Anyone watching?

It's crazy how many empty homes there are!!!!!!

Madness.

One reason is that with the astronomical prices of property those inheriting property in very expensive areas are able very readily to buy up property elsewhere and in so doing shut out young and not-so-young from purchasing a home at all.

However, don't jump to conclusions about individual properties. Some folk have to live away from the only home they own because of work requirements. An empty house may be the only secure home that those folk have.

I don't know if you watched it John, but I don't mean multi home owner people with a work home/their home.

This was STREETS of metal clad buildings that the councils wanted to knock down and re-build, but didn't have the money now belts have been tightened. They were being shown that it cost around TWO THOUSAND pounds per property to get it into a habitable house - yet the councellers were more concerned about giving away greenbelt and NEW builds to meet their targets.

Most of them had NO idea about the number of empty houses they had in ther constiuencies!

BG

Councils continue to act as if they 'own' these empty properties when in fact the local TAXPAYER does.

The taxpayers could be getting some return for their 'investment' (however small) if the councils allowed interested, none business, parties to purchase the empty properties at a significant discount - on the proviso they refurbished the property and were not allowed to sell them for a minimum period (else face financial penalties equivalent to the percentage discount they originally received).

_________________
This post may contain nuts

I seem to remember then trying to do that in Glasgow many many years ago, Selling them for a pound each, Thing was to do them up was going to cost too much and the properties still wouldn't have worth the refurbishment costs. So no takers. Wheres as developers would have been able to regenerate the area had they been allowed to purchase them.

_________________
Professional Kitchen & Bathroom Fitters | Master Painters and Decorators | Brighton & Hove

Yep 13 years of new labour when money was plentiful ( yes borrowed, but still there to spend) and they wasted an opportunity

I watched the programme and it said the amount of houses empty was equivalent to a city the size of Leeds, yet all you hear from MP's is we need to build more housing, so maybe the answer is that no more new houses to be built untill all the empty ones are fixed up and lived in or pulled down for regenerating the area

There are houses near here that could have been repaired and occupied, but are now derelict after being empty for 30 years or more.

_________________
I started out with nothing, I still have most of it.

Directmail scam information site: http://astrocat.proboards.com/index.cgi?

you can also fine here help about properties *************

Or perhaps not!

I didn't realise there was that many empty properties in New Delhi

Mod 6

Big problem for local councils is the fact that as landlords, they are responsible for ensuring electrical and gas safety of these empty properties., before letting them. How much is a rewire? I bet that would take up most (if not all) of the £2000, budget the program reckons it would cost to make them habitable. Plus the fact that they probably picked some of the better properties to spend their 2 grand on. Surely there are properties that would cost, ten's of thousands to bring up to spec and make habitable? Pity the producers didn't try with one of those.