AIBU to question Reform's plan to prioritise married couples for social housing?

[QueenSophia]

Reform have proposed to prioritise social housing for various groups : 'Rules would be changed to reserve at least half of all social homes in England for British-born workers aged under 35, with prioritisation also given to married couples, veterans, victims of domestic violence and care leavers.'

I agree with DV victims, those with children, care leavers : veterans are also at high risk of homelessness. But why prioritise married couples over single people? I'm not convinced that's fair. I assume it's to encourage marriage which is a good aim but I'm not convinced if this is the right decision.

So they're prioritising everyone?

What about the vast number of care leavers who were not born in the UK, which category do they fall into? The care leaver category or the non prioritised 'not born in Britain' category?

Its a puzzle.

It should be allocated on the basis of assessed need, not what people are.

That's a good question- so far unanswered AFAIK.

I agree. None of this "British born married couples with British kids" getting priority.
It should be based on need.

Yes...I suppose as the General Election won't be until 2029 (probably?) they're throwing ideas around and testing them out. Hopefully their desire to win will mean they tone down anything too unpopular before 2029.

Social housing allocation should be based on need, not the relationship status of the applicant. Survivors of DV and care leavers are usually higher priority already- quite rightly- so I suppose the most positive thing about this latest idea of theirs is at least that is correct.

The more plans that Reform put out there the more it feels like we’re going back in time to, quite frankly, a much grimmer part of history. This proposed policy appears to be stigmatising unmarried people, single parents, etc. the other day it was attacking the disabled. They don’t seem to like the LGBTQ community at all, people who aren’t white and British, and I’m pretty sure that Farage has mentioned restricting access to abortion in the past. Which I’m sure has nothing to do with him being at least partly funded by crazy American Christians anti abortion types.

I think that social housing is subsidised because councils could rent them out for closer to a market rent, thus maximising their assets.

We just need a huge social housing building programme like there was after the war. Forget these 'luxury flats' which are basically one room with a corner kitchen and a bedroom and high service charges.

Build social housing, bungalows, 2 bed houses and maisonnettes.

Social/council housing is not for profit. The rent covers their costs.. they "wash their face" so to speak.
Private landlords are a business and want to make money, so charge more. Their costs are also higher.
Council/social landlords have their own teams of staff for fixing things/maintenance etc. Landlords usually get a contractor in.

Who sets market rent?

I live in a council house on a council house street. All of us, apart from the half a dozen or so elderly pensioners, work and pay full rent and rates.

No one is subsidising my living expenses.

Well then you are in luck @likelysuspect because Reform are going to build loads of houses.🥳

For free.

Not a single tax payer penny.

Not a brass farthing.

Not even a sausage.

Yay for all the free houses and sunlit uplands ahead.💃💃💃

Subsidised = provided at a loss and needing financial input from the subsidiser to break even.

Market = provided for (often considerably) higher sums than needed by the provider in order to make a profit for the provider.

Not for profit = provided for a sum that enables the provider to break even without loss or profit.

Social housing is the third one. Its purpose isn't to generate profit for the local authority. Its to provide affordable housing to keep people safe and well, and which they can use as a foundation to build lives and contribute to society. Thus saving money for the tax payer because well housed people are more likely to have jobs, have less need of the NHS and social services, to raise healthy well adjusted children and who don't drain the public purse through extortionate rents to private landlords requiring benefits, or extremely costly temporary accommodation.

I’ll explain the subsidy question because there’s a lot of confusion on this thread. The answer to “is social housing subsidised?” depends on whether you account for the cost of capital. Social rents are set by a formula and this generally (not always) covers maintainance and admin costs with a bit left over. Social rents average about 3-4% of open-market equivalent property values (which in today’s world roughly equal construction costs). So after costs the rental yields to the landlord are probably 2-3% of property value, sometimes less. A typical private sector landlord would be looking for a c5-6% gross yield and maybe 4% after costs (but before tax and mortgage).

So social rents are lower than open market private rents but normally higher than maintainance costs. But that doesn’t cover the cost of capital. Suppose the council borrowed the money to build the properties using perpetual (ie non-repayable) debt. The cost of that debt is likely 5-9%. Remember, the rental yield after costs is maybe 1-3%. So borrowing money to build social housing does require subsidy. Thats why it’s essentially impossible to build more social housing without subsidy today, and why the government has a £39bn new social housing subsidy scheme.

So you can sort of argue that existing social housing doesn’t require subsidy, if you don’t believe it’s appropriate to account for the cost of capital. But to build new social housing definitely requires a lot of subsidy.

That’s not actually the case though because the vast majority of social housing (for decades) has been built by housing associations, not councils.

They borrow money on the financial markets to build new properties, and then cross subsidise the social housing by building and selling open market sales/ market rent properties.

the rent (at a company level, not necessarily for individual properties) covers the cost of capital for the housing association.

there are a small, limited number of capital grants available to housing associations, the mayor of London probably being the most active in providing them. IMe of >20 years in social housing I would estimate less than 5% of housing association new builds are able to utilise this funding.

Then people would need their rent topped up. Better for councils to own assets which generate income.

The maths is the same whether council or HA. It’s true that historically new build social housing has been subsidised by open market sales but that doesn’t work any more because there’s no profit to be made in most open market newbuild these days. And from a corporate finance perspective the spreadsheet doesn’t change: if you’re renting out an asset for less than your cost of capital that’s a subsidy whether you have loans or got it cheaply or not.

They’ve announced another £16bn of newbuild social housing subsidy this morning, for this reason.

I don’t understand how the maths is the same. Who subsidises housing associations when they don’t use government grants? They borrow from banks, and repay the interest from their income.
maybe I’m misunderstanding what you mean.

cross subsidy is certainly still working for the 2 HAs I’m on the board of.

Reform are like going back in time. They shouldn’t be encouraging marriage.

Are there the usual hate comments against young mums whenever this subject comes up? I had mine at 16 and 18 and apparently a lot of people think that was just for a free council house.
I have always privated rented and have come around to the idea why should anyone sit around demanding a home from the council anyway? Unless you grew up in care because then the state kind of is your parent.

Other than that buy/rent your own home. And there’s always the “why are people without kids deprioritised” Jesus Christ because you have even less of a reason to be demanding free shit how is that rocket science.

Council and social housing is good for society; it provides stability and, ideally, mixed communities (as per the original intent). The private rental sector is a second rate substitute for the social rent sector. It should play a minimal role at best.

Social and council housing is no more "free shit" than healthcare it education. It's the hallmark of a civilised society that ensures all citizens' essential needs are met. I'm surprised that someone who went through what must have been a challenging experience would seek to denigrate the importance of affordable and secure housing in favour of the chaos of the lightly regulated private sector.

It just grates to read people say teen mums have kids just for a free council house (idk if that’s been said on here but I’ve heard it loads) when I’ve always rented privately. Then the same people demanding council homes for childless men (and women) and saying it’s unfair all the teen mums get priority when it’s not necessarily so. It should be obvious why a single person without kids doesn't need a free home anyway. Imagine sleeping on the street by yourself now imagine sleeping on the street with two kids in tow which do you think is harder?

No such thing as a free home.

Would you say this is free:
man I know in his fifties unemployed (long term) actually has his own council flat despite being single and childless (surprise surprise for the people who think single men don’t get council homes) his rent is straight up less than £100 a week (so less than £400 a month) we live in the south east btw.
And universal credit pays that for him.

No health issues btw

private renters also use universal credit to pay their rent. If that’s the bit you think is free you have an issue with benefits, not social housing

Housing aspect of universal credit rarely fully covers private renters rent. So they also have to use some of their own money. Plus the sheer entitlement I’ve noticed from a lot of council tenants “they need to give me a bigger place/ fix this thing I could easily fix myself” plus the general expectation that you should sit around in your own shitty situation until they give you somewhere no matter how long it takes (saw this with some of the people I lived in temporary accommodation with) refusing to even consider private renting.
They’re generally so entitled than you see adults that don’t even have kids demanding a place online there’s no reason they can’t get a job and rent or buy their own place. At least people with kids have the reason they can’t work more is they have to look after the kids.