41% of Right to Buy homes are now private rentals

“NEF also says that the Treasury should amend rules to make it easier for councils to use finance the building of replacement council homes.”

The Blair / Brown Labour administration had a long time to do that, yet failed to. So supply of social housing has not increased.

The erstwhile Tory government has drunk the Shelter kool-aid to further damage supply while doing nothing to control demand.

Will the incoming Labour government have the determination to solve these challenges or just continue down the same mistaken path?

They say that they will!

“More than a million households are waiting for a council home, while paying much higher rents to private landlords, often for homes in a much poorer condition than they’d have in social housing.”

Seriously? hahahahahahah!

Reply to the comment left by Reluctant Landlord at 13/05/2024 – 08:17
I just love the way they try to rubbish the PRS.

From my personal experience of one particular London council where I have an ex – council flat I find the councils are hopeless at carrying out repairs to their buildings.

They have cost me £thousands in rectifying the problems caused by penetrating damp and all because the council failed to deal with a leaking cast iron downpipe which was reported to them several times over a period of six months.

The PRS have transformed these ex- council properties while still having them available for people for rent.

What have Councils done with receipts from council house sales? It doesn’t sound like they have used the money to build more homes.

Could someone explain how a right to buy house is now being rented through prs?
Do owners sell as soon as legal to the buy to let market and if so where do they live?

Reply to the comment left by Judith Llewellyn at 13/05/2024 – 10:32
I think that many will have done an Angela Rayner, and either lived in them for 5 years, or claimed that they were living in them for 5 years and them sold them. The conditions for selling these homes at a massive discount to the tenant stipulated that the tenant had to live in the property as their main home for 5 years. So you can’t really make any judgments about these statistics unless you know how long it was between the house being bought at a massive discount and the house being rented out.

Reply to the comment left by Judith Llewellyn at 13/05/2024 – 10:32
That’s the same as asking what any other First Time Buyer does with their starter home.
Circumstances change, finances improve, equity amasses and people move up the housing ladder.
Just because someone lived in a certain house for a while doesn’t mean they should be compelled to live in it for ever.

Despite the western economic system feeling the need to import a million or so net immigrants per annum, our intrepid think tankers decide the cause of our housing problems must of course be… private property ownership, with an ace of spades level of villainy given to non- corporate landlords. Who would have guessed?

Reply to the comment left by Jo Westlake at 13/05/2024 – 12:40
That’s correct: If people have lived in their “Right to Buy” home for 5 years and they choose to sell it as their main home, as Angela Rayner did, then that in itself is not breaking any law. The question is, did they rent the homes out within 5 years of purchase? If they took the enormous discount and rented the house out within the 5 years after purchase knowing that that was what they were going to do then they probably committed fraud and they might of course also be liable to CGT. Either way, they weren’t entitled to the discount.

If they didn’t rent the home out within 5 years of purchase you then still have the separate question of whether it’s in the public interest to do it. You can’t really consider that question without knowing the maintenance costs and the costs of renting. In our area the cost of renting a 3 bed semi detached council house is under £900 PCM. The cost of renting a 3 bed semi on the open market is over £2.5K PCM.

If the Council sold the council houses in our area for market value and had to pay no tax or were able to qualify for roll-over relief by re-investing the equity released from the sale of those houses into building new social housing then by selling one 3 bed semi detached house housing one family they would probably be able to house 2-3 families in flats.

Reply to the comment left by Beaver at 13/05/2024 – 14:08
That is not correct in my case. I bought under the right to buy in 1990. I was able to sell the property on at any point however if I sold within 5 years I was liable to repay the discount. There is nothing in the lease or conditions of sale which prevented me from renting out the property from day one of ownership. Capital gains tax will be due if and when I sell the property based on the discounted price.