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.

A relative lived in a 1 bed flat. It was lovely, spacious kitchen nice bedroom, decent bathroom. To get to it on the 6th floor there were 2 options...a lift where people had pissed/vomited and beat the shit out of the panels or a staircase covered in piss and vomit. Either option stunk to high heaven and the access route to the flats was covered in detritus you had to pick your way over. Completely vile and awful. I certainly wouldn't want to live in a place like that. Some people seem to have no pride in their surroundings.

Lot of ageism here.A kind of suggesting that one should quietly fade away.Also many younger boomers don't own.Try getting millenials not to.constantly blame rathet than seeing the bigger picture.Ok blamers.Also some ageist ads encouraging older people tp release equity.Patronising and infantalising.
Do people have a god given right to family houses and capitalist family consunption when the world is as it is? Imho families are the basis of extreme selfishness.Years ago my dad tried to sell the family house to a charitable organisation which catered for .homeless people with depression and alcoholism.The nimbys went mad and the cruel judgemental comments really struck me as a young person.Yes there were security issues which needed addressing but the society were v vigilant.Dad backed down.

No one is obliged to move.

How does that work in the private sector?

Annie and Fred live in a 5 bed detatched in the Home Counties. Its worth £900k.

Sidney and Gertie have 2 kids. They live in a 2 bed and can't afford to buy a £900k house.

If Annie and Fred decide to downsize to a 2 bed, they are putting MORE pressure on demand for 2 beds. This makes it harder for Mabel and John who have just had a baby to move from their 1 bed.

The LA will not allow planning for the 5 bed detached to be split into smaller properties citing too much pressure on the road network and setting a precident for nearby properties. Local Nimbys support this action.

Local Nimbys also do not wish to allow the building of a council estate on brown fields site next door. Again citing too much additional traffic.

How does 'moral obligation' translate into 'who foots the removal and renovation bills' for council housing?

The real issue leading to this ‘debate’ is that the UK housing market has not kept pace with population needs, not only in terms of numbers of houses but quality and property sizes. This is 100% the fault of government who prioritize greedy developers and not social needs. Of course no one should feel morally obligated to downsize. There can be all sorts of reasons why someone wants to stay put and that’s fair enough. We actually downsized 5 years ago and are
much happier in a smaller property but it’s our choice.

For the price of a much smaller property I assume you mean? Then they can move into a little flat for cash and everyone can attack them for pushing up the prices of starter homes.

They pay rent but stupidly low, have absolute security and have houses updated and maintained at zero cost to them on a regular basis, I know lots of people in council houses who could easily buy or rent privately but refuse to because they have it so easy

This.

Builders kept building executive homes no one can afford.

They did first time buyer properties under duress.

What was neglected was the smaller family home across the board. This is where all the pressure in the system is.

I don't think people are morally obliged to downsize and free up property.
I do think help should be available for people who want to but face difficulties.
I also think that supplying adequate social housing should be a priority.

Why?

Your post is also incredibly ageist. The oldest millennials are 42, I'm in that group, had my child young and they are now off at uni. I'm not blaming anyone for anything. I own property and have done well in life.

The thing that puts me off moving is the expense and stress involved in selling and buying. The sheer enormity of dealing with the contents of a large house to move to a smaller one and all the costs involved means I’ll only move when my head can cope with all that and not to appease strangers who think I ought to move.

I have just moved from a flat to a much bigger three bed house. I look forward to downsizing in 20 / 25 years as cleaning a whole house is a pain in the ass!

No, obviously people shouldn’t feel the need to downsize. However, I think the government should make some effort to make it more appealing to do so. Some kind of stamp duty relief, ensuring the appropriate smaller properties are built etc etc.

Yes, we should all downsize to a 2 bed bungalow. Which where e I live will cost me another 20% on the price of my small family house with on street parking and a downstairs bathroom. 30% if you include stamp duty and moving costs.

As someone else has already pointed out, there is a lack of suitable smaller properties for elderly people. Bungalows are in very short supply, making the demand and price high. I live in a coastal town with a high proportion of retired people and there has been a lot of new building going on here (3 sites being developed as I write) - not a single bungalow on any of them.

As a result, most older people who can afford to 'develop' their homes to be more suitable for them in their older age, e.g. by extending, putting in downstairs bathrooms and so on.

If there is a desire for older people to 'downsize', there needs to be targets set for developers to build suitable, affordable homes for them alongside the mega houses they tend to prefer building.

Probably already been said by one approach would be to offer downsizers the option to move without paying stamp duty.

I've seen a fair bit along these line on you tube recently - with idea that it has started to get noticed by editors and politicians as the effects started to go up the social economic ladder and hit their kids and GC.

It's still very hard to build new properties - lots of local opposition - but I think they've started to think about younger adults spending large amount of their income on rent and heating and now food and how that means less disposable income and how that's impacting the economy. Also more retired people who didn't mange to buy needing government help with rent increasing in numbers - it's also contributing to lowering birth rates - job shortages in some areas.

I think decades of this and the resulting impact are starting to be noticed.

Aye, that's gonna fly...

There are so many people sitting in council houses that they know in their heart of hearts could go to more well deserving people. Those who could easily pay more in rent as their salaries have massively increased since the tenancy was agreed three decades ago or those who have 3/4 bedroom houses but live in them alone. The problem is you will never convince those people to move so you’re in a fixing to nothing there.

if the argument was that those paying mortgages or people who own their own homes should downsize then there has to be an incentive to do it whilst also making sure there are people who can afford to buy them. Some of those big old detached houses are hugely expensive. You’re not going to have a plethora of people who can even afford them if they were freed up.

@Dinosauratemydaffodils and the other issue is that when you do find bungalows that are suitable- a lot of still have enormous gardens and whilst that may suit a few older people, many want outside space yes- patio and a bit of grass maybe, but not necessarily an enormous garden - a lot of these bungalows have been neglected too and are in poor condition at an age you often don't want to be renovating.Ironically the ones my FIL fancies are often park homes! But that's another can of worms again.

It’s really not. Baby boomers is a generation of people born after WW2 through the 60s. No more offensive that saying GenX or Millenial

Well, quite, which is why I said "putting aside the obvious economic/social mobility problems".

Clearly it's not as simple as old people moving to smaller houses, but the fact is that there are people out there in houses which are too big for them, and people out there in houses which are too small for them. Finding ways to make it as easy as possible to downsize is not necessarily the devils work as some might have you believe.

I think they meant it in the way the context in which it was use. The Boomers were not through the 60's - it was until 1964.

There's families living with several properties. It just proves life isn't fair. It's not Hans Christian Anderson.

I’ve been told by people I work with that I was selfish to buy my house as a single person when a “hardworking family” could’ve had it.

They had the same chance as me to get it and I’m not about to start apologising to “families” for not living in the smallest and most depressing flat I could find.