[BBC News] Proposals for council house sales

[Domino]

Mixing tenants and homeowners has NEVER led to better quality estates.

Council tenants are lower down the class scale and jealous of homeowners financial status

Homeowners are higher up the class scale and resentful / snobbish towards council tenants.

Unfortunately the above statements are facts of life that will never improve the quality of estates

 

This is complete and utter bollocks of the highest order. I grew up in just such a situation (on both sides of your mythical divide) and am therefore speaking from experience.

 

So am I.

And there is nothing mythical about it.

Your first sentence is proof that I am right.

Human nature will prevail for the vast majority

[Jimcalagon]

So am I.

And there is nothing mythical about it.

Your first sentence is proof that I am right.

Human nature will prevail for the vast majority

 

Yeah, whatever

[cheeky boy]

My in-laws lived in a council block in south London which has about 40 flats in it, although not very old it was becoming grafftied and the lifts stank of piss.

 

The Peoples Republic of Lambeth (council) were forced to allow their tenants the option to buy and in this building more than half did.

 

The building is now clean & well maintained and the tenants & owners co-egsist happily

 

I don't see any reason why this policy would not be a success here other than sneering from snot-nosed BMW drivers

 

If someone honest and hard working but on a low income wants to buy their council house then they should be encouraged to do so

[RC-Drift.com]

...I don't see any reason why this policy would not be a success here other than sneering from snot-nosed BMW drivers...

There's plenty of them living in corpy houses

[bazcabs]

That's just typical, I spent 12 years paying rent to commissioners and finally decided to buy a couple of years ago as they said there would never be a 'right to buy' option in IOM

[mojomonkey]

As I understand it there would have to be a change in statute to allow the sale of local authority housing. Castletown Commissioners, and any other commissioners, can discuss it as much as they want but the final decision would have to be made by Tynwald. I can't see the political will for this.

 

Aside from that I don't think Castletown Commissioners have thought this through. Without local authority housing the level of responsibility of each local authority is virtually zero. Getting rid of local authority housing would leave local authorities wide open to local government reform, which they all seem vehemently opposed to.

 

Local authority doesn't need selling off it needs to be properly managed. The rents aren't reflective of what is actually affordable and the stock is poorly divided. There are couples with children who left home long ago or elderly people living in three or four bedroom houses simple because they always have been there. This is to the detriment of families living for a family sized house. One of the consequences of living in a local authority house is that the property is not yours and there need to be great recognition of this. Manage the housing stock better and more benefit can be gained from it.

[Gladys]

Not if they use the money from house sales to build more public housing.

[BPs]

I live in a council house and have done so since I was 22 years old. Now 53. I never earned enough to get a mortgage so I am still in my house. I pay my rates which are quite seperate from my rent (contrary to popular misled opinion) which is bundled into my monthly fee.

 

I look after my home and keep it up to date and without any request from my local authority for assistance.

 

I never earned enough to even raise a deposit for a mortgage and while I would like to own my house I know I can never do so. But I still keep it as though it was my own.

 

I just hope that the tory politicians on this Isle will not now penalise me in ridiculous rent rises because I cannot buy it.

[WTF]

why would anyone want to buy a house?? it costs around 3 times as much to buy a house as rent from a local authority ( private rentals are expensive though ) all your maintenance is payed for by the landlord, why sink a vast portion of you're income in a propoerty that costs to maintain that you can't take with you? there are plenty of folks paying 70- 90 quid a week rent to local authorities who could afford to buy their own little house, living conditions would be similar, but your disposable income would be significantly less. and for a few elderly folks who scrimped and saved and got a house who became ill, the government sell it from under you to pay for your medical care even though you have paid NI. if you didn't own your house, the government pay your medical costs. piss your money away on consumables and expensive cars and holidays. the only time buying is worth the bother/cost is if you want a big posh house that is never going to be built by government for you to rent cheap. simple maths says don't buy, get a corpy house. and what about 20 years down the line when half the corpy houses are private and half are still corpy and they want to do a pully or janets corner?? you can't really flatten a house here and a house there and leave all the private owned ones standing willy nilly and work between them??

[P.K.]

UK schemes take into account the amount of time tenants have lived there i.e. How much rent has been paid, which affects the buying price. This ensures older people >40 get the chance to get a mortgage too, and are not faced with a 25 year mortgage.

 

I think the schemes are a good idea as it encourages people to not give up and to try harder, even if their circumstances mean they are in council accomodation.

 

It also allows the council to build new housing stock (which they failed to do in the UK) - and mix tenants and homeowners leading to better quality estates.

You've got this a bit wrong Albert. Firstly depending how long you have paid your council rent you will get a THUMPING great price reduction when you buy it. I've heard figures of 40% to 50% off the valuation. Money for old rope. Secondly just about every new planning scheme is only approved if the builder includes a certain amount of "affordable" housing. So the rest are presumably "unaffordable" then - eh? So nowadays you always get a mix of home owners with council homes and housing association tenants. Well you used to. There's no new domestic schemes starting over here and haven't been for some time.

[Albert Tatlock]

No I haven't got it wrong - it's precisely those discounts that allow people >40 to have mortages less than 25 years.

[P.K.]

Fair enough but I didn't think that "how much rent has been paid, which affects the buying price" tells the story. It's not about the amount of rent you have paid as such, it's how long you have been there that matters. You can pay a peppercorn and still get it reduced by 50%.

[Albert Tatlock]

Well er...No of years X monthly rent paid still equals total rent paid does it not?

 

Therefore those that have been there for a while and are now in their 40s plus still have a chance to take up the offer, when mortgage providers otherwise wouldn't look at them for a 25 year mortgage at that age. 15 year mortgage with a reasonable record of recent saving, living within means, and keeping up with their rent would be the minimum. Lenders still need to be careful or they'd potentially create their own mini sub prime crisis here.

 

My view is that selling some of these houses and encouraging people to buy, will result in higher housing stocks and lower waiting lists if it is managed properly.

 

We seriously need to consider this proposal in light of what looks like could be a slow few years for the building trade IMO, whilst at the same time pushing to build the houses we need and will need.

 

There's a sh1tstorm approaching, in terms of employment and regulation.

[Saltire]

Mixing tenants and homeowners has NEVER led to better quality estates.

Council tenants are lower down the class scale and jealous of homeowners financial status

Homeowners are higher up the class scale and resentful / snobbish towards council tenants.

Unfortunately the above statements are facts of life that will never improve the quality of estates

 

This is complete and utter bollocks of the highest order. I grew up in just such a situation (on both sides of your mythical divide) and am therefore speaking from experience.

 

I agree. I grew up in council estate where alot of the houses were bought by tenants, and a fair number were still rented. Never seen any problems between those in bought or rented houses. Not all estates are like Shameless!

[%age]

. . . if they use the money from house sales to build more public housing.

 

No. This will never happen. Although the Isle of Man Government is reknowned for its mismanagement and lack of comprehension of the value of money when it comes to building projects, even our elevated group of shopkeepers and what have you, would never go for this one.

 

Build more public houses just to possibly sell them immediately back - no chance.

 

I worked for local government in the UK during the impact of the Tenants Rights Act. Even before the Bill made its way into parliament the number of new houses built per year went to precisely - buggar all. One or two councillors moved into some nice council owned properties though, including one case into what amounted to a castle - and it eventually sold for a song of course.

 

Margaret Thatcher introduced the policy in the UK to give her a couple of terms in office. There is no doubt she gained a lot of new homeowners to her causes. Selling council houses and just about everything else off she could (BP, British Gas, British Steel, etc etc ). To be fair, her policies got Britain out of a jam at the time.

 

But you know this Island is in deep trouble when it starts to sell off its housing stock.