A million new houses should be built just for workers under 40 to unlock home ownership for Generation Rent, urges Theresa May’s former adviser
Ex-No10 policy guru-turned-Tory MP Neil O’Brien is calling on the PM to carry out the radical action in a bid to fix the housing market for young people
A MILLION new houses should be set aside just for workers under 40 to unlock home ownership for Generation Rent, Theresa May’s former adviser says.
Ex-Number 10 policy guru-turned-Tory MP Neil O’Brien is calling on the PM to carry out the radical action in a bid to reverse the spiralling difficulty for the young to get on the property ladder.
Mr O’Brien’s new think tank, Onward, has laid out a blueprint to achieve the ambitious goal.
Under it, half a million new flats and houses must be built just for people under the age of 40 who are in jobs, to rent with discounts of up to a fifth off market value.
Secure tenancies in them for a decade would allow the grafting renters to build up enough cash to afford to buy somewhere themselves.
In addition, the government should agree to stand behind 500,000 ‘stepladder loans’ to pay young people’s deposits If they can’t afford them.
With the average house price in the UK now at an eye-watering £227,000, a minimum deposit of 5 per cent leaves first time buyers often having to find more than £10,000 in cash.
Mr O’Brien told The Sun: "Younger people deserve the same opportunity to get a home of their own that older generations have enjoyed.
“To restore the opportunity of home ownership for a new generation government needs to do some radical things to change our broken housing market to help working people."
Onward’s building plan would be paid for by transferring council housing stock to house building associations, and by local authorities sharing more of developers’ big profits from new plots.
The number owning their own home in Britain has plunged in the last fifteen years, from 71 per cent to 63 per cent.
Soaring prices have seen younger people hit the hardest, with the number of 16-34-year-olds on the property ladder dropping from a half to a third.
Once known as the nation of homeowners, Britain is now fourth from bottom in a list of the 28 EU member states’ rates of homeownership.
In 10 of them, the rate is more than 80 per cent home ownership. The housing plan is from Onward’s first report, published today.
Sun Says
FINALLY, it looks like thinking Tories are cottoning on to the housing crisis.
But it needs leadership from the top to solve our biggest domestic concern.
MP Neil O’Brien’s scheme may not be perfect. Radical change to planning law is needed too. But at least it’s ambitious.
The Prime Minister must stick this at the top of her agenda.
She’s nervous about annoying her voters in the shires. But if the Conservatives don’t fix this, there will be an entire generation who will never trust the party. They simply must rebuild the housing ladder.
Our housing crunch has been decades in the making. With brave leadership the PM could go a long way to fixing it.
For her party and the country, she must get on with it.
Mr O’Brien founded it with another former No10 policy advisor Will Tanner, and Tories have huge hopes the two respected thinkers will come up with answers to reverse voters’ increasing frustrations with capitalism today.
In more damning findings from the report, Onward also reveal the growth of landlords snapping up property in the booming ‘buy to let’ market has locked 2.2 million families out of home ownership.
To tackle the problem, the government should slash the amount of tax relief offered to landlords on their properties.
Councils should also be empowered to limit purchases of new homes from foreign buyers just looking for a good investment.
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Mr O’Brien added: “We can’t solve the housing problem with one hand tied behind our backs.
“As well as building more homes, we need to change the balance between the rented sector and home ownership.
“We should protect existing landlords but discourage more people from investing in rental property, because the buy to let boom has bid up prices and reduced home ownership among younger people.”
'We have to build more houses'
BRITAIN has a big housing problem. Renting or buying a home eats up far more of people’s income than it used to, writes Neil O'Brien MP.
The proportion of 25 to 34 year olds on middle incomes who own their own home has been slashed from 65% in 1996 to 27% in 2016. Here’s how we can turn things round.
First, we have to build more houses. Because Britain has built fewer new homes, the increase in house prices here has been the fastest increase of any developed country in the world.
If the price of things in the shops had gone up as fast as house prices since 1970, then a chicken in a supermarket would now cost a whopping £60.
Second, we need to change the balance between houses for rent, and houses people buy. The number of renters has doubled over the last 15 years as people have piled their savings into buying up homes to let out.
If we’d kept the balance between rented and owner-occupied properties the same since 2000 we’d now have over two million more families owning their own home.
So instead of growing the number of rented houses further, we should use reform the tax system to encourage people to put their savings into investment in businesses, rather than property.
Third, lets directly help million younger families with housing. I propose we build new homes for young working people to be rented out cheaply so people can save up for a home.
And for those who can afford a mortgage but can’t save a deposit the government should lend them the deposit so they can get off the treadmill of paying so much in rent they can’t save up.