To hate landlords?

[MsPeachh]

Last month, I had to move suddenly. I found the flat I’m in now, it had just been bought by my landlord and I’m the first person in after the former owner moved out. It’s an ex-council house that the owner had purchased under “right to buy” and now I have to pay a third of my salary to a private landlord for what was originally meant to be affordable housing.

I’m a scientist in my late twenties with good qualifications and I feel total despair that I might never be able to afford my own home, and I will be lining someone else’s pockets via rent for the rest of my life. Let alone what anyone in a position less fortunate than mine is supposed to do.

To make matters worse, I looked up my landlord’s info on Companies House and I discovered that they have 22 properties in my area! It’s a village on the outskirts of a town where lots of people move when they are ready to move out of the hustle and bustle and settle to raise kids. And more and more of these properties are being snapped up by this landlord. It makes me sick, honestly. I know a lot of people become landlords accidentally in later life due to remarrying etc and ending up with two houses between one couple, but this landlord sucking up 22 houses in such a small area disgusts me. I feel like I’m completely losing hope for the future of people my age and younger as house prices keep soaring and soaring.

AIBU?

@december212 also find that landlords are easier to negotiate with regarding price compared to owner occupiers. As I was looking in expensive areas, owner occupiers often could not move without achieving a certain price and were usually stretching in terms of budget. Ex Landlords are chain free and often aren't so fixed on achieving a certain price. I don't know their reasons for selling, but i remember one seller saying she had to sell by XXX date because of taxes. So a lot of landlords selling is beneficial to first time buyers from my perspective.

Don't have anything personally against landlords, only the system, just sharing my perspective as a London FTB in 2019.

@Hopingforonlychild I agree with you that some properties are overpriced, due to demand by investors - be it for holiday homes, buy to let, university accommodation, etc. It must be very hard for first time buyers to get on the market now compared to say 15/20 years ago (back to 100%+ mortgage days).

Those not in a position to borrow need somewhere to live. In our town of 20k+ people there was recently only 3 social housing properties for rent. The only way this could improve is by the housing associations buying properties, which they won't. Without individuals/businesses letting residential properties there would be virtually no options for renters.

It sounds like you had some lucky escapes when buying in the past!

Your hate needs to be directed at successive governments who have failed to build anywhere near enough social housing, despite promising to do so

I don’t think we need to build the amount of properties that we think.
The properties are out there in many shapes and forms they are just not being deployed efficiently as the system works against getting people into homes
I was watching a programme about social housing.

Some is made up of people offering accommodation who wanted to work with the council to offer housing for those on benefits but the system the council had to work with worked against getting people housed

Can’t remember the exact details but even the housing officers thought the rules and regulations were just crazy.
It left not only those offering housing at risk but also the tenant wasn’t in secure long term accommodation. Even if it was what those offering the accommodation wanted

There would be a whole lot more social housing if people weren’t able to live in three bedroomed houses once all their kids have left home.

I know people will tell me “it’s their home” and why should they move but social housing is there for a purpose and should be used as efficiently as possible. My county has hundreds of families on a list and hundreds of single people/couples in their 60s knocking around in big houses they don’t need.

@Carrotcakey

There would be a whole lot more social housing if people weren’t able to live in three bedroomed houses once all their kids have left home.

I know people will tell me “it’s their home” and why should they move but social housing is there for a purpose and should be used as efficiently as possible. My county has hundreds of families on a list and hundreds of single people/couples in their 60s knocking around in big houses they don’t need.

Absolutely agree with that. It should be by need not by want. I need the 3 bed house for my family. Absolutely! I want the 3 bed house because I've lived here for long time. Sadly. No.

I have to say that I was surprised how this works here. Absolutely agree that it is inefficient.

It should be by need not by want
I need the 3 bed house for my family. Absolutely!
I want the 3 bed house because I've lived here for long time. Sadly. No

I happen to agree, but good luck with that given the howls of "you can't just uproot people!!". Nobody's suggesting tenants should be flung out at a moment's notice, but perhaps some change in expectations is called for

It seems to me that SH is either a valuable resource to be deployed properly or it isn't - and as said, we can't all have everything we want exactly as we want it all the time

It is infuriating when people demonstrate their brains are stuck on mindless chant mode. They do so when they respond to the word 'housing' by automatically parroting the words 'ladder' or 'affordable' or 'social' or even 'for young people'.

Breaking news: Not everybody conforms to stereotype, but everybody needs a roof over their heads.

I happen to agree, but good luck with that given the howls of "you can't just uproot people!!". Nobody's suggesting tenants should be flung out at a moment's notice, but perhaps some change in expectations is called for

My suggestion was you sign a lease for a council house/flat with sliding scales of rent depending how long you think you will need the property for. 5 years and that is a heavily subsidised rent, 25 years and that is a far higher rent.
No returning to the waiting list for a certain amount of time.

Urgent Appeal for clicking button 4. option, ( and adding note for 100%,) on an online form to tell the government what the public wants, in an Open Consultation on Housing Standards.

Closing in four days, there is a Public Consultation on Raising Accessibility Standards in Housing. Gov.Uk./ Housing, local and community/ Planning and building/ Building Regulations.

The aim is to choose option 4. Add in the 'comments' that 100% of all New Build Homes should be suitable for every kind of person and their families, who will in future occupy the home through the lifetime of the building .

The extra cost is £1,400 per home, which developers don't like. The reason it is needed is because the existing entire housing stock of the whole country has barely any fully liveable homes for people who may need to manage alone or with little help, when through illness, injury, permanent disability or accident, or extreme frailty in old age.

There is no reason for a thin, healthy, non wheelchair user to be offended by a home with doors wide enough for a bariatric wheelchair, nor by the space required for convenient turning circles for such a person to access all parts of the home. Wheelchair Liveable standards (M4 (3)) exclude nobody, but make homes inclusive for everybody.

There isn't enough money, nor enough segregated ghetto space, to shove every disabled or old person into 'care homes' or separate 'retirement' homes. (Every survey of older or disabled people shows they do N O T want to be sent away to a 'special' place, disconnected from the full range of normal human contact) Nor enough money to send care workers to attend to people who could manage unaided, if only their homes permitted it.

Just as properly enforced design, planning and building regulations would have prevented Grenfell, they could, if Mandatory, begin to stop the shoddy brick shoe box 'housing units' so profitable for developers and so loathed by inhabitants.

Yanbu

Oh dear, not another "public consultation" 20mum

For all I know this one might be the exception but I've been involved in too many, every last one an exercise in pretending to listen about something which has already been decided by those way above the pay grade of the opinion-takers

They're a good way to waste time and paper, though - just so long as there's enough storage space for all those ignored reports

There is no real economic output, no services were exchanged unlike hotels or serviced apartments, no goods were produced
How is it different? When you rent a place on BnB for your summer holiday, do you care what profit the owner make? Do you check the hotel company to see how good their profits and boycot them if they are wracking it in and shout that the hotel should be owned by the government so that children of poor families can afford to go on cheaper holidays? Of course not, but Landlords are vilified. Oy because they have something that some renters wished was their own.

If even heavier tax (bringing landlord profits severely down to the extent it is not economic) or legislation prevents a property being bought to let, and by "law of supply and demand", the property would sell and price would adjust to the point it is met by some "demand". At least the property would be owner occupied
Landlords are already selling, more than ever. Are we seeing prices going down? Nope! It does become owner occupied but by people who can afford to buy at today's proce. Meanwhile, those who can't have even less choice of properties to rent.

'housing units' so profitable for developers
as ever it's govt by the wealthy for the benefit of the wealthy

@Puzzledandpissedoff

It should be by need not by want I need the 3 bed house for my family. Absolutely! I want the 3 bed house because I've lived here for long time. Sadly. No

I happen to agree, but good luck with that given the howls of "you can't just uproot people!!". Nobody's suggesting tenants should be flung out at a moment's notice, but perhaps some change in expectations is called for

It seems to me that SH is either a valuable resource to be deployed properly or it isn't - and as said, we can't all have everything we want exactly as we want it all the time

The difficulty often is that there are in fact no smaller units to move to, depending on the LA's history of housebuilding. So what may sound "reasonable" is difficult to achieve in practice. Uprooting may mean moving many miles away.

The difficulty often is that there are in fact no smaller units to move to

Yes, I agree that can be a challenge - though as you say it depends on area

Thing is, though, that even if they were plentiful it wouldn't stop the complaints of "why should I move?", which seems to me to ignore some of the bigger issues

Or even be impossible because other LAs won't take people from out of area except with local connections.

The difficulty often is that there are in fact no smaller units to move to, depending on the LA's history of housebuilding. So what may sound "reasonable" is difficult to achieve in practice. Uprooting may mean moving many miles away.

It would assume it would be easier to build bunch of smaller units locally than same bunch of 3 bed houses.
I know 3 of the HA houses on my street and the next are 1 person only occupation. It was 4 until last year, but the old lady sadly died. So it may be a practical way to go.

@SchrodingersImmigrant

The difficulty often is that there are in fact no smaller units to move to, depending on the LA's history of housebuilding. So what may sound "reasonable" is difficult to achieve in practice. Uprooting may mean moving many miles away.

It would assume it would be easier to build bunch of smaller units locally than same bunch of 3 bed houses.
I know 3 of the HA houses on my street and the next are 1 person only occupation. It was 4 until last year, but the old lady sadly died. So it may be a practical way to go.

I'm afraid you would assume wrong. In the SE, where there is greatest pressure, the cost of land is outside most LA's pockets. Around here the only social housing flats built/converted in the past 10 years have been on sites already owned by the council - eg a close of LA bungalows was demolished and supported living flats built - so more units/acre, but of course they had to wait for the bungalows to go vacant, or they would have had to put people up whilst building.

No to mention the NIMBY effect on planning. I lobbied hard for a site near me to be turned over for social housing. The folk in the next street living in their bought council houses preferred a supermarket. That's what they got.

The answer is to abolish state housing. Housing benefit means you get help with rent according to your means A N D your housing need. You don't get a falsely cheap house for the rest of your life.
The end of the distinction between private and 'social' would help use the housing stock more effectively, and permit much more moving around according to need and preference, without officials barring the flexibility or the option of moving location.

As to the public consultation I mentioned, I truly think it would make sense because it only takes a moment to press option 4 on the online consultation. I cannot think who would positively wish to have new housing built to inferior and wheelchair user-excluding standards, merely so developers can make an extra £1,400 by building shoddy brick rabbit hutches. Inclusive housing means your double buggy gets round today, and your wheelchair gets round tomorrow

Housing benefit is just throwing money into a yawning chasm that gets bigger every year. We're already giving private landlords £12 billion a year. How much are we going to be giving them in 20 years' time when the first tranche of generation rent starts to retire and we're paying all of their rent at supposed market prices?

@AngryFishes the point is, housing benefit drains the public purse for a few months, while a person is between jobs, and unlike a council house, it doesn't go as a subsidy from the public purse to anyone for life, no matter how rich they become.
It also applies to a reasonable size of home, not a large one for life, no matter if their large family moves out soon after they get a large council house
It's also unreasonable that a council tenant has total lifelong security of tenure, as a perk for winning the lottery of entering an elite aristocracy of rentals. The excluded peasantry of poor disadvantaged private tenants, paying their own full rent, at market value, also pay into the public purse for flinging money at the council tenants 'aristocracy' . Meanwhile, they themselves can be thrown in the street at 8 weeks' notice.

We're already giving private landlords £12 billion a year. How much are we going to be giving them in 20 years' time when the first tranche of generation rent starts to retire and we're paying all of their rent at supposed market prices?
It's this attitude that money is thrown at Landlords for nothing that is polluting the matter.

It's not given to landlords, its paid to in exchange of something it is your boss just giving you money too?

@dontdisturbmenow

That really isn't the case. If it was you could simply pay for a property management company. A landlord is getting a return for their investment in the property. Many pay someone else to manage the property and simply skim the profit off the top. So by paying housing benefit we are providing a subsidy for landlords. Since housing is an essential and increasing scarce resource it shouldn't be left in the hands of private lanlords.

@20mum ah bless your heart. It's actually the other way around: housing benefit is a drain on the public purse forever while council houses pay for themselves relatively quickly.

The biggest group of Hb recipients are pensioners, then long term workless through disability or caring responsibilities, then workers whose household income is too low to cover what their landlord is demanding. The unemployed barely figure, for various reasons, and most people who get it do so for a long time.