Briefing: Held-back households

By: Nicola Hughes
Published: February 2012

Briefing: Held-back households

The housing system is central to this squeeze on low to middle earners. As our housing market comes under increasing pressure, a large number of households find themselves struggling to find and maintain suitable and stable housing choices, or to meet their reasonable housing aspirations.

  • Promoting market stability to end the cycles of housing boom and bust that leave households locked out of homeownership, stuck in unsuitable homes, or threatened with repossession

  • Exploring the role of housing subsidies and benefits in helping hard-pressed families keep their heads above water

  • Creating a private rented sector that gives more stability and certainty to the growing number of renting families

  • Thinking afresh about housing tenure, and developing appropriate allocation policies and tenancy strategies