Renting
used to be a dirty word in the 60’s and 70’s. You either lived in a ‘Rigsby
Rising Damp’ style bedsit with wood chip on the wall and a coin operated
electric meter (that buzzed in the night) or you lived in a council house. In the latter part of the 20th
Century, the British were persuaded that rent payments were ‘wasted money’.
However, owning often makes less financial sense than renting and as the rate
of homeownership is starting to drop substantially, as we roll the clock forward to today,
there is no stigma at all to renting .. everyone is doing it. In fact, of the 57,061
residents of Royal Tunbridge Wells, 19,544 of
you rent your house from either the local authority/social provider (ie council
house or housing association) or private landlords – meaning 34.25% of Royal
Tunbridge Wells people are tenants.
The idea of
homeownership is deeply embedded in the British soul, in fact 36,569 Royal Tunbridge Wells people live
in an owner occupied property (or 64.08%). Housing is at the heart of
Government policy, as George Osborne has promised 200,000 new properties a year
so first time buyers can buy their first home whilst recently changing the tax
laws for buy to let landlords. To get votes, Thatcher (and everyone since) ran election campaigns promising everybody their own home, and as a
country, we seem to equate homeownership the goal of British life.
So as more and
more people are renting nowadays, are we turning to a more European way of
living? Well, I believe, as a country, we are. In fact, homeownership could be
affecting your health! The
UK, according to Bloomberg, is only the 21st most healthy country in
the world. Germany is at No.10 and Switzerland at No.4 and homeownership is at
52.5% and 44% respectively in those countries (in the UK it is 64.8%).
In the Tunbridge Wells Borough Council area, 78.81% of homeowners who
own their house outright said they were in ‘very good’ or ‘good’ health whilst,
at the other end of the scale, 4.5% said their health was ‘bad’ or ‘very bad’.
Looking at renting, the census splits tenants into two types – 72.46% of Royal
Tunbridge Wells local authority/social tenants said they were in ‘very good’ or
‘good’ health and 9.21% were in ‘bad’ or ‘very bad’ health …
… whilst ‘private
rented tenants’ in Royal Tunbridge Wells, were the healthiest, as 88.9% of them
described themselves in ‘very good’ or ‘good’ health and only 2.9% were in
‘bad’ or ‘very bad’ health
I am not suggesting
that low homeownership rates in Switzerland and Germany are directly linked to
health, nor, do I expect Brits to all go to Berlin, Interlaken or Düsseldorf
and realise how happy people are when they don't need to worry about all the
stresses which accompany homeownership. The numbers for Royal Tunbridge Wells
do go some way to back up the argument (and they are the same across the whole of
the UK). Nonetheless I do think that substantially all of the upside to
homeownership in recent years has been a function of monumental rising house
prices. Now that's come to an end, it's hard to see why anybody would want to
buy?
Renting is here to stay
in Royal Tunbridge Wells and it’s growing incrementally each year. Even with
the new tax rules for landlords, buy to let is still a viable investment option
for most people in the Town. There has never been a better time to buy buy to
let property in Royal Tunbridge Wells, but buy wisely. Gone are the days that
you would make profit on anything with four walls and a roof. Take advice, take
opinion, do your homework. One place to do more homework, to read more articles
on the Royal Tunbridge Wells Property market like this, is the Royal Tunbridge
Wells Property Blog
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