Poor forced from the city's centre!

[redflag]

Am i alone in seeing if housing benefit is cut, and the poor are forced out of the cities, buy to let homes will go up for sale then the double dip recession (actually the third dip by my counting) will kill our housing market even more.

People act like only those who are out of work get housing benefit, and also that the poor or out of work don't deserve to have nice things and like like other human beings, getting really sick of it actually!

I haven't read all of the thread so apologies if I am repeating, but surely the cap should be on rental prices, not HB??

Surely low-earners, eg, nurses, teachers, teaching assistants etc, will not be able to live and work in the South East. What are the implications of that?

I envisage a lot of empty rental properties...

I find it hard to believe, there are those that think people renting are 'living the high life' if they live in the south east, because they need some HB to help to pay an extortionate rent whilst they are working in a underpaid job. We are talking about people living in their home towns having to move away from their families and support networks. This is not a socially moral change.

After all, it is not them that are making the most out of the property?

Loudlass A fair point about proportionate loss - however, working claimants will be hit far less than non-working claimants.

Also, in the South the median and the 30th percentile are not so far apart because what drives the prices is location, not housing quality.

Jenski There will not be empty rental properties. If properties are going empty than landlords will lower their rents.

LFN - But the LL's won't lower their rents quickly enough for the low-paid to continue living somewhere they can actually get to work from, which means they would lose their job. And most BTL LL's in my area couldn't lower their rents by very much as they need that amount to cover their mortgage payments and LL insurance. The median is quite different from the 30th centile if it's the difference between getting £56 a week HB help with £250 a week rent, or getting £20 a wek HB help. One is just about stretchable to, the other is an impossibility for us!

If that is so LFS, then there should be a cap on the amount LLs are allowed to charge to begin with, therefore saving Gov money on HB.

And tbh,I think workers will be hit harder by this than non-workers, as if a non-worker has to move to a different area, it's not exactly preventing them from getting to work, is it?!

In principle I agree with you, Jenski, about a cap on the rent a LL can charge - but if that cap is less than the cost of a BTL mortgage and LL insurance, and a (tiny) bit of profit - then the BTL LL's would sell up, and that would create an even greater shortage of housing for people that can't afford to buy.

What are the percentage of BTL LLs - I have no idea?

I certainly know areas of the SE where LLs own loads of properties, and they are making ALOT of money from high rental prices. I hadn't really thought so much about the BTL LL.

That's unusual in my town, it's usualy people that are trapped in negative equity that are renting the houses out because they can't get the sale price now that they paid for it 4-5 yrs ago.

The rents in expensive areas have been massivley artificially inflated over the last ten years becasue the stupid labour government were prepared to pay them and private landlords took advantage. Once landlords realise there is no market for their properties and they can't afford to sell them at a loss, it will bring about a readjustment of market rates. And if there is anyone out there prepared to pay higher rental on these properties, then presumably they will free up a cheaper property.

But I agree with everyone else who has said that the vast majority of people (excluding the very rich and the totally benefit dependent) cannot touch any halfway decent areas of central London anyway. But they don't moan - they go and live in Dartford or Slough or somewhere fairly dull and unimpressive, and spend hours and hours slogging to work each day, because they are expected to live within their means and get on with it.

And as for the Somali woman with ten children - why does it have to be a choice between a mansion in Belgravia or wherever, or the 'squalor' that redflag imagines is her only alternative? If she's arrived as a genuine asylum seeker fleeing terror and persecution, I'm sure a couple of knocked-through post-war semis round the back of DFS in Croydon, with a lovely view of a motorway flyover will suit her just fine. After all, it really doesn't matter where we put her does it - so long as she's safe? Plenty of people struggling to pay their own rent or mortgage have to be quite content with properties like that, until they can do better.

Our duty is to house vulnerable people with children - that's all. Not keep them in ivory towers.

One of the problems with these debates is that they so often proceed from an inaccurate distinction between 'workers' and 'unemployed/not working/benefit scroungers' (delete according to the language you prefer), when actually many people move between these groups and there are many, many people who, when these measures come in, will be plunged very rapidly into poverty.

For example, couple privately renting in zone 2/3 London because their families are there and that's where they work, both public sector workers, both or one made redundant with very little notice, suddenly can't afford to pay rent, try to claim HB but their private rent over the cap so unable to make up the difference, unable to find alternative accommodation locally as no landlord will take HB, try to find alternative work in London whilst topping up rent from few savings they have until they've lost their savings and are eventually forced to move out to area with very little employment but where they can just about afford to rent, subsidised by HB for a bit until it gets cut...

i totally agree, i have a 3 bed and if i have 6 more kids no one going to give me a 6 bed house we woukd have to make do in the 3 bed buts thats why i only have 2 children.