The Uk’S Housing Crisis

[Jahulaye]

Should we start building up again?

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/property/new-homes/9795268/To-solve-Britains-housing-crisis-we-must-build-up-not-out.html

All around me they’re tearing down 60’s high risers and replacing them with small modern mini housing estates, should we start building up again? Not in the same 60’s style but maybe mega high risers a mile high like a pyramid with built in shopping malls,l Ext? Essentials mini cities?

[nailit]

//Tower blocks built for council properties have not really worked, partly because of poor design and partly because of social factors in terms of residents//
What does 'social factors in terms of residence' mean ff? Ive lived in several high rises and am currently living in a high rise. Never had a problem with other residents.

[-Talbot-]

They were gonna build communities
It was going to be pie in the sky -
But the *** stench hallways and broken down lifts
Say the planners dream went wrong

[fiction-factory]

Can mean several things- such as people who wouldn't choose to live in a high rise because of mobility reasons or having children, to people who don't look after properties, vandalise them, use them for drugs etc, or don't have sufficient respect for communal areas. These issues tend not to arise or be such a problem in private apartments in tower blocks, where the facilities are usually also of higher quality

[EDDIE51]

^ The empty homes problem is being dealt with. Again in the budget it was announced that empty homes would be charged a 100% council tax surcharge on what they would pay if the homes were occupied. At the moment an empty property is charged at 50% of the full council tax, so that's a 400% increase. Of course a council can't pat council tax to itself, but Kensington and Chelsea, the site of Grenfell towers, alone has over 1500 empty private flats and houses. They are being intentionally kept empty to increase the housing shortage and so increase the value of the property to investors.

[fiction-factory]

Glad yours is fine, nailit. That seems to show that tower blocks in theory can work if they are built properly and the residents want to live there and make proper use of it.
I forget to mention illegal subletting as a social issue in some council blocks too.

[andres]

In our area there are plenty of cheap terraced houses for sale. Lots of people on the Council's housing list who can't afford to buy property. Years ago the local council would have bought some of those houses and rented them out . Maybe they should start doing it again. Wouldn't solve the housing crisis but it would help some people to get somewhere to live.

[douglas9401]

My sister in law lived on the twelfth floor of a tower block on the seafront in Aberdeen.
They were built with good lifts, door entry systems and excellent insulation, she only gave it up because she got married and moved to Australia.
I'd live in it or one just like it without a second thought.
It's great looking down at the gulls in flight and not having flies about the place. :-)

[nailit]

Thanks for reply ff but its a bit of a stereotype about council owned tower blocks. As stated, ive lived in several over the years and loved everyone. Also, (maybe because I can be a bit of a recluse at times) I quiet like the privacy of them. No chatting to the neighbors over the garden fence....

[fiction-factory]

Yes, I think more should be built, of a better quality and with more saftey features, and more care is taken over who is housed in them - and there is better supervision - eg regular checks on tenants, more CCTV in communal area, zero tolerance of unsocial behaviour, then they can all hopefully be like yours. I've known people who live in council blocks and in ex council blocks that are now privately owned and although the standard of the building is not ideal, residents generally make sure the properties are looked after.

[EDDIE51]

andres , Margaret Thatcher outlawed councils from using the cash from council house sales to build / buy new ones. The original intention of council house sales was to use the cash generated to build new ones, thus increasing the stock of affordable housing. Of course that did not suit the Tories so Maggie promptly banned councils from using the sales cash to build new stock. It was also a major reason that many councils sold their entire housing stock to housing associations.

[Gromit]

If we have to build up instead of out, we are building in the wrong place.

[Old_Geezer]

"They are being intentionally kept empty to increase the housing shortage and so increase the value of the property to investors."
Not all are. It's indefendable bullying and mugging of decent citizens by those in authority who have no morals nor ethics. They aren't fit to be on a planet with decent folk.

[EDDIE51]

The Grenfell towers fire has made the problem much worse. There are several hundred tower blocks around the UK that do not meet fire safety standards. Many are so bad that they can't be made safe and will have to be demolished.
We need to replace those before we start building new ones.
Tower blocks now have such a bad reputation that few will agree to live in them, but yes, they were popular back in the 1960s >> 1990s.

[EDDIE51]

Old Geezer , the property owners I am talking about are almost all Russian multi millionaires. They own tens of thousands of properties in affluent areas and are keeping them empty so as to increase the housing shortage and so increase the value of their holding, no point putting cash in the bank at current interest rates. But holding empty property in expensive areas increases the value by over 20% a year.

[jourdain2]

This sounds small scale - but bear with me, please. There is permission given to build 9 houses on a small plot in our village. 3 plots will be for self-build detached.
The other 6 will be 3 pairs of semis described as starter family homes.
They will all be built on a frontage of 45m - the houses will be 4m wide and they will add to the danger of the through road (some 20m after a blind bend). I can't see the point. There is no employment in this area, no public transport to speak of (a bus 2x a week)and no shop. Each house will have a garage - but 2 cars are a necessity for families. There is a school but anyone having more than 1 child will have to move, the houses will be so tiny. We would welcome more people for the school, pub and church - but not exactly well-placed for jobs etc..

Planning needs to be a bit more thoughtful and put homes where jobs and facilities are i.m.o..

[Kromovaracun]

Just over 2% of the UK's land is actually built on (and much of that is not homes). There is plenty of room.

The sole reason that we have a housing crisis is because of electoral strategy by both governing parties for the past 30 years aimed at buying the loyalty of homeowners. Namely, this was to sell people affordable homes and cement their support with constant increases in value. That's why we have no national housing plan, and that's why every strategy by every government to increase home ownership comes second to keeping house prices artificially high. The current state of the housing market is intentional.

[New Judge]

“We are told we need to grow more food to replace imports once we are out of the EU…”

No we are not told any such thing, Eddie. What the UK will be able to do (apart from growing some more food of its own, as we should do anyway) is to import food from non-EU countries, which we are not able to do at present because of the EU’s protectionist policies.

“…but as we all know, all immigrants will magically disappear as soon as we leave the EU .”

No serious Brexiters suggest any such thing, Eddie. That is a rumour spread about by Remainers of their Brexiter compatriots.

“Margaret Thatcher outlawed councils from using the cash from council house sales to build / buy new ones.”

Of course she did. The idea was that the stupendous burden placed on the taxpayer of providing subsidised housing for people who cannot afford their chosen lifestyle should be minimised. There would have been no point in selling off housing which cost the taxpayer a fortune to provide and maintain, only to replace it with another lot.

Tower blocks are fine. Just look at those in the Barbican in the centre of London. They are well maintained and are a pleasure to live in. The difference between them and places such as Grenfell Tower is that the residents pay the full whack for their accommodation (either by buying or renting) and respect their property, that of their neighbours and the area generally.

[Spicerack]

//But we are also told we need to build 200,000 new houses a year just to keep pace with the natural increase in population//

Natural increase? Conveniently missing the rather large elephant in the room, Eddie.

[New Judge]

For those reluctant to mention the “elephant in the room”, in the past ten years net migration to the UK has totalled about 3 million people. Assuming an average of 3 people per household (probably an over-estimate since a large proportion of migrants are single) this means that at least 1 million homes (100,000 per year) were required to cope with this influx. In that same period the average number of homes (net) added to the UK’s housing stock was around 120,000. So it does not require a great leap of logic to determine what the vast majority of additional housing stock growth was consumed by.

[Zacs-Master]

Your stats assume immortality, no migration and that all immigrants live in a house rather than renting a flat or a room.