cornwall!

At the moment it seems a new estate is popping up every week, in every possible place they could cram one around here (Midlands town).

The problem is the population of the town is surging, but they never build new schools/doctors/dentists/hospital facilities /through roads. It very much seems like people are getting angrier and are having to scrap over the underfunded resources that are being shared between an exponentially increasing number of people.

I think that’s where all the ‘immigrant’ and ‘full’ rhetoric is coming from. It’s actually that there is a push to increase the population, but no extra funding to the services needed to sustain it.

I fear that this could happen in the UK on a mass scale if something is not done.

metro.co.uk/2022/08/02/cornwall-family-live-in-travelodge-because-renting-is-too-expensive-17110021/

Yes we should build social housing but we would not build enough to accommodate everyone who doesn't have a deposit. These people would be dependent on private rental. And if they are competing with people who earn well but who can't afford to buy despite having a deposit amidst a rental supply crunch, homelessness would only increase.

The housing crisis is so acute that we need a multi-pronged approach.

@socialmedia23

its good news. Brown field building only and no more concrete in the green belt and countryside.

the world needs us to live with less!

movely apartments with balconies like urban Switzerland