To be conflicted by the crackdown on 2nd homes

[chairz]

I complete understand the problems they cause & do agree with a higher levy but thenI have used holiday cottages lots of times in the past & plan to in the future.

Edit: Merchant bankers {Autocorrect}

What an idiot! I’m mortgage free and doing ok but I don’t need to screw over someone else’s community by owning a holiday home, for all the reasons that others have more eloquently explained.

If people with money are discouraged from owning these homes by taxation, they will simply find a more constructive investment vehicle for their money. Something more useful that generates high quality jobs such as renewable energy. Tourism is renowned for its seasonal, poorly paid jobs. I don’t see the point of the recent expansion.

Thanks for calling me a moron, I promise you I am nothing of the sort.

I said that most people start off on an equal footing, the percentage of people inheriting property or being given large deposits is much smaller than those who are not.

No need for me to be sent off to read about genuine people who are really struggling with what cards they have been dealt, I’m well aware thank you. But yet again this is a small percentage of the population. There is a much larger middle ground, some of whom have done well, some less so, and some not at all.

My gripe is with the mean spirited people who have probably not done so well but really resent people who have so the answer in their view is to punish them by making them pay more…taxes, rates, anything to bring them down a bit. It is nasty but this thread is full of it, does it make the ‘have not’s’ feel any better, I doubt it.

For the record, I live in a tourist area in a very expensive part of the country but a lot of affordable homes are being built which much help. Parts of this area are heavily reliant on tourism and I doubt that they would survive without it. There are a lot of businesses who are able to survive and service the local community because of the income from tourists that come to the area for around six months of the year not just for the summer holidays. There are a lot of holiday homes but the tourists need somewhere to stay and caravan parks are not popular with the locals.

I also have adult children who will need to buy homes, they are working hard and saving for a deposit because they are well aware that they need to do this themselves, I’m not a fan of handouts. Our help to them comes in the way of support on a daily basis, they need to make their own way and be proud of their achievements.

I said that most people start off on an equal footing, the percentage of people inheriting property or being given large deposits is much smaller than those who are not.

Is it?

"In 2021 the percentage of first-time buyer home sales with family assistance rose to a seven-year high of 46 per cent with an average of £56,150, up from 43 per cent in 2020 and 39 per cent in 2019. This will rise again next year to 47 per cent in 2023, Savills forecasts."

And I think the average gifted deposit is 32k

That isnt accurate

Holiday homes= no demand for schools, shops or GP or buses
They close and then no-one wants to live in a village without a school where 75% of the home are not lived in and there is no community.

The Ocado vans and the cleaning teams from the town 40 miles away show that they do not create local jobs (and you cant afford a £350K 2 bed cottage in rural Yorkshire on a cleaners wage)

It is accurate. If tourists can’t stay in an area, they won’t go there.

Holiday homes cause issues for sure, but to suggest that tourist areas will do just fine without them is false.

@BoredZelda - I live in a tourist area that was doing just fine, in terms of visitor numbers, before every man and his dog decided to do AirBnB.

Families have nowhere to go as the landlords have sold up - with little notice - to sell (to people who want second homes and who have pushed local prices up even more) or to use for holidays lets.

Now there are far too many tourists - it’s horrendous already, even walking through the local towns, and we aren’t in peak season yet. The drs surgeries and hospital can’t cope. The supermarkets run out of food. The fuel runs out on “changeover day” as the tourists fill up to go home..and there are are huge queues for the garages that have any left.

There are barely any waiters, chefs, bar staff.. so many small businesses stopped opening in the evening/reduced days last year because they didn’t have the staff to open, so they lost profit there. These staff no longer exist as they cannot rent accommodation locally. The businesses trying to stay open put their wages up to try and compete for the staff available. These businesses are not benefiting from the mass influx of tourists, they are struggling to stay afloat.

Business is booming for cleaners though!. Prices have increased from £12ph to £20ph in the last year. There is more to be made from cleaning holiday lets than there is from other jobs in hospitality… affecting local businesses who are already struggling for staff… and so on.

We stay in the same two bedroom cottage every year on the Isle of Skye. It’s 20 mins drive away from the nearest shop, an hour’s round trip from the nearest supermarket and school. Wouldn’t make an ideal family home.

Might be ideal for someone.
A person or couple who want to downsize after retirement? Selling their family home to do so?
You just never know.

Now there are far too many tourists - it’s horrendous already, even walking through the local towns, and we aren’t in peak season yet. The drs surgeries and hospital can’t cope. The supermarkets run out of food. The fuel runs out on “changeover day” as the tourists fill up to go home..and there are are huge queues for the garages that have any left.

Must be awful to have income from people who want to holiday in your area.

Good point, @BoBoredZelda - would people who live in tourist areas genuinely not want anyone coming to visit and spend money?

I live in a touristy area (northern national park), and tourists are welcomed here, but it's not our only industry. It's not even our biggest industry - there's obviously farming, but we have plenty of businesses operating in the local market town (one of which is the HQ site of a national company). Those currently provide more jobs (and better paying jobs) than tourism does, but if workers stop being able to afford homes in this area, that could change. And it wouldn't be a change for the better.

Aside from cafes/restaurants and things like the steam train, many of the attractions here are free - hills, rivers, waterfalls, crags. A tourist going walking in the hills isn't necessarily contributing that much in monetary terms (that's not to say they aren't welcome, but I think it's important to be realistic about the level of spending we're talking about).

There is plenty of accommodation (lots of people camp, and there is a campsite just up the road). B&Bs, glamping and accommodation pods/lodges are also popular.

The people who rock up on a Friday night to stay in their second home, their shopping already ordered for the weekend, contribute pretty much the square root of bugger all to the local economy.

Unfortunately none of which would suit us!

As a PP said, we want a kitchen wherever we go - which usually rules out hotels in the UK, B&Bs and Pubs with rooms. My camping days are over and my experience of a static was horrendous. Holidays are meant to be pleasurable not an endurance. Which is why we book Apartments or houses.

I agree my wish for a holiday doesn't trump someone's need for a home, but holidaymakers do bring money.

Now if UK hotels and B&Bs could be persuaded to include kitchens and family suites like abroad it would be a start.

@BoredZelda and @Maireas - It is a good things. It’s important. I’ve never been negative about tourism, even when others are. I’m lucky to live somewhere beautiful and I want others to be able to enjoy it too.

But it’s unsustainable at the moment. There are normally 6 weeks when it is hard to drive anywhere or do anything. This year though, it looks like that already. There physically isn’t enough room for so many people to walk on narrow streets, not enough room in car parks for people to park. There is more and more accommodations available than before now on and more people choosing to stay in the UK.

It can’t be nice for people on holiday either. Would you want to stay somewhere where you feel like a sardine everywhere, are in gridlocked traffic if you want to go anywhere, and can’t eat out with your family as the pubs and restaurants have stopped serving due to lack of staff?

Don't get me wrong - I like seeing tourists around. It makes the place feel very cheerful, as people on holiday tend to be happy. I say hello to the tourists I see around just as much as I do to my neighbours (this is normal behaviour up north, for those who find it odd!). I go on holiday to other areas, and I am also a tourist when I go away - so no prejudice here.

But I wouldn't want my area to be dependent on tourist income for survival. There is a critical mass of local people which is needed to sustain a healthy community and diverse economy. Right now, my area has that, but I would hate to see it tip the other way (as has happened in many other areas, such as Cornwall).

The kind of jobs that a tourist industry brings tend to be low pay, low skill, low prospects, low security. Casual seasonal work that is great for young people on their summer break, but not so good for someone trying to generate a secure income to raise a family.

Surely all this is obvious?

Where is this hugely popular tourist area where people who live there and also visit there as a tourist cant get petrol, food in the supermarkets and where theres no waiting or hospitality staff to provide services so presumably theres nothing for people to do?

Also how does GPs surgeries come into it, are tourists registering for the week that they are on holiday?

We live in a tourist area, we moved here to buy somewhere we could afford as we couldnt afford to buy a house in London, I had a flat originally in London, the tourists are basically the only thing making something of the town, if we didnt have visitors the insular and backward nature of the thinking in the towns would take over.

Honestly just ask yourself whether you would like YOUR area to be solely dependent on a single, low paying, seasonal industry.

You wouldn't, would you? You definitely want a healthy, mixed economy in the area you live, so why begrudge people in tourist areas who want the same?

Yeh, but taking the tourists out won't make it a healthy mixed economy, would it?

People are confusing holiday lets
with second homes. There's an arguement that both are bad for local economies, but second homes are the more toxic. Second homes are empty most of the year and add nothing to the local economy except property inflation. Holiday lets at least give locals and income. Holiday lets needed the Covid grant; second home owners decidedly didn't!

how does GPs surgeries come into it, are tourists registering for the week that they are on holiday?

GP surgeries close when there aren't enough local residents to sustain them, which means worse service for those that remain.

Although, tourists do use walk-in centres etc. I presume this is what the poster referred to, as she didn't actually mention "GPs".

No one should have two homes until everybody has one

I had a flat originally in London...the tourists are basically the only thing making something of the town, if we didnt have visIitors the insular and backward nature of the thinking in the towns would take over.

Can't believe I just read this!

Yep

Yeh, but taking the tourists out won't make it a healthy mixed economy, would it?

That might be a good argument if I was arguing to remove tourists. But I'm not.

I'm arguing that an area shouldn't be allowed to lose the critical mass of locals (and therefore housing for those locals) that will sustain the community.

Upthread, I suggested that holiday lets should need permits, and that councils should cap the number of permits. Priority should be given to those holiday let properties which don't actually have permission for full-time residential use, and so couldn't be a local home regardless.

And they wonder why "DFLs" have a bad reputation 😂

(I grew up in London, so not anti-londoner at all, but that poster was a very bad example of one!)

To be clear, by my the way, when I use the word "locals", what I mean is someone who lives and works full time in the community.

They don't have to have been born there, or have family going back 3 generations, they just need to be currently living and working as a member of the community. They could have come from abroad, or the other end of the country - it doesn't matter.

This isn't about xenophobia or little-Englandism, but about sustaining healthy communities.