Coming up with a solution that can stabilise current prices while allowing for the mass build of the required homes(not houses) for rental will be challenging. Not because it is necessarily difficult, but because of the self interest of many politician landlords making a fortune.
Until this country regards the right for people to own their own home as more important than people's right to enrich themselves from investing in additional properties the housing crisis in the UK will not be solved.
Tax wealth to force the rich to sell assets (which housing shouldn't be but is) and distribute universal basic income so that more people can afford to buy that newly available housing.
Also enable landowners to build upwards wherever that isn't currently allowed.
These energy prices, water pollution, sky-high rail fares, disability cuts... All political choices.
Don't let anyone tell you things can't be different, can't be better. They can! We need leaders and parties with the willpower to actually change the status quo.
High energy prices, water pollution, high house prices, etc. are a political choice. Parties like the Greens backed Nimbyism over building what is required
But we need to ensure, as I'm sure you know, that we stop concreting over green spaces to build these homes, and open up all the houses that are standing empty.
Totally agree. I’m a big advocate for brownfield only building. I think we should abolish the green belt idea and replace with a ‘brownfield only building policy’ where anything from roads to warehouses can only be built on these sites 1/2..
not surprisingly, developers will tell you there isn’t enough of that land but the country is full of it, they just don’t want the expense of the clean up etc. We need a party like the Greens who will force them to do it and stop kissing their butts like Labour!
Great summary Zack. The result of this is the #uk has massive amounts of money tied up in housing property, some estimates say 9 Trillion. Anything not mortgaged is not being invested in the wider economy. Also most of this is inflation is unearned income. ie: untaxed. A subsidy for owners.
What do you mean by “fairly recently”? Certainly not between 1992 and 2010 when I was an MP - and in a minority advocating for council homes and equal treatment and parity of esteem between owners and renters!
A very salient point here is that should Zack win the Green Party leadership election, he will be up for re-election as leader in a year’s time. Whereas Starmer…
The Green Party has actual genuine internal democracy, which follow the principles we advocate applying to the country’s elections also.
You have to vote for whoever best represents your ideals. You may not trust them 100% (which is wise) but you have to give them the chance. Greens are the only sane voice in politics right now.
BC of the dysfunctional land market Zack!
Most house price is land value
Land Value Tax reduces land prices bc demand adjusts to perpetual cost of landownership
LVT should be main Green economic policy as it was with Labour till WWII
Replace all property taxes with LVT to fix housing crisis
And yet, 46 years of neoliberalism has people believing that their sky high rent is because of immigration.
I’m in my 40s. No parents. No generational wealth. 55% of my net income goes on rent. There’s a very real possibility I’ll be in an HMO sharing a bathroom with four families at the age of 60.
Spot on. Next video you can take on the 'maxed out the nation's credit card' lie which has destroyed our communities through austerity and refusing to invest in our country's future for the last 15 years. #backzack
There are so many ways to fix the "housing crisis" and you touch upon second homes briefly but what about the proliferation of AirBnBs? There's far too many empty properties, old industrial sites/shops should be demolished and turned into decent 1-2 bedroom flats as starter homes.
Back in the day rented and private was roughly equivalent in terms of what you got and security of tenure, and mortgages and rent was regulated. Thatcher put a bomb under all that.
It will need a govt to bring back quality affordable housing but can be done. It just needs a plan!
Thatcher’s economics also increased wealth inequality - like with many other western governments that subscribed to neoliberalism. When wealth shifts the beneficiaries buy assets such as real estate.
Supply & Demand.
It’s understandable why other western economies are also seeing housing crises
Meanwhile on #Disability good to see one #ToryShiteLiebour MP has a pair of Ovaries, well done #VickyFoxcroft 👏
Now let's see how many will #GrowAPairOfTesticles/Ovaries & #VoteAgainst #Keir_Starmers disgusting #DisabilityBenefitCuts
Let's just leave #keir_starmer's hypocrisy here for all to see
He’s a low life liar like the rest of these old school politicians, playing games with people’s lives and as corrupt as they come. They’re abhorrent human beings with no moral standing whatsoever!
Brace yourselves folks for #flipflop man #Keir_Starmer to tell us that #OldChestnut 🌰 #Rising #Oil & #GasPrices is down to the #WarInUkraine & nothing to do with an #IsraeliWarCriminal called #BenjaminNetanyahu wanted by the #ICC international criminal court in the #Hague https://bsky.app/profile/financialtimes.com/post/3lsbwni365i23
Wasn't it blair who detached house prices from cost of living? Suddenly mortgage borrowing was no longer part of inflation.
As property prices ballooned the effect has been ignored in inflation keeping annual wages conveniently detached from the most expensive thing you'll ever buy.
The racism I encountered in the rental sector was terrible, I had no choice. Agencies showed me the properties that couldn’t be rented and some just were not interested when they saw me. That needs to be resolved too.
It's because we allow landlords to exist. Simple as that.
Thatcherites bought up all the stock as their "nest egg", denying literally every future generation from enjoying the same benefits they had.
Anyone under 40 just wants to have the same options our parents had.
But we can't.
And we're angry.
Landlording would be OK if financial return in proportion to (modest) amount of work done managing a lease plus legitimate expenses eg maintenance/repair (mortgage does NOT qualify here; obviously wrong to make tenant pay purchase cost of asset they can never own).
Not quite that simple. The problem isn’t landlords it’s inequality that gives the top 1% so much money they have to sink it into assets and out price the rest of us. Yes they are landlords but it’s the scale and the fact they are only interested in capital growth.
Because people in the early 1980s said "i want" and the banks said "oooo, we can make even more money and get even more people in deep doo doo" and Thatcher obviously. My 1st flat 16% mortgage 1978. 1.5 his wages 1/4 mine. £11,250. Now "worth" £400,000+ apparently
Exactly! We are told the problem is young people wasting money on coffees, but prices have been pushed higher and higher by political choices. My parents were a milkman & cleaner and got a 4 bed house in Hampshire. Can you imagine that being possible now!?!
We argued at the time, that those people who bought their council homes, denied to future generations, something never denied to them. Thatcher succeeded in splitting vote. It was one of her and Ingram’s greatest achievements, alongside the miners strike…
NGL the problem is successive governments but also the electorate who keep voting against their own interests. I'm also tired of hearing excuses about education, FPTP and so on. In this country literally anyone can stand for the commons or start a party but voters elect a 🐷 with a blue rosette.
I think it's more about the very rich seeing housing as an investment rather than homes to be lived in. Unless we put a cap on how many houses corporations can buy, prices will continue to escalate.
I disagree that rent controls* can help, but apart from that I agree with everything else about your analysis and proposed solutions.
*from what I’ve read, this tends to reduce supply. But maybe it’s a view promoted by vested interests.
Why is the government allowing so much build-to-rent by corporates, eg 519 apartments in Southampton owned and managed by LGIM? Don't see how this will help. Won't it just multiply the 'private landlord' effect? Plus council pension funds are investing in them, milking people every which way!
These built-to-let monstrosities are popping up all over Manchester too. There are kids paying upwards of £1,400 to live in flats that are roughly equivalent to a Swedish prison cell.
I know I'm only one person, but as a homeowner, I would far rather take the hit so other people could also be housed. My home might be worth less, but I'd still have a roof over my head and so would other people. I'd take that bargain in a heartbeat.
There is also an organisation called "Patriotic Millionaires" which are wealthy people who are willing to pay more tax so that they don't have to live in a neoliberal hellscape.
But sadly, they are in a small minority. For now, the 35% need to organise!
Because if prices came down to a realistic, genuinely affordable, level, you'd plunge virtually every homeowner, with a mortgage or not, into massive negative equity and collapse the economy.
To be fair though, negative equity is literally the risk we all signed up to. Just because it hasn't happened doesn't mean it can't, and house prices only really affect those with more than or less than one (1) house.
Also I don't see how home-owners without a mortgage would have negative equity?
Housing valuation projections, in the UK especially, are based on a classic "line go up" theory. It's ridiculed in every other market as unsustainable and naive but apparently fine for housing
Most couldn't sell it for what they paid, would struggle to borrow against it, wouldn't cover care costs, would collapse the overall value of their assets. Bringing the cost of housing down to realistic levels could make some properties worth a fraction of their current value.
Oh, it's an open secret that it's both the easiest way to massively improve QoL for millions while also being political suicide. At least until the renters outnumber the owners.
I get what you're saying, but surely it'll collapse the economy more when an entire generation has no marginal propensity to consume because they're spending virtually all of their income on rent and energy.
"ultimately empty" was too harsh but I can't think of a succinct way to say that the comments are very similar and don't add much to the conversation. They do say it in different ways and add a bit but not enough to justify so many posts so quickly.
Brilliant Zack! And let’s not forget that providing council housing is the most effective way of supporting home ownership: people who want to buy can save whilst living in affordable, secure, council housing. Lots of my friends’ families on our council estate did so in the 60s.
Building houses! Don’t be foolish that won’t allow me to make stupid videos. Err I mean solve the housing crisis by everyone living in yogurt knitted igloos
The value of land increases from say £10k per house size plot without planning approval to say£150k per house side plot with planning approval. That impacts the house price. That £140k uplift results from community granted planning approval, but who gets it? The landowner & for doing nothing.
Comments
Also enable landowners to build upwards wherever that isn't currently allowed.
Extra credit: land value taxes.
It has been demonstrated over and over that increasing capital gains and increasing borrowing costs (interest rates) stabilises hosing prices
and yet we keep talking about supply side policies... 🤦
These energy prices, water pollution, sky-high rail fares, disability cuts... All political choices.
Don't let anyone tell you things can't be different, can't be better. They can! We need leaders and parties with the willpower to actually change the status quo.
You’re saying all the right things Zack.
My only worry…so did many Labour politicians until fairly recently.
I’m afraid I’m losing hope that this country will ever elect anyone that actually believes in (and acts towards) challenging the status quo.
😔
They excel at gaslighting, if nothing else.
Seriously though, I meant this more generally and not just about housing specifically.
Now look at him.
I'm not comparing the two, and as a member I'm most probably going to vote for Zack.
I'm just so jaded by the state of the world its difficult to fully trust any politicians right now.
The Green Party has actual genuine internal democracy, which follow the principles we advocate applying to the country’s elections also.
We got there in the end!
No judgment if that's what you do.
More houses is not the solution
We need to
1 regulate morgage prices by increasing interest rates
2 tax house sale capital gains at the same level as income
Both policies come at zero finantial/environmental cost, massive political cost if one relies on middle class conservative voters
https://www.ecb.europa.eu/press/economic-bulletin/focus/2022/html/ecb.ebbox202206_04~786da4a23a.en.html
https://www.suerf.org/publications/suerf-policy-notes-and-briefs/house-prices-and-ultra-low-interest-rates-exploring-the-non-linear-nexus/
1% own 70% UK land
60% UK wealth vested in land
You can't hide land in a tax haven
Land Value Tax is the only effective wealth tax
Most house price is land value
Land Value Tax reduces land prices bc demand adjusts to perpetual cost of landownership
LVT should be main Green economic policy as it was with Labour till WWII
Replace all property taxes with LVT to fix housing crisis
Allowing people to exploit this basic need as an opportunity for economic rent is corruption, plain and simple.
I’m in my 40s. No parents. No generational wealth. 55% of my net income goes on rent. There’s a very real possibility I’ll be in an HMO sharing a bathroom with four families at the age of 60.
It will need a govt to bring back quality affordable housing but can be done. It just needs a plan!
Govt is trapped in the days of lords and ladies and forget the public now have professional standards and experience and, gosh wow, degrees and PhD's.
Supply & Demand.
It’s understandable why other western economies are also seeing housing crises
#DisabledPoverty
Is a #ToryShiteLiebour
Political Choice
Now let's see how many will #GrowAPairOfTesticles/Ovaries & #VoteAgainst #Keir_Starmers disgusting #DisabilityBenefitCuts
Let's just leave #keir_starmer's hypocrisy here for all to see
https://bsky.app/profile/financialtimes.com/post/3lsbwni365i23
As property prices ballooned the effect has been ignored in inflation keeping annual wages conveniently detached from the most expensive thing you'll ever buy.
Thatcherites bought up all the stock as their "nest egg", denying literally every future generation from enjoying the same benefits they had.
Anyone under 40 just wants to have the same options our parents had.
But we can't.
And we're angry.
The much, much bigger problem is that every single home owner tries to sell their home at a profit
capital gain tax rise on house sale is a million time better policy than both social housing and demonizing buy-to-let landlords
That's the true cost of housing.
Time we created them.
We argued at the time, that those people who bought their council homes, denied to future generations, something never denied to them. Thatcher succeeded in splitting vote. It was one of her and Ingram’s greatest achievements, alongside the miners strike…
Why are you asking questions irrelevant to my thread?
*from what I’ve read, this tends to reduce supply. But maybe it’s a view promoted by vested interests.
Thus ensuring they have to work so hard they become too tired to become civilly disobedient.
The miners strike terrified the Tories. They took houses away from people to prevent it happening again.
The 65% want to see the value of their property rise every year, so politicians are incentivised to make that happen.
[source : stat from UK Gov website, graph from Moss Properties]
The wealth is all "on paper" and if your own home is appreciating in value, then the next step up the property ladder is also more expensive.
There is also an organisation called "Patriotic Millionaires" which are wealthy people who are willing to pay more tax so that they don't have to live in a neoliberal hellscape.
But sadly, they are in a small minority. For now, the 35% need to organise!
Also I don't see how home-owners without a mortgage would have negative equity?
If "overall value of their assets" are primarily based on one inflated item then yes, that's what will happen.
Your use of "realistic" here is key: we all know it's a false value.
The only way around it that I can see is council housing that *absolutely* cannot be sold, and so can't impact the market too much.
Having a couple together in the timeline to catch people scrolling quickly is OK but spamming is not friendly.
We can see out the replies and QPs if we want to
Council tax is decades out of date and needs reorganisation with accurate property values not late 80s values.
Bring in progressive land taxes for large land owners.
Tax wealth fairly.
Make corporations pay their fair share (google/amazon/virgin)
Give communities the power to provide their own cooperatives for energy, water etc.
https://bsky.app/profile/saintthejase.bsky.social/post/3lnzfoymntk2t
I assum we all agree that *everyone* should have access to good quality, affordable housing, right..?