Renting
used to be a dirty word in the 60’s and 70’s. You either lived in a ‘Rigsby
Rising Damp’ style bedsit with wood chip on the wall and a coin operated
electric meter (that buzzed in the night) or you lived in a council house. In the latter part of the 20th
Century, the British were persuaded that rent payments were ‘wasted money’.
However, owning often makes less financial sense than renting and as the rate
of homeownership is starting to drop substantially, as we roll the clock forward to today,
there is no stigma at all to renting .. everyone is doing it. In fact, of the 41,535
residents of Grantham, 14,608 of you
rent your house from either the local authority/social provider (ie council
house or housing association) or private landlords – meaning 35.17% of Grantham
people are tenants.
The idea of
homeownership is deeply embedded in the British soul, in fact 26,313 Grantham people live in an owner
occupied property (or 63.35%). Housing is at the heart of Government policy, as
George Osborne has promised 200,000 new properties a year so first time buyers
can buy their first home whilst recently changing the tax laws for buy to let
landlords. To get votes, Thatcher (and everyone since) ran election campaigns promising everybody their own home, and as a
country, we seem to equate homeownership the goal of British life.
So as more and
more people are renting nowadays, are we turning to a more European way of
living? Well, I believe, as a country, we are. In fact, homeownership could be
affecting your health! The
UK, according to Bloomberg, is only the 21st most healthy country in
the world. Germany is at No.10 and Switzerland at No.4 and homeownership is at
52.5% and 44% respectively in those countries (in the UK it is 64.8%).
In the South Kesteven District Council area, 72.69% of homeowners who
own their house outright said they were in ‘very good’ or ‘good’ health whilst,
at the other end of the scale, 6.06% said their health was ‘bad’ or ‘very bad’.
Looking at renting, the census splits tenants into two types – 72.69% of South
Kesteven local authority/social tenants said they were in ‘very good’ or ‘good’
health and 11.04% were in ‘bad’ or ‘very bad’ health …
… whilst ‘private
rented tenants’ in South Kesteven, were the healthiest, as 85.6% of them
described themselves in ‘very good’ or ‘good’ health and only 3.81% were in ‘bad’
or ‘very bad’ health
I am not suggesting
that low homeownership rates in Switzerland and Germany are directly linked to
health, nor, do I expect Brits to all go to Berlin, Interlaken or Düsseldorf
and realise how happy people are when they don't need to worry about all the
stresses which accompany homeownership. The numbers for South Kesteven do go
some way to back up the argument (and they are the same across the whole of the
UK). Nonetheless I do think that substantially all of the upside to
homeownership in recent years has been a function of monumental rising house
prices. Now that's come to an end, it's hard to see why anybody would want to
buy?
Renting is here to stay
in Grantham and it’s growing incrementally each year. Even with the new tax
rules for landlords, buy to let is still a viable investment option for most
people in the Town. There has never been a better time to buy buy to let
property in Grantham, but buy wisely. Gone are the days that you would make profit
on anything with four walls and a roof. Take advice, take opinion, do your
homework. One place to do more homework, to read more articles on the Grantham
Property market like this, is the Grantham Property Blog
