House Price Rises Capped at 5%

platypus said:
Ah ok, so what you're actually advocating is that people shouldn't work where they can't afford to live within a commutable distance then. Eg anywhere near a popular city?

Or should the people who have been living and working in an area that has seen house prices explode then be forced to move to jobs elsewhere so that they can buy a house?
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I work opposite the Barbican in central London, a 2 bed flat costs £1.2m, needless to say I don't live there but do a 1.5/2h commute instead.
 
Housing construction is normally authorised and provisioned by the council / government you cant just rock up to some empty land and drop 50 tones of brick and 4 by 4 on it
 
stuie said:
Housing construction is normally authorised and provisioned by the council / government you cant just rock up to some empty land and drop 50 tones of brick and 4 by 4 on it
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Whilst local government sporadically build new houses the majority of new build construction is undertaken by the private sector. I cant think of the last time I heard of a council building homes (perhaps in partnership with a housing association).

Moses said:
Did I mention anything about the specifics of how it'd be done? No. I mentioned a general idea. I'm more than willing to discuss things in more detail, but please don't post ridiculous things like the above... it erodes any of the goodwill in a discussion :\.
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Whats the point of even discussing it then if you don't know how it would be done ? your comment was simply nothing more than you think developers should be stopped from land banking, how are you going to do that then, explain, oh no wait you did!

Moses said:
The real issue is the lack of new housing being built. I'd prefer them to compel developers to build when they have land and get planning permission. If they refuse to, they should be compelled to sell the land. I think the current land banks/planning permission bank is ridiculous - there's currently planning permission covering the area of Birmingham available to be built on.
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You clearly did suggest they should be forced to sell!
 
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Another problem that needs to be addressed is house building. Local councils will happily support the big house builders who in turn will then land bank and build when it suits them, raising finances isn't a problem for them either. The smaller developers will be made to bend over backwards to please the planning departments of local councils and then on top the banks won't support them or lend to them at ridiculous rates, this is making it impossible for them to build.

Hamish said:
House prices should be set by the free market. If your house is worth more then why should you be forced to sell it for less?
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Spot on. People need to stop thinking of housing as a right, you don't have any right to own a house. It wasn't easy 30 years ago and it isn't easy now to buy your own house. Back then imo people were much more willing to make greater sacrifices in order to fund their purchase and I think people are less willing to give up their luxuries now.
 
Large developers will just sit on land though because they have the capital to wait out fluctuations in land values. I concede that the Zimbabwe comment was presumptuous and probably over harsh (sorry xx ) but I don't think that forcing developers into selling banked land is possible. You could go down the CPO route I guess but the legalities of that against a national house builder would likely dwarf the cost of compensating them for their potential loss.

I'm passionate about this subject so apologies if at times I'm over zealous, it does feel though that so many people in this thread are blowing the wrong end of the candle.
 
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Hamish said:
House prices should be set by the free market. If your house is worth more then why should you be forced to sell it for less?
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What he said.


Dis86 said:
I'm confused by a statement that keeps cropping up in this thread and in everything I read about housing 'affordable homes'. What exactly is an 'affordable home'? S
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And this. I can't afford to live inside London, much as I'd like a place in Kensington or Marylebone. So... I don't. I can't afford a Ferrari. So I.... drive a Renault. What is "unaffordable" to one man, is "affordable" to one man. I live within my means, and my aspiration for bigger better things drives me forward. If I didn't have to work for anything and was just given it or content with what I had, I wouldn't get out of bed in the morning.


Not that I'd agree with it at all (indeed I've be voting for the government being dissolved and people getting on with their lives unhindered), but if anything were to happen the planning rules need to change. The problem is that someone currently buys a cheap house (because it is what they can afford), and then they stick an extension out the back and do a loft conversion. Now suddenly the house has jumped up the price scale, and someone on a similar income couldn't afford it. If the owner had been prevented from doing the extension (which would go against the "My life, my money, **** off government" principal) and instead upgraded by buying a bigger house, that small cheap house would now be available for someone else to buy...
 
Moses said:
It sucks for them. I'm sure they'd be against it. But I don't think we can allow such an important national asset (I'm not an epic lefty... I just mean that we obviously have a finite area of land, etc) to go unexploited, essentially. Obviously they rightfully own it, etc, etc, but I also think they have a duty to actually realise the asset... especially when we have a BIG housing shortage.

I'd suggest possibly saying it's a precondition of granting planning permission that it should be built within x years, or something. Yes, planning permission expires (in all cases?!) but it can be renewed/granted again/extended. But, if we say that when it's granted it must be used, else they're not permitted to reapply, that could help.

Some kind of land tax seems, at first glance, fairly dubious... but I'm sure there's a way of holding unused land undesirable through such a measure (obviously that would only apply in certain areas, etc, so Bob the farmer who has a fallow field without planning permission isn't caught out).

I do find it funny how compulsory purchase orders can be used when, for example, regenerating an area... but the idea of using them against developers with land banks is unthinkable. There's a clear public benefit with each, no? One which arguably justifies the state impinging on the rights of a landowner?
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Honest answer, I don't know. Its such an idealist concept that I cant see how it could conceivably be implemented. I just keep coming back to the 350,000 empty properties we have in the UK and what could be done about them, they are already built and waiting to be repaired and lived it. Let the developers sit on land if they want, fix the existing housing stock.
 
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LOAM said:
Whilst local government sporadically build new houses the majority of new build construction is undertaken by the private sector. I cant think of the last time I heard of a council building homes (perhaps in partnership with a housing association).
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Pretty much every house built in the UK is only done with government approval, there's very few exceptions to that. If it doesn't fit in with the local government housing plan you'll struggle to get planning permission.
 
OpenToSuggestions said:
I cannot afford to live in Cambridge. So I don't.
I would love to live in a city like that, but the fact is I don't earn anywhere near enough, so I cut my cloth accordingly.
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Cambridge is not as good as you think it is really.... There is also plenty of affordable housing here, I mean its not as cheap as lets say highlands.

While our family property has seen a pretty nice price growth, even while we were in credit crunch it kept rising, I still think its wrong to make money out of necessity...
 
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Jokester said:
Pretty much every house built in the UK is only done with government approval, there's very few exceptions to that. If it doesn't fit in with the local government housing plan you'll struggle to get planning permission.
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I never said it wasn't, I said its rare that councils build. There's a big difference between permission to build and actually building. Also don't give to much weight to how much clout local government has against the nationals who will employ consultants to bend policy to their own ends.
 
stuie said:
Housing construction is normally authorised and provisioned by the council / government you cant just rock up to some empty land and drop 50 tones of brick and 4 by 4 on it
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Provisioned? Not the word I would use. Maybe authorised is better. Even when the council or other department decides to build something with its' own budget it goes to a private company to manage and build it, the government does not build anything itself.
 
LOAM said:
I never said it wasn't, I said its rare that councils build. There's a big difference between permission to build and actually building. Also don't give to much weight to how much clout local government has against the nationals who will employ consultants to bend policy to their own ends.
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But the point being made is that it's not a free market. It isn't, doesn't matter how you try to dress it up that house are only being built by private enterprise, fundamentally they are only allowed to do so by government planning policy. Though this is considered restrictive by the Conservatives at the moment who (as you say maybe at the bequest of big companies) are looking to makes things easier in order to meet our housing requirements which are lagging behind demand. That drives up prices, where in a free market it would spur extra supply.
 
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