To think foreign ownership of UK property should be tightly controlled?

[Arnoldthecat]

For those who live in the Manchester area, you cannot fail to be aware of the plethora of cranes that are swinging on the city skyline.

Over recent years Manchester and its borders with Salford have been subject to massive development,mostly involving the construction of tower blocks of flats.

The vast majority of these blocks are being financed by foreign investment, mostly from China and the middle east.

It often isnt possible to buy them off plan as an individual as they are already sold before a spade has been put in the ground.

Why is this happening? Well interest rates are low and due to QE and other factors in the global economy, investment companies are desperate to convert their intrinsically worthless paper money into tangible assets.

China is a mega global economy. It has a great disparity between rich and poor. It has a population of about 1.5 billion and a GDP of around $27.5 trillion. Strangley his only translates to around $19,000 per capita.

Essentially millions of chinese live poor lives,are paid little and exploited for the wealth of the elite. That money has to go somewhere.

On a local news program this evening, there was a feature about local mancunians being no longer able to afford housing. Mr Richard Leese, leader of the City's Labour council was asked about it. He deliberately dodged the issue by saying he welcomed foreign investment to the city.

The absolute truth is that Government and local authorities are very happy to welcome foreign investment to build flats because it brings them more income. What they dont care about is that foreigners are turning our OWN people into renters who will mostly never be able to afford a home in their lives.

The British people are becoming slaves to Chinese investors.

The programme researchers picked one particular block in the city and obtained the land registry details for all the flats in the block. The vast majority were owned by investment companies based in China, singapore, Jersey and the British Virgin Islands..only a handful were owner occupied and clearly the rest were rented out.
Why doesnt our Government do something for its own people??

God YES, agree 100%
Would also abolish UK nationals owning more than 1 home by way of massive taxation on BTL properties....I mean M A S S I V E like 80+ % taxation.

I think this all goes back to the fundamental truth of what that historian (sorry can't recall name) at Davos said - the super rich need to pay their taxes.

If it is preventing local people from being able to afford to buy or rent, yes.

You are ignoring the globalised economy and wanting to become isolationist, this line of thinking is comparable to why leave won.

That should show the situation is not a black and white situation. There is no quick fix here, and it is not drawn along political lines.

Lots of other countries ban or restrict foreign ownership.

I think non resident rather than non citizen. I'd prefer to see a home purchased by an immigrant living and working in an area than a British citizen who has no connections there and has no plans to.

I agree wholeheartedly @Uptheapplesandpears. I don't think a family house has been built anywhere near the centre of my town for a very long time but there have been at least 3 high rise blocks of luxury flats built in the last three years where not one of the flats was available to buy at any point, as the whole block is owned by overseas conglomerates who see this as an asset only. They have all been managed by the same estate agent too . It's shocking. We were priced out of the area my DH has lived his whole life despite earning way over the national average salary.

I’m sure I have read recently that Chinese govt is restricting investments outside a China due to too much money leaving the country- so likely to see a drop off in new investments.

UK pension funds do the same thing, build blocks of luxury flats purely to rent out.

Foreign ownership is a national policy. Get others to invest in our infrastructure. See power stations.

Why arent UK housebuilders putting in this investment? Answer,,because they are far too busy gorging themselves on the money of taxpayers gifted to them via the bent and corrupt help to buy scheme. Recent stats showed that the profits of the likes of persimmon and taylor wimpey were circa £1billion and that for each house they build they net a profit of around £60,000 .All built on the back of uk taxpayers. Thats ALL taxpayers,rich or poor,even those who cant afford a home and are forced to rent privately or via social housing. Their tax take being used to line the pockets of uk housebuilders. Thos vultures are on one side and on the other side the vultures in the form of foreign investcos and wealthy individuals investing via tax havens,,bolstering their already huge wealth. Capital flight from useless paper money to tangible assets in the UK. UK people enslaved and no one to fight their corner..