18/03/06 - Conservative Proposals To Boost Home Ownership

Helping first-time buyers get the first step on the housing ladder

Local Conservatives Back Conservative proposals to boost home ownership

Robert Buckland & Cllr Justin Tomlinson, Conservative parliamentary spokesmen for South & North Swindon, this week added their support to new calls by Conservatives to help first-time buyers and ensure that more young people are able to get onto the housing ladder. Last year, there were fewer first time buyers than at any point since 1980, and a typical first timer is unable to afford a semi-detached property in 87 per cent of towns across the country. In the South West, they now need a deposit of £26,359.

The proposals endorsed by David Cameron, which will form part of Conservatives’ policy review, include:

·    Building more homes suitable for first-time buyers, while protecting the environment.

·       Reviewing planning rules to encourage the creation of homes with the gardens and parking spaces that families want.

·       Expanding shared ownership schemes to more than just a few public sector workers.

·       Opposing the Government’s new home sellers’ packs which will increase the cost of selling a home – pushing up prices for first time buyers.

·       Making it easier for council house and housing association tenants to buy their own home, with part-ownership as a step along the way.

Robert & Justin said:

“The challenges that first-time buyers now face include paying £1,500 in stamp duty; soaring costs of living that make it harder to save for a deposit; and house prices that make it impossible to raise a sufficient mortgage for those on modest wages. Home ownership for those starting out in life in Swindon threatens to become the preserve of a lucky few.

“We believe that wider home ownership is a matter of social justice. Conservatives want to bring down the barriers to getting on the housing ladder, to give families the scope to grow and to fulfil people’s aspirations of having a place of their own. We will build more homes make them both eco-friendly and affordable, and give local people stronger powers to decide where they are built.

“And we welcome the calls for a review of John Prescott’s flawed planning rules, which are resulting in ugly blocks of flats without sufficient parking being crammed into suburban communities. We need to allow the market to build the homes that families want – with gardens and parking spaces.”

Notes to Editors

CONSERVATIVE PLANS FOR FIRST TIME BUYERS

1. More affordable and eco-friendly homes

We want to ensure more homes are built, suitable for first time buyers, whilst protecting the environment. We want to ensure the construction of more affordable, attractive, eco-friendly new homes, with greater power for local communities to decide where those homes are built. A wave of new, affordable, eco-friendly homes is not only an opportunity to achieve aesthetic and environmental goals. It is also an opportunity to regenerate our cities, and provide homes in and outside our towns and cities that people want to buy, and can afford to buy. We have written to Britain’s builders inviting them to work with our Quality of Life Policy Group to achieve these goals.

2. A new model of ‘near-city’ living

We want to revitalise rundown suburban communities, and ensure that planning rules encourage the creation of homes with gardens and parking spaces that families want. Combined with the regeneration of our inner cities, we want to see a new model of ‘near-city’ living. We want to revitalise the ring of rundown suburban communities and ‘grey deserts’ around the cities. These communities will help provide the homes, with infrastructure in place, that people would like to live in.

John Prescott’s planning regulations on housing are resulting in intensive densification, cramming in mini-estates and blocks of flats and concreting over back gardens, irrespective of the character of neighbourhoods. We have asked the Quality of Life Policy Group to look at ambitious changes to planning regulations that are creating soulless blocks of flats without sufficient parking spaces. We want to help the market deliver the houses with gardens and parking spaces that people aspire to own.

3. More accessible and flexible shared ownership schemes

We want to open up shared ownership schemes to a wider audience, rather than the small number of workers in the state sector at present, and end the scandal of new homes lying empty.

Labour’s current ‘key worker’ schemes are only open to a fraction of those who want to get onto the housing ladder. Even public sector workers are finding them too restrictive, and as a result, new homes are lying empty. We want to expand the provision of shared ownership schemes, and also to make them more accessible and flexible. Caroline Spelman has written to the Council for Mortgage Lenders asking them to make a submission to our Policy Groups on the scope for expanding shared ownership.

4. Removing the barriers of Home Information Packs

We will oppose the Government’s plans for expensive and bureaucratic new sellers’ packs, and will be opposing the regulations when laid before Parliament. We want to see the removal of barriers to home ownership. Labour’s new Home Information Packs will add up to £1,000 to the cost of selling a home, according to the National Association of Estate Agents, without providing satisfactory assurances to buyers. First-time buyers are likely to be most seriously affected; lacking confidence in the housing market and a firm financial footing, they are more likely to want their own valuation in addition to the pack. We are calling on the Government to halt the introduction of this new roadblock to ownership, and we will be voting against the forthcoming secondary legislation in Parliament.

5. Helping those in social housing move up the ladder

We want to remove the obstacles that John Prescott has introduced to social tenants buying their own home. We also want social tenants to part-own their property as a step to full ownership. John Prescott has curtailed the rights of social tenants to own their home; the Right to Buy has been diluted through a series of cuts to the discounts and eligibility, and as a result of stock transfer to housing associations – where new tenants do not have the same rights.

By contrast, we want to help those in housing association and council housing to gain an equity stake in their home, so they can move up the housing ladder, and achieve their long-term goal of full home ownership. We want to promote sustainable mixed communities, which help reduce anti-social behaviour and improve the local environment. Michael Gove has written to leading housing associations, offering to work with them and our Policy Groups, to examine how we can extend the dream of ownership to a new generation.

KEY FACTS

·            There were an estimated 320,000 first-time buyers in 2005, the lowest annual total since 1980. By contrast, in 1997, there were 503,000 (Halifax press release, 28 January 2006).

 http://www.hbosplc.com/media/includes/28_01_06_Halifax_First_Time_Buyer_Annual_Review.doc

·            A typical first-time buyer is unable to afford a semi-detached property in 87 per cent of towns in the UK. In the last ten years, the typical deposit put down by an average first time buyer has increased from £5,500 to £24,000, which means it now takes five years to save for a deposit, compared to just two years a decade ago (ibid.).

·            John Prescott’s planning regulations (PPG3 / PPS3) impose high density targets on new all housing developments. Leafy back gardens are classed as ‘brownfield land’. In many suburban communities, houses and gardens are being demolished and replaced with blocks of flats that are out of keeping with the character of the neighbourhood. The number of new off-street car parking spaces allowed are tightly restricted, so increasing problems with on-street parking.

·            Soaring council tax, higher utility bills and the complete abolition of mortgage interest tax relief have all pushed up the costs of owning a home further, making it more difficult to service a mortgage, or save towards a deposit. In the last three years alone, the total costs of owning and maintaining a home have risen by treble the rate of inflation (Halifax Press Release, 8 March 2006).

http://www.hbosplc.com/media/includes/08_03_06_Annual_Housing_Review.doc

Table source: Halifax

http://www.hbosplc.com/media/includes/28_01_06_Halifax_First_Time_Buyer_Annual_Review.doc

A map of the regional boundaries that Halifax uses is at:

http://www.hbosplc.com/economy/LatestRegionalSummary.asp?region=north