O/T Its surprising how people vote

[animallittle3]

Wow, this thread just keeps on running.

Two things - when you allow uncontrolled immigration on such a scale that our population year on year increases by enough people to fill a city the size of Liverpool you should hardly be surprised that the strain put on resources such as welfare, housing,education and the nhs puts these resources as breaking point.

I give you the happy clappers and their idealogy, even Merkel has had to admit that there are areas of Germany that are no go for Germans now.

Second thing - almost all hose builders have to build in an element of affordable housing into their developments to get it through planning. And getting any development through planning is a huge and very expensive task which only ever pushes up the cost of the development and therefore the houses.

I know of one serial objector who has prevented Selby council building social housing just outside the town centre, and has also held up a development on the edge of York for seven years and it's still not been allowed to go ahead. Not on the principle of the development itself ( which has been passed by North Yorks Council 3 times), but on legal technicalities.This can only add to the cost of the development if it ever goes ahead.

The solution isn't just to say build more houses, the will is there, but there are very often too many obstacles put in the way.

They also have to be built in any areas with amenities such as schools etc etc , this will also have a bearing on the price .

Then there's global property speculators , especially in the major cities , many buy houses and leave them empty and wait whilst the price shoots up , sell and repeat .

Isn't land also used similarly ?

No stack em high sell em cheap doesn't quite work with housing in my opinion .

[red flagged]

Housing companies have land banks that's true enough Animal, but mostly to allow themselves continuity of supply rather than in the hope that the land value will increase. They don't usually trade off land to other (rival) developers. Estates managers try and forward plan to allow themselves up to 5 years to get a development through the planning process.
Additionally land costs money ! I know you know this ! my point being that there's a cash-flow limit to the amount of time a company can have it's capital held up in land it's gaining no return from.

Increasing numbers of immigrants to our islands have contributed to the housing crisis, not saying it's the only factor just one we shouldn't ignore.
As with the so called crisis in the health service, we need to get to the root causes and address those, throwing borrowed money at it just won't get us anywhere.