#housing network

[upsettingandunfortunateclasshate]

If you're middle class, you probably won't become homeless | Suzanne Fitzpatrick

The myth that we’re all just two paycheques away from sleeping rough ignores the real inequality in this country

[cocainesocialist]

A right to shelter should trump the right to be a profiteer | Dawn Foster

If people hoarded food the way they hoard homes, hungry people would riot. No wonder proposals to help councils requisition empty properties are popular

Treating housing as an asset is not benign. Hoarding homes pushes prices up, and encourages market supply to boost what is most profitable – luxury flats that can be left empty and flogged when the market is booming, not family homes that can be bought on a modest income. And when land values soar as a result of a keen market interest in buying up property, unscrupulous local authorities eye up the land social housing is built on, and consider whether turfing out council tenants to make a quick buck on the ground homes stand on is worth a punt.

The public seems to be accepting the idea that a right to shelter should trump a right to profiteering: the histrionic claims that requisitioning empty homes will lead to families being turfed out of their properties reveals there is no proper argument to be made for letting homes lie empty while people sleep on the streets.

[dispatchesfromtheclasswar]

If you're middle class, you probably won't become homeless | Suzanne Fitzpatrick

The myth that we’re all just two paycheques away from sleeping rough ignores the real inequality in this country

[cathkaesque]

UN report lays bare the waste of treating homes as commodities

A massive shift of global capital investment has left homes empty and people homeless, argues Leilani Farha, UN special rapporteur for housing

The UN special rapporteur for housing, Leilani Farha, will highlight the devastating human rights impact of society’s tendency to view houses as financial commodities rather than homes for people, in her report to the UN this week.

The report warns about a rise in “dehumanised housing”: housing built as a high-yield commodity rather than for social use. A significant portion of investor-owned homes are simply left empty. In Melbourne, Australia, for example, 82,000 (or one fifth) of investor-owned units are unoccupied. In prime locations for wealthy foreign investors, such as the affluent boroughs of Chelsea and Kensington in the city of London, the number of vacant units increased by 40% between 2013 and 2014.

In such markets, the value of housing is no longer based on its social use. Properties are equally valuable regardless of whether they are vacant or occupied, so there is no pressure to ensure properties are lived in. They are built with the intention of lying empty and accumulating value, while at the same time, homelessness remains a persistent problem.

[spsot]

Is immigration causing the UK housing crisis?

Migrants aren’t jumping queues for social housing, and in some places immigration actually lowers housing demand

[benelliottvc]

The architect who reminds us council housing can be beautiful | Paul Karakusevic

Neave Brown has long been a beacon of hope. Now he has been awarded architecture’s highest honour, we should learn how to reimagine social housing

Another look at Neave Brown.

[michaelsnaithblog-blog]

Disabled people are worst affected by bedroom tax and welfare reforms

Benefit cuts leave disabled people facing decreasing incomes, postcode lotteries and threats to their independence, says Paul Gamble

[homemakeroxford]

Housing First alone can't solve the UK's homelessness crisis | Nicholas Pleace

The scheme has ended homelessness in Finland and can help in the UK, too – but only as part of an integrated approach