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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Original poster

To think Right to Buy discounts should be made fully portable?

105 replies

Arsenic · 15/05/2015 19:36

I.e. that tenants should be allowed to spend their discounts on the open market, rather than being obliged to buy the home they are in?

It would make sense in expensive areas (tenants can't afford to exercise their RTB due to rocketing values).

It would aid geographic mobility.

It would aid social mobility.

It would free up a lot of social housing.

It would even keep the Tories happy (higher value council housing vacated in London would presumably be sold of us per their announced plans).

Generally speaking, it would do a lot of good.

OP posts:
Jackieharris · 15/05/2015 19:42

So pay poor people to move out of London?

Original poster
Arsenic · 15/05/2015 19:46

I think the rules on the local schemes usually allow the money to be spent on shared ownership schemes Jackie, so it wouldn't necessarily have to play into the social cleansing agenda, no Grin

OP posts:
Original poster
Arsenic · 15/05/2015 19:47

But there aren't many local schemes.

I saw how stratospheric the prices of local ex-council flats now were and the idea of a national scheme struck me.

OP posts:
PtolemysNeedle · 15/05/2015 19:50

That would mean just giving people thousands of pounds. The discount is only a discount on market value, not the amount the property cost to build so councils aren't losing money by offering a discount, and they are be frothing because it's one less property they have to manage.Where do you expect all that money to come from? It makes no sense.

Original poster
Arsenic · 15/05/2015 19:59

It's buying the tenants out of a lifelong contract ptolemy.

There are tens of 1000s of homeless families being housed in extremely expensive B&B accommodation. Freeing up social housing units could house a lot of those families and cause huge savings to be made.

OP posts:
SaucyJack · 15/05/2015 20:03

Don't be ridiculous.

RTB doesn't actually cost councils any money in the short-term. They own the properties outright. They can sell them for 50p if they like without losing money.

Giving people money to spend on the open market would cost billions.

HaloKelly23 · 15/05/2015 20:05

Social housing is in a crisis right now, people are homeless and waiting lists are spanning years.

I'm in social housing and I don't agree with RTB whatsoever. It was right for it to be scrapped. I would love to buy my house and get on the property ladder but how will that affect future generations?! Nope, nope, don't like it!

I could be missing something but how will selling off social housing improve the situation??

Original poster
Arsenic · 15/05/2015 20:06

What do you think they pay the B&B bills with Saucy?

OP posts:
hamiltoes · 15/05/2015 20:08

Isn't the point in the right to buy that you can buy the home you have been living in for years Confused your idea doesn't make any sense to me.

While one house is sitting there its helping one family in need. If that family can buy the house they have lived in for years at less than market rates, the council can use the profit to build another house.

Now you have two familys being helped who are in need.

At least, thats how it should work.

SaucyJack · 15/05/2015 20:08

My RTB discount on this flat is worth about 75k.

That's a lot of B&B.

DontWorryBeHappyNow · 15/05/2015 20:09

Right to Buy discounts shouldn't exist at all. So YABU. Totally.

Original poster
Arsenic · 15/05/2015 20:09

I could be missing something but how will selling off social housing improve the situation??

No - the opposite.

Portable discounts would preserve social housing, making it immediately available to be re-let (apart from the very expensive stuff that the Tory g'ovt has decreed should be sold off when it next falls empty).

OP posts:
hamiltoes · 15/05/2015 20:09

Oh, and if you chuck swathes of money at people to buy on the open market all you'll find is prices rising because the demand is even higher that it would have been. Also, where is the council supposed to find this money? The discount money doesn't really exsist.

Original poster
Arsenic · 15/05/2015 20:15

Isn't the point in the right to buy that you can buy the home you have been living in for years confused your idea doesn't make any sense to me.

While one house is sitting there its helping one family in need. If that family can buy the house they have lived in for years at less than market rates, the council can use the profit to build another house.

Now you have two familys being helped who are in need.

At least, thats how it should work.

Yes, it should. And now that the money from a house sale is available to build another house (didn't used to be the case) that should be a very good thing.

BUT the council houses aroung the corner from me (lots of them) now have a market value of £750k, the flats about £500kish. So I can't see that working.

I'm really worried about the gulf that is going to open up.

OP posts:
DinkyDye · 15/05/2015 20:15

Right, so you're lucky enough to be in a council home, then to be eligible for RTB discount but you want to take that free money so you can buy elsewhere?

The world has gone made with entitlement.

Original poster
Arsenic · 15/05/2015 20:16

Right, so you're lucky enough to be in a council home, then to be eligible for RTB discount but you want to take that free money so you can buy elsewhere?

No. I pay a mortgage.

OP posts:
Original poster
Arsenic · 15/05/2015 20:21

I say gulf that is 'going' to open up. It's already opened up, clearly, but it surely must get worse, which I can barely imagine.

We will have two tenures, will we? - luxury and ghetto?

I was only able to scramble on to the ladder because of shared ownership and that was an expensive grind. I cannot begin to imagine being a FTB on a less than stellar income in London or the SE now. So the less-well-off will just stagnate.

OP posts:
FuckingLiability · 15/05/2015 20:25

I also don't believe RTB should exist, much less be portable. If there was £100K+ available to hand over to people just to vacate their council house, councils wouldn't be paying millions for emergency accommodation for all the people who can't be housed in social housing because there isn't any.

The only thing that would make more social housing available would be to build more social housing.

Affordable housing is not the same thing, but extending the RTB discount to housing associations is madness. Housing associations are essentially charities and the only organisations providing homes which are even vaguely within the reach of people on low incomes.

Original poster
Arsenic · 15/05/2015 20:30

This is the odd thing.

A council tenant thread from Harrow started a thread a few months ago saying she had been offered something in the order of £60k to vacate her home and buy elsewhere. I googled at the time and found about ten London councils offering middle 5 figure sums in similar schemes. So about half the maximum RTB discount, but clearly some councils are finding the money and consider that it makes financial sense.

OP posts:
Original poster
Arsenic · 15/05/2015 20:36

As for 'building more housing';

It's neither possible nor desirable to build much more in London.

Nationally, there is still a gap widening.

We need to be looking at a balance of tenures, I think and a range of ways of getting different types of tenants into different types of ownership.

OP posts:
DinkyDye · 15/05/2015 20:54

If you're eligible for RTB what mortgage are you paying? ?

Original poster
Arsenic · 15/05/2015 20:58

Dinky are you quite alright?

I'm NOT eligible for RTB.

You've decided I am.

OP posts:
DinkyDye · 15/05/2015 21:03

Ffs Arsenic. You asked about taking the discount elsewhere and then misquoted me. If YOU are not eligible then obviously my comment was not to you directly.

DinkyDye · 15/05/2015 21:04

Not sure why l bother with these arsey OP.

Yes I'm quite alright, are you? Hmm

Viviennemary · 15/05/2015 21:06

I don't even agree with right to buy never mind a portable one. How about giving anybody the right to buy a housing association or council house and it goes to the highest bidder and the money goes to build new houses. I don't think people would like that very much.

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