Talk Morgan Forums Community The Malvern Arms The Planet of BoE

I think the main shortage is in affordable housing - both on the purchase and renting side. I'm currently paying £717 a month mortgage on my house (3 bed semi - we bought for £124K in 2008 - current Zoopla value is between £229K and £253K). About 10 doors up an identical size house is on the rental market for £1260 a month.

The stupidity is that the person renting without issue for 10 years at vastly inflated prices (therefore very reliable but unable to save a deposit) is not able to be considered for a mortgage as they are classed a higher risk than someone who's living at home and been given a £20K deposit from the bank of mummy and daddy.

So the BoE governor Bailey blames early retirement for putting upward pressure on inflation. In a speech to economists he said that these retirees spending their savings was maintaining demand and requiring increased interest rates to reduce demand. So as an early retiree I’ve not got a mortgage and i’m going to get better interest on my savings, that’ll stop me spending for sure.

Meanwhile the chancellor thinks that removing the lifetime allowance on pension pots is going to get early retirees back to work, however if you’ve started drawing down on a pension your contributions are capped to £4K per year before you have to pay tax on them.

Led by donkeys.

I have recently been involved assisting my son rent a flat in London. It was an interesting process where you would be given a 10 minute time slot to visit the property along with about another 30 other people and on leaving the building you were required to give your best and final rental offer on the spot to try and secure the rental. Obviously the rental price was getting driven up by this process, but you were also getting pushed to pay 6 or more months in advance to make your bid more attractive.

Simple fact is that over the last 40 or 50 years, UK population is bigger, divorce rates are up and life expectancy has increased and property building hasn't kept pace with increased demand which has driven up both purchase and rental prices.

That’s a horrible experience just to rent a flat. I remember when my son was buying in London some years ago and had to literally befriend the seller to get an edge in buying the flat.

Sorry you both had to endure that horrid dehumanising experience, truly dreadful.
I had no idea what it's like up there.

Yep, greedy landlords - dehumanising is the right word.

Get rental properties back into council ownership and have clear qualification criteria and waiting lists.

Went through the same thing with my Son and his girlfriend December. Multiple viewings on a ONE bed flat in St Alban's. He secured the rent at £1,150.00 per month (he was probably chosen down to having a good career with Easy Jet / regular income) When he moved in many electrical items didn't work in the flat, down light lamps out and a knackered dishwasher. Agents were useless !

The whole thing is complex. London has jobs, but housing is stupid cost. So what quality of life?

Oop North, housing is a fraction of the cost, so many commute to London from Doncaster, which is a couple of hours. But jobs up North are not great, even though quality of life, subject to how rural you go, is excellent.

I could have moved to London or anywhere else on over generous terms back in the day. That's what many Civil Servants did. But I chose to stay close to my roots, because as a Yorkshire man living in Yorkshire, it doesn't cost that much.

My mother bought her council house way back for £6k. When she died, I sold it immediately for £105k. That's nothing compared to prices in the South, but its a large 3 bed semi with a big garden and off street parking for 2/3cars. It sold in a few weeks, and we paid off our daughter's mortgage with some of the proceeds.

Thankfully we have never needed to chase the rental market.

It wasn't so bad in the end as after looking at a couple of places I refused to play best and final offer bidding game and waited for a suitable apartment to arrive on the market. I then went straight to the agent and forced a holding deposit on them prior to looking at the apartment. They were unprepared for my approach took the money and then realised that it prevented them from going into a bidding war. I then went and looked at the apartment said yes and they were obliged to deal at the advertised rate. I could have lost the holding deposit but as it was only a weeks rent (£600) it was worth a gamble. The online pictures of the apartment showed it to be Ok and it was unfurnished so less opportunity for surprises.

The usual problems of apartment not cleaned or emptied on handover and the previous tenant lost a set of keys on the day of handover occurred - but I guess you expect this sort of behaviour.

We have become accustomed to being everyone's football of late and equally accustomed to batting away the homespun wisdom, with facts not political or personal motivation.

So you want take rental properties back into council ownership? Between 1980 and 1989, 970,558 council houses nationally were sold at a discount. A Labour policy introduced by Tories. There is a raving socalist local to us, who bought and sold his council house (at profit) and moved into rented accommodation, so he could buy himself a 100k motorhome.

So you want to blame landlords for now owning ex council houses? How about the ex tenants who cashed their chips in and the parties that you statistically speaking voted for?