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.

After divorce I couldn’t think of anything worse than staying in a huge home alone but hey ho some do. It’s definitely a status thing IMO. I have more to do in life than worry about maintaining a large property and whether people think I’m lord of the manor.

i do, however, live in a 2 bed cottage in a nice area. You could argue and say I don’t even need that now (although I could say it’s an emergency bedroom if any of my offspring ever feel the need to run away back into my arms!! - hmmmm)

What’s crap about it? There’s no legal time limit for how long they can go back for deliberate deprivation to avoid care fees.

😴

Let’s hope you never have to find out how much crap it isn’t when you need residential care and have given all your money away.

Given the level of maturity in you at least you’ve a very long time before needing elderly care 🙄

Unless she’s senile already. 😂

@ArcticSkewer yes I have, both paid privately. Didn't have complaints or no rights.

Oh well, lucky you! It's not been my family's experience and covid makes things even worse as visitors are still controlled. My grandfather was in the best rated and most expensive nursing home in the area and it was utterly shit. I complained each and every time but then my grandparent was just treated even worse. Tbh I was mainly complaining about the way other residents were treated when their own family weren't there to see, but sometimes also him. It was inhumane. We paid a fortune for that.
My grandmother on the other side had council care after her money ran out (she was in for over a decade). She just stayed in the same place. They were so kind and absolutely amazing. Not particularly well rated.

My conclusion is that payment makes no difference nor do ratings. If you complain, they are treated even more badly. It's almost impossible to move homes. Really - I would never save my money for a care home thinking it was going to make the slightest bit of difference.

If you had a different experience, feel free to waste your own money later in life.

Really - I would never save my money for a care home thinking it was going to make the slightest bit of difference.

If you had a different experience, feel free to waste your own money later in life.

Well obviously both of our experiences have shaped our beliefs. Logically though if no one wants to pay what happens then?

Knickers in a jealous twist? Aww bless!
Did someone disagree with you? So you have to resort to nastiness.
Listen to clueless keyboard warriors or solicitor/accountant/financial advisors who actually know wtf they are talking about? Hmm let me take a nano second to think about that 🤔

Council yes, but not privately owned. If you bought your own house why should you be under any obligation to anyone else? You need a bigger house you sort it out yourself.

And if you aren’t in a position to buy, why should you put other people’s interests before your own and your family’s?

Status may be part of it, @Mothermummymum , but definitely not the biggest factor. Things that I think matter more are attachments to your home and community, local friendships and support, alongside the stress of moving to somewhere new, where you don’t know anyone and have to find all new friends, support, services etc, and the sheer physical and mental effort of getting rid of lots of stuff so you can fit into a smaller home.

I saw this with my mum - she moved from a big three bed bungalow to a tiny two bed, and never really managed to fit all her stuff in - despite lots of decluttering her new place was rammed with furniture and possessions. And as she had to move away from the village where she had lived with my late father, where she had friends nearby and where she had spent decades creating an amazingly big garden, that was really distressing for her - I don’t think she ever got over it. She died last month and her final wish was for her ashes to go back to her old home, to be buried with my dad, in the place she was happiest.

Then you need to guarantee people that there will be a suitable property to down size to eg. without stairs, a lift in communal areas, use of well kept gardens....and you also need to make sure that such accommodation is affordable and exists in areas that people want to move to.

Forget that! I'll stay in my nice quiet 3bdr detached house with my
garden!

After divorce I couldn’t think of anything worse than staying in a huge home alone but hey ho some do. It’s definitely a status thing IMO. I have more to do in life than worry about maintaining a large property and whether people think I’m lord of the manor.

You are the one obsessed with status.

The rest of us simply want privacy, space, a nice garden and to stay in houses that we have crafted and that we love.

Again this just deflects away from the fact that home owners in the main are not the problem. I know very few that have huge houses. My DGM did but that was left over from when housing was affordable.

The problem in my city is inhabitable houses that the council has ignored for years. By doing them up we would have a healthy social housing stock.

@user1471538283 Its called managed decline.

The country needs a total reset and mindset when it comes to housing and particularly when it comes to the elderly. We need to stop building blocks of expensive self contained flats in central areas designed for mainly overseas and rich students who can pay the extortionate amounts and look at building low rise blocks with lifts with good balconies with 2 and 3 bedrooms and decent space for social housing rates for small families and couples and older people . This would then take the pressure off the private rented market , more choice would possibly bring rent levels down too. There is no reason most young, fit students can't do shared houses or halls. I also think any council and housing association sales to tenants should have a condition that they can't sublet for 10 years and can only retain 25% of profit in the first 10 years. Far too many have been bought and sold on quickly for a vast profit. Someone I know bought after paying next to no rent for 20 years ( benefits covered it) she got her mum to lend the cash to buy it and then sold it on very quickly- it's this kind of thing that needs stopping. How is it fair to others who don't have these options. I also think you should only be able to buy if you have been there 10 years plus and if 80% of rent plus has been covered by yourself - not by benefits- the publics tax is essentially covering you to get a massive discount that's not available to others. I'm actually very social minded but think we have got housing all wrong , caused all kinds of issues and right to buy is a lousy idea ripe for being taken advantage of by the very sharp elbowed.

People won't be told though. It much easier to blame someone in a bigger house than the government.

From an older thread. four years ago

The Elephant and Castle neighbourhood is being physically, socially and ethnically transformed. This started with the demolition of the Heygate estate, a classic for stigmatised perceptions of council housing and the people who live in it. As the local 35% Campaign has meticulously documented, a succession of promises to Heygate residents were broken to arrive at a situation where 1,214 council homes were demolished, to be replaced with 2,704 new homes, of which only 82 (3%) are for social rent. The HA partner was London and Quadrant. To be eligible for the cheapest one-bedroom home built by them on the Heygate site, people needed a minimum household income of £57,500. The average household income in that part of Southwark is £24,324

It is NOT the fault of social housing tenants already living in social housing that this is happening. Whats really sickening is that people KNOW developers AND housing associations are doing this but STILL want to blame social housing tenants and move them around like chess pieces. Do the fucking maths. 1,214 council homes demolished and replaced with 82 for social rent.

This is not down to social housing tenants yet they are expected to pay the price!

We need proper community housing. Like Somerford Grove which had different dwellings built for everyone at all different stages of their lives.

This problem goes further back than 1980
The 1953 White Paper stipulated the continuing of promotion by all possible means the building of houses for owner occupation.

In 1954 private housebuilders were freed from the obligation to secure building licences one of the main ways by which local authority housing had been prioritised in the immediate post war years.

The big change came with the 1954 Housing Act which required that future council efforts be concentrated on redevelopment RATHER THAN general needs.

Where we are now is the result of decades of changes going further back than 1980.

@JenniferBooth I totally agree- my son is on £36k and can't even look at shared ownership in London unless he gets a partner (hes24) whereas he could easily afford a £750 flat (he pays more than this now) - it's basically totally ruling out most single people in London and quite a few other places too by making them all shared ownership and based on ludicrously high valuations.

My mums on her own now in a big house
found on for her so we worked it out
the money it would cost here to move would fund the difference in running new downsized house and here current big house for at least 9 years
shes 84 so staying put

Not sure that this makes sense - don't we have a shortage of affordable 2-3 bed homes - rather than the larger properties that retired people may be 'rattling around' in? Particularly if someone has bought a large family home when houses were cheaper - if they now decide to downsize to release equity for retirement then they are competing for the smaller starter size homes .

Nope. This is my forever home, privately owned and only DH & I live in our home which has four bedrooms (the cat also has one - does that count as “occupied”?)