To think no one has a right to make money off their house

[Laughingstock1991]

The general consensus among financial commentators this week has been that the housing market has turned. Interest rates are still going up and are unlikely to come down for a few years. The low interest rate financial experiment that has been in place since 2008 has ended and it’s unwinding is going to be painful. The housing boom was based on cheap credit.

My mortgage is likely to go up about 400 a month. Lots of commentators reckon we are in for a big fall in house prices. Good thread here:
https://twitter.com/EdConwaySky/status/1668987423643119623

What pisses me off is the absolute assumption made by some people (like my friend today) that the government should use public money to bail out mortgage holders. Most people were stress tested on their mortgage- I was- and yes it’s going to be tough but do I think public Money (renters money) should be used to bail out mortgage holders- fuck no! The Lib Dems have raised this also today.

House equity is unearned wealth. There are no guarantees. We have been through a boom and now it’s going bust. Hopefully sanity will return & housing will be seen as a home again- not an investment. Its not a ‘market’.

And I say all of this as a homeowner who is going to have to pay a lot more. I want everyone to be able to afford a decent home- not just those with money.

I don’t think that’s unreasonable!

My ex mother-in-law was in a supported assisting living type apartment that she paid 150 grand for a 1 bedroom. Honestly, it was like a prison cell. Anyway, the woman next door to her was getting a rent paid by the local authority. She sounded as if she had a grand old life. You do wonder who the fool is.

Exactly this ⤴️

3BSHKATS · Today 19:59
My ex mother-in-law was in a supported assisting living type apartment that she paid 150 grand for a 1 bedroom. Honestly, it was like a prison cell. Anyway, the woman next door to her was getting a rent paid by the local authority. She sounded as if she had a grand old life. You do wonder who the fool is.”

Any sort of private’s assisted living/retirement flat is an absolute scam. Really needs investigating by a public body.

Many people of blindly or knowingly taken on mortgage debt over the last 15years at a time when borrowing money has never been cheaper.
Unfortunately many have unwittingly got repayments that on low interest rates are manageable but as rates rise are increasingly unaffordable.
Financial research shows that since 1970 the average interest rate is 7, it was therefore foolish to think low repayments would last the full term of a 25+ year loan.
Hopefully many will make it through bit it does show you that sometimes just the banks will let you borrow it, it's not always sensible.

But it’s ok for the government to pay the housing costs of people who choose not to work a day in their lives? Yes some people have no choice but to not work, but many choose not to.

If the government can afford to help people like that, they can afford to help homeowners who are at risk of losing their homes

I'm absolutely not for public money bailing out mortgage holders, but then I'm also not in favour of the large housing benefit payments made to a significant number of people. That's as much of a house price inflation driver as anything else.

What I would say about the housing market dropping, though, is that the ultra wealthy will definitely benefit from it.

Equality economist, Gary Stevenson (Gary's Economics on YT, etc.), often talks about how the wealthy benefit from downturns with their ability to buy up the assets of the working and middle classes. What better way to get hold of more assets than to spend some of your vast wealth on cut-price property that's sure to rise in value again shortly.

Inheritance tax is also paid on inheritance of £500,000 not £1 million.

Well I guess we could try living in a communist country where no one owns a home - they are all owned by the state - no inequality or inherited wealth - well that was the theory. . It's just that the communist regimes that have happened so far tended to enable the ruling party elite to give themselves better treatment, luxuries and housing than the rest of the population. So it never really worked.

I agree and I think borrowing huge sums of money, in the hope you can pay it back over a long period, is always going to be a big gamble.

Of course with rents so high, a lot of people probably didn't feel they had much choice, so I don't blame them, but we need affordable housing, rent caps and vastly more social housing so that everyone live without getting into debt.

Obviously it's possible to improve things without creating a faux-communist regime like the Soviet Union, though.

Possible solutions are rent caps, social housing for the majority, restrictions on second homes and empty homes, more rights for tenants.

I fully agree I think that all home prices should be locked at £1000 no matter of size😉location or school catchment area

Yes you are being unreasonable . People save hard to buy a home and pay huge interest over many years to pay their mortgage . Meanwhile many have their rents paid by the government so yes in tough times the government who ultimately are responsible for interest rates should help mortgage holders out .

I agree. Add to that people should have their homes forcibly seized and taken from if they refuse to give them up voluntarily.

Yes I grew up in Georgia in the 1960's and peoples homes were taken from them for non-compliance and nobody complained then and homelessness was virtually none. so fully agree my sweet thanks for agreeing Hun Xx

Not saying people’s opinions about landlords are right or wrong, but just out of curiosity, if good landlords didn’t purchase properties to rent out to people, where will people live?

Chances are the people who live in those properties wouldn’t be able to afford to buy the property themselves, and the councils don’t have enough homes for everyone?

Another solution is to ban second home ownership. I'd be in favour of that.

A solution to what problem, exactly? That person is still richer than you. Instead of having two cheaper homes, they'll just use their purchasing power to get one even better one.

People need to recognise the real problem. Bleating 'I can't afford a house' isn't about the house. It's about you - specifically about you being poorer than the others who can afford it.

Many other European countries have much less of an obsession with home ownership. So it might be that we go down that path and have more rent protection for low income famillies and pensioners and build more social housing (alongside building a lot more housing stock). And set up schemes to enable more older people to downsize earlier before they get stuck in houses that are not accessible and expensive to run.

This makes me angry as a renter. Are they going to bail out renters? Also lots of fraud will happen - landlords will claim then put up rent anyway making the wealth divide bigger.

I will literally take to the street and riot of they do this. It is making the wealth divide much larger and perpetuating the problem.

Banks need to be more lenient and offer solutions, not the government. The bank and mortgage holder took the risk of creating the loan. It's for them to resolve, not me, as a renter, through my taxes.

I don't vote for inequality and will not vote for a party that supports this.

Meanwhile many have their rents paid by the government.

I wouldn't say many on a population level, but if you do get the housing element then you're in a better position than a lot currently!

I've never took any government benefits but rent and earn well, just haven't been able to save 50k for a deposit (who can?) Meanwhile my friend on benefits use their benefits to pay off their mortgage. Your comment makes no sense.

@Inthedarkagain

You would be inadvertently bailed out as your landlord might have to sell up otherwise and kick you out.

Helping people to keep their homes will benefit everyone. Unless you have sufficient funds to purchase your landlord's house off them.

💯 % OP. The sense of entitlement of many homeowners (not you obviously) is completely nauseating. Exposes the real “gimme” characters of so many people. Ugly boring mugs they usually are too!

👏👏👏👏👏

YABU You have no idea what hoops some people have to go through to save to buy their house. The idea that they should not be allowed to do as they wish with something they bought from hard earned wages just because someone else couldn't borders on communism. I'll leave it there before I say something t really upset anyone.n