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.

katy in the NW agricultural land is about £2-3k an acre. With a house built on it, each acre is worth about £300k. Bear in mind it costs about £200k to build the home and separate garage properly.

I could put 2 homes on each acre but then the value drops to £250k. I would get £500k but it would cost me about £400k to build the places out.

My profit is the same with one home as two. It is certainly not like winning the pools. I will be doing well to make £40k from building a home which is mid project now. After taxes that £40k profit shrinks to £24k as I'm currently residing in the US and have to pay 40% tax on that profit.

I would prefer to win the pools!

Of course I could build a crappy home for less but that isn't the way I do things. I sleep at night knowing everything is done properly and my buyers/renters are safe.

The big builders cut a lot of corners. It's insane and I have no idea why planners are inspecting more. Some of these homes are glorified sheds with the way they are build.

want2b - I think my dad was putting 10-16 houses per acre
Low(er) cost housing

Super Mum - I think Katy's value is the one that the landowners receive, not the developers.

10-16 units per acre isn't going to be big enough units for the majority of people and for the land in most areas where there is agricultural land. It's not great to build up so high as then you start needing elevators which are expensive to maintain.

Also it's too many units if you include parking. In most areas with agricultural land you do have buses but each household will still need a car. Each unit needs at least 1.5 parking spots as you need to accommodate guests, tradespeople etc who will visit once the units are occupied.

It's this sort of planning that most people fail to think through. Yes build two bedroom units but make them at least 1000sqft with at least 100sqft of outdoor space for each unit. You should be able to fit a table, 4 chairs, a BBQ and a laundry airer on the balcony.

Just because it's affordable housing doesn't mean the aesthetics and practicality shouldn't be considered. I've read studies that showed better mental health of residents in 500sqft per person compared to 400sqft per person who had better MH than those who lived in 300sqft per person. It's really hard to do a 2bed for less than 1000 sqft and have proper storage as well as a feeling of space once occupied.

Also 1000sqft for a 2bed means better spacing for making it properly suitable for a wheelchair when you are building.

There is a lot of evidence to suggest green space & watching nature helps with mental health.
If you built maisonettes circa 1950's style, gardens out the back drives at the front. They would be suitable for old, young, single, small families the environmental impact (and flood risk) lessened as you could plant hedges not fences. People get the mental health benefits of having a garden and access to wildlife. Kids get to have a trampoline and a rabbit, people get to keep their dogs or cats.
It all adds up to a happy community.

Just to add that new builds are tiny.

Our (2-bed) bungalow is 1,400 sq. ft of usable interior space.

Just for lolz (?) we looked at loads of new builds near us (the ones we could actually access, as quite a few thought gravel car parks were de rigeour which isn't brilliant for wheelchair access). Even the 4-bedroom houses were no more than 1,200 sq. ft. Which you have to subtract the staircase from ...

And as for "garages" ... they're not. They're just glorified sheds. If you can't open the car doors fully, it's not a garage.

There is a lot of evidence to suggest green space & watching nature helps with mental health. If you built maisonettes circa 1950's style, gardens out the back drives at the front. They would be suitable for old, young, single, small families the environmental impact (and flood risk) lessened as you could plant hedges not fences. People get the mental health benefits of having a garden and access to wildlife. Kids get to have a trampoline and a rabbit, people get to keep their dogs or cats.
It all adds up to a happy community.

(Puts Tory hat on)

No, you're not selling it to me. How much profit again ?

Government would need to pay the difference in interest rate but I don't see that being a huge amount.

Household debt currently is approximately equal to our gdp and mortgage debt is upwards of 80% of that. So, it would in fact be a massive chunk.

Who can realistically afford the sort of housing this government are offering?

nobody. the government has set up a game where instead of investing in industry and wealth producing ventures, the best game in town is housing. So, locals are competing with foreign investors.

I agree that recent new builds can be ridiculously small but the square footages mentioned above by want2b and lurkinghusband are unrealistically large for urban dwelling.

The thing about new builds is that they have all been designed to use what would have been loft space in an older design of house as living space instead.

We are in a 1930's ex council 3-bed semi which is just over 700 square foot. Only 3 of us but it would be perfectly adequate for a family of 4.

Nearby new-build 3 bed houses are all typically 900 square foot but across 3 levels and no loft storage. On the same footprint and style our house would be a 4 bed and would be just over 1000sq ft but we couldn't extend upwards ourselves as the roof is so low-pitched that there isn't room for a building-regs compliant loft extension.

Meanwhile there seems to be no such thing as a new build 2 bed house any more in urban areas. All 2 bed new builds are apartments of less than 600sqft (discounting the "luxury" 2 bed apartments that are more spacious but cost twice the price and are unaffordable for normal people) and you have to look right at the edge of town or in more rural developments for a 2 bed house.

I see in today's news local pollution levels are now becoming asked about more when people buy a property. Again many people will tolerate an hour's commute because they want to live further into the country. I am in outer London but have a wood opposite.

I would like the stare to allow private citizens in cities with housing shortages to buy state owned unused land (there is tons of it) for housing. Even if the housing were let out to tenants at least that is making more homes available and if there are lot then rents would fall too due to the competition.

The suggestion in the press is that inner cities (currently most expensive) might fall in value as people want better air quality which is fascinating as my area of outer London was mostly build in the 1930s to get people out of smog and the East End and slum housing for proximity to fields and fresh air. Then we had a phase of young people just wanting to live right inthe very centre of London and perhaps now they will see that commuting is not such a nuisance if it gets you cleaner air.

I see in today's news local pollution levels are now becoming asked about more when people buy a property. Again many people will tolerate an hour's commute because they want to live further into the country.

There is a certain irony in that ...

lurking
I see that irony, and I think its half of diesel gate isn't it. Everyones had to move further out from their work for cheaper housing. So where people lived and worked in the same community, thats gone now. An hour or two commute is the norm to central business points.
Again this comes back to why smaller developments work, if every town /village built a street of council houses/ maisonettes. Communities could stay together, you wouldn't build yet more commuter towns where people HAD to work an hour away (ok some would due to choice / nature of their work, but some wouldn't).

An hour or two commute is the norm to central business points.

What happened to the teleworking I was developing in the 80s and 90s ?

Oh yes. It was bollocks.

Lurking people like bums on seats where they can be seen.

Lurking people like bums on seats where they can be seen.

Oh, I know ... because someone who has struggled through a 2 hour commute is soooo much more engaged than someone who started as soon as they got up.

When the BoE chap was slating UK businesses last week for being "mediocre", I would venture this is one example he had in mind.

Yeah I know all about that, I did a 2-2.5 hour each way commute for 1.5 years. My first job let me work from home 1 day per week out of pity.

peuk To be clear when I say 1000sqft I'm talking about storage too. So your home being a 3bed at 700sqft doesn't include the storage which is at least another 200-300sqft of space. Personally I'd put two large bedrooms in that space rather than smaller bedrooms.

I agree that recent new builds can be ridiculously small but the square footages mentioned above by want2b and lurkinghusband are unrealistically large for urban dwelling.

I think we'd be classed as more suburban ...

We could only afford out here 30 years ago (end of tube lines) and it was an hour door to door (I allow 90 minutes and am very early for important meetings however) then and remains so today and it still is as it was then - 1930s semis like many suburbs of London so it's not that people have a longer commute. I work mostly from my house so yes the telecommute thing has worked for me.

My son bought a small house which was built before the 1920s, probably earlier. The nice thing about that is there is a loft (the neighbours have made theirs into an extra bed room) which he could convert and just more space all round compared with new builds.

Also, when building a home you need to think about living standards. I always put in a vented dryer. It doesn't have to be used but it's great to have it if you need it. A dishwasher is standard as is space for a bath tub. I would never build a place with no room for a bathtub.

I see it now in Denmark with small bathrooms being a significant issue for the elderly and disabled. They are tiny with no space for a bathtub. You literally have 2.5ft from the edge of the toilet to the wall. Everything gets soaked when you shower and it's hard to wipe it all down.

I see it now in Denmark with small bathrooms being a significant issue for the elderly and disabled. They are tiny with no space for a bathtub. You literally have 2.5ft from the edge of the toilet to the wall. Everything gets soaked when you shower and it's hard to wipe it all down.

Could they not be converted to a wet room ?

They are a wet room already. They are just way too small for someone who has mobility issues.

I think that while quite clearly houses have to be potentially accessible for people with disabilities that we are a small island with lots of people and unless we concrete over the whole thing our houses need to be compact. Most new builds are perfectly adequate, I live in one myself.

I think that while quite clearly houses have to be potentially accessible for people with disabilities that we are a small island with lots of people and unless we concrete over the whole thing our houses need to be compact.

How much of the UK do you think is " concreted over" ?

Turns out it's an average 3%

www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-18623096

And as others on this thread have suggested, we don't need more land wit houses standing empty as it is ...