[TheLandIsOurs] scandalous housing

[david bangs]

Your own housing history is shockingly illustrative, James. Well said. 

The description you give from 1964 is not an example of a functioning housing market, though, given that half of the housing supply was council housing, and the local authority was intervening to make mortgages more available. 

You draw a perverse conclusion...Your facts suggest that wot is needed is a revival of a major public housing programme...not the bonkers housing market,

Dave


  ----- Original Message ----- 
  From: james armstrong 
  To: TLIO list ; diggers ; democracyvillage at googlegroups.com 
  Sent: Monday, April 30, 2012 4:45 PM
  Subject: [TheLandIsOurs] scandalous housing


    


  In 1964 I bought a 2/3bedroom newish semi in Sevenoaks, Kent  for £3,000.

  As a worker  in London I qualified for a 100% loan from Greater London Council- actually a 95% mortgage arranged thro Halifax BS,  and  I paid £150 deposit. (£100 lent by my father)


  My salary then in my first job as a graduate was under £2,000 as virtually an office junior and I also had to pay rail and bus  fares to commute to London.

  Supply of new houses in 1964 was  380,000 units  p.a., half of which were council houses .



  Total supply in 2010 was some 135,000, of which council houses- nil


  You can supply your salary  and the current price of a semi in Sevenoaks etc  and the deposit needed, then do the sums.



  My conclusion is that to-day government has discovered and refined a new policy- exploit the  the mass of the people and control them by severely stressing them .  The present  housing crisis is not as a result of market forces but  the result of deliberate destruction of market conditions. and  is the explicit policy of successive governments . It reflects a political decision.



  If anyone wants a deeper analysis let me know.



  We can and should end this scandal.  


  James                                                                                        




  
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