Jeremy Vine - people are morally obliged to downsize and free up property

[JoanThursday1972]

Currently have this on the radio. Suggestion is that people are not entitled to remain in and live in the house that they have bought and paid for. That they should downsize and free this up for more deserving occupants, ie families.

This is surely a personal choice and not an obligation? Anyone is entitled to live in a house they have bought, regardless of size.

I’m questioning the subsidised point

Its often thrown around on here like council tenants are living for free while everyone else pays £££££

The fact it’s lower cost isn’t the same as it being actively subsidised.

The thing with moral obligations is that you either feel it or you don't, depending on your own moral framework. And every person's morality is for them to establish and determine.

They're not making it obligatory so if you don't want to move, can't for whatever reason, or don't feel it's necessary, then don't.

I'm no 'Boomer' 🙄but rather on the cusp between Gen X and the Millennials, and DH and I have more bedrooms than we 'need'. However, we bought larger than we 'needed' because we weren't certain whether or not we'd have children, and though we never did, we've used those rooms for various purposes over the years. Home gym, office for wfh, hobbies, etc. We had only a tiny space before this house, and it was fine, but I'd never want to go back. I have too much stuff, now, that I love and want to keep using, and it all takes room.

Morality doesn't come into it, imo. We paid for our house, and it's our home. I don't feel morally obligated to give it up and take a smaller house. People prioritise different things. We have a large house (for two people), but we haven't spent as much on other things (travel, fashion, dining, cars, etc.). Why should we feel guilty about that?

This

IMO, would be to stop foreign nationals from buying up properties and either leaving them empty, or renting them out at huge rents.

It's not just foreign nationals though. I believe 1 in 7 over 70s own a second property, that's a lot.

I live alone in a 3 bed house. Would be willing to downsize to 1 bed if I could have a large garden. Couldn't cope with flat though.

He’s surely controversial on purpose - anything to get people frothing at the mouth.

People are going to get taxed out of properties they don't need by energy prices and rising council tax.

Plus maintenance costs are going through the roof.

Don't really need any moral obligation nonsense.

"From each according to his ability, to each according to his needs"

Exponential population growth has meant insufficient supply on a small island...Who would have thought?

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-462092/Britains-gardens-threat-Prescotts-rules-allow-new-homes-built-green-spaces.html

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-440794/Thirty-thousand-gardens-year-torn-Prescotts-policies.html

http://news.bbc.co.uk/today/hi/today/newsid_8729000/8729919.stm

It seems to have been about legally designating gardens as brownfield sites & thus allowing several houses to be built where there had previously been just one house & a large garden. So not compulsory purchasing, though that's the way I seem to remember it being presented in the media. (And no criticism for the DMail links, please - I was a Guardian woman in those days!).

We should have detracted not multiplied. Problem is multiplication is fun and rewarding in a welfare state.

I think old couples who love in massive houses while families have to squish into tiny ones should not be feel a moral obligation to downsize, no. But they should definitely not be the type of nimbys that they are round my way. Constantly objecting to any and all planning applications that could actually end up with more homes for people that need them. There's a guy in his late 60s round here that is petitioning for the council to drop it's plans for repurposing the leisure centre. Apparently because it's the only 33 metre pool for miles around the council should definitely not rebuild it as 25m and use the freed up space to build housing. Because at his age why should he have to change his exercise plans to a smaller pool and anyway the pool will be out of action for "a significant amount of his remaining lifespan" what a twat.

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-462092/Britains-gardens-threat-Prescotts-rules-allow-new-homes-built-green-spaces.html

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-440794/Thirty-thousand-gardens-year-torn-Prescotts-policies.html

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-462092/Britains-gardens-threat-Prescotts-rules-allow-new-homes-built-green-spaces.html

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-440794/Thirty-thousand-gardens-year-torn-Prescotts-policies.html

@JingleBellez so what would you do about people living longer?

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-462092/Britains-gardens-threat-Prescotts-rules-allow-new-homes-built-green-spaces.html

http://news.bbc.co.uk/today/hi/today/newsid_8729000/8729919.stm

It seems to have been about legally designating gardens as brownfield sites & thus allowing several houses to be built where there had previously been just one house & a large garden. So not compulsory purchasing, though that's the way I seem to remember it being presented in the media. (And no criticism for the DMail links, please - I was a Guardian woman in those days!).

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-440794/Thirty-thousand-gardens-year-torn-Prescotts-policies.html

@GasPanic good point about CT, that will keep going up.

I believe the issue here is how shit the conveyancing system is.

Being elderly and going through all that legal hoo hah is a dreadful thought. It's bad enough when you're in your 30s.

If buying / selling houses was more simple then I'm absolutely certain many older people would be more keen to crack on and downsize.

I can't imagine my parents (70s) coping with the legal process, viewings, gazumping, gazundering, answering queries, battling "searches" and the endless lies from estate agents.

Oops, sorry for the multiple posts. Every time I tried to post it, I got a MN error message & didn't realise it had actually posted..

I'm not sure on moral obligation, but I do wonder really if many people - especially retired single people/couples - can afford their big 4-5 bedroom detached houses, even if the mortgage is paid off.

Surely having the heating and electricity off as much as possible, more than you're comfortable with, means you can't really afford to run it (what about expensive repairs etc. in the long term too), so if you have the option to downsize you're literally making life easier and more comfortable for yourself.

There are lots of "I'm alright Jack" older people who don't care that there's a shortage of affordable property for younger generations and like to sit in their huge house complaining about how little their pension is. (Not many people have the luxury of a lot of free time and a lot of free money - and yes it is free money, because you're getting far more back than you paid in).

Has Jeremy Vine ever actually achieved anything, apart from winding people up?

@ComtesseDeSpair I agree, we do need to reassess how later life is thought about and planned for in society.

People with lots of free equity being made to downsize will skew the market segment they move into.

They'll be downsizing into the same smaller properties others on the ladder are trying to upsize into. The downsizers will win, thus stagnating the rungs below them.