Housing - the silent crisis?

[CrisisTime]

The shocking state of housing in this country for anyone who didn't get on the gravy train in earlier decades, that is.

The homelessness. The sheer costs of housing. The tiny rooms and tiny houses. Storage rooms converted to miniscule 'bedrooms'. The dirt and dilapidation of so many rentals. Increasingly greedy landlords and letting agents. A cool house-share like The Young Ones would never exist now. The gentle landlord I once had (a vicar's wife) and her relaxed tenants - is no more. Just the sheer lack of decent affordable housing for so many.

300,000 more people coming to UK every year as well, which makes bad matters even worse, if they could be worse that is.

Is any politician from any party ever going to do anything on this issue? All I ever heard is daft initiatives that are a drop in the ocean.

it's very regional though. Tons of cheap houses for sale where I live. You can pick up a 2 or 3 bed from £50,000.

I moved from the North to the South East... had nothing but issues with housing in the South East since day one. Been here 6 yrs now. At the moment we're in the process of having to move from our 3 bed house with drive, garage and garden to a 2 bed pokey flat because the horrendous rising costs have forced it.

The most crushing bit is having to sell off our 4 yr old DSs garden toys... slide, swing, playhouse, trampoline. Im 35 soon, and I'm going backwards

It's not that bad here either. Private rents are around 25 quid more a week than SH.

Not everywhere is the south.

What's your plan OP?

Totally agree OP. I work in social housing. There's not enough affordable homes to rent and many people are unable to obtain a mortgage. This is a nationwide issue, although it's worse in London and the SE. Politicians just don't focus enough on housing, yet having a secure home is so important.

We need government incentives to build houses, of which there are none at the moment.

We also need central government to relax and intervene in droconian local planning regs.

Secondly, there is currently a crisis in the building industry because so few tradespeople have been trained/ entered the professions in recent years, and the quality of training for those who have has seriously deteriorated in quality.

So more immigration, of those vital trades, would be a huge step in the right direction

Probably a troll but just in case it is a guardian believer...

Yes, the landlords who rent out newly renovated properties for what a room costs in London , because there is something called market forces - and end up housing dealers for free for months while the place gets wrecked. (Not that it would be any more pleasant in London)

What was cool about the young ones house share? Great sitcom, but it was a filthy dump! It would also be grossly illegal now due to HMO laws. Would you like gas safe, electrical checks, fire doors etc etc rescinded?

Housing crisis - too many people, right to buy, no incentive to build or renovate affordable places , too much bias to the bottom right. All the usual stuff.

I agree Weather there are lots of cheaper homes outside of the south east and other urban areas and hotspots. Unfortunately, these aren't the places people want to live due to lack of employment or transport links etc. Meanwhile the south east is becoming unbearable due to rising costs, overcrowding and a strain on services.

I live within 20 minutes commute to Cardiff in South Wales. Both houses for sale and for rent prices are shooting up. When I was looking for somewhere to rent a year ago every house we saw for rent went within a day or two, and the rest were too expensive or clearly owned by slum landlords. They still exist.

A mate of mine had to leave with her children in the middle of the night with her 3 children due to domestic violence. There wasn't a hostel space available so she had to camp out on friends sofas (with DC) for six weeks before temp housing was found.

I looks like the next time we have to leave out rental (LL selling blah blah) we might be priced out of the area and have to move DD to a new school. I just hope its after she finishes her GCSE's in the next couple of years

Can anyone please explain why people who are paying such expensive rents, whilst interest rates have never been so low & for many a mortgage would be cheaper than renting, the banks seem to be making it virtually impossible to get a mortgage without a huge deposit, but due to such huge rents, saving for a deposit is beyond most people.
I don't understand why this is not being addressed, apologies if I am being incredibly stupid but seems to me this situation is just fuelling the housing crisis.

What's your plan OP?

Build more houses to start with, re stock council house numbers. Rent capping, no more buy to let. High taxing on people who own 2 houses. Rent quality schemes. Long term rent tenancy agreements.

dontcallmelen because why would banks lend more than they are comfortable doing? They can't just say well let's forget the deposit, we'll take all the risk and you can have a nice house?

There were 100% mortgages but they're pretty highly regulated now!

I believe the government needs to stop propping up house prices with their various schemes, stop house purchases by overseas residents etc. We need the housing market to fall in the SE desperately.

We sold up and moved away for a better quality of life but can see our DC moving back as adults for jobs etc because we won't be able to help them out

3 bed on a sink estate here doesn't go for under £1000 a month

Paying your rent on time for years makes no difference to the credit agencies/mortgage people

No spare money for a deposit because of high rents. I pay more in rent for my 3 bed than lots of people do on their mortgage. Never missed a payment. It counts for nothing.

And all those people who say well you could move from the SE. I doubt my DCs dad would be ok with that, moving costs a fortune (fees/deposit), no job to go to, no support network and no school places until you have an address.

Crack down on BTL
Secure tenancies long term
Cut agency fees (the only positive thing the tories are doing for me at the moment)
Tax the fuck out of the 2nd home owners (yes even you "accidental" ones) - for accidental read - I wanted to make more money on it before I sell
More social housing
Crack down on abandoned/empty homes
Rent controls

Is there a crisis* ?

As long as housebuilders can buy large plots of land, and employ phased building (to fix the market prices of future build) then someone doesn't believe there's a crisis. And since it's been this way for a while now, someone seems happy with it. Else it would have changed.

(*=irony)

I disagree about needing immigrants for house building. It makes the housing situation worse. Our young people go to college to learn construction and to do apprenticeships and there are trained builders out there.

I don't know. We only bought ten years ago and have already paid off mortgage. It's the ones who start out with huge mortgages/properties that struggle.

Bizarre comment about the Young Ones. The joke was that their house was a shithole. And there are loads of house shares today, much cooler than that one.

You didn't mention the overseas buyers snapping up properties as a pension fund - not renting them out or living in them - not even having tenants who spend their money in the local area - same as second homes - they add nothing to the local aconomy others than 2 weeks a year

I agree OP, there is a horrendous crisis in housing, and despite politicians paying lip service to the problems for years, nothing effective is ever actually done.
Your phrase "silent crisis" has given me pause. There is awareness of the problem and yet those of us on the wrong side of the housing market don't seem to have a voice.
We are not being heard. Perhaps we need to roar!

Politicians won't do anything from the housing crisis because many of them benefit from the crisis.

I put the price I paid for my flat 9 years ago into Rightmove today - nothing available. 9 years ago there was a choice of loads of flats / houses for this price. How anyone keeps up is beyond me.

YaSOnbu! I wake up at night in a panic sometimes worrying about when the next section 21 is coming, we really struggle to manage rent and bills as it is and have nothing put aside for the next lot of fees and deposit let alone the increased rent (prices are astronomical here and have rocketed over the last few years). We work hard and have nothing to show for it, no luxuries, no stability for the children and ultimately our lives are not our own when our landlord has this much power over us. I despair about what will happen to us in the future, with no hope of getting a council place or a mortgage there is no way off this horrible treadmill and there are thousands more like us out there. The situation just isn't fair.

The problem is that there are either too few houses or too many people as I'm sure no one is arguing there's any form of monopoly going on.

We can either build more houses or have fewer people here. With either of those, the demand will drop and so will prices.

@Astro55

Ah, you're blaming the foreigners.

Rent capping is bad economics and will simply lead to a shortage.

Also, how do you plan to reconcile rent capping with increased taxes on those with second properties? Do you really think those people will hold onto their properties while paying extortionate tax and getting a poor ROI? Of course they won't. They'll sell the house at market value (too high for the average Joe, hence the current issue) and you'll be left in the same predicament, but with fewer rental options.