Baby boomers and housing

What I find so sad and unacceptable about today’s rental market is the lack of security of tenure. You read awful stories about children being forced to change schools at critical points in their education, of people being evicted because their landlord has defaulted on the buy to let mortgage.

That's true, that and unaffordable rents.
Renting was more secure years ago; we had several family members who rented the same properties privately for 50 years or more.

Yes all you had to do was be a good tenant - pay your rent and keep to your side of the tenancy agreement. It’s like that in countries like France and Germany and (probably others). Certainly in Germany, renting property out is one of the ways that Trade Unions invest their capital. Much safer than the stock exchange and providing a service at the same time.

That's interesting, I didn't know that, although I had heard that there is a lower rate of home ownership in Germany.

Because of the involvement of TUs and the like, there were a lot of small scale developments of a very high standard. One thing I noticed when I was there was the next apartment block down was being built and already the children’s well equipped playground was finished so it was already for when the first family moved in. When I mentioned this, my German friends looked rather puzzled at it not being completely obvious that this would be the case.

NEWQUAY does the "good book" REALLY say those let who wont work not eat? Good christian principles then!!Now I know why May and co at Westminster call themselves christians.What strange and shocking attitude to other people experiencing financial difficulty

Many gransnetters have said that they have helped their children buy houses. We have done this ourselves with our three daughters.
But really this is not solving the housing problem. It might even be making it worse by increasing house prices.
We now have people in their thirties and forties who can only buy with parental help.
What about the others who don't have that help? It makes for a more and more divided society.

Good heavens, paddyann I completely missed that!
Amazing that a text written 2,000+ years ago should be taken as a pattern for modern life when circumstances are radically different from those of the peasant community it was written for and about...

Whatever we might wisely say about our hard work in the past and the iniquities of private landlords the fact remains that there aren't enough houses to go round and scarcity always pushes up prices. We could shoulder some of the blame for electing governments that have done nothing to relieve the situation...

In the south east the cost of land accounts for up to 70% (or even more in some areas) of the price of any house, the cost of building it forms a very small proportion of the house.

No matter how many houses we build the price will not come down unless we can reduce the price of the land they are built on. In fact the more houses we build the more expensive land becomes as builders compete to buy a scarce resource.

I have no idea what the solution is to this problem. Any ideas?

The good book says "let him (her) who WON'T work not eat"!
Was that Paul?

was that Paul the misogynist?

It might be good advice for some of those who think the world owes them a living I read a letter in a newspaper from some GPs, whose GS, despised the wage slavery of a earning his living, but was quite happy to live with his GPs and sponge off them (I think his parents had thrown him out).

I felt that the order of the boot and a couple of nights on a park bench or sofa surfing would do him a power of good.

Another aspect of this subject - tower blocks.
This was the answer to the housing problem at one time. I think they are a most de-humanising type of housing, and wish they weren't necessary.

was that Paul the misogynist?
Yes - allegedly

www.theguardian.com/society/2017/nov/20/one-in-seven-councillors-in-english-rental-hotspots-are-landlords

This is why councils do not want to build more council houses. One in seven councillors will lose out.