Who will buy these homes?

Labour unveiled a plan some time ago to spend £2b on house building across the country so perhaps the development near you is part of that plan.
Labour have promised to move migrants out of hotels which costs the taxpayer £m's each day. There are thousands in hotels so where are they going to go? Maybe these houses are Labour's solution. There will be one hell of a backlash if it is.

I think the key is “affordable”. We also have lots of houses being built on the edges of town but the prices are ridiculous. This is not a wealthy town - quite the opposite - and very few people will be able to afford £600k for a 4 bedroom house (nowhere near London or SE).

No idea who is buying Gloriana, but guess that the argument is that people are moving up the property ladder into larger houses and therefore freeing up smaller more affordable homes. Personally I belive we should be building homes which are actually affordable for those on the lowest incomes.

I have just moved from London into a newish estate on the outskirts of a market town in Bedfordshire. The house is 5 yrs old and cheaper than my 2bed in London. Lots of young families around me and my GS bought a similar hse 2years ago not far away, so people somehow are buying them. There are 2 or 3 more estates under construction down the road but I think you are right they will be beyond the reach of many. I do know some houses on this estate are social housing which is presumably a clause in the planning rules so there is a good mix of people which is a good thing.

The government isn’t building these new houses, the property development companies are.

Government policy is said to be build first on grey and brown field sites. My town has many such sites but it’s no surprise in our village that several planning applications to build on green belt here have been submitted. Our area is more desirable than nearer the town centre where ample green and brown sites exist. Houses will sell for higher prices.

So far, I’ve seen no planning applications for affordable or social housing, which is what is needed in the country.

Same here. Huge estates in the countryside around Edinburgh. Expensive, not serviced by buses, schools or any services.
I know 2 families who've bought them.
A young professional family with 2 cars and a retired couple who have been hosting Ukrainian refugees.
The young couple say it's soul-less.
The older couple like that it's well insulated.
I absolutely agree.
The plans just gave a green light to developers who want to make as much money as possible.
Everyday on rightmove.co.uk there are dozens of identical houses for sale.
Meanwhile there are empty office blocks and factory sites begging to be converted into attractive housing by an imaginative design team.
I think there should be a competition to design something amazing and this housebuilding craze should be highlighted to show what's really going on.

I went to the nurseries yesterday for some plants. It's down narrow country lanes on the outskirts of a middle-size, prosperous county town. There were at least four developments of new houses, like Barratt Homes, all looking like boxes with pocket handkerchief sized gardens. I'm not sure who buys them, at £400k for a semi detached. It won't be first timers at that price, average earnings aren't very high here. It won't be elderly downsizers either because there's no facilities or real sense of community. I guess it's the people in the middle climbing the property ladder, which we are so obsessed with in this country.

I am on a small new development in a tiny village. Of the 7 houses, 4 are occupied my middle class retirees, one by a single semi retired man and the other two by young couples, one of whom has children. All are relatively comfortably off.
The same is true of development about a mile away.
And another about 2 miles away us having trouble selling and have changed to rental ... at very high prices.
The developments have done little to deal with homelessness among young couples I feel.

Both my DC have bought new homes within the last three years they both have two DC each.
Since covid my Ddils work from home so wanted an office space, and less garden as they have no time to spare for gardening.
They both wanted low maintenance houses with good insulation.

Brown sites are often difficult to develop, especially if industry has been there previously. We have a small site in our village that once was a Victorian leather factory. It has taken years to be developed, a huge crater of earth was removed to decontaminate the site. It’s now four bungalows and a small block of flats. None cheap and all sold.
On the edge of the village are a two housing developments, all on land sold by local farmers, brining in more money than farming. All in high demand due to a direct train to London from a station 5 miles away.

Bringing *

Hundreds of new homes being built in my area some are social housing , lots of squashed together flats but the prices are high. £290K for a terraced 2 bed . I went to view this house. It was reasonably spacious and both bedrooms double , decent kitchen , small lounge . Garden of an acceptable size . Mid terraced so very overlooked and houses close together overlooking each other . But , I knocked on the dividing wall and it sounded hollow , it seems the houses are built with those lightweight breezeblocks , so the dividing wall is breezeblocks and plaster board . Immagine the soundproofing! Surely neighbour noise would be quite intrusive. The house I live in is 2 bed mid terrace 45 years old , the dividing walls are heavy breezeblock and brick because when I knock the wall it is not hollow . Neighbour noise is reasonably subdued but manageable. ( I do have quiet neighbours thankfully ) I don't think these modern fast built houses are very well built but when I meet someone who is living on the new estate I will ask .

In tourist areas (not just coastal) many new houses are bought by people or syndicates who then rent them out.
AirBnB is a growing market .
In all areas of England councils are paying for many private rental houses to house people on the social housing list.
Some of these have jobs and pay rent, some receive housing benefit.

Sarnia

Labour unveiled a plan some time ago to spend £2b on house building across the country so perhaps the development near you is part of that plan.
Labour have promised to move migrants out of hotels which costs the taxpayer £m's each day. There are thousands in hotels so where are they going to go? Maybe these houses are Labour's solution. There will be one hell of a backlash if it is.

I suspect the 'explosion' of applications by both private landlords and the Home Office to turn average 2/3 bedroom family homes into HMO's is in anticipation of siphoning asylum-seekers out of hotels and into the community.

The three bedroomed property next door to my brother was sold to the Home Office by the landlord, after he had, quite legally, turfed out the family who had been renting it. It has since been modified to become six bedrooms, although God knows how tiny the rooms must be.

Everyone in the cul-de-sac is awaiting the new occupants, courtesy of the Home Office.

The housing market is in a slump where we are, nobody can sell or even get viewings.
Everyone rushed to buy before stamp duty went up and now is terribly slow. The government have wrecked the housing market. Sellers are having to drop to the price they bought their house for years ago and some even lower than that in order to sell.
In the Guardian it said things haven’t been this bad for 10 years.

I feel like doing a survey and ask the people in the new houses where they lived before. I can’t believe we need so many. Where I live thousands of new houses have spoiled the landscape and clogged the roads. I can’t believe all these houses are necessary.

Our small market town has been spoiled by large housing estates being built on every bit of green space. What used to be playing fields and green space has been built on. But we have no increase in amenities and a poor road structure.

Local Authorities gie the planning permissions because they are penalised if they don't. Developers then build the houses at the speed that they can sell them.

What does it matter who buys these houses? The simple fact is they sell, otherwise they would not be built.

Where I lived until July was in an are that attracted high science and high tech IT companies. Many well paid jobs for highly qualified people of all nationalities, a mainline train to London for commuters and a good motorway north south and east west connections. All this attracted buyers to the area.

Where we live now has become a commuter destination since WFH began. DD moved half an hour further from London to live here this year because she works from home 3 days a week.
Again it is in an area becoming popular with companies because of good motorways and transport links.

Salaries in bothplaces are high, people are moving up the housing ladder.

Of course we need the new houses, many people are living in inadequate homes or families are homeless. We give visas to 100s of 1000s of legal immigrants each year. They need homes for themselves and their families. As I keep saying builders do not build houses they cannot sell

My house before this ne Toetoe was a terraced new build and the sound insulation was ver good. The hollow sound is because the plaster board is attached to the solid walls with batons, leaving a space, rather than plaster directly applied to a solid wall. this means, taking into account next door, that there are three layers of sound insulation plus air between houses rather than one solid one.

I only heard my neighbours if they were drilling to put up shelves or something like that.

It was a hundred times better than the solid wall 1939s houses that I have lived in!

New estates inevitably look soulless. Where I an now was built in the 1990s. It doesn’t look soulless now.

Toetoe

Hundreds of new homes being built in my area some are social housing , lots of squashed together flats but the prices are high. £290K for a terraced 2 bed . I went to view this house. It was reasonably spacious and both bedrooms double , decent kitchen , small lounge . Garden of an acceptable size . Mid terraced so very overlooked and houses close together overlooking each other . But , I knocked on the dividing wall and it sounded hollow , it seems the houses are built with those lightweight breezeblocks , so the dividing wall is breezeblocks and plaster board . Immagine the soundproofing! Surely neighbour noise would be quite intrusive. The house I live in is 2 bed mid terrace 45 years old , the dividing walls are heavy breezeblock and brick because when I knock the wall it is not hollow . Neighbour noise is reasonably subdued but manageable. ( I do have quiet neighbours thankfully ) I don't think these modern fast built houses are very well built but when I meet someone who is living on the new estate I will ask .

There are sound insulation regs for new houses now and the inspectors test for this. My 5 year old semi is brilliant in that regard. Our TVs are behind each other on the shared wall and we neither of us hear the other at all.

People's housing ambitions are unrealistic. Unless you have money for a deposit or the income to pay the bills, it will become increasingly difficult to get on the housing ladder via a new build in a desirable area. New builds are expensive and affordable is subjective. Cheap housing is available but usually in inner city areas where people do not want to buy to live - merely rent out to others.
It's no good demanding cheap Council houses if these properties are not cheap to build. Housing is not a charity and people can no longer expect subsidised rent, especially when it is abused by those who sub-let for gain.

Loads of new builds near us, of those I know who have bought one couple lived at home until they married, then bought (parents paid deposit), a second couple were similar but haven’t married. Two other couples were renting in not very pleasant flats and have bought under the shared ownership scheme.
Our local authority have to meet government targets as MOnica said.

My granddaughter and her husband [well he will be next week!] are staying with us - no problem - but obviously they'd love something of their own but there's nothing suitable in our area and he needs to be in the same vicinity because it's near London as he has to travel a lot- and she wants to be near her family and work place. I love having them around - they're no trouble but it's not really ideal.

I live in a small market town.

Many of the shops down the main street have flats above them, a large proportion of them look fairly derelict.

If ‘someone’ did them up and rented them out to singles, professional couples, even families with children ( they have big rooms), it would free up some homes and make the town centre look so much better.

Too expensive, I assume.