Affordable houses

[LetsTalk33]

Hi, posting here for traffic. We're moving to another area that we are no familiar with and during a viewing this past weekend on a new development we noticed that a good amount of the houses for selling there were marked as affordable housing. We don't know what that means. Are those the same as council houses? Does anyone has experience with buying property around affordable houses that could share, please? Can it devalue the houses around it that aren’t classified as affordable housing?
(The house we were viewing was a full priced house, so the place is a mix of affordable houses and full priced ones; it has around 90 houses being built.)
Any input is much appreciated. Thanks!!

Developers have to give over a certain percentage to affordable housing or they won't get planning permission.
I think it can mean council / housing association tenants and also shared ownership (part rent part buy).

Have no idea about housing values I'm afraid.

The government definition of affordable housing states it must be provided at a level at which the mortgage payments on the property should be more than would be paid in rent on council housing, but below market levels. taken from BBC website.

Councils normally set a minimum % of properties in a development to be "affordable" as part of planning permission. They could be subsidised for keyworkers, either for sale or rent, part ownership or reserved for a housing association to rent to those on their list.

You would have to find out from the developer what kind of affordable housing it is. It can be anything from shared ownership i.e. people who part buy, part rent, or housing association rentals.

There are some old threads on the same subject like this one, with varying opinions.

www.mumsnet.com/Talk/am_i_being_unreasonable/1775797-to-buy-a-new-house-next-to-social-housing

A recent new development in our village had some affordable homes built as a requirement of the planning permission. We looked into it as a possibility when we wanted to buy a house and most properties were given to local people and families on the housing register (we weren't so couldn't apply). A few were sold as part rent/part buy with housing associations but there was huge demand for them.

In our area it's the same as you, affordable properties mixed in. However some of the rental ones here require a minimum income of at least £2000a month because the rent on them is £800+. So here the affordable doesn't mean anyone on the Housing register will move there, those working will.

Planner here... affordable housing is included in almost all new housing development. Depending on where you are depends on the amount. In the south east this is around 40%.

Affordable housing includes shared ownership, key worker, social rental and intermediate rental. It is generally clustered or pepperpotted through new developments in generally clusters of 6-10 units (excluding flats). The best developments ensure they are tenure neutral I.e. that you can’t tell the difference between them and market housing (although there are always tell tale signs including where the car parking is located, size of rear garden, shed in garden and fences between rear gardens).

I previously lived in a shared ownership property. We both have good jobs but needed both of us to work to afford the mortgage and rental payments.

At the end of the day there is a stigma still associated with social housing (I’m surprised the developer told you what those properties are, normally they just say that they are sold!). What I hear in meeting with developers is horrendous, but not as bad as it was!

So whatvimpact could it have on you? Some, little or none - it all depends on who moves in and that is exactly the same as a market house next door whether rented or purchased. The difference is that if there are any significant problems there are complaint chanels through the housing association (or council if they manage them).

Thank you so much for all the replies!!!

Mouikey, the developer didn't tell us about it, but they gave us a brochure with the site plan when we left, and the plan shows all the affordable houses clearly marked!

If there is a shortage of housing where you are going, it’s unlikely to make much difference. The houses will be wanted by buyers. If you want to preserve value, don’t buy new.

@Mouikey how can a fence/shed and where a car is parked be telling? Genuinely interested, I thought a fence was a fence and a shed a shed. And all the Housing on our estate is allocated spaces unless you have a drive, that's the same for all houses no matter whether they're SH or mortgaged.

getting a parking space at all in london is usually reserved just for the private sale units as they're valuable. it closer to the house - more valuable than others which can go to the affordable ones.

I would love someone to show me how ‘affordable / shared ownership properties in London are in anyway affordable for those who otherwise would not be able to buy!

It is very easy to tell the difference. Certainly its plainly obvious after a few months. The paint will be wearing off the doors quickly. The door handles letter boxes etc will look cheaper. Fencing will be of poorer quality. Drains loose all that sort of thing.

What I mean is if you stood in the street the houses would all look identical say all green doors and silver letterboxes and white fences. But the finish will be noticeably different. This is in response to a poster up thread.

Affordable housing stock for direct sale is generally 80% of the market value.

Shared ownership or social housing will have different options/pricing

Affordable housing currently on the market where I live is too expensive for us to buy.

I do know a few families who have purchased both affordable and standard properties on the same development. There is a big difference between them on this development (I've listed these below) but offer the same number of bedrooms.

Affordable housing is only terraced or semi-detached. Standard housing also has detached as an option.

2 parking spaces and a double/tandem garage for standard houses. 1 space and single garage for affordable.

Both front and rear gardens for standard homes, just small rear garden for affordable.

Nice wooden fencing with nice finish to standard homes, rough looking/economy fencing for affordable.

2 en suites in the standard homes, 1 ensuite in affordable homes.

3 good sized bedrooms in standard, 2 good sized and a nursery/box room in affordable homes.

Seperate kitchen, diner, living areas in standard, open plan living/kitchen/diner in affordable.

The rooms are bigger and spec is higher in the standard homes. The choice of finishes is greater on the standard homes.

The affordable housing is priced at £200,000 - £260,000. This is unaffordable for us and most people locally (theres over 600 properties for less than £150,000 within 1 mile of here). The standard housing starts at £240,000 and goes up to £520,000 for a 5 bed detached.

All greenfield usually has 40% affordable and brownfield it’s usually 30% affordable.

Selling a property directly bordering a HA property can be difficult because of the stigma. If you are worried buy one a few doors down, or on another side of the development as they are usually clustered. You can usually spot a HA property from the street as they are not usually given much front garden and don’t usually get given lawn space out the front. Sometimes the fencing is lower quality, same with fixtures and fittings to the front. They also don’t come with garages but often come with a shed.

There are some affordable homes near us, it's never made any difference and if we hadn't been told we wouldn't know. The ones near us aren't council, they are housing association joint ownership, though I'm not sure if it makes a difference or not. The only give aways here (which I learnt of only recently) are that they must all be supplied with a lockable shed in the garden, a door number ready fixed and they have only one parking space, no garage.

Thanks statetrooperstacey that makes sense and is blindingly obvious now you've pointed that out. There are very few front gardens on our quite large estate, 90% of the houses I'd say have either less than a metre of 'garden' or just strips and straight onto the pavement front doors.

I purchased a house between two refurbished council houses. I very much regret it. Although these properties looked very smart at the time, less than two years later they are absolute shit tips, I mean absolutely trashed. Both gardens either side of mine are full to capacity with rubbish, are completely overgrown with weeds and brambles, old furniture, carpets, pizza boxed, alive with rats and are a complete eyesore. My garden is surrounded by a wall of 4m high brambles. It has to be seen to be believed. They look like they belong to the worse kind of slum landlord. My advice would be not to take the risk with your own money. oh and yes it will lower the value of your property: it's written in black and white on the valuation for my property, something along the lines of "the price refects the proxitiy of council owned housing" or something like that.

We bought on a new build estate last year and there are a few affordable houses on it, too. You can tell which ones these are because they all have solar panels and electric car charging ports as standard.

They are just like all other residents on the street, apart from the things I mention above, there are no differences (on our estate).

When we were waiting to complete and visited the sales office to do our 'finishing touches' there was a guy in there looking at the site plan and asked what the "white houses" meant. The sales lady explained these were the affordable housing. He actually pulled out of reserving one property in particular because it was on the same street as some affordable housing

We bought a full price home in a development that is 40% affordable housing outside of London, which is a mix of shared ownership and council dotted around the development.

The biggest issue on our development is that many of our full-price neighbours constantly complain about the anti-social behaviour from a handful of those living in the affordable housing (90% are lovely young families). It doesn’t bother me at all but to be fair there are a few households who produce a decent amount of noise, arguments, police presence, litter, mild graffiti etc on the development. It seems to be just a clash of personalities/lifestyles between those neighbours who didn’t realise that the development would have the occasional anti-social social housing family in the mix before they paid £550k for their home!

If it bothers you I’d think carefully before going ahead.

Shared ownership works as being affordable (in some sense of the word).

in london a 600k 2 bed property can be sold for say a 25% share.
you own/ mortgage that 150k which would cost you around £500 pcm and then pay around 2.5% rent on the unsold share. say £900pcm, so £1400 total pcm to live there.

You may not ever be able to qualify for a 600k mortgage outright or if you did you would be looking at a £2300 pcm cost for the full value (if using same mortgage % costs i used on the first calculation)