Redesigning Housing Policy

2019 ◽  
Vol 250 ◽  
pp. R69-R74
Author(s):  
Kate Barker
Keyword(s):  
Young People ◽  
Social Housing ◽  
Home Ownership ◽  
Supply And Demand ◽  
Regional Distribution ◽  
Housing Supply ◽  
Housing Crisis ◽  
Executive Summary ◽  
Housing Benefit ◽  
Rented Sector

Executive SummaryDiscussion of the UK's housing crisis is of long date, and tends to focus on a simple story about a mismatch in housing supply and demand and the consequent need to build more homes. Yet the reality is more complex with multiple sub-plots including social housing, stress in the private rented sector, benefits, subsidies and ultimately taxation of home ownership.At the bottom of the market, the crisis is real and acute, as manifested in a sharp increase in homelessness and rough sleeping. The inescapable answer is to increase the depleted stock of social housing and widen eligibility criteria. An increase of 100,000 social units a year in England would help address this problem, as well as alleviate the financial squeeze on tenants of the private rented sector, whose number has grown sharply in the past 15 years in tandem with a steep rise in the housing benefit bill. Recent efforts to curb housing benefit have further increased distress, so it will be necessary to consider increasing benefits again alongside regulatory interventions with private landlords.In the home ownership market, recent government intervention has taken the form of the much-criticised Help-to-Buy Equity Loan scheme. This market policy to support new-build homes should be wound down and replaced by a scheme to endow all young people with a capital sum that they could use for second-hand homes as well. More generally, a more sophisticated approach to planning home-building is needed, both for assessing overall numbers and their regional distribution and in financing the supporting infrastructure.But none of these measures is a panacea for a housing crisis that is in large part a symptom of problems in the wider economy, such as low relative wages for young people, a lack of clarity about environmental issues, and failing places. A successful policy package to address the distorted structure of the housing market must also grasp the most difficult nettle of all – namely the way the tax benefits of owner-occupation incentivise overconsumption of housing and a widening wealth gap between renters and home owners, and between owners in different parts of the country. If we spend more to help those who struggle to afford decent housing, then it is only just to raise more taxation from those who benefit from restrictions on housing supply – whether through reform to council tax, a wider wealth tax or a limited form of Capital Gains Tax on principal residences.

scholarly journals Delivering Social Housing: An Overview of the Housing Crisis in Dublin

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Valesca Lima
Keyword(s):  
Affordable Housing ◽  
Social Housing ◽  
Homeless People ◽  
Rapid Decline ◽  
Housing Supply ◽  
Housing Crisis ◽  
Family Homelessness ◽  
Housing Policies ◽  
Direct Construction ◽  
The Social

This paper explores the responses to the housing crisis in Dublin, Ireland, by analysing recent housing policies promoted to prevent family homelessness. I argue that private rental market subsides have played an increasing role in the provision of social housing in Ireland. Instead of policies that facilitate the construction of affordable housing or the direct construction of social housing, current housing policies have addressed the social housing crisis by encouraging and relying excessively on the private market to deliver housing. The housing crisis has challenged governments to increase the social housing supply, but the implementation of a larger plan to deliver social housing has not been effective, as is evidenced by the rapid decline of both private and social housing supply and the increasing number of homeless people in Dublin.

scholarly journals Neoliberal Nomads: Housing Insecurity and the Revival of Private Renting in the UK

2014 ◽  
Vol 19 (4) ◽  
pp. 1-14 ◽  
Author(s):  
John Bone
Keyword(s):  
Social Housing ◽  
Critical Analysis ◽  
Well Being ◽  
Housing Tenure ◽  
Social Effects ◽  
Major Contributor ◽  
Housing Crisis ◽  
Private Renting ◽  
The Uk ◽  
Rented Sector

This paper offers a critical analysis, including insights from the fledgling sub-discipline of neurosociology, with the aim of challenging some of the key assumptions informing the state supported revival of the UK private rented sector (PRS) as a mainstream form of housing tenure. As is widely recognised, the PRS's expansion has occurred in tandem with the long running decline of social housing and the more recent reversal in the longstanding trend towards increasing owner occupation. This paper asserts that the policies supporting this overall trend are misconceived on a number of fronts, as the loosely regulated UK private rented sector is not only a major contributor to the country's ongoing housing crisis but carries with it a range of unacknowledged economic and social problems including profound effects on personal well-being, some fairly evident and others less so. With respect to the latter, it is argued that coming to an understanding of the negative implications of private renting in the UK under current arrangements, in addition to the more evident issues associated with poor condition and high cost accommodation, also requires an appreciation of the deeper psycho-social effects of involuntary mobility, insecurity and socio-spatial dislocation.

Introduction: a new housing crisis

Housing Shock ◽  
2020 ◽  
pp. 1-20
Author(s):  
Rory Hearne
Keyword(s):  
European Union ◽  
Social Housing ◽  
Home Ownership ◽  
Housing Situation ◽  
Housing Crisis ◽  
Housing Systems ◽  
The Past ◽  
The World ◽  
Rental Markets ◽  
New Generation

This Chapter details how the Irish housing systems, and housing systems across the world, are experiencing a structural ‘shock’. We are in the midst of an unprecedented housing and homelessness crisis. This details the dramatic increase in housing inequalities and exclusion, from the rise in homelessness, mortgage arrears and foreclosures, to the collapse in home-ownership rates and, in particular, the emergence of ‘Generation Rent’ and ‘Generation Stuck at Home’. This new Generation Rent is being locked out of traditional routes to affordable secure housing such as home ownership, social housing and secure low-rent housing. They are being pushed into private rental markets with unaffordable high rents and insecurity of tenure, or forced into hidden homelessness, couchsurfing, sleeping in cars, or pushed back to live with their parents. Ireland has had the largest fall in home ownership rates among European Union (EU) countries in the past three decades. This chapter shows that the current housing situation and crisis is not a temporary blip, but a deep and profound structural crisis that is in danger of becoming a permanent crisis. Our national and global housing systems are in crisis and this is a key juncture.

Introduction: the repositioning of social housing and welfare provision

2019 ◽  
pp. 1-14
Author(s):  
Kelly Bogue
Keyword(s):  
Social Housing ◽  
Tax Policy ◽  
Housing Affordability ◽  
Final Part ◽  
Welfare Provision ◽  
The Social ◽  
Housing Benefit ◽  
The Uk ◽  
Post Industrial ◽  
Rented Sector

This chapter sets out the background and context to the UK’s implementation of austerity measures following the financial crash of 2007/08. It examines the principles underlying the enactment of the Bedroom Tax policy before outlining the new regulations on room restrictions that have been imposed on those claiming housing benefit in the social rented sector. It discusses the controversy surrounding its implementation as well as the ways in which it has impacted different regions of the UK. This chapter also reflects on changes to housing benefit more widely and suggests that we are seeing the return of the ‘housing question’ in post-industrial Britain as austerity policies undermine housing affordability. The final part of this chapter outlines the structure of the book.

Separating owner-occupier and investor demands for housing in the Australian states

2019 ◽  
Vol 37 (2) ◽  
pp. 215-232 ◽  
Author(s):  
Le Ma ◽  
Richard Reed ◽  
Jian Liang
Keyword(s):  
Home Ownership ◽  
House Prices ◽  
Supply And Demand ◽  
Housing Markets ◽  
Housing Affordability ◽  
Housing Supply ◽  
Content Type ◽  
Western Countries ◽  
Long Run

PurposeThere has been declining home ownership and increased acceptance of long-term renting in many western countries including Australia; this has created a problem when examining housing markets as there are dual demand and include both owner-occupiers and investors. The purpose of this paper is to examine the long-run relationship between house prices, housing supply and demand, and to estimate the effects of the two types of demand (i.e. owner-occupier and investor) on house prices.Design/methodology/approachThe econometric techniques for cointegration with vector error correction models are used to specify the proposed models, where the housing markets in the Australian states and territories illustrate the models.FindingsThe results highlight the regional long-run equilibrium and associated patterns in house prices, the level of new housing supply, owner-occupier demand for housing and investor demand for housing. Different types of markets were identified.Practical implicationsThe findings suggest that policies that depress the investment demand can effectively prevent the housing bubble from further building up in the Australian states. The empirical findings shed light in the strategy of maintaining levels of housing affordability in regions where owner-occupiers have been priced out of the housing market.Originality/valueThere has been declining home ownership and increased acceptance of long-term renting in many western countries including Australia; this has created a problem when examining housing markets as there are dual demand and include both owner-occupiers and investors. This research has given to the relationship between supply and dual demand, which includes owner-occupation and investment, for housing and the influence on house prices.

scholarly journals Inquiry into increasing affordable housing supply: Evidence-based principles and strategies for Australian policy and practice

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Nicole Gurran ◽  
Steven Rowley ◽  
Vivienne Milligan ◽  
Bill Randolph ◽  
Peter Phibbs ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Affordable Housing ◽  
Social Housing ◽  
Home Ownership ◽  
Evidence Based ◽  
Housing Supply ◽  
Policy And Practice ◽  
Market Driven ◽  
Housing Needs ◽  
The Continuum

This study examined the range of strategies and initiatives governments have used to leverage affordable housing supply across the continuum of housing needs (i.e. from social housing to affordable rental and home ownership) in a constrained funding and increasingly market driven context across a range of different jurisdictions and markets.

Rap and Political Participation: Using Rap as a Creative Method in Research with Children and Young People

Young ◽  
2019 ◽  
Vol 28 (1) ◽  
pp. 50-68 ◽  
Author(s):  
Lorcan Byrne ◽  
Cathal O’Connell ◽  
Siobhan O’Sullivan
Keyword(s):  
Young People ◽  
Social Housing ◽  
Rap Music ◽  
Youth Culture ◽  
Decision Making Process ◽  
Collection Method ◽  
Children And Young People ◽  
Disadvantaged Communities ◽  
Research With Children ◽  
Neighbourhood Regeneration

This article explores how rap music workshops can be an effective method when researching neighbourhood regeneration and refurbishment with children and young people, especially in disadvantaged communities. The article draws a research with 78 children and young people in a large social housing estate which is undergoing regeneration and refurbishment in Cork City in the South of Ireland. The focus of this article is on a sub-group of six teenagers who participated in a rap workshop. The research demonstrates that rap music workshops are an insightful data collection method, particularly in contexts where rap music is already an embedded part of the local youth culture. This research also reveals how children and young people have the imaginative capacity to make an informed analysis of their communities and that they hold a strong desire to influence the decision-making process. This article will be of interest to researchers concerned with creative methodologies designed to elicit and understand children’s and young people’s experiences and perspectives.

Home Truths: Property TV, Financialization, and the Housing Crisis in Contemporary Ireland

2020 ◽  
Vol 22 (1) ◽  
pp. 65-82
Author(s):  
Anthony P. McIntyre
Keyword(s):  
Financial Market ◽  
Good Life ◽  
Home Ownership ◽  
Specific Form ◽  
The State ◽  
The Good Life ◽  
Income Disparity ◽  
Housing Crisis ◽  
Commercial Property ◽  
Ideological Commitment

This article examines how a specific form of lifestyle programming indexes both national concerns and transnational financial trends as well as diffuse social fissures in Irish life. Emerging in the late 1990s amid a construction boom, Irish property television adapted and thrived through the subsequent post-2008 crash, the concomitant implementation of austerity policies and an ensuing housing crisis. This boom-to-bust cycle was precipitated by the financialization of property within Ireland, a process whereby housing and commercial property became embedded in transnational financial market cycles. Through an analysis of three key examples of the genre, this article argues that for the most part, Irish property television seeks to hold at bay anxieties generated by a growing wealth and income disparity in the state. While this programming displays an ideological commitment to the “investor subjects” of home-ownership, increasingly the concerns of those excluded from this version of the good life are evident.

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