Housing

[aka Calum Da Jazbo]

well this will run eh?

another corporate capture of the people's interest

[aka Calum Da Jazbo]

meanwhile for the toffs n russkis

[ahinton]

well this will run eh?

another corporate capture of the people's interest

The "bedroom tax" is indeed as iniquitous as it is damaging as it is useless (it's done nothing to free up more living space for anyone as far as I can tell), but the excuse that's constantly trotted out about how the price of building land exacerbates developers' need to build ever smaller homes conveniently ignores the large amount of existing property that could be renovated to make new homes without having to shell out on building land; addressing this appropriately would (a) be seen as a far "greener" policy than that of appropriating more land to build new homes, (b) in many cases help inner-city regeneration and (c) reduce the number of instances of homes that are too small for their occupants. The question of ownership versus rental is hardly relevant here, as there are far too many cases of both homeowners and tenants living in insufficient space in Britain.

[ahinton]

meanwhile for the toffs n russkis

The Daily Fail gets it wrong again. No surprise there, then.

The article states that

"Just three years ago, this was a run down house worth £575,000.

But with a lot of love and devotion, its new owners transformed it into an ultra luxurious property.

And now it has gone on the market for a cool £1.395million. This means that in three years it will have earned its owners £800,000 – about £660 a day.
OK, so what's wrong with this? Several things, I think.

1. The article states that the house was "worth" £585,000 three years ago; it doesn't actually say that this is that price that its current owners paid for it, but let's assume that this is nevertheless what is means. In order to purchase the property for that price, the buyers would have had to pay conveyancing charges as well as SDLT @ 4%, of which the latter would have been £23,400, so the gross cost to them would have been £608,400 + conveyancing charges (which would have included VAT).

2. No mention is made of how much money was spent on the renovation, but the article does state that the property was purchased in a run-down condition (without giving any idea of just how "run-down" it was at that time or what work needed to be done or what in fact was done to renovate it); the photographs suggest that it might well have been a considerable six-figure sum.

3. Most if not all of the materials used in the renovation will have included VAT.

4. The current price quoted is the asking price; what matters is the price for which it sells, which may well be somewhat less than that asking price.

5. Whatever the next purchaser pays for it, the price will almost certainly exceed £1m so will attract SDLT @ 5%; if, for example, an offer of £1.25m is accepted, tax of £75,000 will be payable by the new owner.

This means that the net difference between (a) the original purchase price inclusive of tax and conveyancing charges and (b) the actual selling price (as distinct from the asking price) less the new owner's SDLT liability and the cost of the renovation including VAT might in fact be relatively small and certainly nothing like the amount cited by the article.

From the current owner's purchase, the new owner's purchase and the VAT paid by the current owner on the cost of renovation, the Treasury would stand to net a total of at least £160,000 if the VAT-exclusive cost of the renovation was, say, £300,000; it could even be the case that the taxman will walk away from the entire exercise with an amount greater than that of the net profit made by the current owners when the house is sold, yet those owners will have spent a six-figure sum and much time and energy on renovation whereas the taxman will have spent nothing and done nothing except collect the taxes due.

I rather think that all of this puts a somewhat different complexion on it, don't you?!

[jean]

From the link in the OP:

"UK sets record for smallest properties in Europe"

I keep hearing this, and it's nonsense.

In Poland, for example, the average dwelling does not even have separate bedrooms.

[ardcarp]

..they're probably referring to the 'old' Europe', e.g. France, Germany, Holland, etc, etc.

When you look at the what-used-to-be council houses in our village they are spacious with large gardens and with a 'rec' nearby for kids to play. Public life was driven by ideals of the common good in that benign post-war era.

[teamsaint]

From the link in the OP:

"UK sets record for smallest properties in Europe"

I keep hearing this, and it's nonsense.

In Poland, for example, the average dwelling does not even have separate bedrooms.

From what I understand, houses in Poland are a lot cheaper than here, based on presumably lower wages.

I have just been looking at retirement housing with my parents, and I can indeed confirm that the vast majority are really tiny.

Modern new build 2 and 3 houses on estates are often hopelessly inadequate for family life. .

We should be building decent houses that people can afford on UK level wages., that afford people space and comfort.

Housing provision and standards in this country , for a country comfortably in the top 10 economies in the world, is a disgrace, and in the south of England is utterly unaffordable for far too many people.

[jean]

From what I understand, houses in Poland are a lot cheaper than here, based on presumably lower wages.

It's size I'm talking about.

Here, we expect to have whole rooms largely taken up by beds, in which we do little except sleep.

That would seem outrageously profligate to a Pole.

[teamsaint]

It's size I'm talking about.

Here, we expect to have whole rooms largely taken up by beds, in which we do little except sleep.

That would seem outrageously profligate to a Pole.

some Poles, perhaps.

Do you think that average housing size and cost in the UK is reasonable compared to average wages/salaries?
I don't.

[jean]

All I am talking about is the space we expect to have solely to sleep in, which is mostly unused during the day.

Cost is a separate issue.

[teamsaint]

when I see the very well off using studio appartment style techniques for maximising their use of space, I will reconsiderthe benefits.

Its the same kind orf arguments that they use for renting. The rich do tend to be in favour of ownership, for themselves, but not always for their tenants.

other points to consider;

Bedrooms are ofen used at other times of day other than when people are sleeping. Consider student lifestyles, for instance. Many people also use them as exercise or study space. They have to.


Oh, and to be pedantic, some people do night shifts, so sleep in the day.

All sounds a bit reminiscent of the bedroom tax, somehow.

[Serial_Apologist]

Hatred of landlords and ladies in general was my first important step towards political radicalisation in the 1960s: I hated their right to charge what they liked (until later abolished Fair Rents came in) and evict me for inviting a girlfriend in or just not liking my face. Today I hate just as much the government's reliance on this human sub-species as a solution to unaffordable housing/wages/public travel costs. Nothing much has changed since the gazumping of the early 1970s when we occupied an empty office tower block accruing market value to its developer, in order to highlight homelessness. Cuba hasn't managed to solve its housing problems, as programmes showing dilapidated states of disrepair in people's homes make clear; do they have a problem of obtaining decent building materials, 'cos I've never understood this? But they did have a system of state ownership of all land and buildings, so that one either rented at rental rates far below those in the West, even taking account of low wages, or bought one's flat off the government and sold it back to them on moving or death. When Alan Whicker went there a few years ago the system was being reformed to allow for properties to be inherited.

A programme on housing in Japan showed a people adapted to small-scale living - including a top solicitor or barrister living in a room smaller than this study (8' x 8') containing all necessary fixtures escept a cooker. The acoustic bass player Marcio Mattos on a visit to Japan and billeted to various people's homes was forced to park his bass at a local Zen monastery as it was the only building large and secure enough to take it! Size, there, from a status pov, seems not to matter where space is at a natural premium. (Having a narrower wealth gap there hasn't solved Japan's economic problems, but that's another story!)

In this country, where municipal ownership has unfortunately become equated in the public mind with sub-Stalinist imposed uniformity, various ruses have been thought up to persuade Joe Public of the advantageousness of private over public housing ownership, such as all those small-scale versions of the "Poundbury illusion", i.e. versions of Neo-Georgian designed architecture dishonestly described as "vernacular" to be found along the Thames Corridor, scaled down to the point at which incomers have been forced to dispense with everyday items of furniture too large to get around corners or up stairs. With London under Boris's housing crisis leading back once more to ideas about elevated living, the Capital will end up resembling Hong Kong unless new thinking is devoted to a problem not btw helped by rising population.

[amateur51]

Hatred of landlords and ladies in general was my first important step towards political radicalisation in the 1960s: I hated their right to charge what they liked (until later abolished Fair Rents came in) and evict me for inviting a girlfriend in or just not liking my face. Today I hate just as much the government's reliance on this human sub-species as a solution to unaffordable housing/wages/public travel costs. Nothing much has changed since the gazumping of the early 1970s when we occupied an empty office tower block accruing market value to its developer, in order to highlight homelessness. Cuba hasn't managed to solve its housing problems, as programmes showing dilapidated states of disrepair in people's homes make clear; do they have a problem of obtaining decent building materials, 'cos I've never understood this? But they did have a system of state ownership of all land and buildings, so that one either rented at rental rates far below those in the West, even taking account of low wages, or bought one's flat off the government and sold it back to them on moving or death. When Alan Whicker went there a few years ago the system was being reformed to allow for properties to be inherited.

A programme on housing in Japan showed a people adapted to small-scale living - including a top solicitor or barrister living in a room smaller than this study (8' x 8') containing all necessary fixtures escept a cooker. The acoustic bass player Marcio Mattos on a visit to Japan and billeted to various people's homes was forced to park his bass at a local Zen monastery as it was the only building large and secure enough to take it! Size, there, from a status pov, seems not to matter where space is at a natural premium. (Having a narrower wealth gap there hasn't solved Japan's economic problems, but that's another story!)

In this country, where municipal ownership has unfortunately become equated in the public mind with sub-Stalinist imposed uniformity, various ruses have been thought up to persuade Joe Public of the advantageousness of private over public housing ownership, such as all those small-scale versions of the "Poundbury illusion", i.e. versions of Neo-Georgian designed architecture dishonestly described as "vernacular" to be found along the Thames Corridor, scaled down to the point at which incomers have been forced to dispense with everyday items of furniture too large to get around corners or up stairs. With London under Boris's housing crisis leading back once more to ideas about elevated living, the Capital will end up resembling Hong Kong unless new thinking is devoted to a problem not btw helped by rising population.

I understand from those in the know that Poundbury (what an apt name for the trend in housing prices) is not the happy place its creator intended it to be. Poor finish, inadequate designs, etc etc. Oh dear.

As I understand these things, Germany is a society in which the proportion of people renting is far higher than here in UK. How have they achieved this? Are the landlords from the private rented sector or are they owned by local government? Is land cheaper and more available in Germany? I don't know - but I bet the Joseph Rowntree Foundation does ... or it ought to.

[ardcarp]

Hatred of landlords and ladies in general was my first important step towards political radicalisation in the 1960s: I hated their right to charge what they liked

I wondered when 'the wicked landlord' was going to be brought up. Undoubtedly there have been, and probably still are, some unscrupulous and money grabbing examples around. Those who rip off students in crumbling, poorly maintained, multi-occupied warrens are making a very fast buck. HOWEVER, the generality of private landlords these days are professional, want to keep their tenants happy, and have to charge affordable rents or their properties will lie empty.

Many (most?) young couples, perhaps starting a family, do not have a hope of getting a mortgage at first, and the private rented sector is filling a great need...in the almost total absence of social housing. Indeed, if any government decided to bash the private landlord on idealogical grounds, and to make it uneconomic to do the 'buy-to-let' thing (by taxation, punitive regulation or whatever) there would be an immediate housing crisis of catastrophic proportions.

As someone on the left of politics, I find it odd that I should be defending the arch-capitalist, the landlord. But short of a revolution in public housing (which couldn't happen overnight anyway) we can't do without them.

[jean]

Many (most?) young couples, perhaps starting a family, do not have a hope of getting a mortgage at first, and the private rented sector is filling a great need...in the almost total absence of social housing. Indeed, if any government decided to bash the private landlord on idealogical grounds, and to make it uneconomic to do the 'buy-to-let' thing (by taxation, punitive regulation or whatever) there would be an immediate housing crisis of catastrophic proportions.

Or perhaps in the absence of interest by buy-to-let landlords, prices at the bottom end of the market would fall, and more houses would be within the reach of just those young couples who can't afford them at present?