Scrap the ruinous mess that is housing benefit
Having worked in housing and council tax benefit departments of local authorities for ten years, i can see how UK property prices are being artificially inflated by the government’s housing benefit scheme. if housing benefit stopped, residential property prices and associated rental costs would revert to their true market rates, and this would result in a substantial decline in property prices. Housing benefit payments inflate property prices as billions of pounds of taxpayer money is injected into the residential lettings market and consequentially residential property is considered a high-yield investment. Thanks to housing benefit, rental income from buy-to-let residential property is guaranteed by the taxpayer. in parts of the UK where there is little or no work, property prices and associated rental costs should be low, but property prices in these areas are dictated by the amount investors expect to receive from tenants paying rent. They charge an artificially high rent, knowing they’ll be met by housing benefit payments that are funded by the taxpayer. This also means that those in employment who would like to buy a home of their own can’t. and it isn’t the tenants who ultimately benefit from this: the homes they live in would be occupied anyway, with or without housing benefit, but their rents would be substantially less if they were dictated by what the local economy can afford. So who benefits? Private, individual buy-to-let investors and, increasingly, large private landlords and the banks. Ending the housing benefit scheme would send residential property prices tumbling, save the taxpayer billions and make house prices more affordable to those wishing to purchase residential property to live in. People must realise that their own taxes are being used to keep residential house prices artificially high. The sooner housing benefit is scrapped, the sooner house prices will ‘normalise’.
STEVE SCOTT, London SE1.