ROOF Blog archive

The Tenants Services Authority should not over regulate housing associations, chief executive of the National Housing Federation David Orr has warned. Mr Orr said he welcomed the creation of the TSA, but said it must be clear about the purpose and limitations of regulation. He said the TSA should be wary of encroaching too far on associations’ rights and responsibilities.

Vulnerable tenants are falling into rent arrears, having their tenancies cancelled and facing homelessness because of the local housing allowance, Crisis found in a survey of private rented sector access schemes. The move to make payments direct to tenants has meant the most vulnerable find it harder to obtain suitable properties and more are having their tenancies terminated. The survey comes a year after the LHA was introduced.

A report into identifying and overcoming barriers in the delivery of zero-carbon homes by 2016 was released yesterday. The report found that people were unsure of the regulations, but a majority wanted the government to legislate for higher energy efficiency in homes.

House prices across the UK fell by 0.4 per cent in April, bringing the annual rate of decline down 15 per cent, according to the Nationwide. It also added that the measures introduced in the Budget are unlikely to boost the housing market, although the new mortgage backed security scheme should boost the amount of mortgage credit available.

In London, mayor Boris Johnson has said he would review his commitment to deliver 50,000 new affordable homes in light of the difficult economic circumstances. City Hall released a statement outlining the mayor’s plan to change the rules on affordable housing, and repeated his commitment to removing the London-wide affordable housing target of 50 per cent.

However, Westminster CC has revealed plans to embark on the biggest council house building programme for a generation in May. During the next four years the council will build almost 500 homes on brownfield and under-used sites on existing estates to help ease overcrowding and homelessness. The scheme will include 104 shared ownership homes and 70 one-bedroom starter homes at a discounted rate. Most of the houses will be set aside for social rent and low cost home ownership, while more than half will have at least three bedrooms. Latest figures show that Westminster has around 1,200 families in overcrowding and 2,500 in temporary accommodation.

Shelter Scotland has demanded an urgent review into a registration scheme which is failing to protect tenants from bad landlords. Shelter says a minority of landlords taint the sector with Dickensian treatment of tenants and the charity estimates that one in four properties is still not covered by the scheme introduced three years ago. The report calls for an urgent review of the scheme to ensure it tackles problems such as withheld deposits, poor management, harassment and unlawful eviction.

Abbey, Britain’s second largest mortgage lender, expects the mortgage market to return to overall net lending this year as it reported a 25 per cent jump in quarterly profits. Abbey’s chief executive called the lender ‘optimistic’ about business prospects after unemployment had risen by less than had been feared, and house prices had not fallen as much as expected. The Abbey chief added that it would weather the storm better than competitors as its mortgage book had a low loan to value of 52 per cent and only 6 per cent of customers were in negative equity.

Communities secretary Hazel Blears has unveiled plans to support communities during the recession and recycle public buildings. There will be a range of options for local councils to give buildings to the community, including handing them over as a gift or selling at below market price.

And today it is expected that Ms Blears will warn that the recession could tip Britain into civil unrest unless voluntary organisations are given extra resources. She said that a recession could drive people apart and ‘fracture community spirit’ or bring them closer together.

The new Equalities Bill which was published on Monday calls on public bodies to narrow the gap between rich and poor. The Bill requires government ministers, departments and key public bodies to consider the action they can take to reduce socio-economic inequalities. Minister Harriet Harman said the Bill was part of building a ‘strong fair future for Britain out of the downturn’.

Research from uSwitch.com has found that the recession is hitting towns across the UK with growing unemployment, falling property prices, and rising council tax. Swindon in Wiltshire has been the hardest hit as unemployment soars 197 per cent while house prices fell 16 per cent and the number of people collecting jobseeker’s allowance rose from just under 2,000 to more than 5,700 in two years. Brent in west London was the most ‘recession-proof’ area, with a 12 per cent increase in earnings, and below-average increase in jobseeker’s allowance claims.

North London residents have reacted angrily over proposals to rent out council housing on the private market. Camden council, which has 17,000 people on the housing waiting list, says it wants to renovate up to 500 homes but locals warn that families could miss out on a flat if it is rented to people who have more money. Residents want all available homes to be used to help those who cannot afford to rent privately or buy.

Rents are cheaper than a year ago, but rents on larger houses are increasing because of a lack of supply. In figures from website findaproperty.com, the average rents stood at £819 a month in April, down from £827 in March and £873 a year earlier. The growing supply of flats on the market – increasing for the sixth month in a row – has pushed down prices. The overall number of properties available to rent has fallen for the second month in a row. On average a property was on the market for an average of 63 days, 15 days longer than a year ago.

The saga of MPs’ expenses rolls on – Scotland’s first minister Alex Salmond says that Westminster should use the Scottish parliament allowance scheme as a model to reform the system in the Commons. In Scotland members’ expenses are published every three months and the practice where some MSPs can claim interest on mortgages for second homes is being brought to an end. Meanwhile, Nick Clegg, Lib-Dem leader, has offered his suggestion – replacing the allowance with expenses for basic utility bills, council tax, and either rent of mortgage interest, with MPs prevented from making financial gains from any part of a mortgage paid for by the taxpayer. Gordon Brown has dismissed suggestions that dropping one of the key proposals for reform – replacing the second home allowance for a flat payment had been damaging.

A Kent couple who lost their jobs and could not afford to pay their mortgage have been found living in a garage. The couple had been renting the garage, which has no water or electricity, to store their possessions, but moved in when they became homeless and had ‘nowhere to go’. Swale borough council has found them somewhere to stay temporarily and advised them to make a homelessness application.

A tenant who campaigned against rent increases by his housing association has been found hanged in his flat. Neil Hill sent a suicide letter to Treasury lawyers two days after losing his case against City West Housing Trust and after being served with the legal bill of £3,000. Mr Hill claimed the rent rise was a breach of contract under the stock transfer agreement, but the judge dismissed the case because of a lack of paperwork.

A lack of new sites is forcing Gypsies and Travellers to live on housing estates against their will, new research from the London Gypsy and Traveller Unit has found. Up to 80 per cent of Travellers living in permanent homes said they wanted to leave, but a shortage of authorised sites meant they had to stay put.

A test case is being heard in the High Court to decide the legality of renewal fees charged to landlords when tenants stay on after their assured shorthold tenancy comes to an end. The challenge by the Office of Fair Trading against Foxtons will affect how future letting agency agreements are drawn up and whether agents will be able to enforce renewal fees in current contracts with landlords.

Housing minister Margaret Beckett has denied opposition claims that no properties have been sold through the government’s HomeBuy scheme, although she is recorded on Hansard as saying so. Ms Beckett says that although she has no ‘solid figures’, she has ‘met at least one couple’ who have participated in the scheme, and developers have told her that they have registered demand from more than 30,000 prospective buyers. The scheme, which the government increased funding of by £80 million in last week’s Budget, offers buyers an interest-free loan of up to 30 per cent of the purchase price, and could make 19,000 homes available to potential buyers.

The UK’s biggest building society, the Nationwide no longer promises new borrowers that it will peg its variable rate mortgages to the Bank of England base rate. Existing customers on the variable rate home loan are guaranteed to pay no more than 2 per cent above the bank’s rate, but new customers will move to a new product that is currently charging nearly 1.5 per cent more when their introductory deal ends. Nationwide said that the change will allow it more flexibility over its new mortgages and allow it to provide better deals for savers.

The Homes and Communities Agency has appointed six industry experts to provide independent advice on design and sustainability. The group will provide an impartial annual review of how the HCA performs and how it can improve its policies and procedures in standards of design, including sustainability in development.

Insurance giant Legal & General is in talks with the government about investing in the residential housing sector. It is looking into so-called ‘build to let’ opportunities to develop homes from scratch to take advantage of increasing rental returns.

New figures have shown that student rents have increased by an average of 19 per cent during the past five years, and 1.5 per cent since April 2008, despite the economic downturn. During the same period rental rates in the mainstream market have fallen by 6 per cent on average, although some London boroughs are particularly hard hit with falls of up to 18 per cent.

A retired ice-cream seller is celebrating living in the same house for a century. The 107-year-old moved to Eastbourne from Italy in 1909 when he was seven when his father opened an ice-cream parlour. Alfonso de Marco worked for the family business from the age of 14 until he retired in 1975, and has since resisted any thought of moving.

The Royal Bank of Scotland has been ordered to drop repossession proceedings against a family after the Financial Ombudsman Service branded its actions unfair. The Ombudsman was not satisfied with RBS’s order to repay the entire mortgage within 30 days without giving an explanation, saying the bank had not treated the couple ‘fairly or reasonably’.

A banker was only given permission for converting a former hotel, bought for £18 million, into a home on condition that he paid £500,000 towards low-cost housing. The scale of his plans – including a 16ft diving pool underneath the house and gardens – meant that the council allowed the 168-page application after imposing the section 106 provision usually applicable to commercial property developers.

Meanwhile a Norfolk family is one of the first to benefit from the homeowner’s mortgage support scheme. Ms Whitford fell more than £4,000 behind on her mortgage after she gave up her job, and now the family’s home has been bought by a housing association and is being rented back to the family. The housing association, Orbit First Step, is currently assessing 21 homeowners in the area to see if they quality for help, and has pledged £5 million during the next two years to the scheme.

The latest figures from the National House Building Council show the first quarter-on-quarter rise in applications to start new homes for almost two years. There was a rise in applications of 2 per cent in the final quarter on 2008. In March this year, the number of applications to start public sector homes exceeded the number of private sector applications. Regions in the South and East of England had the most new build applications.

The number of new mortgages fell by 25.3 per cent in the 12 months to March in figures from the British Bankers’ Association. The figure is also down 6.8 per cent compared with February. A spokesperson from the BBA said that it was ‘unrealistic to expect the mortgage market to receive in a steady and consistent way in the current economic environment’.

The government has released the latest statistics on green belt land. Green belt land makes up 13 per cent of the land area of England by 31 March 2009, an increase of more than 3,100 hectares in annual figures – with the North West showing the largest increase and the East Midlands the largest decrease.

House prices fell at the lowest monthly rate for a year in April, according to latest figures from Hometrack. They fell by 0.3 per cent for the month, taking prices down by 10.1 per cent during the past 12 months. The average time taken to sell has fallen for the third consecutive month to an average of 10.4 weeks, compared with its high in January this year when they were taking 12.3 weeks. The proportion of the asking price received has also increased to 89.6 per cent.

The right to buy for newly built affordable homes in Scotland will be abolished by the Scottish government. Under a draft housing Bill, the government is also consulting on a proposal to block tenants moving into existing affordable homes from exercising the right to buy. This move could mean 18,000 homes were kept for affordable rents for the coming decade. Shelter Scotland has welcomed the move, calling it the ‘death knell’ of an outdated policy.

England’s children’s commissioner Sir Al Aynsley-Green criticised the government’s policy of arresting children of failed asylum seekers and holding them in a detention centre before detention. He said that almost 2,000 children were held at Yarl’s Wood Immigration Removal Centre each year and they had told him that the experience was upsetting and frightening , and had likened the conditions to being in prison. Sir Al has called for community based alternatives, but Justice Secretary Jack Straw said the government did not accept the commissioner’s conclusions.

The government has committed more than £250 million to tackle crime, stimulate educational achievement and boost job opportunities in England’s most deprived communities. The bulk of the money (£186 million) will be invested in 39 new deal for communities programmes during this financial year, with the balance of £70 million available the following year. The programme has been credited during the past 10 years with making a real difference to communities – bringing burglary down by 30 per cent and improving GCSE results by more than 10 per cent.

Fundamental reforms in social housing are needed to tackle concentrated areas of deprivation, a report from Localis has said. The report said that councils and registered social landlords need to fix broken neighbourhoods and should be given the ‘right to manage’ their housing stock. It also wants the role of social housing to be better defined – separating a ‘duty to house’ and a ‘duty to help’ - and called for an end to the varying tenures and rent levels between the private and social rented sectors.

The Institute for Fiscal Studies (IFS) warned that Britain faced ‘two parliaments of pain’ as it calculated a £45 billion ‘black hole’ in the government finances following the Budget, requiring either a tax rise of £1,430 per family or massive spending cuts. When the effect of the 8 per cent annual growth in debt interest payments and rising spending on unemployment benefit are taken out, spending across government departments will have to fall by an average of 2.3 per cent a year in real terms – the largest spending cuts since the 1970s. The IFS has calculated that by 2017/18 the losses will be the equivalent to £2,840 a year for every family, of which only half has been accounted for by the government.

And still on the Budget – the £100 million announced by Alistair Darling to help councils start building houses has been described as a ‘drop in the ocean’ after it emerged that as few as 900 homes will be created. Last year just 310 properties were built by councils in England, and since 1995 no local authority has built more than 500 homes a year. However, there are currently 4.5 million people stuck on the housing waiting list across England.

Meanwhile figures out from the National House Building Council (NHBC) show that applications from housing associations to build new homes have outstripped those from private developers for the first time. Public sector applications numbered 3,011 in March compared with 2,943 from the private sector, which is reflected in the decline. Overall, applications for new home starts during the first quarter were at their highest level for almost two years. Chief Executive of NHBC felt the figures held out hope ‘albeit at perilously low levels’ that the market was stabilising.

As many as 20 per cent of homeowners with a second property could be forced to sell their homes after Mr Darling abolished tax breaks on furnished holiday lets, accountants warn. Changes to the rules come into effect in April 2010 and will stop owners of properties offsetting the costs of renting out their second home against other income, reducing their overall tax bill. Up to 10,000 properties worth around £200,000 each could be affected, with the owners losing on average £10,000.

A legal challenge by a local authority against a growth target set out by the government will be heard before the High Court on 18 May. Hertfordshire CC is fighting against a target set out by the East of England Plan requiring more than 83,000 homes be built in the county by 2021. The council is challenging on the basis of how the targets were decided.

The government is extending a hotline in Spain to dob in expat benefit cheats. It says that each year benefit fraud by Britons living abroad costs the UK taxpayers £63 million, and while official do not know how many people are making illegal claims or where they all live, they believe the majority of them are in Spain. Originally the hotline scheme was set up in Alicante, but will now be extended to cover the Costa del Sol and Canary Islands.

The promise to eradicate child poverty by 2020 looks set to be abandoned, according to the Child Poverty Action Group. Although Chancellor Alistair Darling repeated the government’s commitment yesterday, campaigners said that levels of poverty have been rising. In yesterday’s Budget Mr Darling is offering only a £20 a year increase to the child tax credit, which CPAG called a pittance.

Sales of repossessed properties in the first quarter of 2009 are double the figures from a year earlier, according to research by the Asset Management Group (AMG). Its figures show a month on month increase in properties ‘under offer’ since the beginning of the year. Managing director of AMG said that predictions of repossession levels this year ‘continue to be high’ but the number of sales suggests an ‘underlying confidence’.

Northern Rock said it would lend up to £14 billion to British homebuyers in the next two years in a boost to the housing market. It said as much as £5 billion could be lent this year. Gross mortgage lending for the first three months of this year was £550 million, with the number of customers applying for loans rising 70 per cent. However, it acknowledged that the level of customers facing debt repayment problems was soaring. Customers more than three months in arrears had increased from 2.92 per cent at the end of 2008 to 3.67 per cent at the end of March.

Plans to overhaul MPs’ expenses have broken down after the opposition parties decided they would not back the alternative – daily payments of £150 for turning up to Westminster. The decision has left hopes of a cross party deal in tatters, although Downing Street said a vote would still go ahead. The Tories wants MPs to claim for rent utility bills, council tax and mortgage interest payments and the Lib-Dems wants to see MPs forced to sell their second homes and return a share of the proceeds to the taxpayer. An independent inquiry by the committee on standards in public life is also starting today.

Forty flood-hit families a week have been returning to their homes following the floods in the summer of 2007. Figures from the councils involved in the floods said that of the 17,000 families who had to leave their homes 98 per cent are now back. However, 350 families are still in temporary accommodation and around 10 per cent of these are living partly or wholly in caravans, or on the top floor of their homes.

Civic Trust is set to go into administration due to a lack of funding. The trust was the voice of local groups dedicated to improving their civic spaces. It has been particularly hard hit by the ‘squeeze on local authority spending in the current climate’. The trust will, however, remain open in Scotland and Wales and in parts of the north of England.

Ants are better than humans when it comes to choosing a home, according to a research study. When allowed to choose between two nests, the ants chose the better constructed nest even though it was nine times further away than the alternative.

The Chancellor has said the economy will shrink by the biggest amount in modern times – down 3.5 per cent in 2009 – before recovering slightly to grow by 1.25 per cent in 2010 and 3.5 per cent by 2010. He has extended the stamp duty holiday until the end of the year for houses under £175,000 and provided an extra £80 million for shared equity mortgage schemes. Other moves include increasing the scheme to guarantee mortgage backed securities to boost lending and the allocation of £500 million to kickstart stalled housing projects, while local authorities will get £100 million to build energy efficient homes.

More than half of the UK’s biggest high street banks, including Abbey, Nationwide, Barclays and HSBC, have refused to join the government’s plan to support homeowners at risk of repossession. No bank that is not owned or controlled by the state has agreed to join the homeowner’s mortgage support scheme (HMSS) which was launched yesterday. A number of lenders are still in talks with the government, but it’s been estimated that 28,000 borrowers have been repossessed already in the time it has take the government to finalise the details.

The government has announced that tens of thousands of people who faced losing their homes have benefited from free legal advice under the housing possession court duty scheme. The scheme ensures advisers are at court to offer legal aid the government claims they have prevented immediate repossession in 85 per cent of cases. Currently more than 2,800 people are using the service each month.

The number of homes sold jumped by 40 per cent between February and March, figures from HM Revenue and Customs disclose. There were 60,000 sales in March compared with a month earlier when sales totalled 43,000. Even when figures are seasonally adjusted – taking into account the traditional increase in home sales in spring – there was still a rise of 13 per cent. However, mortgage lenders warned that a strong revival in the market soon was unlikely.

Mortgage lending also rose in March according to the Council of Mortgage Lenders. Gross lending was £11.5 billion for the month, up 16 per cent from February, although it remains less than half the amount lent a year earlier. The CML warned that increase was a normal seasonal rise and lending and house sales would remain low for the ‘foreseeable future’.

The first quarter of 2009 has seen one of the biggest ever take ups of fixed rate mortgages. A new index from John Charcol showed the proportion of borrowers taking out a fixed rate mortgage is up from 29.1 per cent in December to 80.9 per cent in March as homebuyers anticipate an increase in mortgage rates.

For first-time buyers and remortgagers just getting a mortgage remains difficult, however. The moneyextra.com mortgage index showed that lending to first-time buyers with deposits of less than 5 per cent was non-existent while the supply of borrowing for those with 10 per cent cash to put down has decreased by 84 per cent compared to the same time last year. For first-time buyers the average loan to value was 71 per cent, compared with 82 per cent last year, while for people looking to re-mortgage the average loan to value ratio was 69 per cent compared to 82 per cent last year.

Gordon Brown has agreed to meet Tory and Lib-Dem leaders to discuss plans to reform MPs’ expenses after proposing changes to the second homes allowance. The allowance, worth up to £24,000 a year, would be replaced with a flat daily attendance allowance. The proposal surprised many at Westminster, coming three weeks after Mr Brown ruled out any changes until a public committee finished its review. Mr Brown said he wants the changes in place by July to ‘restore people’s confidence’.

The Chancellor is expected to confirm a £1 billion emergency package to kick start the housing market. The deal would see the Treasury offering to take a share in housing projects where work has stalled either due to falling house prices or a lack of finance, along with providing a fund to reverse the trend in council house building. In addition, Mr Darling is expected to extend the temporary suspension in stamp duty on houses costing up to £175,000 until the end of the year.

The homeowner mortgage support scheme has also been launched today. It aims to help with mortgage interest payments for up to 40,000 homeowners who have lost their jobs or had a sudden loss of income. Those with mortgages up to £400,000 and with savings of less than £16,000 will be given help for as long as two years, although they will be required to fund 30 per cent of the payment and have to repay the full amount once their financial system improves.

Figures from ROOF’s Affordability Index show that despite house price falls, first-time buyers are still locked out of home ownership as the level of deposit required soars. The average price for first-timers is almost £30,000 less than last year, however, deposits have doubled to more than £30,000. And lack of mortgage finance was not the only factor holding back buyers – rising repossessions, unemployment and economic uncertainty have all had an impact and the number of loans to first-time buyers nearly halved.

The public strongly supports the government’s plans to ‘decarbonise’ the nation’s housing stock according to research by the Department of Energy and Climate Change. Researchers found householders are willing to ‘play their part’ in tackling climate change, and under the Great British Refurb plans, at least 7 million homes by 2020 and every home by 2030 will be offered whole house upgrades with energy efficiency and micro generation technologies. Individuals said they also want help with the up-front costs of decarbonising their homes through loans and grants, and they want fair target to take into account the diversity of the UK housing stock.

A table of the wellbeing of young people throughout European states has ranked Britain 24th out of 29 countries. The researchers assessed the countries on 43 separate measures, ranging from infant mortality to poverty and housing, and asked the children how they felt about their lives, schools and relationships. The Netherlands came out on top, while Romania, Bulgaria, Latvia, Lithuania and Malta are the only countries which came below the UK. The Child Poverty Action Group who commissioned the research made a number of recommendations including dropping means tests in favour of universal benefits such as child benefit and ensuring a decent home for every family.

Meanwhile, the government is looking to recruit 60 European social workers, experienced in ‘social pedagogy’, to lead an experimental pilot programme on the way children’s residential care homes are run. The practice helps children ‘develop and flourish’, rather than just meeting their immediate needs and ensuring their safety. Child care advisers welcome the move, but say its success would need more money being invested in residential care homes and in training staff, with one person saying that without trained and skilled workers, residential care was tantamount to ‘warehousing’ children.

A record number of young people are not in any form or education, employment or training (Neets), according to figures from the Conservatives. Nearly 860,000 people aged 16–24 were not in jobs, school or training, up from 629,000 in 2000. The Tories suggest that the recession, along with government cuts to sixth-form funding, apprenticeships and further education college capital spending have contributed to the problem, and they will create a £100 million fund to help young people engage in further training or employment.

A couple who tried to rely on a legal loophole which allows a property to evade planning permission if it has been lived in for more than four years are facing eviction, after the High Court called their scheme a ‘fraud’. The couple were granted planning permission to build a barn for agricultural use, but transformed the interior into a three-bedroom house with a gym, and applied for a certificate of lawfulness that would make their home legal after four years. The High Court’s decision overturned an earlier decision by the government planning inspector which ruled the couple were entitled to stay in the property. They plan on appealing.

A House of Commons’ select committee has warned that the state is failing in its duty to act as a parent to children in care by not protecting them from sexual exploitation, homelessness and crime. In its report the children, schools and family committee calls for a radical overhaul of the system to ensure that the most vulnerable children get the services they require. It says that concerns for the happiness and welfare of the 60,000 children in care should be at the heart of the system and that government is ‘too timid’ in demanding that health services and the criminal justice and asylum systems give special consideration to looked-after children.

In a new BBC survey, the recession tops children’s fears. More than 60 per cent said they had been affected by the downturn, and more than 40 per cent said their parents were worried about money, up from 30 per cent in 2007, while nearly 90 per cent said they would be willing to give something up such as pocket money to help their families cope in the worsening economic climate. One in five of those questioned said they were fed up with hearing about the credit crunch.

New research from Homeless Link suggests that the help that single homeless people receive depends on where they come from, with one in four local authorities having no emergency accommodation available for non-statutory homeless groups. A spokesperson from Homeless Link said that its members had seen demand for their services increase because of the economic downturn.

The Bank of England is in talks with seven building societies hoping to renegotiate emergency funds made available during the credit crunch. While the building societies – including Chelsea, Yorkshire and Skipton – are not considered in danger of collapse, last week’s downgrading by credit agency Moody’s threatened to breach the terms of the government’s special liquidity scheme, forcing the building societies to either hand the money back or be changed more to use the funding, possibly further reducing the amount of money available for lending.

Housing association tenants are furious with rent increases far above the current rate of inflation, with many considering rent strikes, and others lobbying their MPs. Since the beginning of April, hundreds of thousands of tenants faced increased rents of at least 5 per cent, based on a formula of the retail prices index, plus 0.5 per cent. There are about 2.3 million housing association tenants in the UK, a figure that has risen sharply in recent years as many traditional council tenants have voted to change their tenure. The government has promised that by 2012 all social housing rents and service charges will be roughly similar for council and housing association tenants in similar areas.

Pensioners have seen an average of £52,000 wiped off the value of their homes during the credit crunch. A report from propertyfinder.com shows that, overall, pensioners have seen their wealth drop by £220 billion, bringing the total value of property they own in England and Wales down to £800 billion. As many as 1.7 million pensioners – nearly 14 per cent – rely on property to fund their retirement, with many expecting to downsize and use the spare cash to pay for care costs.

All local authorities in the UK have now signed up to the government’s mortgage rescue scheme, with as many as 300 households already qualifying for the support plan. Communities and Local Government says the impact of the £200 million scheme introduced in September 2008 to prevent as many as 6,000 repossessions from occurring is difficult to assess as take up of it is ’demand-led’, so it is under constant review.

According to two leading business groups’ reports, the British economy will start recovering next spring. The Confederation of British Industries has predicted that any recovery will be ‘slow and fragile’ with the economy shrinking 3.9 per cent this year, but expects there will be an economic recovery by next spring when growth turns positive at 0.2 per cent in the second quarter. A report by Ernst & Young Item Club estimated that the economy will shrink by 3.5 per cent this year and grow just 0.1 per cent throughout 2010. Its forecast described the backdrop to the budget as ‘bleak’ and warned the chancellor that he had ‘limited options’ in this spending.

Council leaders are warning that households will be at risk from flooding if action to protect homes isn’t made a priority. A recent survey found that 60 per cent of councils lack the necessary funds to fulfil their flood responsibilities. Town halls are calling on the government to make new flooding laws a priority and to set out clear rules for water companies to cooperate with councils in planning against floods, saying the situation cannot continue where it is not clear who is responsible for dealing with different aspects of flood protection.

Falling house prices have forced 900,000 mortgage borrowers into negative equity, research by the Council of Mortgage Lenders has found. Three in four have an average shortfall of between £6,000 and £8,000, nearly a quarter of a million have a shortfall close to £20,000 and a further 13,000 are in negative equity to the tune of £37,000. Homeowners in the North are worst affected with 9.2 per cent of owner occupiers in negative equity, while in the South East the figure is 5.7 per cent of households. Scottish homeowners are the least affected with only 1 per cent of borrowers suffering from falling prices.

More than half a million homes in Britain now host at least three generations of the same family, a new study has found. A growing number of children, parents and grandparents are sharing their homes – up 7.6 per cent since 2005 and this is expected to increase by more than 56,000 in the coming decade. The rise in multi-generational living comes from changes in social and economic factors the research found – nearly two-thirds say they were forced into the situation by such circumstances, but four-fifths says they are happy with the arrangement.

The Homes and Communities Agency (HCA) and CABE have announced they are teaming up to improve the design quality of new homes, following the publication of a survey into the design of new affordable housing. The Homes and Communities Agency (HCA) and CABE have announced they are teaming up to improve the design quality of new homes, following the publication of a survey into the design of new affordable housing. The findings showed nearly that 61 per cent of housing schemes were average and 18 per cent good or very good, compared with 21 per cent assessed as poor including a ‘lack of distinctiveness’ and having design that ‘does not correspond to its context’. The report recommends closer working between registered social landlords (RSLs) and local planning authorities, and enforcing minimum design standards. In a joint statement the HCA and Cabe said: ‘The HCA will continue to promote high standards of quality in all the housing it funds… CABE will continue to support the HCA and RSLs across the country to make this a reality.’

Kate Barker, a government adviser on housing and member of the Bank of England’s rate setting committee, has said that mortgages which leave buyers with a risk of negative equity should not be banned and banks that demand huge deposits may have been ‘overdone’. She said that banks over-reacted to the credit crunch by withdrawing so many mortgages for borrowers with small deposits. She also indicated that targeting inflation alone was not sufficient to ensure economic stability.

The Financial Services Authority (FSA) has been accused of complacency in its dealings with building societies. A former FSA worker told Lib-Dem spokesman Vince Cable that poorly qualified FSA officials, who had no background in the industry and didn’t understand its ‘community roots or limitation’, allowed building societies to expand into ‘risky areas’ and more societies could be at risk in the wake of the collapse of the Dunfermline building society. Mr Cable has asked the FSA chairman to investigate.

More than 40 per cent of social tenants or their families have been hit by antisocial behaviour during the past two years, according to a YouGov poll. Council and housing association tenants are much more likely than private homeowners to suffer from antisocial behaviour, and more social tenants than owner occupiers believe that the level of behaviour has become worse in their area over the same period. Just 17 per cent of those questioned had confidence in their council or social landlord to tackle the problem, and almost two-thirds expect the problem to increase as a result of the downturn.

A parliamentary joint select committee on human rights has warned that an increasing number of vulnerable people could become homeless under the new Policing and Crime Bill. The Bill will introduce powers to close brothels and curb antisocial behaviour by giving police the power to direct a child as young as 10 to leave an area without talking into account their safety or where they will go. The committee says the proposals risk criminalising rather than protecting some of the most vulnerable members of society.

The Office for National Statistics has released its annual snapshot of life in Britain. It found there were 25 million households in the UK, with the average household numbering between two and three people, although the report highlights an increase in single-person households from 6 per cent in 1971 to 12 per cent last year. Almost a third of men and a fifth of women aged between 20 and 34 still live at home with their parents, but a third of families are living in non-decent homes and almost one in 10 are exposed to excessive cold due to a lack of heating or insulation.

Five of the UK’s largest housing associations (HAs) have joined forces to publish a report challenging the current model for providing affordable housing. Calling themselves the Housing Futures Network, the HAs are arguing for ‘radical, wide ranging’ reforms in housing benefit and building finance, while opening up access to affordable housing to people with a wider range of incomes.

Meanwhile, councils have been given a year’s grace on targets in recession-affected industries such as housebuilding. Communities and Local Government has decided that targets for indicators, such as the number of new homes built, will now not be set until April 2010.

According to research commissioned by internet bank First Direct, as many as 2.5 million people are sitting on a cumulative pot of £20 billion in savings, waiting for house prices to drop. The average amount of savings per person is just over £7,000 plus equity in property, and London has the highest proportion of housebuyers holding back. The survey also found that 12 per cent of first-time buyers felt they would never get on the property ladder, and one in six believe that house prices will start rising steadily again as soon as October 2010.

Figures from Communities and Local Government show the annual rate of decline in house prices hit 12.3 per cent in the three months to February. The December to February quarter saw a fall of 4.8 per cent, compared with the previous quarter’s decline of 4.3 per cent. The drop was most pronounced in Northern Ireland where values tumbled 19.4 per cent over the year; Wales also saw a big drop of 12.5 per cent; England faced an average price decline of 12.4 per cent; and Scotland down by 8.6 per cent. It was the sixteenth month in a row that the annual house price rate had worsened.

Nine of the biggest building societies have had their credit ratings downgraded over fears that losses from the downturn in the housing market may be ‘significantly higher’ than expected. Alliance & Leicester, Abbey National and Nationwide have seen cuts in their financial ratings by Moody’s, which expressed concern about the level of losses on self-certified and buy-to-let mortgages.

Mortgage rejections have increased fourfold in the past two years, with almost one in ten applications being rejected. Moneysupermaket.com has found that 9 per cent of mortgage applications, which would previously have been ‘accepted without a hitch’, are being turned down for the ‘most minor of misdemeanours’.

Meanwhile, consumers are saving less and paying off debts faster, according to research from Nationwide. Less than half of consumers save money regularly, with 25 per cent saving nothing at all, a figure getting worse since the Bank of England dropped its base rate from 2 to 0.5 per cent in December. More than half of those questioned believe it is a bad time to save, and that the government is actively discouraging savings.

Leaders of religious faiths, humanists and academics have written to Chancellor Alistair Darling demanding more action to improve the lives of children in poverty. There is a ‘moral imperative’ to help the country’s poorest during a recession, they argue. And because poorer families immediately spend money on their basics, giving them assistance also helps stimulate the economy, the letter’s signatories say.

The number of people living in overcrowded homes in England will soar 15 per cent to 2.6 million by 2011 as unemployment and repossessions bite, the National Housing Federation warned today. It says an extra 350,000 people would be living in overcrowded conditions in the next two years, exacerbated by the economic slowdown which has left as few as 70,000 new homes being built this year - down from 140,000 in 2008/09. Regionally, the most severe living conditions are in London, where 6.6 per cent of all homes are officially classified as overcrowded.

More than 1.6 million young people aged 18 to 24 are living with friends or family, nearly triple the number doing the same things this time last year. Research by Abbey Mortgages also found that among the 35 to 54 age group, more than 300,000 people are living rent free under someone’s roof, and said that in the current climate many people had little choice but to return home or turn to their friends or family.

Meanwhile, the over-60s are skipping meals to save money. One in five older people is skipping meals to save on food costs, and two-fifths are struggling to afford essential items such as electricity according to research by Age Concern and Help the Aged. Pensioners on low incomes face a higher than average inflation rate the report said, and miss out on up to £5 billion in benefits each year. The charity is calling for a package of measures including a commitment from the government to roll out automatic payment of income related benefits such as pensioner credit and council tax benefit.

The number of housing organisations concerned by the recession has increased 30 per cent since October, with one in four now feeling the effects. Since the last survey six months ago - ‘before the recession really took hold’ - housing and regeneration projects have come to a standstill, redundancies have been announced and business models have been radically adapted. However, skills, knowledge and training remain high on the agenda and greater partnership working between public and private sectors has been established.

A study by the Economic and Social Research Council has said making existing homes energy efficient was a ‘herculean’ task and required radical action to bring about a 60 per cent reduction in carbon emissions by 2050. The research calculated that to reduce emissions from existing homes by 40 per cent would require work to nearly 24 million buildings, and to complete the task within 40 years would need to refurbish an area the size of Cambridge every month. The study also found that energy saving devices do not always increase efficiency in a way that was expected.

Interest in house buying is starting to gain ‘real momentum’ according to UK surveyors, but sales remain low. Figures from the Royal Institution of Chartered Surveyors (RICS) found that new enquiries increased for the fifth consecutive month, however, surveyors will still selling fewer than 10 homes on average during the past three months. Interest was strong in every region – with London and Wales strongest, and RICS said the rise in interest reflected the drop in asking prices and sharp fall in the cost of money.

The strict working restrictions for Eastern Europeans will not be scrapped the government announced recently. The worker registration scheme ‘works for the British labour market and the country as a whole’ and allows for planning for local services, the government argued, while maintaining the restrictions means A8 nationals will not have full access to benefits until they have been working and paying tax for at least 12 consecutive months.

The Land Registry is planning to increase its fees by nearly a third to boost its income in the face of falling property transactions. The Registry said that the steep fall in the number of properties changing hands had forced them into increasing their charges. The cost of registering a £100,000 property increased from £100 to £130, while homeowners registering a £1 million home will pay £550, up from £420.

Four leading organisations have called on the government to spend £6.35 billion in the next two years to create 100,000 new social rented homes, which would give an ‘immediate social and financial return’ to the economy. Shelter, along with the Local Government Association, National Housing Federation and the TUC, are arguing that housing provides an opportunity to rebuild economic activity, creating thousands of jobs, maintaining skills, and safeguarding the ability to build homes that Britain needs.

The Homes and Communities Agency is in talks with groups such as Legal & General about the way for institutional investors to build social housing. Gordon Brown is keen to find ways to increase the amount of housing, and a new public-private fund with the HCA putting equity into schemes and offering rental guarantees for the first two years of ownership is expected to be announced around the budget on 22 April.

The HCA delivered about 50,000 affordable homes in England and increased rental and low cost home ownership in the past financial year. Its latest accounts show it invested £3.9 billion on housing and regeneration.