Re: Long overdue
OK.
Landlords or companies found guilty of not maintaining properties within the regulations are get banned from renting out properties. Sounds fair so far.
Those houses are then available for purchase - so - due to the law of supply and demand - more houses are available - prices go down - and first time buyers will find it easier to get on the housing ladder.
What's not to like.
BTW - This is what they used to have in Sweden - no ownership of private property unless you lived in it. The result - plenty of high quality housing available at half the cost of what it was in the UK at the time. When I was there it was quite surprising to see beer at fives times the UK prices - houses at half the UK prices.
Sorry to state the well known obvious - but the more private landlords you have the higher the property prices. All I'm suggesting is to enforce the rules more strongly to get rid of the bad ones - and make all of them pay more tax.
Remember, it was the landlords who used to pay the council tax (called housing rates) until the landlord's friend Thatcher transferred that bill on to the tenants as the poll tax which is now the council tax. And Thatcher brought in the tenancy agreements which allow landlords to kick people when it suits them (every six months I know but if you've got kids in school six months is nothing). So they've had a good deal over the last 30 years. Time we redressed the balance - and as mentioned - no private landlords - just regulated housing associations and council houses like they had in Sweden would be the best way to provide good quality, affordable housing stock.
Biting the hand that feeds IT
