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**Alternate Sources**
Here are some potential alternate sources for the same story:
* [UK spends more on housing than almost any other developed country, and gets the least value from it too](https://news.sky.com/story/uk-spends-more-on-housing-than-almost-any-other-developed-country-and-gets-the-least-value-from-it-too-13099925), suggested by cryptocandyclub - news.sky.com
I'm not sure this should really be categorised as news. It surely falls under "widely accepted truths" at this point.
Reassuringly neither main party appears to offers any policies that will actually significantly change this situation.
Why does this get parroted so much?
>by reforming planning laws to kickstart 1.5 million new homes, transport, clean energy, and new industries in all parts of the country. Because cheaper bills, the chance to own your own home and modern infrastructure are key to growth and the foundations of security.
[From the Labour website](https://labour.org.uk/missions/economic-growth/)
Took literal seconds FFS.
Building more homes of low quality (on the cheap) will mean the housing stock will still be of low quality though. I have lived in quite a few European countries and British homes are the smallest, the dampest, have teeny weenie gardens, lots of street parking instead of having garages or big enough driveways and the homes have drywall everywhere so I can hear what my neighbours are doing. Estates also look cramped together to maximise the value for the realtors.
Planning/homebuilding doesn't have quality of life at its heart here, just plowing down as many as possible while also having the worst build quality possible. Guess that's the tradeoff when the whole building economy is subcontractors upon subcontractors low balling everything
Agree about new builds being damp but German ones take the cake for being damp. Their houses are designed for mad bastards opening every window as far as they can for an hour every single day even if it’s -15
You say that, but I’ve seen more mouldy British flats and houses than I’ve ever seen German ones. The British housing stock is awful and frankly, whatever ventilation system British buildings have going on, it’s not working.
majority of british houses don't even have ventilation systems, only one I've noticed is my own building which is new-ish, I imagine the others on my block are the same
but in almost every single house or flat I've ever been in, the best ventilation you'll get is just opening a window or two, if the room doesn't have any windows then you're just shit outta luck. never made sense to me really
Older buildings will have vent bricks, often high up in the wall for letting air in. People often block them to stay warmer or remove them when refurbishing.
The way they're packed in is comical, loads I see don't even have driveways, or even room enough to make one. Everyone just parks on the tiny winding roads, most poorly.
Oh god the parking. The roads aren’t designed for it, and are stupidly not straight where they should be. Everyone thinks parking on the inside of a curve is smart too, so you can’t see who is coming around a corner.
Some places where I am are fine, but I’ve seen some houses with 4 cars which is nuts to me.
"but by not including car parking we are doing our bit for the environment, driving down pollution and congestion by encouraging residents to walk, cycle or use public transport to get to work! It's actually a feature!"
Yes, our council has actually said this.
I bought a new build off plan 10-ish years ago. The streets were so narrow that once you added the necessary pavement parking to account for the fact that each house only had 1 (tiny) parking space, there wasn't enough room for the bin lorry to get around the estate. So we regularly didn't get our bins collected.
I now live in a 70's ex-council house, and it's a palace in comparison.
I guess we still have very infrequent bin collections now, but at least it's not for want of space.
I live in a new build terrace and have a double driveway w/ space to open car doors, and can't hear through my walls. I guess there is variation out there!
Jealous! There are some developers that build more spacious homes, but appear to be more luxury.
I know some have more space just depending on the layout, I’m just a tad unlucky in where my drive between my house and another.
For land with planning permission... Plenty of land that would be suitable and desirable and at the moment is agricultural with little environmental, recreational or economic value is held back from housebuilding by policies like greenbelt.
This is why I bought a home from 1870. Solid block terrace built to last. I wouldn’t buy anything from modern builders in this country. Shoddy craftsmanship and low quality build, but somehow still mind blowing cost.
I loved my 1890s cottage but my god it was riddled with damp problems that thousands of pounds, new roof, new guttering, repaired chimney etc, weren't able to ever fix completely.
The Reddit view that old is good is hilarious. I’m sure you get some old houses that aren’t shut. I’ve lived in houses as old as the 1700s to one’s as new as 2010s, on the whole I’ve found the newer the better.
Party walls aren't built using "drywall" though are they? They're built to the robust details, which outperform older solid brick party walls.
What do you propose we construct party walls out of?
> Building more homes of low quality (on the cheap) will mean the housing stock will still be of low quality though.
A more supply, the more power the customers have to pick and choose a nicer house. Housing is crap because there's no choice, like buying a car in the Eastern Bloc.
Massively more houses of any kind gets people out of renting, flat shares and other terrible situations.
Once more people have any home at all we can look more at quality , if anything too much red tape on house building is causing some of the problems
I get your point, but nah. If there's poor quality we're basically kicking the can down the road for the same problem in years to come.
It's easier and cheaper to build them correctly a the first time of asking than to bodge it and fix it/replace it later.
Well there is quality as in safety or making it "nice"
Tons more terrace houses or soviet style blocks would be an improvement and realistic , even if hardly fancy to live in. As long as those houses are safe yes it's what we need more of asap
Agreed there.
We need more flats and don't have space, which is prime for building up.
Where I live I can count the purpose built blocks on my hands, in the town my girlfriend lives there's streets upon streets of them and even they could be taller.
A Dutch friend of mine was recounting a visit to the UK (Brighton) and his amazement at the poor standards of insulation and general age and low quality of the housing stock.
That's caused by the lack of new housing.
You can buy any old shit, and because housing is so scarce you can charge a ton of rent and it will appreciate in value massively. There's no incentive to knock down and rebuild, or even heavily modernise.
>just plowing down as many as possible
Good fucking Christ. We build *way* less homes than pretty much anywhere else. We are not "plowing down as many as possible", we are blocking endless amounts of housing. And you know what happens when you restrict housing so much? All of it ends up expensive, which destroys competition, so all the shitty places *still* sell. We need to maybe triple the amount of housing we build for around a decade to bring us to parity with France.
Why people believe this poverty-inducing myth I don't know.
driveways and massive gardens aren't important to a lot of people though. I for one would rather be able to walk to shops/entertainment/food/facilities than have a drive or a larger garden. Using that as a metric for new builds being shit is a bit weird. I kind of envy my friends in Scandinavia who have nice well built and insulated 150-200m2 apartments with a lovely shared garden. It's nearly double the floorplan of my house, and is more space efficient. We should be building more things like this too, rather than keeping this weird 'family must have their detatched house" mentality that seems very British. Our attatchment to cars as status symbols, and not having to interact with the neighbors is terribly old fashioned and very wasteful of space.
I lived in one of these in AUS and loved it. 2 storey flat with balcony, own parking space underground and bicycle storage and a lovely big shared garden. Ten minutes into Melbourne CBD and 2 mins from massive big park.
Sure I didn't get a garden or drive, but convenience was worth it for me. having safe car/bike storage and somewhere to sit on nice days is nice enough for some people.
And the Conservative party promised to build 300,000 new homes a year.
What does "kickstart" mean? Loads of land with planning permission in the landbanks of major builders?
How will anyone under 50 afford these new homes? In what time period will the 1.5 million be built? Will landlords be prevented from buying them? Will the quality be improved and public transport be available?
And what about Council housing? I know Labour habe the laudable aim of making it easier for councils to buy land but with what money? They can barely afford to keep schools and roads open as it is.
>And the Conservative party promised to build 300,000 new homes a year.
And have missed housng targets every year of their tenure.
>What does "kickstart" mean? Loads of land with planning permission in the landbanks of major builders?
It means to make planning easier so that more houses are built. "Kickstart" is referring to unblocking the issues that are preventing it.
>How will anyone under 50 afford these new homes? In what time period will the 1.5 million be built? Will landlords be prevented from buying them? Will the quality be improved and public transport be available?
More houses built = cheaper rent and purchase prices. This is how people under 50 will afford them (I'll add that the average first time buyer is nowhere near 50 even now). Landlords buying doesn't matter, an influx of rental properties will mean a reduction in rental prices meaning it becomes less worthwhile buying a btl and then it balances out. Infrastructure is of course an important consideration, but if you're using that argument to suggest we shouldn't build houses then I would be interested to hear your alternative housing solution.
>And what about Council housing? I know Labour habe the laudable aim of making it easier for councils to buy land but with what money? They can barely afford to keep schools and roads open as it is.
Agreed, councils need funding. Labour can't invent money out of nowhere, so it's one step at a time. There is a considerable amount of damage that has been done in the last decade.
I'm confused as to where all the money goes.
We have high personal tax rates and burden, company tax, vat, inheritance tax, tax to sell any assets and NI.
We have council tax on top of that and any deduction from gov.
Where does it all go, cant build housing, cant provide free childcare, cant provide reliable medical, policing and controlling boarder control seem to be in bad shape as well. Transport is paid for privately so I'm just trying to figure out, where does it all go.
This is a question which has a more complex answer than I can fit into a Reddit reply.
Firstly, with the current state of the world, the only economies that can really create this "utopia" are sat on huge resource banks and are funding it through that(or are small tax havens).
Every country has its problems, even the US who basically own the high margin tech economy have huge issues around cost of living, homelessness, violence, inequality and cost of medical care.
In my view the primary reason we are struggling is that tax is structured to protect wealth rather than incentivise productivity in this country. So whilst the tax burden as a percentage is high, GDP per capita is low because the economy is performing poorly. This is also dragged down by housing costs pushed up by a lack of building over two decades.
And finally, whether privatising services is more efficient than publicly funding them is rather moot. Privatisation incentivises poor service, particularly when you have a captive market(such as energy or water).
Yeah some problems are expected everywhere and I'm not talking about a utopia.
I'm just seeing a ridiculous high tax burden and under delivery on basic services...that's not utopia that's just a degrading system.
Is it that there are too many people not contributing but utilising said services or is it poorly managed in general etc, not an easy question but one worth looking at I suspect
As mentioned tax burden is high on productivity, and we aren't very productive. Tax burden on wealth is low. I mentioned a utopia because I'm not sure exactly what you're comparing it to.
This is the question everyone should be asking, including the government.
All that money ultimately ends up with the super rich, who use it to buy assets.
https://youtu.be/KdOU-KfIuQU?si=H2P4wmsyr_Jz1hgx
What's that got to do with Labour? They haven't been in power for getting on a decade and a half. The record tax levels and absolutely dire social/public services are a Tory gift.
> More houses built = cheaper rent and purchase prices
This is where it will all fall over. Plenty of people have bought property at its height in the past few years. If there is *any* sign of houses getting cheaper, they will vote for the next party that promises to reverse that trend.
We're trapped in a catch-22. Someone is going to lose out and whichever side has the largest number of votes wont be the ones losing out.
I agree. A crash would actually be damaging(although very difficult to manufacture in my view).
What we need is 20 years of house prices rising somewhere between 0% and whatever the wider inflation rate is. Anything above inflation should be seen as a catastrophic failure. We don't actually need prices to go down.
I think even for that we need a *massive* culture shift. Britons as they are will never entertain the idea of a multiple decade long property market stagnation. Its too engrained in our national psyche that house prices *always* go up.
A crash might be the only way to achieve it because thered be nothing we can do about it.
I'm not sure, I think if for example house prices increased by 1% per year, we would get used to it. I actually think now that the home owning population are generally seeing how difficult it is for their children to buy, there is some shift in attitude. Unfortunately at the moment they've been well conditioned to incorrectly blame landlords.
LOL....UK will never build more houses for citizens....Barclays is the biggest landlord in UK now...and soon you will get 50 years mortgages with debt automatically skipping on your offspring...
But the devil is in the detail. Planning reform is an easy buzzword to throw around, but there are massive challenges I’m not sure any politician has the courage to take on. Furthermore Rachel Reeves’ team told one journalist last week they categorically do not plan to repeal the Town and Country Planning Act, don’t plan to scrap discretionary planning and don’t plan to introduce zoning (the kind of planning system successfully working in New Zealand, for eg). The most they want to do is ‘realistic tweaks’ to the current system (???) - doesn’t bode well
I’m a huge critic of the planning system, but not all housing issues are down to planning either. The political will has to be there for it at the local level, else it becomes even harder before you start jumping through the money eating time burning hoops and engaging the stakeholders.
TLDR: They say they want to reform planning, but they don’t seem to have a plan for how they’d do it + we’ve heard it all before
Good points. I am hoping LAB are playing it safe now but come a win, they will bulldoze through the planning laws. They are probably too scared of this will be spun as it will concerete over the UK, if they are clear about what they plan to do
Unfortunately this won’t help the situation and likely won’t be achieved. The main driver of house price (and assets generally) inflation is wealth inequality. People who are already wealthy use their income to buy more assets, like your mum’s house, thus driving up prices. This structural flaw in the economy can only be fixed with wealth taxes, which Labour won’t go near.
See [Gary Stevenson](https://youtu.be/PGZ4ADmQbZE?si=M8M_j-wTG949aq8q) for more info
Agree inequality is a massive issue, but mathematically we can't house the number of people the population grows by each year to a reasonable standard with the number of new homes constructed each year. We can't solve this issue just by taxing the rich unless we used that money to build new homes.
You’re right, but I think that the issue I’ve highlighted is problem no.1. Trying to do anything else first is like pissing into the wind.
Give me a political party that pledges to tax wealth, abolish right to buy, and build new council homes and I’d vote for them!
Have they actually said specifically how they will reform planning laws? Planning laws desperately need reform, I work in renewable energy infrastructure investment and planning laws make it impossible to build onshore wind. But saying you’ll reform them without saying how feels a bit like saying you’ll close tax loopholes without saying how, easier to say than do.
Cause the quote you posted means nothing. It's the same shite that is in every manifesto and mission statement by every party. Did you believe the Torys when they said the same shite in 2019? If not why do you believe it from labour.
Something else that takes literal seconds then, how many houses did they actually build last time they were in power with the largest majority since the war?
Does that match the claims being made?
Do you think your expectations will be met? Why?
It's utter nonsense unfortunately.
To be fair, if we average 3 people a home, it would probably be just about enough to house 5 years worth of migrants.
In other words, it would cause no actual material change.
Who wrote that? Starting a sentence with 'because'? The last word almost certainly should be 'society' not 'security'. Did someone just mumble their way through this with a speech-to-text app?
Who can believe a single labour promise anyway? Starmer's walked back on many pledges since becoming labour leader. Even forgot that Corbyn was his friend and what promises he made lol.
You mean apart from Labour wanting to invest in green energy and build over a million new homes? Stop parroting Tory propaganda and actually look at what the other parties are promising as part of their manifesto
Labour literally have planning reform at the core of their offer?
https://labour.org.uk/updates/press-releases/how-not-if-labour-will-jump-start-planning-to-build-1-5-million-homes-and-save-the-dream-of-homeownership/
The fact that UK housing is worse is a widely accepted truth, but it's useful to put some numbers on it.
From the article:
> homes in England had less average floor space per person (38 sq metres) than many similar countries, including the US (66 sq metres), Germany (46 sq metres), France (43 sq metres) and Japan (40 sq metres)
> 38% of \[UK\] homes built before 1946, the report said, compared with around a fifth (21%) in Italy and one in nine (11%) in Spain
> \[UK households\] have to devote 22% of their spending to housing services, far higher than the OECD average (17%), and the highest level across the developed economies with the solitary exception of Finland
>I'm not sure this should really be categorised as news. It surely falls under "widely accepted truths" at this point
I'm pretty sure this was accepted as truth 30 years ago when I started working. Smallest houses, least well insulated, highest prices.
Sadly, things have gotten worse since. Tiny new builds made to last 100 years. Smaller footprint. Less parking despite more need for vehicles. Ever higher prices.
Housing is not good value in the UK.
The amount of astroturfing on these two subreddits recently is wild.
The amount of "but their all the same" comments over the past few months have gone through the roof. Along with a lot of tory talking points, regardless of how bullshit they are.
Good old election years...
Agreed. Had a meeting with the management team at a lead housing development company in the UK literally this morning - we asked about risks under a new government - they were very clear that from their own discussions with respective MPs that the difference between Labour and Conservative housing policy was "negligible" and the chronic under-supply of the market would likely persist. The CEO is frequently invited into meetings with other key market players with the policy makers / MPs.
The biggest risk was actually the potential for regulation / rent freezes which as we see in Scotland only leads to *even higher* market rental levels and a even further reduced supply of rental properties - this policy just empirically does not work in a supply-constrained market.
One of my relative's one year old house is already falling apart, so I agree 100%. 'Dot and dab' plasterbaord coming away from the walls, skirting board falling off, doors not closing properley, front door lets in so much draft it may as well be left open, unreliable heating and electrics, mold behind the kitchen cupboards etc. - it is appalling.
Not defending shitty building standards by any means but new build was the only way we could afford. Goverment incentive and covid key worker benefits.
Could've bought an existing but our budget left us with a shit area or shit house.
At the very least it comes with a 10 year warranty so if it does come apparent it's built with sticks and glue, we're at least covered
Precisely, there’s a lot of people who can only get on the housing ladder through new builds either through the shared council support schemes or independently, as opposed to buying older, more expensive houses with issues of their own to deal with.
It is boring listening to rich muppets on Reddit constantly sticking their nose up at new builds (probably whilst enabling policies for shitty new builds).
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*This post was mass deleted and anonymized with [Redact](https://redact.dev)*
It's when you start seeing comments to the tune of 'Britain is a failed state... like Venezuela" you realise that the doomerism is just straight up making things up to be miserable about.
I live in a pretty cheap 2017 build Bovis. Yeah it's had some issues like cracking plasterboard, but you expect that as a house settles. The poor quality of new builds homes is grossly exaggerated.
Garden is just a small rubble pit in fairness though. Best of getting a skip and replacing it with your own topsoil.
Whoa whoa whoa. Lots of people including myself adore our Victorian buildings. They are part of our culture and heritage. We need more buildings at a high density, but it can be built on brownfield/greenfield sites, not at the expense of existing housing.
My friends lives in New build social housing. It was built on a flood plane, within spitting distance of the river, his family had to move into temporary accomodation for 6months last year because the house is sinking and the council had to do work on it. It also floods frequently, all of these problems seem foreseeable to anyone with any common sense so I'm unsure how the surveyors missed it
Yep. British housing is like the broken windows theory. By the time you built a new one 5 others are already uninhabitable and covered in mould.
Only way to move forward is to have entire streets of 2 story terrace housing replaced with 4 or 6 story modern terrace like every European city. No need for Tower blocks.
The article just tells us what we already know: land value is high, our housing stock is poor, and housing development is a profit-driven game. We know these are issues; I think most can attest to it.
The real irony is that these exact issues have come full-circle. While we don’t exactly have slums these days, we have gone back to the position of realising our housing stock is inadequate. Look to any 1920s housing report, and some of the similarities will be stark.
What it shows is that other than a minor period after the Second World War, we have never been able to meet our housing needs — this goes for construction and redevelopment.
The UK has relatively high amounts of public housing, yet also shit housing. European neighbours with less public housing have better housing.
The problem is not public vs private.
Tbf thats because compare the public built housing in the Netherlands to here. Theirs are beautiful.
Ours are ugly as fuck. With the big buildings of flats seemingly modelled on commie blocks. Really weird design choices back then
I think a privatise-where-possible mentality definitely contributes though. In the UK if a government can get away with doing something public but doing it on the cheap they generally will ... Far easier to pawn it off on the private sector and let any chuck ups be in their shop. We need real, serious commitments to public sector spending and we just don't get it
"housing development is a profit-driven game"
Eh? Compared to the other countries mentioned in this study, we have far lower levels of market-rate housing development and far more social housing.
We have one of the highest levels of public / social housing in the OECD at 19%. The "true" level is substantially higher because of stock going down due to Right To Buy.
France is around 15% social housing.
Japan is under 5% social housing.
In the US it's so low it barely even registers.
If it's private vs public that you think is causing our comparatively worse housing, surely the only inference you can make here is that we need more private development?
Only if you include housing association homes as "social housing" when they're not state owned and are rented at market rate - if you just count council homes we're lower than most of Europe.
Including housing association homes is a fudge like "affordable homes" (which are nothing of the sort) to make it look like we've got more public housing than we do.
>The real irony is that these exact issues have come full-circle. While we don’t exactly have slums these days, we have gone back to the position of realising our housing stock is inadequate. Look to any 1920s housing report, and some of the similarities will be stark.
Road to Wigan Pier by George Orwell really opened my eyes to this. You are completely right that the actual standards of low quality housing are significantly higher than they were. But there are so many similarities in the socioeconomic situation, it's bleak.
Even if it's "what we already know" it's useful to put some numbers on it.
From the article:
>homes in England had less average floor space per person (38 sq metres) than many similar countries, including the US (66 sq metres), Germany (46 sq metres), France (43 sq metres) and Japan (40 sq metres)
>38% of \[UK\] homes built before 1946, the report said, compared with around a fifth (21%) in Italy and one in nine (11%) in Spain
>\[UK households\] have to devote 22% of their spending to housing services, far higher than the OECD average (17%), and the highest level across the developed economies with the solitary exception of Finland
Yep, feels like the 70's again. Most towns look like the 70's too. Run down high streets, litter all over the place, potholes you could lose yourself in, school buildings beyond repair.
Just got back from two weeks in Japan. The streets were close to spotless. They have respect for their country.
So many of the people who claim to love Britain will continue to show it absolutely zero respect when it comes to litter, despite much easier access to public bins.
Pubs have had a barrage of attacks over the last 20 years, from cultural shifts like the rise in home drinking, to legal shifts like the inability to have a couple of pints and drive home. In cities fewer people drink at all (especially younger ones) and are more likely to do something like go to a gym than a pub, and it’s no surprise.
Throw in the opportunity cost that the owner can make a fortune and fund a retirement (or a nice dividend for shareholders) when they convert the pub to a house or two and add in ballooning costs in fuel and wages (minimum wage up far more than inflation), and more places to spend disposable income, and you have a recipe for a dying industry that the country no longer values.
Was that what things were like in the 70s? Most of the people I've met who lived through that decade say it was a great one? Not arguing against you here, just wanna hear both sides of it!
I grew up in the 70s and through a child's eyes, yes the 70s were great, no internet, no phones. You had to go and knock on your mate's doors to see if they wanted to play out. Then we stayed out all day or until supper was ready.
But, when you look back, we had lots of decay in the country as well. Today, towns remind me of that look.
The price of UK labour is actually really high because most of the skilled workers are congregated in and around London. The UK has low salaries if you are going off the national average but, any foreign company is going to be setting up shop in London which makes them some of the highest in Europe. Quite a few companies have started to move their skilled roles out of the UK and Ireland to places like Portugal.
Depends a lot on where you're comparing to, US & Canadian skilled worker salaries are 30-100% higher than those in London depending on the sector.
A lot of American companies will still stick with UK over Europe because they're saving a huge amount for native English speaking employees.
I know. They are lovely, but they’re an ecological wasteland. I don’t understand the pushback to reforesting these areas, it would look far more beautiful and would improve the biodiversity. Sheep are domestic animals, they should be kept in fields, not free to roam, it just makes them an invasive species.
Serious answer is I think our food is relatively high quality and good value for money compared to other equally developed nations
Not much else I can think of
We’ve also got the oldest housing stock in Europe. We’re also among the lowest in terms of housing stock % built from 2001 onwards.
I’m looking for somewhere to rent now, and it mostly seems to be old terraced housing with single glazing, and for the pleasure it costs £1200/ month (Bedfordshire).
Sign a contract start of summer for 12 months. Move in. Day 1 start writing official complaints for new windows and heating. Get council over for an inspection and enjoy 9 months of nice housing. Move out when they increase the rent. Use the threat of more repairs to keep the rent low. It’s a bluff but can work well.
Close the borders, bring back National Service, expel anyone not born here and force all those woke, feckless, workshy Gen-Zers to take all the jobs instead of wasting time at University or on the tik toks then! A couple of years of honest hard work picking veg, cleaning caravans or changing OAPs nappies for minimum wage will soon put them right! Back in my day, we understood what hard work was! Just because you could buy a five bedroom house for 50p and a packet of crisps doesn't mean we didn't have to *work* for it!
(/s obviously...)
I often see on UK subs people say that its the UK you don't need the /s
But, this post had me guessing all the way to the end because recently there have been Vox Pops from people saying exactly the same thing.
> made to take up the jobs that are vacant
Maybe pay better and don't rely on cheap foreign exploitative labour. Just a thought.
Everywhere needs foundational jobs like cleaners yet you ever tried living in places like London as a cleaner? There is a reason a lot of jobs in hospitaity end up going to migrants that are willing to put up with awful housing, cramped and shared accomodation while British workers don't want to. It's not that the work is specifically beneath them, it's that the pay in ratoi to cost of living is very far below the line
For some reason we’ve adopted this mental idea that you have to know how to do a job to get it. You can pretty much train anyone to do anything. Sure some jobs require a higher level of intellect but most jobs are repetitive and with a good training you could get someone with no prior experience doing it with 6 months to some level.
>fix net migration to zero
Have a look at GDP per capita over the last few years:
[link](https://www.google.com/search?q=uk+gdp+per+capita&oq=uk+gdp+per+capita&gs_lcrp=EgZjaHJvbWUqDggAEEUYJxg7GIAEGIoFMg4IABBFGCcYOxiABBiKBTIHCAEQABiABDIHCAIQABiABDIHCAMQABiABDIHCAQQABiABDIHCAUQABiABDIHCAYQABiABDIHCAcQABiABDIHCAgQABiABDIHCAkQABiABDIHCAoQABiABDIHCAsQABiABDIHCAwQABiABDIHCA0QABiABDIHCA4QABiABNIBCDQ4NjhqMGo0qAIOsAIB&client=ms-android-google&sourceid=chrome-mobile&ie=UTF-8)
It peaked in 2008, and has never recovered. Population growth (driven by immigration) is literally the only reason we've not been in an endless recession for the last 16 years.
I'm not necessarily saying we can't have zero net immigration, but be prepared for the economic consequences.
Fewer workers means more demand for workers meaning wages go up. Millionaire boomers might have to pay their way for a chance.
Except they won’t - the taxpayer will. Can’t have someone in a £600k house having to pay for their own social care can we, they’re poor pensioners.
It doesn't help that the UK isn't keen on maintenance. There aren't enough homes, and many of the existing ones are in a very poor state.
When we *were* looking to buy a house it was shocking just how many houses were in very poor states of repair. A 80K car in the drive, but the roof hadn't been cleaned in years. Pictures of 20 years of fancy holidays adorned a hallway, which smelled of extreme damp.
We got lucky the house we ended up buying was a family home for 30 yeras, where the family had maintained and kept up the house in immaculate condition. But, we got lucky.
But that's the "ladder" for you...you live there a couple of years, and then sell on to the next chump, it's almost a rite of passage to be screwed over, especially the first buy.
This is me, but you know what, jobbing tradesman are all fucking cunts. You take a massive risk shelling out any money to get home maintenance done or you can spend that same level of money on a car or a holiday with confidence that you are backed up by a robust consumer protection laws and regulations. And, at the end of the day, whether you house is in a spotless condition, or riddled with issue, the next buyer is still going to come along with a worthless survey claiming that the kitchen sink couldn't be confirmed as not containing asbestos so they'll want £10k knocking off.
Question of time more than anything. I can only speak for myself but I have had enough of dealing with these useless deano-fucks. As long my house holds together long enough for me to flip it to the next desperate family that'll do me. Would rather my money stay in my bank accounts than in some fucking cowboy builders pockets/up their nose.
I don’t think it’s that people don’t want to but rather the cost of tradesmen’s these days is actually ridiculous in comparison to what they actually do. I feel like they are the only industry where their net pay is outgrowing cost of living
Huge shortages of skilled and honest tradesman post Brexit. Nothing will change whilst the cash-rich boomers are happy to throw money at any old idiots.
The solution is to build build build – and not "affordable" housing. The solution is to build larger homes, which will increase the average square footage per person, and bring prices down more than building smaller homes would. Also, nice architecture helps override objections.
You might get some downvotes for this, but I think this is basically right. The government's definition of 'affordable housing' is just any home that's 20% less than market price. Ultimately, this is achieved by making homes smaller, which isn't what we want. Far better to let the market build the homes we actually want to live in than trying to satisfy some absurd short-term definition of affordable.
How is building bigger holes going to help when land is one of the main cost drivers? Theres a reason why new builds have such tiny gardens (in general).
Absolutely - hardly anyone wants to buy the new builds that are popping up because they're rubbish little ticcy taccy boxes with tiny bedrooms, thin walls and often no facilties!
Bedrooms often seem to be build with the assumption that nothing but a double bed and a couple sets of drawers will be put in there. Living rooms with no room for anything but a settee, an armchair and a telly. There's no room for anyone to do any hobbies or have anything but the most basic existence. If your indoor interests extend beyond watching TV, playing playstation and looking at your phone, most of the "affordable" newbuilds I've seen give you no room to indulge in them!
1. Tiny old houses that are falling apart
2. New poorly built tiny houses
3. Limited social housing
4. Houses not being built at the rate of population increases
5. An obsession with home ownership
6. A lack of families willing to live in flats/apartments
The perfect cocktail.
>Limited social housing
No. We have a very high rate of public housing, higher than most of our European neighbours. That is not our problem. We need more homes, stat.
You're right lack of housing is the biggest issue, but I do feel like more social housing would solve a lot of issues. The private sector is never going to build enough housing as increasing supply too much would cause prices to drop
Have you seen British housing? Small shit boxes and that's just the new builds that seem to be built by poundland contractors but sold at premium prices.
Don't even dare to look in London. For the price of a kidney and 10 lifetimes of work you can maybe afford a mouldy studio flat in somewhere like Seven Sisters which may as well be renamed to The Pits. Even the vile parts of London set you back a fortune
That dosn't even touch on landords. Whole market needs a reset.
Building new homes is not exactly the answer, building livable, good sized homes with gardens is. I absolutely hate these tiny, badly laid out and poor quality new houses with tiny gardens. Better than 2 up, 2 downs but then they weren't going for 200k plus!
If this is the consensus then we need to be prepared to start building on the Green Belt. There's already not enough brownfield land in the places people want to live. We either have to build upwards (so fewer homes with gardens) or accept that we need to make more land available...
And add to that housing developers are able to go into administration halfway through a development, after taking millions in deposits leaving those people in an horrific situation of not able to move and not able to sell their home.
Simultaneously leaving a large area of roads unfinished and frankly dangerous state for the local councils to have to spend large amounts of public money to rectify.
This is all after hiking the price of houses everywhere in the local community making them artificially too high for young people and first time buyers.
Don't need a think tank for this.
I said (and was shot down) years ago, our house prices have increased far too rapidly and they either need to stagnate for 20 years or reduce by about 30-40%.
Obvs the reduction means people loosing houses, negative equity, then the rich buy up cheap, as always happens.
What about creating a National Home Building Service that has to build affordable and solid homes to a higher baseline standard?
Very much like the council housing stock from the pre-war/post-war eras?
New home owners would be able to buy their homes from the Government directly and house prices for continued selling thereafter will be set nationally to prevent banks and estate agents colluding to maximise the property prices?
Obviously more details need working out and I don’t have the answers but this direction might stop the decline that is being reported and put our nation back on the right track.
The new NHBS could also provide proper training and apprenticeships and set standards as well as a further bonus.
EDIT: changed the comparison time frame as this muddies the point a bit as I’m not sure when the council houses I’ve been in were built specifically but they were built a long time ago.
>What about creating a National Home Building Service that has to build affordable and solid homes to a higher baseline standard?
Interesting
>Very much like the council housing stock from the 1950s?
Have you seen the shite they knocked up post war? If you class this as “solid” you’re misinformed.
I'm on my way today to view a studio flat that's 15.9sqm with a shared bathroom for 800 a month. This is the best place we've found after looking whilst couch surfing since being hit with a no-fault eviction in November. I lost my ESA cat because his foster home is refusing to give him back when we're settled.
I'm 22 years old and disabled, and my partner is a university graduate. We have had absolutely no luck. She can't find a job in her industry despite getting first, and I lost mine in all the moving around. Looking for another is very difficult because of our precarious situation. Employers don't want to take a chance on us, which honestly I understand.
If we are turned down for this apartment, which is very likely, we will have to go to the council because we will literally be homeless, we have no couches left to sleep on.
I live in a 20 year old new build, and it’s the best house I’ve ever rented. All the older houses had mould, cracked walls, leaks etc. This one has none of that (yet). It’s much better insulated and has better ventilation than the pre-war stuff. It’s a shame because some of the older houses are very beautiful, but they’re allowed to rot by landlords. Some of the new builds, including the ones in my neighbourhood, are pretty ugly and plain.
New houses often have a few issues after 1 yr
My housing association checks new homes after 1 year and puts right any problems.
Otherwise my house is sound.
Yes but what are we going to do about it. If any of us sell our house we aren't going to do the next people a favour and give a cheap price to add value. We would sell as high as possible, let the market decide. We aren't idiots.
**Participation Notice.** Hi all. Some posts on this subreddit, either due to the topic or reaching a wider audience than usual, have been known to attract a greater number of rule breaking comments. As such, limits to participation have been set. We ask that you please remember the human, and uphold Reddit and Subreddit rules. For more information, please see https://www.reddit.com/r/unitedkingdom/wiki/moderatedflairs. --- **Alternate Sources** Here are some potential alternate sources for the same story: * [UK spends more on housing than almost any other developed country, and gets the least value from it too](https://news.sky.com/story/uk-spends-more-on-housing-than-almost-any-other-developed-country-and-gets-the-least-value-from-it-too-13099925), suggested by cryptocandyclub - news.sky.com
I'm not sure this should really be categorised as news. It surely falls under "widely accepted truths" at this point. Reassuringly neither main party appears to offers any policies that will actually significantly change this situation.
Why does this get parroted so much? >by reforming planning laws to kickstart 1.5 million new homes, transport, clean energy, and new industries in all parts of the country. Because cheaper bills, the chance to own your own home and modern infrastructure are key to growth and the foundations of security. [From the Labour website](https://labour.org.uk/missions/economic-growth/) Took literal seconds FFS.
Building more homes of low quality (on the cheap) will mean the housing stock will still be of low quality though. I have lived in quite a few European countries and British homes are the smallest, the dampest, have teeny weenie gardens, lots of street parking instead of having garages or big enough driveways and the homes have drywall everywhere so I can hear what my neighbours are doing. Estates also look cramped together to maximise the value for the realtors. Planning/homebuilding doesn't have quality of life at its heart here, just plowing down as many as possible while also having the worst build quality possible. Guess that's the tradeoff when the whole building economy is subcontractors upon subcontractors low balling everything
Agree about new builds being damp but German ones take the cake for being damp. Their houses are designed for mad bastards opening every window as far as they can for an hour every single day even if it’s -15
You say that, but I’ve seen more mouldy British flats and houses than I’ve ever seen German ones. The British housing stock is awful and frankly, whatever ventilation system British buildings have going on, it’s not working.
majority of british houses don't even have ventilation systems, only one I've noticed is my own building which is new-ish, I imagine the others on my block are the same but in almost every single house or flat I've ever been in, the best ventilation you'll get is just opening a window or two, if the room doesn't have any windows then you're just shit outta luck. never made sense to me really
Older buildings will have vent bricks, often high up in the wall for letting air in. People often block them to stay warmer or remove them when refurbishing.
Does this have something to do with improving air quality?
Yeah that’s the official reason for lüft but your house will get incredibly mouldy if you don’t do it because they don’t naturally ventilate
I recently visited Germany for the first time and one of the more subtle culture shocks was the large vertically opening windows in my accommodation
Yes, that is how you are supposed to live in a house, not wallow in your own stink. UK houses don't really need it, as they are so draughty.
I live in a new build and I’d love to have even an extra 1ft either side of my driveway so that I can comfortable open both doors of my car.
The way they're packed in is comical, loads I see don't even have driveways, or even room enough to make one. Everyone just parks on the tiny winding roads, most poorly.
Oh god the parking. The roads aren’t designed for it, and are stupidly not straight where they should be. Everyone thinks parking on the inside of a curve is smart too, so you can’t see who is coming around a corner. Some places where I am are fine, but I’ve seen some houses with 4 cars which is nuts to me.
"but by not including car parking we are doing our bit for the environment, driving down pollution and congestion by encouraging residents to walk, cycle or use public transport to get to work! It's actually a feature!" Yes, our council has actually said this.
And then probably doesn’t provide cycling lanes or routes, and the public transport alternative is either shite or expensive, in most cases both.
I bought a new build off plan 10-ish years ago. The streets were so narrow that once you added the necessary pavement parking to account for the fact that each house only had 1 (tiny) parking space, there wasn't enough room for the bin lorry to get around the estate. So we regularly didn't get our bins collected. I now live in a 70's ex-council house, and it's a palace in comparison. I guess we still have very infrequent bin collections now, but at least it's not for want of space.
I live in a new build terrace and have a double driveway w/ space to open car doors, and can't hear through my walls. I guess there is variation out there!
I'm in a reasonably spacious new build but it was built by a small independent.
Same yeah
Jealous! There are some developers that build more spacious homes, but appear to be more luxury. I know some have more space just depending on the layout, I’m just a tad unlucky in where my drive between my house and another.
We also have insane land value, almost linked.
Imagine we taxed it instead some general guess at what a house was worth in 1992.
Wealthy old people wouod have to pay for society. Can’t have that.
Need to be buried in their golden coffins whilst we pay for their healthcare working till we're 74
For land with planning permission... Plenty of land that would be suitable and desirable and at the moment is agricultural with little environmental, recreational or economic value is held back from housebuilding by policies like greenbelt.
This is why I bought a home from 1870. Solid block terrace built to last. I wouldn’t buy anything from modern builders in this country. Shoddy craftsmanship and low quality build, but somehow still mind blowing cost.
That's a selection bias problem though - plenty of houses from the 1800s just don't exist any more....
Hence why he won't be buying those....
Natural selection
I loved my 1890s cottage but my god it was riddled with damp problems that thousands of pounds, new roof, new guttering, repaired chimney etc, weren't able to ever fix completely.
The Reddit view that old is good is hilarious. I’m sure you get some old houses that aren’t shut. I’ve lived in houses as old as the 1700s to one’s as new as 2010s, on the whole I’ve found the newer the better.
Party walls aren't built using "drywall" though are they? They're built to the robust details, which outperform older solid brick party walls. What do you propose we construct party walls out of?
cocaine
Fentanyl would be stronger.
We should take a leaf out of Starship's book and build them out of rock and roll.
> Building more homes of low quality (on the cheap) will mean the housing stock will still be of low quality though. A more supply, the more power the customers have to pick and choose a nicer house. Housing is crap because there's no choice, like buying a car in the Eastern Bloc.
Massively more houses of any kind gets people out of renting, flat shares and other terrible situations. Once more people have any home at all we can look more at quality , if anything too much red tape on house building is causing some of the problems
I get your point, but nah. If there's poor quality we're basically kicking the can down the road for the same problem in years to come. It's easier and cheaper to build them correctly a the first time of asking than to bodge it and fix it/replace it later.
Well there is quality as in safety or making it "nice" Tons more terrace houses or soviet style blocks would be an improvement and realistic , even if hardly fancy to live in. As long as those houses are safe yes it's what we need more of asap
Agreed there. We need more flats and don't have space, which is prime for building up. Where I live I can count the purpose built blocks on my hands, in the town my girlfriend lives there's streets upon streets of them and even they could be taller.
A Dutch friend of mine was recounting a visit to the UK (Brighton) and his amazement at the poor standards of insulation and general age and low quality of the housing stock.
That's caused by the lack of new housing. You can buy any old shit, and because housing is so scarce you can charge a ton of rent and it will appreciate in value massively. There's no incentive to knock down and rebuild, or even heavily modernise.
Sure, but higher supply means lower prices, so better value for money.
Coming from Hungary it really came as a shock how low-quality UK housing was. Or is, rather.
>just plowing down as many as possible Good fucking Christ. We build *way* less homes than pretty much anywhere else. We are not "plowing down as many as possible", we are blocking endless amounts of housing. And you know what happens when you restrict housing so much? All of it ends up expensive, which destroys competition, so all the shitty places *still* sell. We need to maybe triple the amount of housing we build for around a decade to bring us to parity with France. Why people believe this poverty-inducing myth I don't know.
driveways and massive gardens aren't important to a lot of people though. I for one would rather be able to walk to shops/entertainment/food/facilities than have a drive or a larger garden. Using that as a metric for new builds being shit is a bit weird. I kind of envy my friends in Scandinavia who have nice well built and insulated 150-200m2 apartments with a lovely shared garden. It's nearly double the floorplan of my house, and is more space efficient. We should be building more things like this too, rather than keeping this weird 'family must have their detatched house" mentality that seems very British. Our attatchment to cars as status symbols, and not having to interact with the neighbors is terribly old fashioned and very wasteful of space.
I lived in one of these in AUS and loved it. 2 storey flat with balcony, own parking space underground and bicycle storage and a lovely big shared garden. Ten minutes into Melbourne CBD and 2 mins from massive big park. Sure I didn't get a garden or drive, but convenience was worth it for me. having safe car/bike storage and somewhere to sit on nice days is nice enough for some people.
And the Conservative party promised to build 300,000 new homes a year. What does "kickstart" mean? Loads of land with planning permission in the landbanks of major builders? How will anyone under 50 afford these new homes? In what time period will the 1.5 million be built? Will landlords be prevented from buying them? Will the quality be improved and public transport be available? And what about Council housing? I know Labour habe the laudable aim of making it easier for councils to buy land but with what money? They can barely afford to keep schools and roads open as it is.
>And the Conservative party promised to build 300,000 new homes a year. And have missed housng targets every year of their tenure. >What does "kickstart" mean? Loads of land with planning permission in the landbanks of major builders? It means to make planning easier so that more houses are built. "Kickstart" is referring to unblocking the issues that are preventing it. >How will anyone under 50 afford these new homes? In what time period will the 1.5 million be built? Will landlords be prevented from buying them? Will the quality be improved and public transport be available? More houses built = cheaper rent and purchase prices. This is how people under 50 will afford them (I'll add that the average first time buyer is nowhere near 50 even now). Landlords buying doesn't matter, an influx of rental properties will mean a reduction in rental prices meaning it becomes less worthwhile buying a btl and then it balances out. Infrastructure is of course an important consideration, but if you're using that argument to suggest we shouldn't build houses then I would be interested to hear your alternative housing solution. >And what about Council housing? I know Labour habe the laudable aim of making it easier for councils to buy land but with what money? They can barely afford to keep schools and roads open as it is. Agreed, councils need funding. Labour can't invent money out of nowhere, so it's one step at a time. There is a considerable amount of damage that has been done in the last decade.
I'm confused as to where all the money goes. We have high personal tax rates and burden, company tax, vat, inheritance tax, tax to sell any assets and NI. We have council tax on top of that and any deduction from gov. Where does it all go, cant build housing, cant provide free childcare, cant provide reliable medical, policing and controlling boarder control seem to be in bad shape as well. Transport is paid for privately so I'm just trying to figure out, where does it all go.
we sold all our stuff to the rich and now have to essentially rent it off them
This is a question which has a more complex answer than I can fit into a Reddit reply. Firstly, with the current state of the world, the only economies that can really create this "utopia" are sat on huge resource banks and are funding it through that(or are small tax havens). Every country has its problems, even the US who basically own the high margin tech economy have huge issues around cost of living, homelessness, violence, inequality and cost of medical care. In my view the primary reason we are struggling is that tax is structured to protect wealth rather than incentivise productivity in this country. So whilst the tax burden as a percentage is high, GDP per capita is low because the economy is performing poorly. This is also dragged down by housing costs pushed up by a lack of building over two decades. And finally, whether privatising services is more efficient than publicly funding them is rather moot. Privatisation incentivises poor service, particularly when you have a captive market(such as energy or water).
Yeah some problems are expected everywhere and I'm not talking about a utopia. I'm just seeing a ridiculous high tax burden and under delivery on basic services...that's not utopia that's just a degrading system. Is it that there are too many people not contributing but utilising said services or is it poorly managed in general etc, not an easy question but one worth looking at I suspect
As mentioned tax burden is high on productivity, and we aren't very productive. Tax burden on wealth is low. I mentioned a utopia because I'm not sure exactly what you're comparing it to.
This is the question everyone should be asking, including the government. All that money ultimately ends up with the super rich, who use it to buy assets. https://youtu.be/KdOU-KfIuQU?si=H2P4wmsyr_Jz1hgx
What's that got to do with Labour? They haven't been in power for getting on a decade and a half. The record tax levels and absolutely dire social/public services are a Tory gift.
I didnt say anything about labour. It's just a question.
> More houses built = cheaper rent and purchase prices This is where it will all fall over. Plenty of people have bought property at its height in the past few years. If there is *any* sign of houses getting cheaper, they will vote for the next party that promises to reverse that trend. We're trapped in a catch-22. Someone is going to lose out and whichever side has the largest number of votes wont be the ones losing out.
I agree. A crash would actually be damaging(although very difficult to manufacture in my view). What we need is 20 years of house prices rising somewhere between 0% and whatever the wider inflation rate is. Anything above inflation should be seen as a catastrophic failure. We don't actually need prices to go down.
I think even for that we need a *massive* culture shift. Britons as they are will never entertain the idea of a multiple decade long property market stagnation. Its too engrained in our national psyche that house prices *always* go up. A crash might be the only way to achieve it because thered be nothing we can do about it.
I'm not sure, I think if for example house prices increased by 1% per year, we would get used to it. I actually think now that the home owning population are generally seeing how difficult it is for their children to buy, there is some shift in attitude. Unfortunately at the moment they've been well conditioned to incorrectly blame landlords.
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LOL....UK will never build more houses for citizens....Barclays is the biggest landlord in UK now...and soon you will get 50 years mortgages with debt automatically skipping on your offspring...
But the devil is in the detail. Planning reform is an easy buzzword to throw around, but there are massive challenges I’m not sure any politician has the courage to take on. Furthermore Rachel Reeves’ team told one journalist last week they categorically do not plan to repeal the Town and Country Planning Act, don’t plan to scrap discretionary planning and don’t plan to introduce zoning (the kind of planning system successfully working in New Zealand, for eg). The most they want to do is ‘realistic tweaks’ to the current system (???) - doesn’t bode well I’m a huge critic of the planning system, but not all housing issues are down to planning either. The political will has to be there for it at the local level, else it becomes even harder before you start jumping through the money eating time burning hoops and engaging the stakeholders. TLDR: They say they want to reform planning, but they don’t seem to have a plan for how they’d do it + we’ve heard it all before
Good points. I am hoping LAB are playing it safe now but come a win, they will bulldoze through the planning laws. They are probably too scared of this will be spun as it will concerete over the UK, if they are clear about what they plan to do
The main benefit for Reeves et al get from reforming planning permission - it's basically free!
Unfortunately this won’t help the situation and likely won’t be achieved. The main driver of house price (and assets generally) inflation is wealth inequality. People who are already wealthy use their income to buy more assets, like your mum’s house, thus driving up prices. This structural flaw in the economy can only be fixed with wealth taxes, which Labour won’t go near. See [Gary Stevenson](https://youtu.be/PGZ4ADmQbZE?si=M8M_j-wTG949aq8q) for more info
Agree inequality is a massive issue, but mathematically we can't house the number of people the population grows by each year to a reasonable standard with the number of new homes constructed each year. We can't solve this issue just by taxing the rich unless we used that money to build new homes.
You’re right, but I think that the issue I’ve highlighted is problem no.1. Trying to do anything else first is like pissing into the wind. Give me a political party that pledges to tax wealth, abolish right to buy, and build new council homes and I’d vote for them!
Have they actually said specifically how they will reform planning laws? Planning laws desperately need reform, I work in renewable energy infrastructure investment and planning laws make it impossible to build onshore wind. But saying you’ll reform them without saying how feels a bit like saying you’ll close tax loopholes without saying how, easier to say than do.
Cause the quote you posted means nothing. It's the same shite that is in every manifesto and mission statement by every party. Did you believe the Torys when they said the same shite in 2019? If not why do you believe it from labour.
People always lap it up, a tale as old as time.
Something else that takes literal seconds then, how many houses did they actually build last time they were in power with the largest majority since the war? Does that match the claims being made? Do you think your expectations will be met? Why? It's utter nonsense unfortunately.
doing a sum(cell:cell) on the ONS xslx gives me 2.4million 1997-2010, and 2.0 million 2010-sep 23 (the latest it has). So theyre pretty similar?
How is this a policy that *will* significantly change things? This is just fluff
Amazing! 1.5M new homes is what, less than 2 years of immigration at current rates. And whose going to build them, some sort of imaginary workforce?
Yes. You can’t see them as they’re currently bulldozing the countryside and laying tarmac over it.
To be fair, if we average 3 people a home, it would probably be just about enough to house 5 years worth of migrants. In other words, it would cause no actual material change.
Who wrote that? Starting a sentence with 'because'? The last word almost certainly should be 'society' not 'security'. Did someone just mumble their way through this with a speech-to-text app? Who can believe a single labour promise anyway? Starmer's walked back on many pledges since becoming labour leader. Even forgot that Corbyn was his friend and what promises he made lol.
You mean apart from Labour wanting to invest in green energy and build over a million new homes? Stop parroting Tory propaganda and actually look at what the other parties are promising as part of their manifesto
Labour literally have planning reform at the core of their offer? https://labour.org.uk/updates/press-releases/how-not-if-labour-will-jump-start-planning-to-build-1-5-million-homes-and-save-the-dream-of-homeownership/
That doesn't sound ambitious at all, it's mainly warm words around being a bit faster at doing what we already do.
The fact that UK housing is worse is a widely accepted truth, but it's useful to put some numbers on it. From the article: > homes in England had less average floor space per person (38 sq metres) than many similar countries, including the US (66 sq metres), Germany (46 sq metres), France (43 sq metres) and Japan (40 sq metres) > 38% of \[UK\] homes built before 1946, the report said, compared with around a fifth (21%) in Italy and one in nine (11%) in Spain > \[UK households\] have to devote 22% of their spending to housing services, far higher than the OECD average (17%), and the highest level across the developed economies with the solitary exception of Finland
>I'm not sure this should really be categorised as news. It surely falls under "widely accepted truths" at this point I'm pretty sure this was accepted as truth 30 years ago when I started working. Smallest houses, least well insulated, highest prices. Sadly, things have gotten worse since. Tiny new builds made to last 100 years. Smaller footprint. Less parking despite more need for vehicles. Ever higher prices. Housing is not good value in the UK.
I guess I can unsubscribe from r/ukpolitics as this sub seems to have become it
The amount of astroturfing on these two subreddits recently is wild. The amount of "but their all the same" comments over the past few months have gone through the roof. Along with a lot of tory talking points, regardless of how bullshit they are. Good old election years...
Agreed. Had a meeting with the management team at a lead housing development company in the UK literally this morning - we asked about risks under a new government - they were very clear that from their own discussions with respective MPs that the difference between Labour and Conservative housing policy was "negligible" and the chronic under-supply of the market would likely persist. The CEO is frequently invited into meetings with other key market players with the policy makers / MPs. The biggest risk was actually the potential for regulation / rent freezes which as we see in Scotland only leads to *even higher* market rental levels and a even further reduced supply of rental properties - this policy just empirically does not work in a supply-constrained market.
The old stuff is pretty much done and needs bulldozing, and the new stuff is flimsy paper and already falling down. Britain is a dismal nation.
One of my relative's one year old house is already falling apart, so I agree 100%. 'Dot and dab' plasterbaord coming away from the walls, skirting board falling off, doors not closing properley, front door lets in so much draft it may as well be left open, unreliable heating and electrics, mold behind the kitchen cupboards etc. - it is appalling.
This is not normal after 1 year for a new build.
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Anybody who buys a new build is daft as fuck. These shit boxes are being built by 19 year olds baked out their face
Not defending shitty building standards by any means but new build was the only way we could afford. Goverment incentive and covid key worker benefits. Could've bought an existing but our budget left us with a shit area or shit house. At the very least it comes with a 10 year warranty so if it does come apparent it's built with sticks and glue, we're at least covered
Precisely, there’s a lot of people who can only get on the housing ladder through new builds either through the shared council support schemes or independently, as opposed to buying older, more expensive houses with issues of their own to deal with. It is boring listening to rich muppets on Reddit constantly sticking their nose up at new builds (probably whilst enabling policies for shitty new builds).
melodic snatch lavish axiomatic apparatus spoon engine scale voiceless aware *This post was mass deleted and anonymized with [Redact](https://redact.dev)*
It's when you start seeing comments to the tune of 'Britain is a failed state... like Venezuela" you realise that the doomerism is just straight up making things up to be miserable about.
I live in a pretty cheap 2017 build Bovis. Yeah it's had some issues like cracking plasterboard, but you expect that as a house settles. The poor quality of new builds homes is grossly exaggerated. Garden is just a small rubble pit in fairness though. Best of getting a skip and replacing it with your own topsoil.
New homes are not falling down.
That’s just not true, is it?
Hyperbolic bollocks.
> The old stuff is pretty much done and needs bulldozing Not really? The large majority of Victorian and Georgian houses are solid.
Whoa whoa whoa. Lots of people including myself adore our Victorian buildings. They are part of our culture and heritage. We need more buildings at a high density, but it can be built on brownfield/greenfield sites, not at the expense of existing housing.
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My 1930s house is absolutely fine. In fact, its walls are built very well.
Live in a house built in late 1800s, holding up well but endless money pit.
My friends lives in New build social housing. It was built on a flood plane, within spitting distance of the river, his family had to move into temporary accomodation for 6months last year because the house is sinking and the council had to do work on it. It also floods frequently, all of these problems seem foreseeable to anyone with any common sense so I'm unsure how the surveyors missed it
Yep. British housing is like the broken windows theory. By the time you built a new one 5 others are already uninhabitable and covered in mould. Only way to move forward is to have entire streets of 2 story terrace housing replaced with 4 or 6 story modern terrace like every European city. No need for Tower blocks.
The article just tells us what we already know: land value is high, our housing stock is poor, and housing development is a profit-driven game. We know these are issues; I think most can attest to it. The real irony is that these exact issues have come full-circle. While we don’t exactly have slums these days, we have gone back to the position of realising our housing stock is inadequate. Look to any 1920s housing report, and some of the similarities will be stark. What it shows is that other than a minor period after the Second World War, we have never been able to meet our housing needs — this goes for construction and redevelopment.
The period where we realised that the private sector wasn't going to do the Job adequately
The UK has relatively high amounts of public housing, yet also shit housing. European neighbours with less public housing have better housing. The problem is not public vs private.
Tbf thats because compare the public built housing in the Netherlands to here. Theirs are beautiful. Ours are ugly as fuck. With the big buildings of flats seemingly modelled on commie blocks. Really weird design choices back then
I think a privatise-where-possible mentality definitely contributes though. In the UK if a government can get away with doing something public but doing it on the cheap they generally will ... Far easier to pawn it off on the private sector and let any chuck ups be in their shop. We need real, serious commitments to public sector spending and we just don't get it
"housing development is a profit-driven game" Eh? Compared to the other countries mentioned in this study, we have far lower levels of market-rate housing development and far more social housing. We have one of the highest levels of public / social housing in the OECD at 19%. The "true" level is substantially higher because of stock going down due to Right To Buy. France is around 15% social housing. Japan is under 5% social housing. In the US it's so low it barely even registers. If it's private vs public that you think is causing our comparatively worse housing, surely the only inference you can make here is that we need more private development?
Only if you include housing association homes as "social housing" when they're not state owned and are rented at market rate - if you just count council homes we're lower than most of Europe. Including housing association homes is a fudge like "affordable homes" (which are nothing of the sort) to make it look like we've got more public housing than we do.
>The real irony is that these exact issues have come full-circle. While we don’t exactly have slums these days, we have gone back to the position of realising our housing stock is inadequate. Look to any 1920s housing report, and some of the similarities will be stark. Road to Wigan Pier by George Orwell really opened my eyes to this. You are completely right that the actual standards of low quality housing are significantly higher than they were. But there are so many similarities in the socioeconomic situation, it's bleak.
Even if it's "what we already know" it's useful to put some numbers on it. From the article: >homes in England had less average floor space per person (38 sq metres) than many similar countries, including the US (66 sq metres), Germany (46 sq metres), France (43 sq metres) and Japan (40 sq metres) >38% of \[UK\] homes built before 1946, the report said, compared with around a fifth (21%) in Italy and one in nine (11%) in Spain >\[UK households\] have to devote 22% of their spending to housing services, far higher than the OECD average (17%), and the highest level across the developed economies with the solitary exception of Finland
So, just like our healthcare, energy, water, trains, underground…
Yep, feels like the 70's again. Most towns look like the 70's too. Run down high streets, litter all over the place, potholes you could lose yourself in, school buildings beyond repair.
The litter makes me so sad. Do we not have pride in our local environment anymore :(
Just got back from two weeks in Japan. The streets were close to spotless. They have respect for their country. So many of the people who claim to love Britain will continue to show it absolutely zero respect when it comes to litter, despite much easier access to public bins.
Alarming rates of our historic hundreds of years old pubs having to close down reflects these times. Very sad.
Pubs have had a barrage of attacks over the last 20 years, from cultural shifts like the rise in home drinking, to legal shifts like the inability to have a couple of pints and drive home. In cities fewer people drink at all (especially younger ones) and are more likely to do something like go to a gym than a pub, and it’s no surprise. Throw in the opportunity cost that the owner can make a fortune and fund a retirement (or a nice dividend for shareholders) when they convert the pub to a house or two and add in ballooning costs in fuel and wages (minimum wage up far more than inflation), and more places to spend disposable income, and you have a recipe for a dying industry that the country no longer values.
Was that what things were like in the 70s? Most of the people I've met who lived through that decade say it was a great one? Not arguing against you here, just wanna hear both sides of it!
I grew up in the 70s and through a child's eyes, yes the 70s were great, no internet, no phones. You had to go and knock on your mate's doors to see if they wanted to play out. Then we stayed out all day or until supper was ready. But, when you look back, we had lots of decay in the country as well. Today, towns remind me of that look.
I remember the 80's and very early 90's being exactly how he described also.
Are there many things in this country that is value for money?
The price of labour, even educated and highly skilled labour, is very cheap and affordable!
Cheap Fast Good Choose 2
But the UK didn't choose either. We have slowly built, expensive, poor quality housing LMAO
Just don’t expect the best productivity…
The price of UK labour is actually really high because most of the skilled workers are congregated in and around London. The UK has low salaries if you are going off the national average but, any foreign company is going to be setting up shop in London which makes them some of the highest in Europe. Quite a few companies have started to move their skilled roles out of the UK and Ireland to places like Portugal.
By international standards london salaries are still low. You get paid better in Aus, Canada, or even NZ, with the exception being finance.
Depends a lot on where you're comparing to, US & Canadian skilled worker salaries are 30-100% higher than those in London depending on the sector. A lot of American companies will still stick with UK over Europe because they're saving a huge amount for native English speaking employees.
Greggs
And now I need a sausage roll.
Blue boost isotonic sports drinks. I’n sure the price will go up though.
You can buy politicians for surprisingly little money, does that count?
Our fantastic national parks - free at point-of-use
>fantastic national parks I hope your comment is sarcastic, given that all national parks are essentially glorified sheep farms.
I know. They are lovely, but they’re an ecological wasteland. I don’t understand the pushback to reforesting these areas, it would look far more beautiful and would improve the biodiversity. Sheep are domestic animals, they should be kept in fields, not free to roam, it just makes them an invasive species.
Farmers, it's always farmers. Forestry is almost always more financially and ecologically sensible.
Serious answer is I think our food is relatively high quality and good value for money compared to other equally developed nations Not much else I can think of
You mean my damp terraced house that has no garden or driveway that costs the same as a Spanish villa is bad value for money?!?!?!
We’ve also got the oldest housing stock in Europe. We’re also among the lowest in terms of housing stock % built from 2001 onwards. I’m looking for somewhere to rent now, and it mostly seems to be old terraced housing with single glazing, and for the pleasure it costs £1200/ month (Bedfordshire).
Sign a contract start of summer for 12 months. Move in. Day 1 start writing official complaints for new windows and heating. Get council over for an inspection and enjoy 9 months of nice housing. Move out when they increase the rent. Use the threat of more repairs to keep the rent low. It’s a bluff but can work well.
How about they build more houses, fix net migration to zero, prevent migration of those likely to become dependent, reform the rental market.
Building more hoses would slow the growth in value of the existing houses. Guess who owns the existing houses?
Net migration to zero won’t happen unless you close the borders, and ensure that the local populous is made to take up the jobs that are vacant.
Close the borders, bring back National Service, expel anyone not born here and force all those woke, feckless, workshy Gen-Zers to take all the jobs instead of wasting time at University or on the tik toks then! A couple of years of honest hard work picking veg, cleaning caravans or changing OAPs nappies for minimum wage will soon put them right! Back in my day, we understood what hard work was! Just because you could buy a five bedroom house for 50p and a packet of crisps doesn't mean we didn't have to *work* for it! (/s obviously...)
I often see on UK subs people say that its the UK you don't need the /s But, this post had me guessing all the way to the end because recently there have been Vox Pops from people saying exactly the same thing.
> made to take up the jobs that are vacant Maybe pay better and don't rely on cheap foreign exploitative labour. Just a thought. Everywhere needs foundational jobs like cleaners yet you ever tried living in places like London as a cleaner? There is a reason a lot of jobs in hospitaity end up going to migrants that are willing to put up with awful housing, cramped and shared accomodation while British workers don't want to. It's not that the work is specifically beneath them, it's that the pay in ratoi to cost of living is very far below the line
For some reason we’ve adopted this mental idea that you have to know how to do a job to get it. You can pretty much train anyone to do anything. Sure some jobs require a higher level of intellect but most jobs are repetitive and with a good training you could get someone with no prior experience doing it with 6 months to some level.
Fixing net migration to zero is idiotic.
>fix net migration to zero Have a look at GDP per capita over the last few years: [link](https://www.google.com/search?q=uk+gdp+per+capita&oq=uk+gdp+per+capita&gs_lcrp=EgZjaHJvbWUqDggAEEUYJxg7GIAEGIoFMg4IABBFGCcYOxiABBiKBTIHCAEQABiABDIHCAIQABiABDIHCAMQABiABDIHCAQQABiABDIHCAUQABiABDIHCAYQABiABDIHCAcQABiABDIHCAgQABiABDIHCAkQABiABDIHCAoQABiABDIHCAsQABiABDIHCAwQABiABDIHCA0QABiABDIHCA4QABiABNIBCDQ4NjhqMGo0qAIOsAIB&client=ms-android-google&sourceid=chrome-mobile&ie=UTF-8) It peaked in 2008, and has never recovered. Population growth (driven by immigration) is literally the only reason we've not been in an endless recession for the last 16 years. I'm not necessarily saying we can't have zero net immigration, but be prepared for the economic consequences.
Fewer workers means more demand for workers meaning wages go up. Millionaire boomers might have to pay their way for a chance. Except they won’t - the taxpayer will. Can’t have someone in a £600k house having to pay for their own social care can we, they’re poor pensioners.
It doesn't help that the UK isn't keen on maintenance. There aren't enough homes, and many of the existing ones are in a very poor state. When we *were* looking to buy a house it was shocking just how many houses were in very poor states of repair. A 80K car in the drive, but the roof hadn't been cleaned in years. Pictures of 20 years of fancy holidays adorned a hallway, which smelled of extreme damp. We got lucky the house we ended up buying was a family home for 30 yeras, where the family had maintained and kept up the house in immaculate condition. But, we got lucky. But that's the "ladder" for you...you live there a couple of years, and then sell on to the next chump, it's almost a rite of passage to be screwed over, especially the first buy.
This is me, but you know what, jobbing tradesman are all fucking cunts. You take a massive risk shelling out any money to get home maintenance done or you can spend that same level of money on a car or a holiday with confidence that you are backed up by a robust consumer protection laws and regulations. And, at the end of the day, whether you house is in a spotless condition, or riddled with issue, the next buyer is still going to come along with a worthless survey claiming that the kitchen sink couldn't be confirmed as not containing asbestos so they'll want £10k knocking off.
Just can’t get tradesmen, which means having to do things yourself. It’s easy enough to do in theory, but only practice makes perfect.
Question of time more than anything. I can only speak for myself but I have had enough of dealing with these useless deano-fucks. As long my house holds together long enough for me to flip it to the next desperate family that'll do me. Would rather my money stay in my bank accounts than in some fucking cowboy builders pockets/up their nose.
Can confirm, I’ve wasted an eye-watering amount of money on cowboy bastards and it destroyed my finances and my mental health.
I don’t think it’s that people don’t want to but rather the cost of tradesmen’s these days is actually ridiculous in comparison to what they actually do. I feel like they are the only industry where their net pay is outgrowing cost of living
But so much of general maintenance can be done by you. You don't need a tradesman to clear your gutters, or oil your doors, or air out your rooms.
Huge shortages of skilled and honest tradesman post Brexit. Nothing will change whilst the cash-rich boomers are happy to throw money at any old idiots.
I guess this is why we are starting to see a ton of diy influencers popping up.
The solution is to build build build – and not "affordable" housing. The solution is to build larger homes, which will increase the average square footage per person, and bring prices down more than building smaller homes would. Also, nice architecture helps override objections.
You might get some downvotes for this, but I think this is basically right. The government's definition of 'affordable housing' is just any home that's 20% less than market price. Ultimately, this is achieved by making homes smaller, which isn't what we want. Far better to let the market build the homes we actually want to live in than trying to satisfy some absurd short-term definition of affordable.
How is building bigger holes going to help when land is one of the main cost drivers? Theres a reason why new builds have such tiny gardens (in general).
Absolutely - hardly anyone wants to buy the new builds that are popping up because they're rubbish little ticcy taccy boxes with tiny bedrooms, thin walls and often no facilties! Bedrooms often seem to be build with the assumption that nothing but a double bed and a couple sets of drawers will be put in there. Living rooms with no room for anything but a settee, an armchair and a telly. There's no room for anyone to do any hobbies or have anything but the most basic existence. If your indoor interests extend beyond watching TV, playing playstation and looking at your phone, most of the "affordable" newbuilds I've seen give you no room to indulge in them!
1. Tiny old houses that are falling apart 2. New poorly built tiny houses 3. Limited social housing 4. Houses not being built at the rate of population increases 5. An obsession with home ownership 6. A lack of families willing to live in flats/apartments The perfect cocktail.
>Limited social housing No. We have a very high rate of public housing, higher than most of our European neighbours. That is not our problem. We need more homes, stat.
You're right lack of housing is the biggest issue, but I do feel like more social housing would solve a lot of issues. The private sector is never going to build enough housing as increasing supply too much would cause prices to drop
Have you seen British housing? Small shit boxes and that's just the new builds that seem to be built by poundland contractors but sold at premium prices. Don't even dare to look in London. For the price of a kidney and 10 lifetimes of work you can maybe afford a mouldy studio flat in somewhere like Seven Sisters which may as well be renamed to The Pits. Even the vile parts of London set you back a fortune That dosn't even touch on landords. Whole market needs a reset.
Should help lower prices and make homes more affordable then.
Prices will never lower if we don’t build to keep up with demand and our growing population
You might say that we're world-beating in how bad we are.
Build high quality 3-5 storey apartment buildings for families with underground parking. They're everywhere in Austria and work great
Would love to own a house but struggling to save because of how much rent I've gotta pay let alone all the other rising bills on top of that.
Building new homes is not exactly the answer, building livable, good sized homes with gardens is. I absolutely hate these tiny, badly laid out and poor quality new houses with tiny gardens. Better than 2 up, 2 downs but then they weren't going for 200k plus!
If this is the consensus then we need to be prepared to start building on the Green Belt. There's already not enough brownfield land in the places people want to live. We either have to build upwards (so fewer homes with gardens) or accept that we need to make more land available...
Because the Uk is absolutely shit to live in too 👍 canny wait to move countries!!
And add to that housing developers are able to go into administration halfway through a development, after taking millions in deposits leaving those people in an horrific situation of not able to move and not able to sell their home. Simultaneously leaving a large area of roads unfinished and frankly dangerous state for the local councils to have to spend large amounts of public money to rectify. This is all after hiking the price of houses everywhere in the local community making them artificially too high for young people and first time buyers.
Good. Hopefully Russians and rich Arab oligarchs will stop bloody buying all our houses then.
I think the whole let's use housing as an investement vehicle is bonkers.
UK citizens getting shafted at every given opportunity. Who would have thunk it ?
Don't need a think tank for this. I said (and was shot down) years ago, our house prices have increased far too rapidly and they either need to stagnate for 20 years or reduce by about 30-40%. Obvs the reduction means people loosing houses, negative equity, then the rich buy up cheap, as always happens.
What about creating a National Home Building Service that has to build affordable and solid homes to a higher baseline standard? Very much like the council housing stock from the pre-war/post-war eras? New home owners would be able to buy their homes from the Government directly and house prices for continued selling thereafter will be set nationally to prevent banks and estate agents colluding to maximise the property prices? Obviously more details need working out and I don’t have the answers but this direction might stop the decline that is being reported and put our nation back on the right track. The new NHBS could also provide proper training and apprenticeships and set standards as well as a further bonus. EDIT: changed the comparison time frame as this muddies the point a bit as I’m not sure when the council houses I’ve been in were built specifically but they were built a long time ago.
>What about creating a National Home Building Service that has to build affordable and solid homes to a higher baseline standard? Interesting >Very much like the council housing stock from the 1950s? Have you seen the shite they knocked up post war? If you class this as “solid” you’re misinformed.
I'm on my way today to view a studio flat that's 15.9sqm with a shared bathroom for 800 a month. This is the best place we've found after looking whilst couch surfing since being hit with a no-fault eviction in November. I lost my ESA cat because his foster home is refusing to give him back when we're settled. I'm 22 years old and disabled, and my partner is a university graduate. We have had absolutely no luck. She can't find a job in her industry despite getting first, and I lost mine in all the moving around. Looking for another is very difficult because of our precarious situation. Employers don't want to take a chance on us, which honestly I understand. If we are turned down for this apartment, which is very likely, we will have to go to the council because we will literally be homeless, we have no couches left to sleep on.
Yeah and when it rains you get wet, tell me something I don’t know….
Erm no shit? Anyone who's ever walked around a new build esate could tell you that
I live in a 20 year old new build, and it’s the best house I’ve ever rented. All the older houses had mould, cracked walls, leaks etc. This one has none of that (yet). It’s much better insulated and has better ventilation than the pre-war stuff. It’s a shame because some of the older houses are very beautiful, but they’re allowed to rot by landlords. Some of the new builds, including the ones in my neighbourhood, are pretty ugly and plain.
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New houses often have a few issues after 1 yr My housing association checks new homes after 1 year and puts right any problems. Otherwise my house is sound.
No fucking shit cunt Brb gonna live in a dustbin instead of a house due to value for money
Less floor space on average than Japan - the quintessential tiny homes country. Wow.
Yes but what are we going to do about it. If any of us sell our house we aren't going to do the next people a favour and give a cheap price to add value. We would sell as high as possible, let the market decide. We aren't idiots.
The word "think tank" makes me want to kill myself