Shelter response to PM’s plan for ‘Generation Buy’
Posted 03 Oct 2020
Polly Neate, chief executive of Shelter, said: “Average house prices are now eight times the average salary in England, meaning most people cannot afford to take on a 95% loan. Many of those who’ve seen their incomes decimated during this pandemic are young people and families in desperate need of a stable home – buying is just not an option for them.
“You have to question whether the Prime Minister is in touch with reality, he is talking about giant mortgages at a time when more than 320,000 private renters have fallen behind on their rent as a result of Covid-19. Offering up huge loans and even more debt is the wrong answer to the much bigger problem of rising housing insecurity in this country.
“The Prime Minister needs to stop selling pipedreams and start facing reality. The only way we will make a dent in the housing emergency is by increasing the number of secure and genuinely affordable homes, and that means building decent social housing.”
ENDS
Notes to editors:
Key figures:
The average house price in England is now 7.8 times average earnings. (Source: www.ons.gov.uk/peoplepopulationandcommunity/housing/bulletins/housingaffordabilityinenglandandwales/2019)
An estimated 322,000 adult private renters in England (4%) - who were not in arrears prior to the pandemic – have since fallen into arrears. (Source: YouGov survey of 3,698 people in England, 578 of whom renting privately, online, 18+, weighted to be representative of England's population, 17th - 19th August 2020.)