House price increases harm Hackney renters
Protesters from Hackney Digs at a demonstration against lettings agents fees last year. Photograph: Hackney Digs
House prices in Hackney are continuing their seemingly relentless upward march, but the fact homes in the borough now sell for on average £500,000 ‘serves the interest of a small elite’ according to campaigners Hackney Digs.
In recent months house prices in Hackney have risen by 17 per cent – more than in any other area in England and Wales, according to Land Registry figures.
Heather Kennedy, from Hackeny Digs, which campaigns on behalf of renters, said: “Promises about affordable housing have not been kept. It seems the Olympic legacy is one of social cleansing and gentrification.”
Apart from making it much harder for first time buyers, Digs believe high housing prices will have a negative impact on renters too.
“There’s such a short supply of places, so desperate private landlords will take properties with health and safety issues,” said Ms Kennedy.
She added: “And because there is so much demand, there’s no pressure for them to sort it out because tenants are desperate too.”
The last 30 years, the governments have kept house prices up in order to show so-called wealth increasing. The 2 million Council Housing sold off were never replaced and now there is a short fall of those same numbers. 300,000 were built yearly, till Thatcher when it was reduced to 200,000.
The ConDems and property developers are happy to have this short fall. The 1 million properties empty and even more profitable than buying gold.
In the meantime, keep blaming the poor and immigrants for lack of housing or that housing benefits goes straight to paying off landlords’ mortgages.
There is a lot wrong with housing in Hackney, and it is on a never ending increase. I first moved to the borough 4 years ago, firstly to Hoxton where renting at the time was relatively affordable and was rented for it’s worth, as it was everywhere else in the borough. I stayed in my property for two years before deciding to move to somewhere with a lot more room and ended up in a flat in Hackney Central. Last year I moved again, just up the road to Lower Clapton, as the rent was DOUBLED on my H.Central flat. The hunt to find a flat within a reasonable asking price was in the very least almost impossible, taking five months to secure a flat. I conducted countless viewings on flats that I could afford and each of them worse than the previous. Seeing what agencies were offering as ‘decent’ properties was absolutely shocking. I saw some virtually unliveable flats with unbelievable asking prices simply because the demand for housing here is at a major shortfall against available housing, and the landlords see absolutely nothing wrong with charging a fortune for something that people are going to take on because there is simply nothing else. Since i have lived here, there have been endless problems with the place. Water leaks, damp, mice and huge structural issues. All of which the landlords had conveniently “painted” over to make the place appear liveable, and no doubt when I leave, they will do just the same again, only for it to reappear again in the not too distant future for the next tenant. There is simply no evaluation when it comes to pricing. Seriously asking £1500 a month for a 2 bedroom ex-council wreck is scandalous, and it continues to be a problem, everywhere else in the borough. When I see ads for flats in the area I am baffled as to how they think it is acceptable to demand the staggering prices they ask. It makes you wonder, how high can they actually go, and will they ever stop?
Hi Obi_live:
“Tom Copley, Labour’s housing spokesman in the capital, said that Margaret Thatcher’s government had built more council flats and houses in a single year than New Labour’s managed in its entire period in office.”
This is correct. The official data shows that the Blair and Brown governments built 7,870 council houses (local authority tenure) over the course of 13 years. (If we don’t include 2010 – the year when David Cameron became PM – this number drops to 6,510.) Mr Copley has contrasted this figure with the record of Mrs Thatcher’s government, which never built fewer than 17,710 homes in a year.”
OK – this isnt the whole story which you can find here:
http://fullfact.org/factchecks/council_house_building_margaret_thatcher_labour_government-29270
but the fact is that both Council Homes (massively) and affordable housing asociation homes (steadily) went down through the Major, Conservative and New Labour governments. The Lib Dems are not keeping house building down. In London we have plans to massively increase hosebuilding in the city
http://hackneylibdems.org/2013/12/17/new-houses-for-london/
Alexander: They can go as high as people will pay. Only increasing the number of houses in London can make these properties uneconomical to let so they can be sold and brought up to scratch. Rent controls dont work. I rented all through the sixties and up to 1986 and I recognise most of the things you mention. And going round some of Hackney’s estates today that goes for social housing too.
Well, let’s build more housing, no I forgot you’ve got Open Dalston worrying about some derelict houses ..