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?

Dh already had a cottage when we married in 1986. Last house bought in 1992 at the very top of our budget, and three years before we had ds.

I wasn't a teacher at the time; I worked in Local Government at a not very high grade, and dh was and remains in HM Forces. I don't think working for HMG makes dh 'rich', and he certainly wasn't when we bought this house.

The point is as I said earlier, that you cut your cloth. As we only have one child we could afford a larger house. I would also like to point out that mortgage rates at 10.8 -12% when we bought in 1992, were far higher than anything we have seen in recent years, so the cost of borrowing a larger sum today is probably much the same as a smaller sum was then.

There is a hugh difference between those in there 20's and 30's even. In less than 6 years house prices doubled where I lived (leading up to the 2007 slump). So nice to know I do not deserve a family. Think of what you could afford now if you had no equity.

I do not think older people should be forced out in any way. But prices need to get back in line with earnings.

Your lucky because your OLDER , scary teacher all the house price rise you experience will just make it harder for your child. Young peoples lives are destroyed by house price increases.

YOu are now getting a lovely low rate for your mortgage due to EQUITY.

It's nothing, or little, to do with EQUITY. i paid 18% on my mortgage in 1987/88, everyone did. The last few years of sub 5% rates are unusual.

What I find strange is the government recommending this, supposedly to free up space, plus building new homes, when there are so many empty properties around the country already. About three-quarters of a million last time I checked.

OldLadyKnowsNothing, you need a deposit and to earn a lot to buy a house (to get the mortgage). House prices have risen above earnings the young are worse affected.

No, I'm not getting a lovely low mortgage rate, as I fixed at 5% in 2006. Them's the breaks.

When we married, dh had hardly any equity, so we had a one bedroom cottage with no central heating on Dartmoor. We stayed there until we could afford to trade up. We waited to have a child until we could afford to do it.

You can have a family, no-one is stopping you, BUT you need to consider what you can afford first.

I don't think I'm lucky because I'm older.....you have the advantage of what seem to be long term low rates. There was nothing like that available when we started out on the housing ladder; rates were habitually 10%+ for several years and climbing. I was grateful on Black Wednesday to have a 10.8% fix as the rates went up to 18% when UK exited ERM.

Each generation has its own bar to buying - for yours it's high prices, for mine it was high interest rates and then stacks of negative equity and repossessions, plus endowments that have significantly underperformed.

You only get good mortgage rates with equity (yes in the past they gave out 125% mortgages but they were still not as good a deal as if you had a deposit).

5% is good imagine being young and struggling for a deposit you would find it hard to get a 5% deal (or even a mortgage).

the larger houses get bought by developers and turned into flats. it doesn't free up anything when referring to buying a home - if you can't afford it - you cant afford it.

with regards to spare bedrooms - the new underoccupancy benefit changes are going t take that into account and only pay for what you are allowed article on the lords debate of underoccupancy penalty for those who have no accomodation to actually go to

If they want OAPs to downsize which I'm sure many have to try and save money, hows about asking all the middle classes living in houses with more bedrooms then they have kids to fill em to downsize as well?, no excuses of home office/study etc a bedroom unused is a bedroom unused and lets ban people from buying holiday homes that are left empty for 8+ months a year, and get rid of all the MPs second homes as well.

It all adds up, not to mention the numbers of derelict houses left to rot both by the councils and individuals.

Iggly, you have always needed a deposit to get a mortgage, and the ratio of earnings to borrowings were far more severe when dh took out his mortgage back in the mid 80s.

Take your earns multiply by 4 can you afford your house?

earnings

HOuses cost far less though

I say again........ any raise in house prices above wage increases is extra money that your child will have to find when they want a house.

then there is the small matter of appropriate housing for older people

"The Government was told that two thirds of planning applications for new retirement housing schemes were refused first time round, while fewer than half of councils had housing strategies for older people."

from the independent

www.insidehousing.co.uk/care/letter-calls-for-planning-reforms-to-help-elderly/6518440.article "A group of specialist housing providers has written to the government urging ministers to ensure planning reforms provide for an ageing population."

Iggly - the rules have always been 3 x joint income, and we are well under that now.

Houses may have cost less, but the cost of borrowing was far higher at 10-15% rates, than it is today.

Yes, my child may find it difficult to buy, and I expect my generations parents thought the same about us. However, I am not expecting my ds to stay in the UK to work, so he may well end up somewhere where renting as opposed to owning is the norm. That's down to him.

By the time he comes to buy, I expect our parents will have died, and so there will be some money to hep him with.

I don't have a mortgage on my home mainly because when all our friends were buying "McMansions" in trendy suburbs, we purchased a 3 bedroom in an average suburb.

We did extend over the years and the house is now a 5 bedroom home.

We also have an investment property in a beachside suburb.

When we took out a mortgage, the bank would only lend on DH's full salary and one quarter of mine.

Each generation has has their own difficulties and I agree that it is very hard in today's climate for young people to get on the property ladder.

However some of the young people want everthing straight away. No going round second hand stores for furniture. (Our only new piece of furniture was our bed )

scaryteacher, its a very insular and bblinkered way of tlooking at things from a ' well i did it so everyone can do it' point of view.

a lot of this is luck and circumstance - sure you can plan to own your home...to a degree.

you need some sort of semi decent wages - a bit more than minimum wage for a deposit

you need quite a big deposit these days

so then we are debating good jobs and wages rather than housing...lets not go there right now - it leads to education, parenting and well we would be here all night...so leaving all that significant part of the argument to one side...

Dh and i bought a house we could afford. we had one child. we planned for one more child, we had twins. you can't plan for that.
then the interest rates went sky high - those interest rates you are talking about in the 90's

well those meant that our house was re-posessed.

so i find myself with three kids on a council estate not being able to afford gas for the meter on xmas day.

i now own my own home thanks to the bank of my dead mother. - ver fortunate that she bought using cash from my dead father in the 70's

i am fortunate in a way that a lot of people arent'

you can plan some, but if house prices are unaffordable - your back to children being just for the rich

choosing between saving for your kids university education or a house - saving for a deposit - AND and emergency cushion? yeah right~!

stable job in this economy - good luck.

scaryteacher, its a very insular and bblinkered way of tlooking at things from a ' well i did it so everyone can do it' point of view.

a lot of this is luck and circumstance - sure you can plan to own your home...to a degree.

you need some sort of semi decent wages - a bit more than minimum wage for a deposit

you need quite a big deposit these days

so then we are debating good jobs and wages rather than housing...lets not go there right now - it leads to education, parenting and well we would be here all night...so leaving all that significant part of the argument to one side...

Dh and i bought a house we could afford. we had one child. we planned for one more child, we had twins. you can't plan for that.
then the interest rates went sky high - those interest rates you are talking about in the 90's

well those meant that our house was re-posessed.

so i find myself with three kids on a council estate not being able to afford gas for the meter on xmas day.

i now own my own home thanks to the bank of my dead mother. - ver fortunate that she bought using cash from my dead father in the 70's

i am fortunate in a way that a lot of people arent'

you can plan some, but if house prices are unaffordable - your back to children being just for the rich

choosing between saving for your kids university education or a house - saving for a deposit - AND and emergency cushion? yeah right~!

stable job in this economy - good luck.

I can't see how a relatively minor concession like stamp duty waiver will provide a big incentive to someone who is already sitting on a 200% or 300% tax-free profit.

It still wouldn't make sense for an 80-year-old couple to leave their 5BR house. Say they sell it for GBP1m and move into a GBP250k flat. They've got GBP750k to invest. They can't put it in a savings account, because as I understand it (am not in the UK), interest rates are below inflation rates so in real terms they are losing money from the second they open the bank account.

They no longer have the investment horizon to put it in the stock market or any alternative investments such as art or antiques.

Then Mrs 80 breaks her hip and has to move into a nursing home. Mr 80 remains in the flat, but (again, I am not sure this is how the UK system works so am happy to be corrected) the proportion of their assets now protected from nursing home fees is 250k. They burn through the remaining 750k and when they both die, leave their DC a small flat rather than the large house they could have done if they'd simply stayed put. There is no financial advisor on earth who would recommend her clients take that kind of deal.

Those houses will come back into circulation eventually - through inheritance. Which opens up a different can of worms, in that property will only be affordable if you have an inheritance behind you.