First-time buyers would like the Government to introduce subsidies and abolish stamp duty as aspirations for home ownership fail to dissipate, research by the Council of Mortgage Lenders shows.
A YouGov poll by the trade body found that 72% of adults want to be home-owners in two years’ time, and 80% hope to own in ten years’ time, broadly in line with the 30-year average sentiment.
The research, called ‘Home-ownership or Bust’, identifies ways first-time buyers feel they could be helped into buying a property.
The majority of respondents, almost 80%, said the Government should do more to support them, followed by just under 60% looking to mortgage lenders and 40% citing house builders. Only 20% thought estate agents should do more to help them.
Just over 50% said high house prices were an obstacle followed by 40% who cited a lack of savings, while a third said the costs associated with purchases were too high.
Putting forward solutions, two-thirds said the Government should abolish stamp duty and introduce incentives for first-time buyers.
Other ideas include encouraging saving, requiring discounts on new homes and reforming the planning process.
Despite the Government spotlight on landlords, taxing them more is the least popular action among first-time buyers, with just under a fifth backing this suggestion to help them on to the ladder.
Paul Smee, director general of the CML, said: “Like all good research, the findings give rise to some searching questions for the industry and Government – not least, how far it is possible to balance the tension between aspiration and achievability, which continues to be a feature of the UK’s relationship with home-ownership? And should tenure neutrality be the ultimate policy aspiration?”
Comments (4)
I’ve been banging on about the generation rent time bomb for ages now.
Renting is ideal when you’re younger and part of the ‘I want it all and now’ set. No long term commitment, move up or down after 6 months depending on affordability, no need to find the thousands needed for Stamp Duty, deposit, legals etc and being able to get the latest iPhone and go on expensive holidays with your mates.
Young couple moved into cottage close to me and their landlord told me they were renting for 6 months whilst getting a mortgage to buy it. They crashed and burned on affordability yet there had a Range Rover Evoque parked outside and then a brand new Mercedes.
Problem is they’ll get to a stage of life where they do want to buy (as do most renters looking at the stats) but then find that age and mortgage term conspire against them and the face the prospect of having to pay rent out of a pitiful pension when they retire.
I can’t see the Govt of the day having the funds to subsidise the rent, so they’ll have the scenario of having to move into a far cheaper rented property in a correspondingly cheaper area just at the time of life where they’ll be spending all their time at home.
Ps I made this point to a journalist from one of the nationals a couple of years ago and was accused of stigmatising tenants before she admitted to me that she was in rented (‘in Pimlico don’t cha know’) and never been in anything else. Obviously touched a nerve there!!!
First time buyers have undoubtably lost out again as government led changes in recent years have created both more demand and less supply ….pushing prices up.
I think we are building up a long term time bomb in this country if we do not introduce ways of helping far more first time buyers onto the ladder. If we don’t we will trap huge swaves of people into rented accommodation, where they are paying double what they would be on a low interest rate mortgage, unable to save enough for a deposit or to cover costs. If many of them, say 100,000 a year (who would have been able to buy a home in the past), then get trapped long term…unable to break out….who is going to pay all those extra rents when they eventually retire if their pensions aren’t good enough? In today’s terms, let’s say 100,000 times £10,000 a year…..that’s an extra £1 billion a year added to welfare housing costs …..year on year on year plus long term care costs, some of which would have been covered from the sale of an owned home.
Ok so reduce the cost of buying to FTB, increase the cost to investor landlords and help buyers with getting a mortgage…….err done that but dont want to upset our big investor friends so letting then carry on. Something wrong here?
well said….my sentiment entirely. I think high levels of home ownership in this country benefit more equity in wealth distribution, society in general and in the long run will save the government shed loads of money.
A bit of thinking outside the box, more flexibility of regulations and investment is all that it needs. But of course they are the things that politicians seem incapable of coming up with. I have loads of ideas that would help…. but I am just a lowly estate agent….not a recognised so-called ‘industry expert’.