The federal government must incentivise redistribution by encouraging the three.6 million owners aged over 65 with greater than two spare bedrooms to think about downsizing, a Whitehall Group Paper has beneficial.
Since this could possibly be resented by older, income-poor folks in bigger dwellings, the paper thought-about methods to sugar the capsule, comparable to providing sensible help for shifting, waving stamp obligation for downsizers decreasing the dimensions of their property by two bedrooms or extra, and guaranteeing there’s a provide of extra appropriate dwellings for this demographic in all areas.
This was one advice made, although broadly the paper stated policymakers want to start out prioritising long-term outcomes reasonably than election cycles.
Dame Kate Barker, writing the foreword to the Whitehall Group Paper, stated: “This paper seeks to look proper throughout the issues in housing and takes a holistic view of options… proposing insurance policies with out concern of vested pursuits.
“The problems of provide and distribution of area might be acquainted to all these reflecting on housing issues, including in high quality and the more and more pressing drawback of power effectivity offers this paper further chunk.
“The overriding proposal is for extra joined-up and coherent housing coverage. This could run wider than simply not altering housing ministers continuously, but additionally interact HM Treasury and monetary regulators. Solely then may we obtain the objective of defining, and shifting in the direction of, housing market success.”
On power effectivity, the doc proposed sensible suggestions comparable to eradicating VAT for energy-saving supplies used to refurbish properties, enjoyable listed constructing controls for energy-saving retrofits, and aligning council tax with power efficiency (EPC ranking).
Relating to the personal rented sector, the paper stated shifting away from archaic phrases comparable to ‘landlord’ and ‘tenant’ in the direction of ‘property proprietor’ and ‘resident’ was one of many recommendations, together with incentivising longer leases to allow residents to place down roots and spend money on their communities, encouraging lenders to supply discounted mortgages to property homeowners providing longer tenancies, and tax breaks to these property homeowners.
On social housing the paper concluded that it should be given extra precedence following latest tragic occasions, just like the dying of two 12 months outdated toddler Awaab Ishak. There needs to be a evaluate of location of housing affiliation properties to maximise effectivity of upkeep, in addition to the adoption of recent expertise enabling tenants to add photographs of issues to landlords and inspiring utility suppliers to ship customary customer support and pricing to these on prepayment meters.
