This content applies to England only.

England is suffering a massive housing crisis. There simply aren’t enough decent, affordable homes.

• More than two million people find their rent or mortgage a constant struggle or are falling behind with payments. [1]
• Against a background of mounting debt across the country, huge numbers of homeowners are having their homes repossessed, because they are no longer able to keep up with their mortgage repayments.
• Second home ownership is pricing local people out of many rural areas.
• Over 1.7 million households are currently waiting for social housing. [2]
• Some homeless households - many with dependent children - wait for years in temporary accommodation.
• Families renting privately on low incomes have to put up with poor living conditions and little security.
• The number of new households is increasing faster than the number of house builds.
• And at the sharpest end, many hundreds of people sleep rough on the streets every night, cold and fearing for their safety.

Shelter believes this situation is unacceptable.

The housing crisis in numbers

• 1.4 million children in England live in bad housing. [3]
• In 2008/09, 654,000 households in England were overcrowded. [4]
• In 2009 the number of repossessions rose to 48,000 from 25,900 in 2007, and it is predicted that repossessions will remain high in the coming years. [5]
• 7.4 million homes in England fail to meet the Government's Decent Homes Standard. [6]
• The UK is now more polarised by housing wealth than at any time since the Victorian era.
• In 2009/10, more than 62,000 households were found to be homeless by local authorities. [7]
• At the end of September 2010, 49,000 households were living in temporary accommodation arranged by local authorities. Just over 38,000 of these households had dependent children. [8]

Home is more than just a roof over your head

Housing is an issue that affects every one of us. We all know how important having a decent home is. From our health and emotional well-being, to our achievement in education and our ability to get work, where we live has an enormous impact on our lives.

A home is a place that provides security, privacy, decent living conditions, and links to a community. A home must be suitable to the needs of its residents – providing adequate space, affordable costs and linked support where necessary.

Bad housing

Bad housing covers a wide range of issues, including overcrowding, insecurity of tenure, poor living conditions and deprived neighbourhoods. In these cases, having a roof to sleep under does not mean you have a sense of security.

Overcrowded accommodation

In 2008/2009, 654,000 households in England were overcrowded. [9]

The lack of social housing and family-sized homes, combined with an affordability crisis in the property market, means that many families on low incomes are forced to live in overcrowded accommodation. This has a detrimental effect on family relationships and health, as well as a damaging influence on children's education and emotional development.

Non-decent homes

7.4 million homes in England fail to meet the Government's Decent Homes Standard. [10]

Unable to afford a decent home or access social housing, many households have no choice but to live in poor conditions, which damage their health and often pose dangerous hazards.

Everyone should have a home

Shelter believes that everyone should have a home. Given the enormous impact housing has on people's lives and its wider effects on society as a whole, we believe that access to decent housing should not be dictated by the whims of an increasingly volatile property market. We campaign for better housing policies and laws to end homelessness.

Preventing homelessness

Shelter campaigns for better policies to tackle and prevent homelessness, both in terms of immediate responses to the current crisis and finding lasting long-term solutions.

Improving existing housing

With a national shortage of social housing and an affordability crisis in the property market, low income households are increasingly having to rely on a largely unregulated private rented sector to meet their housing needs, where security of tenure and living conditions are often poor.

Shelter campaigns for improvements across all housing sectors (social rented, private rented, intermediate and owner-occupied) to ensure people have secure and decent homes.

Building more homes

With over 1.7 million households currently on local authority housing waiting lists and a huge under-supply of family-sized properties, the only solution to the current housing crisis is to build more homes.

Shelter is concerned that the coalition Government’s plans for delivering new homes don’t go far enough. The Government’s proposed 150,000 affordable homes over four years is less than a third of what is needed. This will leave millions of families stuck in limbo on housing waiting lists, and push house prices further out of the reach of those on ordinary incomes.

New homes should be affordable to those who need them, environmentally-friendly, and provide adequate amenities to foster communities where people can thrive.

Improving neighbourhoods

Bad housing is closely linked to many wider social problems that blight neighbourhoods, such as crime and antisocial behaviour. And Shelter believes these problems can be best addressed once the underlying housing issues have been resolved.

[1] Breaking Point report, Shelter, London, 2008.
[2] Housing Strategy Statistical Appendix Data 2010, Communities and Local Government, 2010.
[3] Against the Odds report, Shelter, London, 2006.
[4] Survey of English Housing Preliminary Results 2008/09, Communities and Local Government, 2010.
[5] Council of Mortgage Lenders, 2010.
[6] English House Condition Survey 2007, Headline Report, CLG 2009.
[7] Statutory Homelessness Statistics, Communities and Local Government 2009.
[8] Statutory Homelessness Statistics, Communities and Local Government 2009.
[9] Survey of English Housing Preliminary Results 2007/2008, Communities and Local Government 2008.
[10] English House Condition Survey 2006 Headline Report, CLG, 2007.