Housing White Paper, what do we think?

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In Britain we think of ourselves as a nation of home owners & Conservative policy for a long time has focused on measures to increase home ownership but as the Government publish their White Paper on Housing today we are anticipating a shift in their thinking.

Private Rented Sector

The private rented sector became a scapegoat under the previous Prime Minister & because of that it suffered.  For years the construction industry has made the Government aware that by 2025 there would be a shortfall of rented property of 1.8 million.  With house prices becoming increasingly unaffordable, the majority of British households will be relying on the rental sector in the future.

The number of UK households renting property doubled from 2.3 million in 2001 to 5.4 million in 2014.  British households have changed, we have more single occupancy households than ever before as people leave marriage & starting a family later whilst at the other end of the scale we have people living into their 80s, 90s & beyond, still living by themselves.

With the private rented sector propping up the housing market it was a shock when the Government took measures to dampen the demand for buy-to-let investments by making changes to the taxation of landlords which sees them unfairly penalised.

Existing Housing Stock

While the focus on build-to-rent schemes is set to overcome some of the shortfalls of previous Governments, building new houses will not solve the crisis alone. We have to make use of existing housing stock.

Could encouraging our ageing population to downsize release larger properties for families to move into?  Could local councils help older people with practical & financial support to make the move to downsize?  The focus on retirement living is on purpose built flats but developers might need to think about mixed tenure as potentially some older people who have lived in detached properties all their lives are put off at the thought of living in a flat.

Planning

Planning is also a major barrier with many councils taking time to approve developments, in the main part because Planning Departments are under staffed.  The new strategy focused on forcing councils to plan for their own needs & giving them greater powers to pressure developers to build more quickly after planning permission has been granted is all well & good, but if it takes years for plans to be approved in the first place then are we any better off?

Plans to use a £3bn fund to help smaller building firms to challenge major developers has also been announced.  This includes support for off-site construction, where parts of buildings are assembled in a factory.  This could speed up the construction time but do we have the skilled workforce to carry out such building work, again, further information regarding how this is to be achieved will need to be addressed by the Government.

The Conservatives haven’t made a complete u-turn with regards to home ownership & are still seeking to help first time buyers with a “lifetime ISA” but they are covering more bases with some of the measures that have been highlighted above.

We’re interested to see whether they have a change of heart on landlord taxation because right now the Government need the private rented sector to help out with propping up our ailing housing sector.  Hey, it might even give them more time to focus on the state of the NHS!!