Housing

Lord Hodgson of Astley Abbotts CBE, July 2020

The UK population has grown fast in recent years – an increase of 6.6 million since 2001 with a further increase of 5.6 million expected by 2041. Even for a geographically small island, the UK is relatively crowded by comparison with France and Germany. Indeed, an overwhelming majority of British people think that the country is already overcrowded and that steps should be taken… [Full Details]

Daniel Bentley, February 2018

Why aren’t we building more homes? This has been the perennial question in housing policy, as initiative after initiative seems to have made too little headway. But, as Daniel Bentley explains in this new guide to the housing crisis, the challenge is not just to increase the number of new homes, but to ensure the right ones are built in the right places. The… [Full Details]

Daniel Bentley, May 2017

The government’s housing white paper identifies the delivery rate of new homes, once planning permission has been granted, as ‘too slow’ and a ‘major problem’. This is a welcome new consideration within Whitehall, to join longstanding and equally valid concerns about bottlenecks in the planning system. The proposals it suggests for tackling slow development include: removing the practical barriers to development that are identified… [Full Details]

Peter Saunders, June 2016

After almost a century of continuous expansion, the rate of home ownership in Britain has fallen from 70 per cent of households in 2000 to fewer than 65 per cent today. Among the under-forties it has dipped alarmingly. This book asks what has caused this decline in home ownership, why it matters, and what might be done to reverse it. The spread of home… [Full Details]

Daniel Bentley, March 2016

Something has been going wrong in the British housing market for some time now. The problems that have accumulated are manifold – home ownership is falling, social housing waiting lists are growing, overcrowding and homelessness are increasing, to name a few – but the bottom line is that housing has become increasingly expensive for everybody. Too much money has been chasing too few homes, and affordability has… [Full Details]

Daniel Bentley, January 2015

The private rented sector, which has undergone a remarkable renaissance over the past two decades, is becoming increasingly central to considerations about the housing market and the benefits system. Four million homes are now privately rented in England, accounting for 18 per cent of all households. The sector has doubled in size since 1989 and contains more households now than social housing. Owner-occupation is… [Full Details]

David G Green & Daniel Bentley, February 2014

Overseas interest in the London property market has grown in recent years. The capital is now one of the most attractive property markets for international investors all over the world. Foreign buyers are chiefly interested in costly central London properties, on which they spend billions of pounds a year, but the impact ripples out to the suburbs and beyond. The new-build market in central… [Full Details]