New Housing Estates -

Its is still a nasty, if catchy, little ditty.

Little Boxes was written by political activist Malvina Reynolds and became a hit for Pete Seeger.

Nina and Frederic's version was a cover.

I thought Nina &Frederik's song was really offensive and patronising because it covered the inside of the houses and was a reflection on their occupants as well.

Our first house was on a small state of identical new terrace houses, but once in the front door the interiors were as diverse as the people who occupied them. Go to a front door and you had no idea what lay beyond it. I have good friends still that date back to those days.

It is only people with money. who have choice and can afford to patronise those less wealthy than them.

Housing for the masses has always been little boxes, whether those are the small Georgian terraces housing the servants and tradesmen who served the big houses, or, since WW2, the square miles of little boxes built to give decent housing to the growing population.

But better little boxes than over occupation, back slums and multiple generation families squeezed into run down properties with inadequate services.

We bought our first home in the 70s on a small newish estate and it was a box. Ok the garden was a good size but that was it. No garage, no hallway, minute bathroom, kitchen and impossibly small bedrooms. By comparison some of the new build starter homes are spacious. We stayed 7 years and luckily sold to other first time buyers. However they really struggle these days to sell on that estate because first time buyers want better and I dont blame them.

My last place - a new build the builders - Beazer at the time, but Persimmon by the time it came to the snagging - built our estate just small enough - (47 houses) - that they didn't have to provide a play area.

geekesse

Anybody remember Nina and Frederik’s song ‘Little Boxes’? youtu.be/ReV-z0PORso

I remember it well, and it really applies to the urban sprawl on old ICI land near me. It's like a fungal growth of boxes and more boxes. Precious little infrastructure, facilities or open spaces, nurseries, shops etc. Just profit and then added profit for the "throw em up" developers. I feel very sorry for first time buyers.

Jaxie In many areas the cost of the land can be as much as 60 or even 80% of the cost of building a house. Double the plot size and the developer has to add £100,000 to the price of the house.

In our village, the owner of an end of terrace house with a double garage along side, sold the strip of land the garage stood on. It was 25 foot wide and faced onto a busy road with views of the local dual carriage which passed nearby on an embankment. That plot sold for over £200,000

I looked round some new builds in the Midlands. The bedrooms could accommodate at least ten people. The sitting room ( or lounge ) could only accommodate seating for six it was so small. The house agent agreed with my criticism that it was ill designed. It had a magnificent staircase but landings which were so narrow you couldn’t have put a piece of furniture on them. Some new builds in Lyme Regs had bedrooms that were too small to accommodate wardrobes or bedside tables. The gardens are overlooked pocket handkerchieves in size. Developers are evidently cramming too many houses on plots with profit in mind rather than facilities for those who buy them.,

MissAdventure - makes an excellent point that youngsters just want to get out of living with parents or renting. They are being exploited by greedy developers. And mark my words - I know for an absolute fact that THEY don’t live in the type of housing that they build. They’re off living in the posh areas without a housing estate in sight !

MagicWriter, what I meant was that if you can afford to buy a house you have the choice between a modern one with maybe small rooms and almost certainly not a very big garden and an older one which may have bigger rooms and more garden. I hope your grandchildren are able to find homes they can afford. It’s very difficult for youngsters today if they’re not earning huge salaries.

There are some very ugly " luxury apartments" going up in the rather posh city near me. They are advertised as very expensive.
The prison is just next door, with some famous inmates. I just hope they don't have back windows.

We have searched for over 6 months to find a home which has a reasonable main bedroom. Many show homes have a small double bed, but when trying to walk around it the shins get knocked. Even looking at homes near £800,000 the rooms are small. Our current house is not huge but certainly bigger than the overpriced rubbish on the market. I am aware of some sellers adding over £100,000 to a home they bought a few months ago. The madness is that people are buying them! We've decided to stay put

I live in a rural area but have seen a couple of huge housing estates go up in our nearest town. They range from some attractive looking four bedroom to two bed terraces which look small but pretty. Lots of sizes and designs in between.
The roads are curvy with small cul de sacs, small gardens with green spaces in front. I think most young couples would love them and they are reasonably priced. Young people and lots of children and the chance to build a community.
I wonder if rooms are smaller because people expect an ensuite bathroom, a walk in robe, downstairs cloaks and more recently a pantry. All get crammed in somehow.
Btw sheep’s wool is a breathable, highly efficient sustainable and natural insulation recommended by heritage England. It resists flame to 1200F. So more fire resistant than rock wool or many other alternatives.
Good to see solar panels on roofs and an effort at environmental improvements.
Just wish local councils would refuse planning permission on flood plains.

* Germanshephardmum*, only folk who have money have real choices. Young folk, starting out are often priced out of the market and cannot afford these inflated prices for tiny little boxes.

I have grandchildren living in Scotland where house sizes are a wee bit bigger but are really struggling to leave home and find homes of their own.

So no, folk don’t always have choices of where they want to live or what size property they can afford!

They are building 3000+ houses opposite my local hospital, no thought to the patients who have to put up with the noise while they recover. No thought to parking as the hospital car park fills up really quickly. When I saw the plans for these houses, I wanted to ask if the hamster wheel came with it or was it an optional extra.

An in-fill house was also built not far from me, the front door to the neighbouring house is on the side, facing the wall of this house. If the tenant wants to move out, she's going to have to remove a window to get her furniture out. There's isn't even enough room to get her shopping trolley between the house and her front door.

They are building a lot round here mostly apartment blocks, everywhere you go. Its suppose to be a rural area but the farmers are selling their land off for building on. Its where every body is going to park and the infrastucture ie Schools,Doctors, hospitals ours is only half used. Its happening everywhere I think.

I drove past 5 "detached" houses down a lane and they would be lucky to get their bin down between them and I bet they will go for a pretty penny. At the end of the lane there is a very large house that has been there for years and it looks like they sold off their drive to stick up these 5 houses. How they got planning permission is beyond me.

I think most people just want to get a foot on the housing ladder, rather than live with their parents until they're 52, or pay ridiculous rents.

If we had a responsible government, which was not in the pocket of the volume housebuilders, and which actually wanted to address the housing shortage, the first thing they would do is address the problem of land-banking by developers.

There are two issues here.

Firstly, the developers buy up "hope land" usually on the edge of settlements. They buy it for the price of agricultural land or slightly more because they hope that it will eventually be zoned as housing land, increasing its value by 1000%

Secondly, they sit on land which has been granted planning permission for housing. Although the planning permission usually stipulates that a "start" has to be made within three years of permission being granted, they can make a "start" by doing a small amount of work onsite - eg laying the foundations of the corner of one house, which is then inspected by the council's local building inspector and certified as a "legal start".

After that the developer covers up the foundations and stops works until such time that he thinks the development will be much more profitable.

According to "The Times" there are a million unbuilt houses with planning permission.

www.thetimes.co.uk/article/permission-given-for-a-million-homes-that-havent-been-built-cwcn0r5kg

I live in quite a small house advertised as a three bed (though the third is a cupboard if you know what I mean). This was a new build on a small plot which has three of us in a row. Parking is difficult and the gardens are tiny. When I looked up the planning application online the builder actually wanted four houses. I have now idea how he thought that was going to happen. It is all about money and cramming as many on a plot as you can. I presume the builder of our little row saw the loss of a property as a loss of about £250k (and all he did was knock down a bungalow).

Callistemon my road has no number 13.

I sometimes wonder if they do market research to find out what people actually want and can afford.

We have some truly hideous houses locally which have been on the market for some time which are not selling. Mentioning no names or places they're near to a fairly pretty village which has an ugly school by the edge. Guess which style they copied? Not the cottages, that's for sure.

I would have thought that 3-bed semi-detached houses would be popular but no, 4-bed terraces are in abundance and the prices have had to be reduced. They're only worth what people are prepared to pay, of course - and you can only think that the developers are having a laugh.

Beechnut

Callistemon

Just browsing and looking at bungalows and noticed one has a bedroom size 10' 6" x 12' 12"
Is that unusual?

??Makes it a decent size I reckon *Callistemon.

Yes, it's quite a good size. Room to swing a black cat!

Elegran I wonder how many roads don't have a Number 13?

Rosmurta

Oh yes I remember 'little boxes', seen too many housing estates that apples to.

www.youtube.com/watch?v=2_2lGkEU4Xs

Someone must have been superstitious.