Councils to be given powers to take control of empty homes after six months

I really hope they spend time thinking through every eventuality of why a house may be empty before enacting this law.

Knowing government policy, they will miss something. I’m happy to put a tenner on someone in 5 years time coming back from a 7 month hospital admission to find the locks on their doors changed and council tenants living there.

Meanwhile, the overseas wealthy owners will have found technicalities where they pay someone to live there every 5 months for a week to stop repossession.

My great uncles house has been empty for a year as of last week. He died after a short illness. His will and inheritance were all correctly and clearly written and no one disputes them. It’s taken this long and we’re still waiting for probate.

In June the solicitors told us there was no way anyone would look before September now as it’s summer and the court is on holiday.

“Government to pretend to be getting tough on problem it itself is causing” would be a more accurate headline.

Misread this as “six empty homes a month” and thought “Well, that’s not much but it might be an improvement.”

There is a definite problem of some people just not renting out houses because they’re holding out for higher rent.

There’s also a big problem of probate being very slow, houses being very slow to sell in general, some houses being uninhabitable, and so on.

Finally, making out that the entire of the UK housing shortage is because people are greedily holding onto empty houses is just trying to hide the problem. Housing demand is far higher than housing supply, even including empty houses of any sort, and the amount of empty houses in places with high demand is small. After all if you’ve got a house in a place with high demand, you sell it for a high price (even if it’s a wreck) or rent it out for a high rent.

They could achieve much quicker wins all round if they had airbnbs converted back to long term housing, using the planning permission system. 

In one of the neighbouring houses, the landlord evicted four young working men and turned it into an Airbnb. It’s not even a touristy area, it’s suburbia, and there’s no reason for that house to be anything other than a proper home. It was just pure greed from the landlord. 

Airbnbs are already in a good state of repair and there’s no concerns around probate, long term hospitalisation or other legitimate reasons for being empty. 

It is utter madness that we have tourists staying in houses, while homeless families languish in hotels. It is the most backwards use of resources possible. 

Or every month your property is empty your council tax doubles?

Would also encourage landlords to drop their prices to ensure occupancy.

My mothers house is empty because she is in care with Alzheimer’s. The plan was to rent it out but because of the renter’s rights act and the requirement that we sell the house within 12 months of mum’s passing to cover the deferred payment order – she is 90 – it just sits there empty. If I rent it out tomorrow and she dies next week I can’t give notice for 12 months.

I don’t really understand. Are they talking about seizing privately owned homes?

Does the legislation cover all those properties owned by the individuals that live abroad and hardly ever come to the UK? There are many empty properties owned by Chinese, Russian, Saudi, Iranian individuals that remain empty for most of the year. Like many so-called British patriots that live abroad – we all know who they are – the best way of dealing with them is to impose extra rates on the so called properties. Most of the properties in question are only being used as an asset for their wealth portfolios.

The same should be applied to all those wealthy so-called patriots that leave the UK for so called better places where they aren’t taxed as much.

We recently had to sell my dead father-in-law’s house. It was on the market and empty for 3 years before we had an offer, at almost £100k less than the asking price. We had to accept that offer, especially because the council tax doubles every year for an empty house (it was approaching £3k per year when sold and was just about to double again)

We looked at short term renting or airbnb while it was for sale but insurance and legislation makes it impossible without investment (which we didnt have), or would have meant tennants rights would have closed the window for selling.

To possess houses after 6 months in the current housing market would simply be theft, unless the council were to pay a market price, in which case we would have welcomed it. Does it mean that councils would be gaining council housing stock? That too would be a good thing.

Will this apply to luxury flats in London bought by wealthy people from abroad that sit empty?

I think people here backing the government seizing your property of any kind, without an actual crime being committed, are insane. It’s as if you want this place to be like North Korea. The councils shouldn’t have sold them in the first place if this is their thought process.