Housing

[titbumwillypoo]

If you look at most of the problems in the country at the minute the root cause is housing. Rents are too high, wages haven't kept up, not enough houses being built and mostly a finite resource being used as a basis for our economy.
I think there's a simple solution, a two pronged system. Option 1: If you rent out one house you pay 20% on income and then for every house after that an addition 1 percent up to 80%. So couples who have got together or people who've inherited etc and have a spare house (and don't want to sell yet) can make some money but they'll not get massively rich and are more likely to want long term tenants that will look after the place. What it will do is dissuade people buying up lots of houses who then get rich off the backs of other people working without having to contribute much to society.
Option 2 is if you do have lots of houses then you can become a charity. You don't pay income tax BUT you cannot earn more than 10 times minimum wage (£216,736 a year) and you cannot charge more than 10 times minimum wage per week rent. (Say for a 2 bedroom house) Obviously there would need to be some tweaks for bigger houses and HMO's but you get the principle.
Finally, housing benefit should be reduced to a flat rate across the country (over a period of say 5 years) of 10 times minimum wage per week. The money saved could be used by councils to build more social housing under the proviso that it cannot be sold off and to pay more housing officers to inspect bad landlords.
Basically my plan allows people the freedom of choice. If you believe in unfettered capitalism that allows you to set market rates that squeeze people until the pips squeak then you can have it but in doing so you will be giving back to society. Or you can make a decent living that positively helps vast swathes of society.
YABU: Market forces and the profit motive are what makes this country great.
YANBU: Secure housing should be accessible to all for a functioning society and not a way for a minority to get rich(er) off the hard work of others.

Most expensive cities to live in the world
The list will change accordingly to how the stats are calculated

Hong Kong
Geneva, Zurich, Basel, Bern (Switzerland)
Tel Aviv
New York
Tokyo
Beijing
Singapore
Copenhagen
Shanghai
etc

London is further down the list

The cost of housing is not just a UK phenomenon

You keep saying that 'someone is paying off your mortgage'. BTL mortgages are overwhelmingly interest only not repayment so its quite rare that someone would actually pay off your mortgage in full.

All income is taxed, plus the sale is subject to CGT. So the 50k gain in this fictitious example would be after sales costs and all taxes.

Many LLs are not getting a yield much above 5% at the moment which is comparable with other investment types.

The government has done and is doing a fantastic job of pitting the public against private LLs, all the while failing to deliver a housing strategy that works. Currently private LLs are filling a gap which no government since 1997 has bothered to fill. But yes, let's slag them off, increase taxes and legislation so they're forced to sell causing untold headaches for tenants and continue to blame them.

Yes for sure successive govts including labour govts over the past 40 years have created the monster that is the unregulated (latterly light touch regulated) private landlord and has now turned on it.

Well boo fucking hoo. I'll reserve my sympathy for the people who don't have secure housing rather than the ones who cashed in on the situation and now don't feel so cosy.

The two are interconnected and if you think that punishing one will benefit the other, you know nothing about the rental sector.

Oh don't get me wrong, I'm well aware that in boogeymanning their own monster the govt are doing fuck all to address the ills of the housing market.

However I'm never going to cry for landlords. I doubt that many who've dealt with them will. That's the trouble with profiting from a bent system. When it comes back to bite you, the people whose money you took, turns out they don't like you.

What's not fine is borrowing the money with the intention of getting other people and the taxpayer to repay your loan and you get a free house at the end.

I have rented before I could get a mortgage. And I was a landlord when I had a mortgage. Are you seriously suggesting that no one rents out ever? That it’s mortgages only?

Simple solution for any landlord is simply increase rent by 20%.
Landlord gets sane income.
Government get more tax.
Tenant pays 20% extra rent.

Yeah, crackling idea

My landlord has no mortgage. So their Costa are tax on what I pay, insurance, repairs. So I should pay what in rent. Nowhere near a mortgage clearly.