Estate Agents – Page 2 – Improve all U.K. housing markets locally

20 February, 20241 December, 2024

Our two-stage proposals for solving the price and availability of housing nationally

Planning reform is one of two main arguments currently being made for bringing forward new policies which would completely reshape local housing markets across the whole of the U.K.

The other equally pressing argument is about the inadequate way in which houses are marketed currently. Price issues are not simply because of an insufficient supply of new housing. This is not what is causing house prices to escalate beyond the reach of so many people in this country.
(For more on this, please see the other articles on this web site.)

As far as the planning part of the solution is concerned, the required planning reforms should soon be incorporated into new Neighbourhood Development Plans.

Set areas within each town in these plans ought to be designated as having users restricted to primary residences only – on a permanent basis.

Under these provisions, any houses not being used as primary residences prior to the designation taking effect should have the planning use reverted to primary residential use, as soon as the house in question should become vacant.

Under such proposals, those owning houses falling within such use restrictions ought to have to accept these restrictions for the good of the local community, to bring about good planning for the future of the town. (This could, of course, also cover out of town or parish locations as well.)

These new policies would allow towns to retain sufficient suitable housing for use by those in the local workforce wishing, either to buy or to rent the housing they need for their local occupancy.

The planning system should be tilted away from its excessively stringent development control method and instead be moved towards a new, open and locally focused, rules-based zoning system, based on ‘types of user’.

It is becoming clear that all towns and parishes with a housing crisis like St Ives & Porthleven in Cornwall, The South Hams in Devon, Ilfracombe in North Devon (as screened on BBC Spotlight on 30th July 2024), as well as Frome in Somerset and Whitby in North Yorkshire, should canvass for fully devolved planning decision-making powers to be provided to local town and parish councils up and down the whole country.

The towns named above have been in the news lately as being unable to resolve the crisis in housing, endemic in their regions over several decades past, where local workers as well as the retired are concerned. All this despite more powers having been devolved to their county or regional authorities over past years. This strongly suggests a wholly different planning policy is now needed.

Shortcomings such as these ought to be tackled head on. It would seem that this is an issue needing to be raised at the very highest level and without delay. So, I’m including it here as well as referring it to my local MP. You should do the same too if you think there is a similar problem in your local area.
If you want to know what to ask them, ask why they aren’t changing the way houses are both planned for and marketed, to finally resolve the poorly performing, over-priced and obdurate housing markets around the whole country?

I am saying towns and their associated hinterlands should zone all existing and future housing within their administrative areas into the following specific categories and document these within the current Neighbourhood Development Plans (NDPs). These criteria should all be enshrined within new and upgraded Neighbourhood Development Plans lasting at least for five years at a time.

Demand and supply could easily be brought to balance within each individual town and village concerned by introducing an adopting Enhanced Neighbourhood Development Plans (ENDP). See ‘The house price affordability crisis’ on the web site for more information.

Balanced demand and supply locally could be achieved for each individual town and village by having an Enhanced Neighbourhood Development Plans (ENDP) fully adopted as being the document to refer to when making planning decisions throughout the validity of the ENDP.

Owner occupation: (by those working locally or retired)

Affordable to buy: (for those starting off in life and by those working locally)

Private rental: (by those working locally)

Social housing lettings: (by those working locally or retired)

Second homes: (for those not working locally)

Holiday lettings:
(If considered advantageous planning-wise, a mix of these user designations, which should be specific to each individual house, might be allowed in the same street or location.)

This would give planners, advising and, acting in accordance with democratically elected local councillors, appropriate authority to oversee how the local environment should be developed and nurtured, taking into account present community aspirations.

Towns and Parish councils which only have the current right to comment on planning applications within their area, should instead be given the power to decide them. This would be an absolute game-changer.

In peacetime (i.e. whilst our country is not at war with another), residential planning consents should be delegated to all local town or parish councils for them to determine, depending upon local housing need.

This way, genuinely democratic decisions may be arrived at using local decision-makers whom are best able to understand what the current needs of the community are at any particular time.

Planning enforcement should fully apply to such new use criteria and should naturally be fully implemented by the appropriate planning enforcement authorities.

For one thing, these proposals would have the effect of limiting the amount of holiday lets within each town and this would be one of the best methods to solve the present housing crisis.

If you investigate, the overall lack of housing supply is not being caused by a total lack of existing housing stocks but by too much of it being put into uses such as holiday use. “These ideas are thankfully up for debate in Parliament imminently.” says Peter Hendry, author of The House Price Solution.

Any new planning uses, should certainly define and identify precisely where in each locality, houses should be reserved for primary residences only. The preferred user-type should be defined by each local planning authority – in consultation with local owners, but the local planning authority alone should of course have the final say.

No holiday lets, no socially rented units and of course no second homes should generally be permitted In certain zones. Instead, properties there should be reserved for local buyers and renters alone.

Having this would be equivalent to the construction of previously set but demonstrably unachievable house-building targets. The advantage would be that the housing released this way would be exactly where it would be required within each town and parish location.

Local areas desperately need this. In this way local communities could benefit from a re-designation of sufficient residential properties, as may be required, without having to ruin the existing built environment with excessive and inappropriate over-development.

As the property which would be involved would have already been built, this policy could be brought in without undue delay. After all, in most cases, this was what these properties were originally built for in the first place!

There certainly needs to be further regulation of the use of residential property, so that enough housing can be retained for local people to buy or to rent. Otherwise, whole communities will be ‘hollowed out’ by holiday lets etc., as was explained and has been happening for some time, especially in tourism hot spots.

This web site proposes changes to the whole way in which houses are marketed as well as bringing in more effective planning controls.

So, here on this web site is the full reasoning explaining what is needed to finally improve all the housing markets across the whole of Britain? If you follow the link below you will find yourself on that very page. Please enjoy this offering and by all means comment if you have thoughts of your own about this.

This site proposes changes to the whole way in which houses are marketed by agents as well as bringing in far more effective planning controls.

For more information on the necessary house marketing changes, go to:

The House Price Solution

“Introducing The House Price Solution”

Posted by: Peter Hendry, Consulting Valuation Surveyor
Author of:– The House Price Solution

Please also note. Unless things change significantly along the lines explained, countless people will continue to experience considerable financial anxiety or pain so, please sign our petition.
The link below opens this is in a new tab for you to look at.

The cost-effective way to stabilise housing affordability across the whole of Britain

Your action in asking our government to debate this could help bring about all of these much needed changes.

22 July, 20231 December, 2024

The house price affordability crisis

“Solving the affordability crisis”

To fully resolve this housing crisis requires the following reforms.
To begin, the planning system should be tilted away from its excessively stringent development control method and instead be moved towards a new, open and locally focused, rules-based zoning system, based on ‘types of user’.

Owner occupation: (by those working locally or retired)

Affordable to buy: (for those starting off in life and by those working locally)

Private rental: (by those working locally)

Social housing lettings: (by those working locally or retired)

Second homes: (for those not working locally)

Holiday lettings:
(If considered advantageous planning-wise, a mix of these user designations, which should be specific to each individual house, might be allowed in the same street or location.)

This way, genuinely democratic decisions may be arrived at using local decision-makers whom are best able to understand what the current needs of the community are at any particular time.

The other primary change must be to improve the way in which houses are actually marketed, by using registered house agents instead of estate agents. This equally vital change is covered in detail under the article headed. The House Price Solution.

This site proposes changes to the whole way in which houses are marketed by agents as well as bringing in far more effective planning controls.

For more information on the necessary house marketing changes, go to:

The House Price Solution

“Introducing The House Price Solution”

Posted by: Peter Hendry, Consulting Valuation Surveyor
Author of:– The House Price Solution

The cost-effective way to stabilise housing affordability across the whole of Britain

Your action in asking our government to debate this could help bring about all of these much needed changes.

11 July, 20221 December, 2024

Restricting second homes and holiday lets will not restore the affordability of houses in local communities

Restricting the numbers of second homes and holiday lets will not restore the availability or the affordability of reasonably priced houses for people living and working in local communities – why?

This is the published opinion of a senior contributor and property surveyor of 30 years working experience and author of the ‘improvethehousingmarket’ web site.

It is published in a bid to start restoring the viability of ‘community’, in all regions of our country and to protect us from excessive second home and holiday property ownership, especially in more attractive localities.

Sadly these ideas may not be on the radar of any political party within Westminster at this particular moment in time. Why, we cannot say!

One thing is certain however, there are problems with any proposals to tax those who wish to own second homes or run holiday letting businesses, not least because doing so will not somehow make such properties suddenly become more affordable to those living and working in the particular communities concerned.

Rather than try to tax (or to fine) those who, for example, use houses as second homes or for holiday letting, or just leave them empty, I propose a fundamental upgrade to the workings of the whole British housing market, because to actually track down and fine the different classes of owners would not just be difficult, it would be impossible to administer in practice.

Some of the main elements of these proposals and their key effects are discussed below. The proposals which I advocate here are urgently in need of being brought in.

House Prices v General Affordability:

The way to resolve the house price crisis, would involve using the unique expertise which I have gained as a professional property valuer with over 30 years working experience in advising clients specifically on house prices.

Without appropriate change, things cannot start to get better for everyone, with regard to house price levels and their broad range-affordability.

“The changes I am advocating here would bring house prices back to within reach of those best suited to the houses currently being sold on the market or becoming available locally.”

Here are the effects of the proposals I am putting forward:

Firstly, local buyers would have a better chance to purchase such houses as well as rent one of them if this remained their wish.

House prices would more closely reflect earnings in the various areas of Britain and hence remain within reasonable affordability for those ready to offer a service within their community.

Finally, with more stable house prices, there would be certainty for builders endeavouring to build the extra properties needed to satisfy increasing local demand. In other words their costs would be able to be estimated more accurately.

Implementing this strategy would however require our government to challenge those entrepreneurs driving house prices higher, (whilst taking profits for themselves in the process).

This would necessarily also have to include fresh discussions with the large scale housing developers, land owners, banks and even some charitable housing associations.

A ministerial team of politicians would have to be assigned to carry this venture forward in order for it to be accomplished swiftly enough to resolve the present crisis.

This proposed alternative solution to the house price crisis involves two aspects:

FIRSTLY:
Instead of allowing the price of houses to depend on sales being arranged by sellers in conjunction with their appointed estate agents (as happens at present), house prices should actually be based on true buyer competition, using offers made for each property, coming with the added knowledge of where each specific buyer currently lives and where they will work.

This way, all ‘local’ offers could be listed alongside all non-local ones and the house seller would then be allowed the opportunity of considering choosing a local buyer over a non-local one.

This is the primary change necessary to bring about fairer house purchases for all houses across the whole of the UK. To achieve this, would simply need the change from seller appointed estate agents to buyer’s agents instead. There’s more on this later but you should know that most people buying something valuable prefer to have an expert representing them and most prefer not to have the selling agent trying to help them when doing this!

Using this procedure, especially where sellers are moving within their own local area, there would be far less need to entertain buyers from richer areas hoping to out-bid those living in poorer ones especially where attractions such as sought-after rural and coastal locations are concerned.

SECONDLY – in addition to the first:
This should involve strengthening the planning system instead of relying on it completely. It should be in addition to the first essential change explained above.

This way, genuinely democratic decisions may be arrived at using local decision-makers whom are best able to understand what the current needs of the community are at any particular time.

As a retired residential property valuer I remain convinced that if democratically elected local councillors were to be granted full authority to decide local residential planning applications, the effect of this could resolve the whole housing crisis.

Decisions made by such elected representatives would not be based upon NIMBYism ‘Not In My Back Yard’; quite the contrary!

Instead it would be a question of ‘IN My Back Yard’, as these councillors would be representing the wishes and needs of the local community – not simply trying to resist necessary change!

There could be no finer outcome than this, especially where residential property is concerned, because with this solution these councillors could work to actually resolve the housing crisis which we are now all being affected by, particularly owing to its increasing severity.

Owner occupation: (by those working locally or retired)

Affordable to buy: (for those starting off in life and by those working locally)

Private rental: (by those working locally)

Social housing lettings: (by those working locally or retired)

Second homes: (for those not working locally)

Holiday lettings:
(If considered advantageous planning-wise, a mix of these user designations, which should be specific to each individual house, might be allowed in the same street or location.)

This would impose new restrictions on residential uses by using planning criteria contained within democratically agreed neighbourhood plans and registers similar to the system currently being proposed in Wales. Such policies could become a blueprint for reducing inflation and to encourage businesses to invest.

This would also help to limit the purchase of scarce housing and so would assist those with local requirements who could then compete with one another to buy the available houses, without being continually beaten to the post by those with more capital coming from outside. It should be stressed adding more planning rules cannot achieve the desired result on its own however.

As just explained, our assertion is that the only way to bring house prices back to levels in line with local buyers’ levels of affordability is to change the present rules for selling such houses by using both of these methods combined – namely both a wholesale upgrade to the workings of the British housing market across the board and the imposition of restrictions on residential uses – using planning criteria as contained within democratically agreed neighbourhood plans and registers.

The author of this post also says: “This new combination would be more inclusive, it would be more local market and it would be able to include local buyers, rather than largely to exclude them, as happens at present.”

If setting up the planning side of these market improvements should prove difficult to do or if it may involve a lengthy time delay, the best thing to do would be to implement stage one and change the marketing policy on its own to begin with. That should have a significant effect on the way the present and imperfect housing market operates and would make a massive difference all on its own.

This site proposes changes to the whole way in which houses are marketed by agents as well as bringing in far more effective planning controls.

For more information on the necessary house marketing changes, go to:

The House Price Solution

“Introducing The House Price Solution”

Posted by: Peter Hendry, Consulting Valuation Surveyor
Author of:– The House Price Solution

The cost-effective way to stabilise housing affordability across the whole of Britain

Your action in asking our government to debate this could help bring about all of these much needed changes.

14 April, 20221 December, 2024

Are estate agents taking us for fools?

The continuing rise in house prices which have occurred both prior to and following COVID clearly show that the proposals set out on these pages for re-shaping house-marketing are both fully justified and long overdue.

The noticeable reduction in the number of sellers putting their houses on the market is a clear indication of the general concern for not being able to successfully move house, owing to the unexpectedly rising house prices causing general market instability.

The argument being put forward about estate agency today is that the service provided no longer supplies an arms length advisory service to either buyers or sellers. To explain this the market definitions below are the current definitions of what ought to be expected by all housing agents’ clients.

Market Value advice is defined as:
The estimated amount for which an asset should exchange on the valuation date between a willing buyer and a willing seller in an arm’s length transaction, after proper marketing and where the parties had each acted knowledgeably, prudently and without compulsion.

Market rent advice is defined as:
The estimated amount for which an interest in real estate property should be leased on the valuation date between a willing lessor and a willing lessee on appropriate lease terms in an arm’s length transaction, after proper marketing and where the parties had each acted knowledgeably, prudently and without compulsion.

Market Approach advice:
The approach that provides an indication of value by comparing the subject asset with identical or similar assets for which price information is available and about which price adjustments can duly be made.

This site proposes changes to the whole way in which houses are marketed by agents as well as bringing in far more effective planning controls.

For more information on the necessary house marketing changes, go to:

The House Price Solution

“Introducing The House Price Solution”

Posted by: Peter Hendry, Consulting Valuation Surveyor
Author of:– The House Price Solution

The cost-effective way to stabilise housing affordability across the whole of Britain

Your action in asking our government to debate this could help bring about all of these much needed changes.

31 July, 20211 December, 2024

The Cure For The Malady Across All British Housing Markets

The cure for the malady across all British housing markets is to use a combination of two cures, in a similar way to a doctor using two specific antibiotics to cure a bacterial infection.

The expertise required to achieve that would involve first acquiring an accurate knowledge of the causes of such infections and following this, the ability to diagnose the correct medicinal cure for the specific infection involved.

It is of course imperative to be able to understand precisely how and why a specific illness or malaise will have occurred. Only then can the correct medicinal cure be prescribed.

Peter Hendry says, “I can explain in simple terms why house prices are continuing to rise despite the increasing lack of affordability affecting ever more prospective buyers.”

In a nutshell, the housing market should find the values of houses in a quite specific way.

The true value (or the correct buy price), of any house being offered for sale should be arrived at by adding THREE separately-assessed components together:

1 The land value – which depends in part upon location.

2: The construction cost (including a profit element to the builder or developer).

3: A further amount of equity or profit produced as a result of having combined these two.

These are the things that a sensible buyer should theoretically be considering, even if only subliminally.

All too often however, anxious buyers will base their offers on a combination of how much they could possibly afford and borrow, together with knowing the asking price being quoted.

“What makes this task particularly difficult to quantify is that house prices in today’s housing marketplaces are not derived in perfect market conditions at all. The reason for this is because in a perfect marketplace, the whole amount of homes on the market would be sold and the demand for them would also be fully satisfied at all times.”

IF, housing markets around the whole country were near perfect, economically speaking, it wouldn’t take a year or more for each house-move to happen. Houses and flats going onto the market would take much less than a year to attract a buyer ready to complete on their purchase.

There would then be fewer unsold and empty properties waiting to find buyers. Supply and demand would be in balance. House prices would enable this to happen and would facilitate sales to take place more swiftly than upwards of a year.

On the rental side of things, here markets are in a very different situation. There are far more people wanting to rent than there are rental properties available. Also, the supply of flats and houses is shrinking currently, which is forcing rent-levels to inflate. Demand for these properties seriously outstrips supply, economically speaking. Here, the obvious solution clearly has to be to provide more properties available for rent.

It should be noted however, if there were to be less unsold properties at any one time, there would be a lessening of demand for properties to rent, because more tenants would’ve become buyers! Therefore, improving buyers’ markets would clearly help with lessening the rental-demand side of things as well. That would be an important added bonus for both marketplaces, which is why ‘The House Price Solution’ is the final answer.

Instead, the present day housing markets have large overruns where, either there is too much property being offered at any one time or alternatively, there are too few properties being offered to purchasers.

Both extremes are most unsatisfactory for prospective purchasers of houses in the regional marketplaces and especially in tourist and second-home prevalent communities.

Unfortunately, current day estate agency does not assess house prices in the way described just now. Instead they peg asking prices at the level they might simply guess they could sell a house for but also they may well often include what their client (the seller) might hope to achieve when determining an asking price!

Worse, they base their asking prices on what other asking prices are, including what the other recent sales will have achieved, albeit these would have used skewed marketing comparisons themselves for the reasons just set out.

To justify what is being explained here, a year ago for example a typical estate agent had 37 properties available and 379 applicants on their register (according to statistics published by the NAEA). Today, after a spirited first half of the year and after COVID has started to reduce, a typical estate agent apparently has just 23 live listings and over 400 applicants on their register.

If knowledge such as this were to be broadcast, it would skew prices-levels downwards whilst the market is flush with houses for sale and it would skew prices-levels upwards when there were not enough houses coming onto the market – as now.

In the former case, sadly there is inherent pressure within estate agency to want to hide the true facts of an excess of properties being listed for sale compared with buyers so as not to spook the market and to keep things going as smoothly as possible, rather than face the reality of a downwards-changing market, with prices dipping.

In the latter case however, with too few properties on their books and too many buyers wanting them, broadcasting the lack of supply actually helps agents to justify trying for rising prices even against general economic trends! This has been what’s going on recently of course.

Selling agents may try to argue that it is the desperation of buyers which is forcing the prices up but that does not explain why the housing markets are operating at such low efficiency in terms of completed sales. This shows serious imperfections, resulting in their lack of stability which means these markets are in need of a completely new approach to buying and selling houses.

In my analysis and resultant diagnosis following understanding the true causes of these problems, two specific ways to deal with them emerge.

A: Firstly there should be restrictions on the right to occupy a proportion of houses in each locality as being permanent “Primary Residence” restricted. This would mean these houses would be for use only by local people, such as key workers for example.

Most people seem to agree that each locality absolutely needs housing to be affordable to those fulfilling the essential roles in their community. This should therefore be enshrined in each area’s local planning rules.

This way, genuinely democratic decisions may be arrived at using local decision-makers whom are best able to understand what the current needs of the community are at any particular time.

The different local housing markets could be brought to balance and price levels better able to reflect local demand for housing, more appropriately.

Secondly and very importantly:

B: The emphasis on all prices should be changed so that these are set by ‘buyer offers’ rather than seller price-rigging, which is of course not an open market practice in any way if this is carefully scrutinised.

This is where The House Price Solution (formerly described as The Hendry Solution) could come in. It allows for both of the essential changes cited above.

It would do this by re-shaping house sales methods entirely and by including the use of “Primary Residence” restrictions on certain properties.

AND

It would enable all buyers to be free to participate and establish the price levels themselves, (subject to declared “Primary Residence” restrictions, which would be locally established using the local planning rules).

This site proposes changes to the whole way in which houses are marketed by agents as well as bringing in far more effective planning controls.

For more information on the necessary house marketing changes, go to:

The House Price Solution

“Introducing The House Price Solution”

Posted by: Peter Hendry, Consulting Valuation Surveyor
Author of:– The House Price Solution

The cost-effective way to stabilise housing affordability across the whole of Britain

Your action in asking our government to debate this could help bring about all of these much needed changes.