A radical shift in housing policy is needed to create good homes for every generation through a dramatic expansion of both social rented homes and homeownership, according to a new report
The report from the Housing & Finance Institute and housing association, Radian, A Time For Good Homes, exposes the severe harm to family and financial stability caused by the huge expansion in private renting over the last 15 years, affecting around 6 million people.
The Good Homes paper outlines a ten-point plan to reverse the damage caused by the upsurge in private renting and to make sure that millions more people can access an affordable, stable home that supports job mobility and creates a springboard for opportunity.
The Housing & Finance Institute and Radian have jointly produced the report to set out the Four Pillars that underpin a Good Home. They are:
Stability: a stable and secure place to live.
Flexibility: choices in how and where a person lives.
Affordability: somewhere that is affordable at every stage of life and that enables savings – supporting those most in need.
Opportunity: a springboard for improved life chances.
The report explains that a flagship Government policy, the expansion of the private rented sector, has worsened the bad housing crisis. They warn that the Government’s recently announced new three-year tenancy plans may not help much either.
The paper is instead calling for the £44bn housing budget to be re-prioritised away from the private rented sector and in favour of delivering a larger, more flexible social rented sector together with radical new proposals for expanding homeownership.
HFI chief executive Natalie Elphicke OBE said it was “high time” for a strategy that combined both social housing and home ownership as priorities.
Elphicke said: “Instead of peddling the usual narrative that one is good and the other bad, we need a fresh perspective to ensure we don’t just provide more and more homes, but that we provide good homes for all generations – we need to move away from the current emphasis on the private-rented sector.
“A new and independent National Housing Delivery Commission should be tasked with putting together a ten-year plan that considers what measures should be introduced and how we make sure that everyone in each generation has access to a good home – as set out in our report today, home ownership and social housing must be at the heart of such a strategy.”
You can download the report here.
