The Property Lobby

2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Bob Colenutt
Keyword(s):  
House Prices ◽  
Town Planning ◽  
Planning System ◽  
Housing Crisis ◽  
Government Grants ◽  
Radical Reform ◽  
The Uk ◽  
Holding Back ◽  
The Impact ◽  
House Building

Book Abstract: Despite countless reports and Government policy announcements on the housing crisis over decades, the scale and depth of the crisis continues. Homelessness, shortages of social housing, rents and house prices continue rise year on year. The word affordability has become meaningless. Land landowners and housebuilders and property investors have made huge profits out of this crisis. This book focusing in examples from London and Northamptonshire examines the power of the ‘finance-housebuilding ’ complex arguing that this property lobby is the main blockage for change and reform. It explains why the housing and planning system has become increasingly dysfunctional over the last 40 years accelerating with the impact of the 2008 Crash. The book gives examples of how the property lobby has been highly effective in manipulating Government housing and planning policy for its own benefit, to the detriment of those in housing need. It shows how the housebuilders business model, backed by Government grants and subsidies, has played a central role in perpetuating the crisis. The property lobby has succeeded in diverting attention from themselves onto the town planning system which has been scapegoated for holding back new house building. The result is that the housing crisis and the power behind it is hard baked into the UK economy. It must be addressed by radical reform of the property, planning and finance system. Without these reforms homelessness, poor housing, and lack of affordability will continue indefinitely.

scholarly journals The Impact of House Prices on Consumption in the UK: a New Perspective

Economica ◽  
2017 ◽  
Vol 85 (337) ◽  
pp. 92-123 ◽  
Author(s):  
Vivien Burrows
Keyword(s):  
House Prices ◽  
New Perspective ◽  
The Uk ◽  
The Impact

Understanding Affordability

2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Geoffrey Meen ◽  
Christine Whitehead
Keyword(s):  
Low Income ◽  
Structural Changes ◽  
Home Ownership ◽  
House Prices ◽  
Household Formation ◽  
Policy Makers ◽  
Political Forces ◽  
The Uk ◽  
Developed World ◽  
The Impact

Affordability is, perhaps, the greatest housing problem facing households today, both in the UK and internationally. Even though most households are now well housed, hardship is disproportionately concentrated among low-income and younger households. Our failure to deal with their problems is what makes housing so frustrating. But, to improve outcomes, we have to understand the complex economic and political forces which underlie their continued prevalence. There are no costless solutions, but there are new policy directions that can be explored in addition to those that have dominated in recent years. The first, analytic, part of the book considers the factors that determine house prices and rents, household formation and tenure, housing construction and the roles played by housing finance and taxation. The second part turns to examine the impact of past policy and the possibilities for improvement - discussing supply and the impact of planning regulation, supply subsidies, subsidies to low-income tenants and attempts to increase home ownership. Rather than advocating a particular set of policies, the aim is to consider the balance of policies; the constraints under which housing policy operates; what can realistically be achieved; the structural changes that would need to occur; and the significant sacrifices that would have to be made by some groups if there are to be improvements for others. Our emphasis is on the UK but throughout the book we also draw on international experience and our conclusions have relevance to analysts and policy makers across the developed world.

How to think about housing and planning

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Shaun Spiers
Keyword(s):  
Economic Development ◽  
Free Market ◽  
Think Tanks ◽  
Planning System ◽  
Land Values ◽  
New Approach ◽  
Faith Based ◽  
Impact Planning ◽  
Holding Back ◽  
House Building

This chapter discusses how politicians have been deceived by faith-based, ideologically predetermined anti-planning arguments from free-market think tanks such as Policy Exchange. While ministers were fixating on the planning system as a barrier to house building, they neglected to do the obvious thing: build houses. In time, the ‘war on planning’, a steady stream of reports supported by seminars, newspaper articles, and private lunches and dinners, began to have an impact. Planning came to be widely blamed for the country's failure to build enough homes and, more generally, for holding back economic development. The chapter then looks at four related issues that help explain why a new approach is needed: the rise and fall of council housing; the economic model of the big developers; the rise and fall of the ‘property-owning democracy’; and land values.

The Changing Role of the Development Plan in Managing Spatial Change

1998 ◽  
Vol 16 (4) ◽  
pp. 379-394 ◽  
Author(s):  
A Hull ◽  
G Vigar
Keyword(s):  
Land Use Planning ◽  
Rapid Change ◽  
Development Plan ◽  
Planning System ◽  
Local Context ◽  
Spatial Change ◽  
Development Plans ◽  
The Uk ◽  
The Impact

The authors examine the role of development plans in managing spatial change, The impact of the enhanced status of the development plan in the UK context is assessed with the aid of research material drawn from detailed case studies in Lancashire and Kent. Two governance ‘episodes’ are highlighted: a highly structured game within the mainstream planning system; and an innovative private-sector-led approach to planning for an area with the potential for rapid change. By means of these two illustrations the authors indicate the importance of the processes of development-plan preparation in the local context, the political tensions inherent to the land-use planning system in managing growth, and explore notions of plans being a store of local consensus about future spatial change.

Whose Housing Crisis?

2019 ◽  
Author(s):  
Nick Gallent
Keyword(s):  
Financial Services ◽  
Economic Transition ◽  
House Prices ◽  
Residential Property ◽  
Housing Cost ◽  
Housing Crisis ◽  
Problematic Relationship ◽  
The Uk ◽  
Housing Outcomes ◽  
Economic Function

England, and especially London, remain in the grip of a housing cost crisis marked by extraordinary ratios between median house prices and workplace earnings. House prices have continued to rise over the last decade despite a stagnation in earnings. At the root of the crisis is the problematic relationship that individuals and economies share with residential property. Housing’s social purpose, as home, is frequently relegated behind its economic function, as asset, able to offer a hedge against weakening pensions or source of investment and equity release for individuals, or guarantee rising public revenues, sustain consumer confidence and provide evidence of ‘growth’ for economies. England’s economy – along with that of the rest of the UK – has been on a long transition away from manufacturing for several decades. It is now reliant on services and particularly the financial services associated with real estate consumption and debt production. This book explores the 'UK's economic transition and examines associated housing outcomes. The re-functioning of housing in the twentieth century is a cause of great social inequality, as housing becomes a place to park and extract wealth. What can be done to address this inequality and what role might planning play in delivering fairer outcomes and in re-prioritising housing’s social function?

The 2008 financial crash continues

2020 ◽  
pp. 99-106
Author(s):  
Bob Colenutt
Keyword(s):  
Social Housing ◽  
Banking System ◽  
Housing Crisis ◽  
Property Market ◽  
Housing Investment ◽  
The Us ◽  
Boom And Bust ◽  
Overseas Investment ◽  
The Uk ◽  
House Building

The 2008 Crash and its continuing aftermath have had a lasting impact on the scale and persistence of the housing crisis. The chapter explains that the Crash was largely caused by over lending to residential property in the US but the contagion spread to the UK banking system. It argues that the fall out continues to affect the market in a number of ways notably credit policies housing investment and cut backs in public expenditure. The banking system and the property market were bailed out and the austerity decade has reduced the capacity and ability of local government to build social housing or compensate for the fall in private sector house building. It is argued that the UK housing market is particularly subject to boom and bust fuelled by speculation and overseas investment yet the planners were scapegoated by the Treasury for the collapse on house building after 2008.

Local pathways to crisis

2019 ◽  
pp. 73-108
Author(s):  
Nick Gallent
Keyword(s):  
House Prices ◽  
Wicked Problem ◽  
Housing Cost ◽  
Housing Supply ◽  
Housing Costs ◽  
The Uk ◽  
The Impact ◽  
Housing Outcomes ◽  
Narrative Account

Returning to the idea of housing access/affordability as a wicked problem, this chapter explores 6 critical explanations of the housing cost crisis, showing how these explanations intersect to produce a broader narrative account of the political economy of housing outcomes. The chapter looks at impediments to increasing housing supply, the role of direct (overseas) investors in the London housing market, reliance on volume housebuilding (the lack of plurality in the UK model of housing production), the associated reliance on ‘build to sell’ (and the lack of space for alternative models), the impact that the tax treatment of housing has on consumption and housing supply, and the role that credit supply has on house prices and housing costs.

scholarly journals MODELLING THE IMPACT OF WIND FARMS ON HOUSE PRICES IN THE UK

2008 ◽  
Vol 12 (4) ◽  
pp. 251-269 ◽  
Author(s):  
Sally Sims ◽  
Peter Dent ◽  
G. Reza Oskrochi
Keyword(s):  
Wind Farm ◽  
Negative Impact ◽  
House Prices ◽  
Turbine Blades ◽  
House Price ◽  
Wind Farms ◽  
Causal Link ◽  
Hedonic Pricing ◽  
The Uk ◽  
The Impact

This paper discusses the findings from a UK study to determine the likely impact of a wind farm on house prices using a hedonic pricing model. The Government's commitment to wind power has resulted in a massive increase in the number of wind farms sited in the UK. This has led to concerns that their visual and aural presence could have a negative impact on proximate house prices. This paper presents an analysis of 201sales transactions from houses situated within half a mile of a 16 turbine wind farm in Cornwall, UK. Whilst no causal link was established between the presence of the wind farm and house price, there was some evidence to suggest that both noise and flicker from the turbine blades could blight certain property and that the view of countryside enjoyed by the occupier had some value which may be affected by a wind farm. Santrauka Šiame darbe aptariami JK atlikto tyrimo rezultatai, kuriuo, taikant hedonistinį kainų modelį, siekta nustatyti galimą vėjo jėgainių poveikį namų kainoms. Vyriausybės parama vėjo energijai paskatino naujo elemento, vėjo jėgainės, atsiradimą aplinkoje; susirūpinta, ar vėjo jėgainių vaizdas ir garsas galėtų neigiamai paveikti namų kainas. Šiame darbe nagrinėjamas 201 prekybinis sandoris, susijęs su namais, pusę mylios nutolusiais nuo Bears Down, Kornvalyje (JK), esančio 16 vėjo jėgainių ūkio. Nors priežastinis ryšys tarp vėjo jėgainių ir namų kainos nepastebėtas, yra įrodymų, kad jėgainės keliamas triukšmas ir menčių mirgėjimas kai kuriems nekilnojamojo turto objektams galėtų pakenkti ir kad gyventojui patikęs kaimo vaizdas gali tapti nebepatrauklus.

Biodiversity Offsetting and the English Planning System: A Regulatory Analysis

2020 ◽  
Vol 32 (3) ◽  
pp. 529-557
Author(s):  
John Condon
Keyword(s):  
Decision Making ◽  
Planning System ◽  
Ecological Approach ◽  
Local Planning ◽  
System A ◽  
Environmental Objectives ◽  
Contractual Governance ◽  
Regulatory Analysis ◽  
The Uk ◽  
The Impact

Abstract Under the Environment Bill, the UK government plans to formally implement biodiversity offsetting in the English planning system as a way to reduce the impact of development on biodiversity. Certain developments will be required to achieve a ‘biodiversity gain’ through the use of developer contributions. This article provides a regulatory analysis, assessing whether the planning system supports the key requirements of biodiversity offsetting, most notably the need to protect biodiversity. The lens of contractual governance is used to spotlight problems with local planning authorities negotiating environmental objectives with developers when other planning objectives are also ‘on the table’. The wider planning system is also addressed, where it is argued that environmental objectives are undermined by a lack of central policy and coordination to regulate the decision-making of local planning authorities. The case is made for an ‘ecological’ approach to planning as means of more reliably protecting biodiversity through offsetting.

LIBOR, base rate spreads and the UK housing market

2015 ◽  
Vol 8 (1) ◽  
pp. 118-134 ◽  
Author(s):  
Martin Hinch ◽  
Jim Berry ◽  
William McGreal ◽  
Terry Grissom
Keyword(s):  
Time Series ◽  
Interest Rates ◽  
House Prices ◽  
House Price ◽  
Base Rate ◽  
Percentage Change ◽  
Content Type ◽  
Change Models ◽  
The Uk ◽  
The Impact

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to analyse how London Interbank Offered Rate Index (LIBOR) and the spread between LIBOR and the base rate of interest as set by the Bank of England (BoE) influences the variation in house prices in the UK. Design/methodology/approach – This paper uses monthly data over a long time series, since 1986, to investigate the relationships between house price and LIBOR. Data are drawn from several different sources to include housing, financial and macro-economic variables. The time series is sub-divided into a series of splines based on stages in the economic and property market cycle. Both value-based and percentage change models are developed. Findings – The results show that BoE base/LIBOR margin variable has a strong positive and significant effect on house price; however, the percentage change model infers a weaker and inverse relationship. The spline analysis re-emphasised the significance of the BoE base/LIBOR margin variable. Where variation between base rates and LIBOR is reduced, a significant positive effect can be observed in the average house price; however, where significant variation exists, the BoE base/LIBOR margin has little effect and LIBOR itself becomes a significant driver. Research limitations/implications – The results highlight that the predictive qualities of the BoE base/LIBOR margin, as the contribution of this margin to the explanation of house price, exceeds both the base rate and LIBOR variables individually. Also highlighted is the contribution of unemployment to the explanation of house price. In both the value and percentage change models, unemployment is shown as a negative and highly significant contributor. Originality/value – Previous papers have demonstrated the important linkage between house price and interest rates, the originality in this paper lies in examining the impact of LIBOR and the spreads between LIBOR and base rate as key variables influencing variation in UK house prices.

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