Right to Buy.

[Differentforgirls]

Was “Right to Buy” a policy that has created the current housing crisis? I think it was.

I used to think that there was a program on it and it convinced me not

because the type of people who bought for stability would of likely been lifetime tenants of 50 or 60 years so it wouldn’t of freed up great amount of housing stock

The fact they bought their house took it out of council ownership though.

The issue is that the money was never reinvested into building more council houses to replace the ones sold

I used to work for a council. I remember when they built new council housing after the “right to buy” legislation, the people who moved in had the right to buy after two years. The council had to give in. It wasn’t sustainable to build new houses the sell them at a loss.

It’s about time RTB was scrapped.

Local authorities are not replenishing the stock in the correct way and it’s not right that the property can then be sold on the open market. Whilst there are restrictions in respect of this it’s rarely enforced as the council won’t buy it at the market value. Most councils are struggling with poor budgeting.

The fact that the responsibility has shifted to developers to ensure social housing is allocated is fascicle as the purpose built council properties which are sold are much larger, built for families and better build quality.

Also there should either be housing for all or not at all. Everyone should be able to get secure housing.

yes but if it was council owned that lifetime tenant it wouldn’t make any housing stock available

but I do think discount should be paid back at market rate if it was ever sold

I bought my council house.

If I hadn't, I'd not have been able to move to live nearer family when I did eventually sell it (because i would have been bottom of the list to be housed by the local authority in this area).

I offered it back to the council when I sold, in far better condition than when I bought it too - they weren't interested.

If they had reinvested the money (and my property was built toward the mid 1970s, and barely maintained since the day it was thrown up. I bought it in the early 2000s so they had many years of rent from it, it had only the windows upgraded and the boiler conversion done, no new kitchen in all that time, no new bathroom either. They also dragged what was a cash sale out for NINE MONTHS where I had to continue to pay rent, but they had no obligation to do any maintenance/repairs, before finally completing on it!), that would have been great.

They didn't, I don't know why. By the time I bought mine they were really pushing to sell off all the old council housing stock. New properties were being done by a Housing Association instead, I assume this was cheaper for them than maintaining old properties.

I am not an expert on this topic by any means but it does seem mistakes were made. Surely social housing has to be replenished if sold on to keep up with demand... I lived near a block of flats in West London which used to be for council tenants. Almost all had been sold wuth RTB and later the original tenants resold privately. Because the building was next to an oustanding rated primary school the result is that overwhelming majority of the properties are now rented privately to parents who use the flats to get a school place and then move out later on. There were 100 flats in the complex and according to current residents less than 10% are still social housing. It doesn't seem right when there is very much a need for housing for council tenants in the area

41% of homes sold under R2B are owned by private landlords. A high proportion of purchasers sold immediately the 5 year penalty period was up.
Of the 2m sold only 2% were replaced.
Shelter regard R2B as a major driver in the housing crisis, and have an interesting article on why. I can't link but you can Google shelter "it's time to say no to right to buy" if you're interested.

But they would when they died. The house would return to the council and be available for another family.
Now when they die, it’s inherited and sold onto the private market. It is no longer available for the council to let out.

Repeat thousands of times, and the council housing stock is vastly diminished.
Add to that councils being not allowed to reinvest the money into building more home (1982 Housing Act).

It doesn’t matter that you don’t reckon it has caused problems, it is well documented that it has.

not as such no. It was the failure to build new houses with the revenue from RTb that is at the root of the housing crisis

They didn’t because the 1982 housing act made it illegal to do so. It was the law.

If wasn’t because councils are all somehow irredeemably stupid, it was an ideological stance by the government of the time.

This doesn’t make as much sense as you have assumed.

RTB isn’t common now (hasn’t been for decades)- houses are too expensive even with discount- and that certainly isn’t the reason councils haven’t built more houses. The funding model is more complex than that.

I don’t think it has caused the housing crisis as those properties would still be occupied by the tenants. I do think it is very unfair though, someone in London could get £100k off purchase price courtesy of the state.

Agree!

Totally agree.

My council did, then had to sell two years later due to right to buy. So they gave in. It was never sustainable.

Ok 😬. So my real life example is shite?

What is your real life example? You said you worked for the council. Plenty of people work for councils, they don’t have direct knowledge and experience of housing finance.

IMO it was the worst thing Thatcher did. The government were subsidising poorer families in a controlled fashion, by providing low rent housing stock.

Now most of the rental stock is in the hands of private landlords, who charge ridiculous rents, which leads to much higher costs to the government in housing benefit. We don't have laws to regulate how much a landlord can charge and this uncertainty deters people from seeking low-paid work, as coming off benefits may leave them worse off.

They don’t get £100k curtesy of the state

if you want to be picky, you can argue that the state lose £100k by not selling to someone else who doesn’t qualify for the discount.

but that would be an entirely different policy, simply selling off council houses, not social mobility related (and rtb has been incredible for social mobility, like it or loathe it- and most people loathe it)

The thing is “corporate” housing stock doesn’t have the value that individuals place on their own homes.

It’s a (proper) asset, reaches end of life, becomes economically unviable.

The idea of replacing old stock with new is win win in theory- people buy an aging, low value asset that is going to be a future problem for the council, and it’s replace with a new build that has 100 years life in it. 2 families housed from one property.

the problem is, they never did the second part.

This isn’t true in every council area. My council has built hundreds of new homes for council housing in my town alone in the last few years. In December they released 22 flats, and in the year previously we had over 100 council houses and a few hundred affordable housing/ shared ownership etc.

my DH bought his flat with maximum discount. He paid £19k five years ago (valued at 62k) for a 2 bed ground for flat with garden. Our council reinvest this money into building new stock. Although they are rapidly running out of space and 70% of our green spaces have been totally built on which is very sad. The flat is now worth £94k as ever rising house prices in surrounding areas has driven the prices through the roof. He isn’t profiteering. His mortgage is half the price of the rent and will be paid off in a year. Then he will be able to build up his pension, which means he will be in a better place for retirement. I’m 16 years younger than him, if anything happens to him I’ll be living there on my own. It’s a home for life and it doesn’t cost the benefits anything in the future.

Those weren’t funded to any level by rtb. Rtb sales in the last couple of decades and particularly recently, are woeful.

they’ve been built with private investment or government capital grant.

Our council regularly buys property that’s for sale, I know because my dad got into a bidding war with them to buy back an ex council property ( the council won). Our local paper is full of articles from the council and we have regular consultations about planning etc and go to meetings about them in the local area as they are destroying green spaces left right and centre and we’re have several endangered animal populations locally. But sure. You totally and definitely know more than me even though they send local tenants information leaflets explaining it all etc. our council DO reinvest money into new housing stock. But affordable housing is often multiple developers and x amount is given to the council in exchange for planning.