Halifax’s Generation Rent report analysed the housing policies proposed by the political parties in the run up to the election. It weighed up which ones would be of most benefit to those aged between 20 and 45.
Perhaps surprisingly, the report found that overall the Conservative policies seem to be most in-tune with the needs of first-time buyers. It found that five of the top nine policies potential buyers favoured came from the Conservative party.
For example, 65% of those surveyed favoured the Tory pledge to build 100,000 starter homes and offer them to first-time buyers aged under 40 (no landlords) at 20% below market rate.
Some 59% of respondents said the Conservative proposals to launch a new Rent to Buy scheme would benefit the housing market. More than half (54%) also backed a new Right to Buy scheme. Meanwhile 56% of respondents were in favour of the Tory policy of extending Help to Buy equity loan scheme until 2020.
However, the Liberal Democrat policy of increasing supply by giving greater powers to local authorities to tackle empty homes was renters’ favourite policy overall.
Housing market myths
But Chris Walker, head of housing and planning at Policy Exchange, said it’s one of the biggest myths of the housing market that there is a vast swathe of empty homes out there and that bringing them back into use will make any meaningful contribution to solving the housing crisis.
“There are not nearly as many empty homes as many perceive, at least not where they are needed most,” he said, “According to official figures, there are only 20,000 long-term empty homes in London. That’s not even half a year’s worth of London’s housing supply needs of 49,000, and represents barely 0.6% of London’s total housing stock of 3.4m.
“In London homeownership has slumped in recent years, as affordability has worsened and fewer than half of households now own. The only way to increase homeownership is to improve affordability and that, in turn, means improving new build housing supply.”
Other popular party pledges would increase the supply of homes and make it easier for first-time buyers to get on the housing ladder. All pledges to build more homes and to either reserve a proportion of these homes or offer them all to first-time buyers were welcomed by the majority of respondents.
However, the Halifax report didn’t mention the more immediate concerns of generation rent – current conditions in the rental sector.
Conditions in the rental sector
Pre-election, Labour was promising three-year rental tenancies as standard, rent controls, and a ban on letting agent fees charged to tenants if the party came to power.
Campaign group Generation Rent (a separate entity to the report of the same name) is pushing for tenants to have more rights as well as for more property to be built.
Betsy Dillner, director of Generation Rent, said: “For people reasonably certain of buying a home in the next few years, the government’s handouts for first-time buyers certainly look attractive. But so far they have assisted only 70,000 of the country’s 4 million-plus private renter households. Millions of renters have no hope of becoming a home owner in the foreseeable future because house prices are too high – banks are unlikely to lend the average mortgage to someone on an average income.
“No number of home ownership schemes will help people who are stuck on insecure contracts paying expensive rents. Labour and the Greens came closest to this in their manifestos, but for renters to get a better deal they need mechanisms to bring down the cost of rent, genuine security of tenure and better enforcement of landlords who break the law.”
