Calls for Help Freeing Up Family Homes

[CogitoErgoSometimes]

Free Up Family Homes The charity 'The Intergenerational Foundation' is recommending tax breaks to encourage older people to leave oversized homes. They estimate that there are 25 million unused bedrooms in England. Half of over 65's have 2 or more spare rooms in their home. Housing minister Grant Shapps doesn't sound keen on the idea. But what do you think? Should home-owners and tenants be encouraged to trade down for public-spirited reasons? Or should they be able to rattle around in their multiple spare bedrooms and left alone?

My father (84) would be delighted to move from his 3 bedroom house to a 2 bedroom bungalow. But his house has been on the market for about 12 weeks now with no serious interest.

It seems that it's mainly couples in their 30s/40s viewing and expecting to get £100k off the initial valuation so they can extend/develop and then presumably sell for £500k. He could not get a 2 bedroom bungalow at the price buyers are expecting to pay. Go figure!

This sort of thing starts with a think tank, then there are tax incentives if you do, then there are tax penalties if you don't . . . no thanks. One of the reasons people want to own a home is not to be told when they "should" move.

Mandy - 2 bed bungalows are often the same price as 3 bed houses. They can have a larger footprint and thus a larger plot of land and thus be more expensive. Houses are built on more than one storey because its cheaper that way. You pay a premium for a bungalow. They are also rarer and more in demand.

I agree that the idea that our parents generation worked any harder than we do is not true.

I've worked 80 hour weeks for three months solid in the past.

All younger generations want, is to be able to do what their parents did. Nobody is asking for an easy ride.

I think people did have it tough in some senses as they were born in the war and people had very little money. both my parents came from poor backgrounds but managed to buy quite a nice detached house. I am sure my dad could have afforded an even larger house but he was very cautious.

My DH and I could not afford a house like that now so I understand what people are saying but maybe we should be asking ourselves what has caused such high house inflation. Maybe it was in the 80's when women wanted to work as well as men. My mum did this. I am not knocking this but would houses have stayed cheaper if only one salary was coming in.

Ridiculous. If you have bought your house, big or small, who has the right to even suggest that you sell it???

Some large country houses are passed down through families and it is a totally private choice. I would tell this charity to spend their money a little more wisely and back off.

Well said lostinthewoods.

Not a very charitable thing to be doing, is it?

So if the older generation move out of their large houses to make way for the younger generation -how do the younger generation afford it ?
By being "given" the money by their parents.
Christ how bloody grasping !

Housing costs have risen for many, many reasons.

1, Smaller households, eg people divorcing and living apart. Elderly people living longer and often alone. It's often cheaper to keep an elderly person who requires care in their own home than move them into a residential home.

2, Mortages became easier to get. This means more people entered the private housing market causing demand to rise. Banks were also willing to lend more which also pushed up house prices.

1. Buy-to-let spits Not even going to start on that.

1. Second homes/holiday homes.

1. Population growth.

1. Everybody wants a garden. Which is understandable particularly with children but it does push up the price of suburban housing.

ifartrainbows the idea is that the principle of supply and demand will kick in to lower prices.

The day the chancellor allowed two incomes to be taken into consideration for a mortgage was the day women had to go out to work.

Simples.

Incidentally, I don't think anyone is talking about forcing anyone to move our of these massive, yet 'cherished' 5 bedrooms places, housing 'all their memories', are they? They're just suggesting that a tax and benefit system might come into play that encourages the selling up of such places to younger families to avoid covering the entire country in concrete, whilst 37% of housing stock is under-utilised.

Again, simples.

ifartrainbows um- supply an demand? Like lostinthewoods beat me to it to say!

A large part of the problem is that the older generation do not have much in the way of a pension.
They have all been encouraged to invest in property as their pension.
I know that my parents are prime examples of this. Crap pension, no real savings but a house they could sell for £250,000. Unfortunately in order to buy somewhere smaller they would have to get another mortgage as property is hideous down on the south coast because all the old people come here to downsize and so there are no houses left for families!

I do think we should help older people to move if they so wish but no one should be forced out of their home.

More importantly the builders should stop building shitty little three bed rabbit hutches with no garden and sell them for £299,000. Aparently that passes as a family home around here.

OK, fair point, ronshar, but it's not 'forcing' anyone to sell- it's 'incentivising'! Property is 'hideous' down on the south coast because there is no supply to appease the demand! If large swathes of the retired/elderly were considering their options and their futures carefully under a scheme that incentivised downsizing, the younger families would be buying up the bigger houses appearing on the market- now at more affordable prices due to the number coming onto the market (supply) and the oldsters would be buying up the 2 bedroom places vacated by the younger families!

So, if the older generation were encouraged to downsize and this would have the knock on effect of lowering larger house prices considerably, how many elderly people in their right minds are going to do this?

Erebus Spot on.

Basically we need to facilliate a "swap" that leaves nobody financially worse off.

Okay.

So the elderly person's house is worth 600K. The swapper's is worth 140K.

How does that work, then?

Do you mean they'll be forced to do so by family members? Sorry if I misconstrued that!

This would have to be a long term 'trend' idea. It'd have to be an idea sown in the minds of today's 60-65 year olds, though I would never patronise the over 70s by saying they're too feeble-minded to 'work' the advantages of a suitable beneficial scheme, if offered! Many older people find their huge houses lonely and a burden to heat, clean, maintain- in fact, find them full of ghosts of the past and might well welcome a government scheme that made downsizing easier and desirable.

it's kind of crazy to think of turfing the eldery out of their family homes when the uk has acres of green space (green belt lol) we can and should build more houses on this 'sacred' land

And bear in mind, a house is 'worth' what someone will pay for it!

Turfing?

This isn't Dale Farm! A bit of perspective, please!

Nobody is being "turfed".

That's like saying you're forced to buy a sofa because it it's in a sale.

Erm, what barriers for elderly people are there precisely to selling up at the moment?

Has anyone read the booker nomination 'Snowdrops' ? It is all about the topic of this thread, oddly enough.