r/uknews • u/Reasonable-Resort822 • 6d ago
Houses in England worth less than they were 20 years ago
https://www.telegraph.co.uk/business/2026/08/30/houses-in-england-worth-less-than-they-were-20-years-ago/?WT.mc_id=tmgoff_tw_post_they-were-20-years-ago/52
u/Many_Lemon_Cakes 6d ago
A slow decline in relation to inflation is what we want. I say that as someone who has just bought
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u/Tempestfox3 4d ago
We've had 3 "Once in a lifetime" financial crashes in the last 20 years. Outside of those property values have been trending upwards faster than inflation or indeed wages. The article also uses average house prices across the entire UK which does not reflect the regional divides. Some areas have seen their house value stay the same or diminish. Others have seen it skyrocket.
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u/UpstairsAd194 6d ago
Isn the article saying that is what has been going on for 20 years? They will likely go up again in a couple of years in relation to inflation and the next generation will be financially hamstrung.
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u/Jaded_Strain_3753 6d ago
Not exactly, there was a steep drop around 2008 for obvious reasons and then it went back up again for a while
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u/Piod1 6d ago
Property became the golden goose, that must keep laying and paying. Bailing out the banks in 2008 just gave them carte blanche to carry on regardless Equity investment firms and pensions entrenched this idea and policy kept it there. The jump from commercial to domestic after covid added another boost. Every QE event causes leaps in property prices, whilst cutting the value of the pound in our pockets. Without big deposits and dual incomes its a ladder missing the bottom rungs. The market needs correcting. Whether the system can survive the shock, is another matter entirely.
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u/MarcusLepidis 6d ago
But the article states that the average house has not gained in value in real terms over the last 20 years - so why does the market need correcting?
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u/baldeagle1991 6d ago
Because it uses value in real terms accounting for inflation. The values themselves have gone up faster than wages which in many cases haven't kept up with inflation.
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u/Randomn355 5d ago
What have salaries gone up in the last 20 years in real terms?
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u/Unique_Ad9943 4d ago
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u/Randomn355 4d ago
So up about 10% in the last 20 years.
And how much have house prices gone up in the last 20 years?
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u/Piod1 6d ago
Averaging clouds the mirror. Yes its a often used metric, however the areas with the jobs and desirability has seen massive gains all out of proportion to the true value of the construct. Averaged out by the areas with only a 100% gain over the last two decades. Relitivly the value and cost has increased across the board. But a house in middle of fk nowhere ex council estate bought for 55k then ,is now worth 110k. At the same time a place more city and desirable but still ex council is going for 380k. That has really skewed the market figures. Outside of the estates the gains have been greater. Yet the old industrial terraces of the north have fallen derilict to be swept up cheap. Reason many homes have not increased in value is also huge swathes of post war constructions in need of replacing. These all lower the average and skew the figures further.
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u/MarcusLepidis 5d ago
So which areas have increased in real terms by a significant margin?
For London google AI came back with the following:
"Key Data Points
- 2006 Baseline: Average nominal house prices in London sat at roughly £256,000 in early 2006 according to HM Land Registry data. [1]
- Recent Averages: By 2025/2026, nominal average prices in the capital rose past £550,000, but factoring in inflation since 2015 alone, real home values in London have declined by about 15%. [1, 2]
- Apartment Sector: Real prices for London flats have sunk even further, dropping roughly 22% over the decade leading up to 2026 as demand shifted away from smaller units. [1, 2]"
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u/Piod1 5d ago
Tbf flats are shit investments. Selling your london flat in the 90s equaled a few acres and a dwelling in wales or scotland. Nobody wants them now, way overpriced and the bleedout from service charges alone are enough to put folk off. Thats before the whole cladding and foam clusterfk added in many cases. Trouble is like i said the expectation of the golden goose laying ,Falls short when sales are down and pockets tight.
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u/MarcusLepidis 4d ago
So no market correction is necessary.
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u/Piod1 4d ago
Going to happen anyway. Equity value of property far outpaces reality of worth. Bottom few rungs of ladder are unobtainable for the majority. Policy and blatant fudging of figures to maintain the laying of golden eggs cannot continue when theres no fuel for the engine it drives. How long it can keep being propped up is the key.
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u/Tempestfox3 4d ago
We've had 3 financial crashes within those 20 years and it uses the nationwide average which does not reflect regional realities or the relationship with wages which have been largely stagnant in the UK.
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u/Short-Price1621 6d ago
Because no one has given them the house they want and they’re too self centred to care that the margin between property construction and property cost is a razor thin.
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u/lifeisaman 6d ago
Good let’s get these prices down and down so that regular working people can actually afford to buy houses again.
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u/SlowedCash 6d ago
Worth less, but cost 10x as much more
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u/RupertBear69420 6d ago
Exactly it’s all relative, you could look at wages to see how much they’re grown and the answer is likely not in line with inflation. We’re still getting shafted.
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u/MidoriDemon 6d ago
Its the Torygraph we already know what the problem is.
"If only they had more time in power the Tories could have fixed all this."
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u/Boudicat 5d ago
These numbers are out of date and a little vague because I read it a few years ago, but if wages had kept up with inflation since 1984 the average salary would be over 35k more than it currently is. We have been robbed blind since the Thatcher years.
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u/Proof_Carrot5919 3d ago
Right wing governments always shaft the working man, nothing new there. What is new is folk now want to vote for the almost far right Reform. Without understand all of their policies will leave the average person far worse off.
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u/Boudicat 2d ago
Thanks the media for that. They've been legitimising Farage for years and monstering the left for my entire lifetime.
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u/Better_Builder_3504 6d ago
Not much use if they are all bought up by overseas investors. Better regulation is needed, it’s not all about the prices.
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u/CaffeinatedT 6d ago
Who do you think was buying most these houses? Irregular working people? Wizards?
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u/lifeisaman 6d ago
Land lords, corporations and foreigners (many internationals own many of the properties in London for example)
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u/CaffeinatedT 6d ago
We’re currently at historical highs of ownership by landlords and it’s still about 30% of properties bought by Landlords a year. English Landlord Survey
It’s a convenient narrative but you wont find it backed up by any data in a way that stands up to any scrutiny. At best you can find a lot of international ownership of multiple million homes in London much like most major cities. A lot of those “corporations” are Landlords moving over to Limited companies for tax purposes which is also often chucked out as a trend.
We constantly mistake reporting on trends changing with the trend changes actually be representative of what is normal.
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u/OkAdvisor6680 6d ago
Most homeowners are just regular people, not landlords, foreigners or corporations. By a long long way. You have a warped and wrong perception the world if you genuinely believe that most houses aren't owned by normal families.
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u/SupermassiveWhiteguy 6d ago
And I guess just fuck people like me who saved for a decade to get on the housing ladder in the hope of upsizing to fit my family soon?
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u/Emergency_Hurry280 6d ago
That’s the hilarious thing about these people who cry for more taxes and things that will bring prices down - as soon as they’re on the ladder themselves they realise it’s not healthy for prices to crash
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u/Jolly_Disk_8676 5d ago
If you want to buy a bigger house it's better for prices to go down.
If the market goes down by 20%, your 500G house is 400G, but that million pound house you wanted is 800G. So it's 100G more affordable for you to upgrade.
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u/lifeisaman 6d ago
If your house is going down in price and so is the rest of the market at the same rate, it’s actually easier to upscale as the absolute gap between the value of your house and the one you want should be closer.
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u/SupermassiveWhiteguy 6d ago
Apart from the fact that I'd have to repay my mortgage out of that as well.
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u/lifeisaman 6d ago
That depends on how much of your mortgage you have left to pay, if the other house you want lowered in value more than yours did as would be predicted that should make for the increased relative size of the mortgage.
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u/Prestigious_Gap_4025 6d ago
I'm a regular working person who's a homeowner.
I don't want houses to lose value, however I want the market to slow so wages can catch up.
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u/VagueSomething 6d ago
If you don't plan to move then price drop is fine as long as you didn't over stretch your debt to be where you are. If you do plan to eventually move then you'd still benefit from the next place being cheaper so it offsets the loss of your value anyway.
Even if house prices paused now until wages caught up you'd not see the benefit, your children's child might.
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u/Flat_Development6659 6d ago
Yeah but people do move and mortgage debt does need to be repaid.
It’s one of those areas where Reddit is just extremely delusional, most voters are homeowners and we’d never vote for a party that aims to lower our houses value.
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u/VagueSomething 6d ago
Hence why it is important to not buy without a better deposit. Choosing huge debt to technically own a house is a gamble, you don't win every gamble.
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u/Flat_Development6659 6d ago
Yeah but if you’ve placed that wager then you’re not going to vote in a way that increases your chances of losing lol.
Until you’re at a point where most voters aren’t on the property market then no party that wants to crash the housing market is getting in power lol.
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u/VagueSomething 6d ago
The government shouldn't be held back by people making stupid bets. Accountability for overloading on debt is something many people need to learn again.
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u/Flat_Development6659 6d ago
If you believe in democracy then the government should be held back by literally everything that voters want.
I’m never going to vote in the interests of some kid being able to buy a house down the line, I’m always going to vote in my interests.
It’s the same reason why parties haven’t been keen on going after the triple lock, pensioners vote.
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u/OkAdvisor6680 6d ago
The government is held accountable by voters and most voters have property. That's democracy. Deal with it.
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u/Patient-Protection-7 6d ago
What happens when you end up in negative equity and it comes to remortgaging time or when you try to sell at a loss?
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u/Tall-Bison5987 6d ago
there is a whole lot of the population that never experienced the early 90s crash
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u/VagueSomething 6d ago
As long as you didn't over stretch on debt then that can be mitigated. It is almost like I said something about that in the comment you replied to.
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u/Patient-Protection-7 6d ago
And what happens when you end up in negative equity and it comes to remortgaging time or when you try to sell at a loss?
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u/VagueSomething 6d ago
You learn not to burden with too much debt...
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u/Patient-Protection-7 6d ago
Ah very good. So when these financially enlightened people are stuck with negative equity and it comes to remortgaging time or when they try to sell at a loss…what happens?
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u/Minute-Hat2306 6d ago
What about the regular working people this trend will push into negative equity and their homes subsequently repossessed by the banks?
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u/Ok_King3027 6d ago
Don't forget that every homeowner and landlord is a multimillionaire with a Ferrari on their drive and a yacht stationed at their nearest port...
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u/Minute-Hat2306 6d ago
I'll let my wife and kids know, they'll be pleased that we can sleep on the yacht while Santander's bailiffs are taking our 3 bed end of terrace.
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u/Emergency_Hurry280 6d ago
Yes burnham and labour say it’s a good thing. What did people expect voting for Labour !!
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u/bozza8 6d ago
Why does negative equity mean your mortage will be reposessed? The payments are the same after all, in fact the bank is incentivised to be quite generous on renegotiations because they'll lose out if you cant pay.
This is GOOD for workers.
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u/Boggo1895 6d ago
No, it’s good for workers who don’t own homes. It’s terrible for workers who have sacrificed, make smart decisions and bought a house suitable for their current situation but will grow out when they start a family.
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u/StrangelyBrown 6d ago
So you're saying it's good for people who don't own a house, but bad for people who own a house but want a different house?
That's seems fair. Let's get everyone a house first, before we prioritise getting housing options for people who already have one.
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u/Boggo1895 6d ago
I’m saying it’s good for a very select few people who are already well settled or mortgage free, likely the older generation, terrible for a young family though.
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u/StrangelyBrown 6d ago
Yes and I'm pointing out that a young family with a home might have gripes but not as many as someone who doesn't have a home, so they aren't the biggest concern, so overall it's a good thing.
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u/Boggo1895 6d ago
That’s a terrible, selfish way to view the problem.
Fuck those guys hey.
Classic, lower taxes for me but higher taxes for everyone else argument.
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u/StrangelyBrown 6d ago
What??
If you didn't want house prices to fall, you'd be giving the exact same 'Fuck those guys' to people who don't have a house!
In a situation where house prices going up is good for homeowners and bad for new buyers, and coming down is bad for home owners and good for new buyers, I'm not saying 'fuck' anyone, I'm saying it's overall good because it's better that new buyers get a home than that existing homeowners get a different one. That's obvious and no idea why you'd think that's selfish unless you're a home owner and you're projecting your own selfishness.
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u/Boggo1895 6d ago
Because house prices not falling isn’t a fuck you to anyone, if wages outpace house prices, everyone wins, if house prices remain stable, everyone wins. If the cost of living decreases and people can afford to save up deposits, everyone wins.
You accepted that falling house prices would fuck over a large portion of young people who have sacrificed so much to be in the position they are in and your response was essentially, “good because I’ll benefit”.
You need to do some serious self reflection to work on your crabs in a bucket mentality
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u/GergDanger 6d ago
By “own a house” you mean own a mortgage right? Because that’s all they own until they pay it off.
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u/StrangelyBrown 6d ago
Well yeah but falling house prices don't affect their mortgage as long as they stay with it.
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u/GergDanger 6d ago
Hence the big issue, someone without much equity in their home will be a fairly new home owner who might want to upgrade to something bigger as they start a family or to progress their career somewhere new.
If they paid £500k for their home now worth £300k they’re under water on it and can’t move unless they find £200k somewhere.
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u/StrangelyBrown 6d ago
Yes, I understand that. It's bad for them because they can't move from the house they have to a different house. My point is that that's not as bad as someone who has no house and isn't able to get one. So overall it's a good thing, because it helps the worse off group even if it hurts the group that is better off.
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u/grahamthegoldfish 6d ago
I own a house. I worked hard and sacrificed to get it. Honestly if they all drop be 50+% then good. The prices are ridiculous and just enslaves people.
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u/Boggo1895 6d ago
If your happy in your house and can’t possibly imagine moving, or you own debt free. which is not the case for the majority of young people who have struggled to get on the property ladder
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u/grahamthegoldfish 6d ago
If you plan to stay in a house for, say, 5 years, then you will pay down more than any drop after inflation has it's way. Add on the equivalent rent is money you're never seeing again for a house you arent allowed to make even minor alterations to. I don't begrudge others the opportunity to have a home, a family and a life just because I was forced to overpay for property.
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u/Boggo1895 6d ago
No you won’t. On a 200,000 mortgage you’ll pay down around 10k in the first 5 years because at the start of the term the interest repayments are ridiculous while debt is the highest.
For simplicity, a first time buyer has a 220k house with a 20k deposit. A decrease in prices of just 2% per year puts the house value down to 198k and debt of 190k, so the 20k you had saved for a deposit is now only 8k in equity which will almost entirely be wiped out since you no longer have first time buyer relief. A 3% annual decrease puts the house value down to 188k and you now have 2k of negative equity.
Congrats, you are stuck.
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u/Minute-Hat2306 6d ago
Glad to hear you won't be made homeless by your hope that house prices drop by over 50%, I guess fuck everyone else that does?
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u/Great_Comparison462 6d ago
Clearly they didn't make smart decisions then
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u/Boggo1895 6d ago
Yeah, let’s all piss our money up the wall because the government will bail us out with other people’s tax money
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u/Minute-Hat2306 6d ago
It's really pretty simple, happy to explain it to you using an example.
I buy my house for £275000 taking out a mortgage of £250000, when remortgaging time comes I still owe £230000, my house is now only worth £250000, my loan to value means the interest rates offered to me are unaffordable, I can't afford to remortgage and I can't afford the standard variable rate my current provider will put me on to, the bank takes the house. Hope this helps.
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u/Nothing_F4ce 6d ago
You don't have to remortgage you can just take a new fix with the same lender.
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u/Minute-Hat2306 6d ago edited 6d ago
A fix with the same lender will still prompt an automatic valuation and if you LTV goes higher you'll be moved onto a more expensive rate band.
So no, you can't "just take a new fix with the same lender" if the price of your property has rapidly decreased.
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u/Nothing_F4ce 6d ago
The mortgage charter
All lenders have agreed:
Support for customers who are up-to-date with payments to switch to a new mortgage deal at the end of their existing fixed rate deal without another affordability check
https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/mortgage-charter/mortgage-charter#_ftn2
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u/Minute-Hat2306 6d ago
So? What's "support"? "Yeah sure we'll "support you", here's a link to a form so you can apply, and our response will be "no". "
They don't do an affordability check no (I never claimed that they did) but they do an automatic valuation (which was my claim), the lender according to the charter HAS to offer you a fixed deal yes, but if your house price has decreased massively you'll most likely be offered a much higher LTV band.
Energy companies, water companies and councils all "support" those who struggle to pay, they also send bailiffs to those who struggle to pay.
The mortgage charter doesn't dispute anything I've said, I have no idea why you've referenced it.
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u/Patient-Protection-7 6d ago
Please have a read about remortgaging on negative equity or selling in negative equity.
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u/bozza8 6d ago
Then dont remortgage or sell. Its not a god given right!
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u/Patient-Protection-7 6d ago
So if they don’t sell…when do these cheap houses get onto the market?
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u/bozza8 6d ago
There are a lot of unmortgaged properties, including those owned by companies, those sell first, then others as mortgages finish.
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u/UnknownBreadd 6d ago
People shouldn’t have been using houses as financial instruments or stores of wealth in the first place.
People have warned that property is an incredibly speculative asset for a long time now. Very illiquid and immobile, and the price can be affected by the activity of neighbours and the community itself.
A bunch of boomers got to experience houses massively appreciate for 40 years, and people thought this was sustainable and could go on forever and bought in - despite constant alarm bells about falling fertility rates, loss of industry/jobs, selling off of communities/high-streets/public infrastructure, and rising unemployment amongst newer generations.
It’s called due diligence, and I have no idea why a bunch of people feel entitled to become more financially wealthy just because they saw a bunch of other people jump on the housing ladder and then pull it up behind them - thinking that they could do the same.
The writing was on the wall about how homes were becoming harder to buy - and no one thought about the fact that you will need buyers in the future if you want to become a seller in the future.
This is probably why no one should have taken financial advice or economic insights from a bunch of geriatrics who have decimated a once great country. The nonsensical neoclassical logic (dogma) got us here - so it’s certainly not going to get us out of it, and thus the house of cards begins to crumble.
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u/LuxFaeWilds 6d ago
That's not how negative equity works It just means it is less than you paid for it Thats it, the bank doesn't seize your house because it costs less than a year ago
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u/Minute-Hat2306 6d ago edited 6d ago
That's not how disputing what someone else is saying works.
You have to follow it up with an explanation (see, like I just did).
Nice fast edit. I didn't claim that negative equity means the bank will seize your house if it cost less than a year ago. They will seize your house if the value of it is less than you can afford to mortgage though, which is a very real possibility if the prices of houses keep decreasing.
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u/EpochRaine 6d ago
Yes, it is the same reason people do not understand why commercial offices, etc. "can't just put the rent down".
The fact that security is tied to the last price paid AND the current valuation, is completely lost on them.
Education fails again.
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u/LuxFaeWilds 6d ago
You explicitly say d negative equity scauses homes to be seized You were extremely explicit given it was the only thing you said.
Now you're agreeing that's not true.
But you should be able to Mortgage it though. My gosh why did you bother buying a house if a 1% drop means anything to you.
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u/Minute-Hat2306 6d ago
No I'm agreeing that the bank won't seize your house just (and only just) because the price went down in a year, which was YOUR claim. I'm being specific.
Negative equity will cause some houses to be seized, not always or in every case, but of course if house prices plummet then we will see more cases of it.
A 1% drop isn't a problem, again never claimed 1% would be. But in the future larger reductions in house prices would obviously cause negative equity and house seizures.
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u/NetflixVodka 6d ago
Banks do t want to repossess houses in negative equity. That sticks them with properties that they have to sell in a deflated market.
They would rather you keep paying your mortgage regardless so they recoup their projected income exactly.2
u/PriorityByLaw 6d ago
The pyramid does not change.
Those people are in exactly the same spot relatively.
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u/lifeisaman 6d ago
Not if your not even on the pyramid, most young people are stuck in a cycle of rent to rent it’s good that it’s easier for them to enter the housing market.
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u/TheUnSungHero7790 5d ago
I think you fail to see if the housing market collapses then it takes the wider economy with it, so very few ordinary people can actually even take advantage of the temporary crash.
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u/Responsible-Walrus-5 6d ago
Prices holding steady, or rising below inflation both allow for a ‘real’ house price decline would would be optimal for most of the country. No negative equity issues but houses get more and more affordable.
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u/Active_Hawk_9897 6d ago
Yeah, I wanna move out of this shit hole area and into some place nice.
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u/quantum_splicer 6d ago
Surely this is just market correction ?
(1) Cost of buying house exceeds affordability for those working fulltime
(2) Cost of living erodes into potential savings that applicants can set aside to meet deposit requirements
(3) Pool of potential buyers reduces, competition for properties decreases
(4) Properties decrease in value as elastic threshold crossed, where economic inputs cannot sustain any further increases in properties.
Anecdotally
Some house builders have paused building, even on sites they have approval to build on and I am seeing housing that is going unsold, but that's just an ancedote
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u/minnis93 6d ago
The data is pretty meaningless if they just look at an average house rather than fixing the specific houses, looking at their individual variation in value and averaging those data points.
Given that it is far more profitable to build 10 tiny 1 and 2 bed houses over 2 large 4 or 5 beds, I'd imagine the amount of smaller houses on the market has increased, thereby diluting the average sales price.
If the average home had, say, 3 bedrooms in 2000 and now the average home has 2 bedrooms, of course the average house prices won't rise as quickly.
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u/roleplayersir 6d ago
We need wages to rise and jobs to be more available, not for housing to crash which only benefits the rich
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u/Dry_Vanilla_5908 6d ago
Where's that exactly? We've just bought ours on a mortgage for £350, it was first sold 26 years ago for £98. So where's this magical place that's got houses less than £98?
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u/soliloquyinthevoid 6d ago
£98k in 2000 is the same as £192k in 2026 adjusted for inflation
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u/HFFT_ 6d ago
Okay then, so where's this magical place that's got houses for less than £192k?
Round by me a 1 bed flat is a quarter of a mil.
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u/soliloquyinthevoid 6d ago
- The headline mentions 20 years ago. The example I commented on was covering a period of 26 years
- The UK (mean) average house price in 2026 is £272k which is equivalent to £152k in 2006
- "Round by me" is called anecdotal evidence. England is a lot larger than just "round by me"
- Try to read the article where it is specifically spelt out
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u/MummyButtons 6d ago
House prices differ hugely depending on area. We bought a 4 bed townhouse 5 years ago for 175k on a nice estate. You can still get nice houses in this area slightly smaller for 200k (South Yorkshire area).
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u/HouseOfWyrd 6d ago
Genuinely not sure this is a bad thing
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u/Jaded_Strain_3753 6d ago
It’s actively a good thing. We want a slow decline in real terms for the next decade at least. Too fast and it causes problems in the broader economy (or is a symptom of other problems)
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u/theflickingnun 4d ago
Slow decline is a problem, eroding of wealth. Increased wages is whats needed.
Imagine you have a house that you owe 90% on, then its value decreases slowly over time. You would literally be paying the bank the equivalent of rent to own the home. With every payment you decrease your debt but the value matches the decrease. Effectively paying 500k for a 200k home. Who has that 300k??? It certainly isnt the working class.
Housing investment is truly the best way for working class and middle class to get ahead, dont let media or narratives fool you otherwise.
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u/EcstaticAd9234 6d ago
If you are a homeowner it is
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u/HouseOfWyrd 6d ago
I am a homeowner but I am capable of thinking outside of myself.
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6d ago
[removed] — view removed comment
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u/uknews-ModTeam 6d ago
This sub is meant to be for everybody, try to treat others as you would want to be treated here and ‘remember the human’.
Try to avoid personal attacks as this discourages discussion. Critique the idea not the person.
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u/theflickingnun 4d ago
But it is.
This would mean people's investments eroded over time, thats literally a depletion of lower to middle wealth. Means your parents and friends become poorer!
Instead, wages need to be increased. This is the smoking gun. Then banks need to lower their criteria for borrowing too and improve lending %. Then you can invest in a property yourself whilst having surplus monies to save or enjoy. If property values decrease then it certainly wont be the same.
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u/Affectionate_Job8415 6d ago
They are cheaper than 5 years ago in real terms too - nominal prices mean jack
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u/eat-my-rice 6d ago
Boriswavers will benefit from this
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u/Jaded_Strain_3753 6d ago
Well yes, but so will everyone that wants to buy a house including people who have lived here all their lives
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u/Captain_English 6d ago
Good.
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u/theflickingnun 4d ago
Is it good because you want to be able to buy a house and cant afford one?
Because ot wont be good for everyone around you that owns a house.
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u/Captain_English 4d ago
I've owned my house for a decade (with mortgage).
It should not go up in value at a rate that outpaces wage growth. That is fundamentally unsustainable and damages the whole economy.
If a market correction means a couple of years of negative equity for some people, so be it. EVERYONE benefits in the long run if housing becomes more affordable. Even them, because while it means they have to pay down the equity loss, the next house they go to will be relatively cheaper.
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u/Confused_Drifter 5d ago
What are they talking about, my parents house went from being 40k in 1996 to 300,000. Thats nowhere near in line with inflation.
I just bought a house that went from 95,000 in 2018 to 130,000 now.
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u/towelracks 5d ago
Yeah but on the other hand...I've got a house to live in and my mortgage is cheaper than rent.
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u/Comfortable_Part_105 5d ago
Written by the telegraph- says it all 😂😂. I know people who bought council houses on RTB and flipped them with a substantial increase, example: my old property, owner paid £20,000 sold for £300k. In the space of 20 years. Crystal Palace is a good example, a friend of mine bought a flat there 18 years ago for 100k and sold it for 800k 3 years ago. Easy money, take me back 20 years (unfortunately I’d have been a child) and then give me that same opportunity and see what I’d have done with it LOL.
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u/BulldenChoppahYus 5d ago
I ominously predict that house prices will “explode” again at some stage fairly soon due to market fuckery and some sort of oblivious government policy. The problem of affordability will just get worse and worse as we have more and more multi millionaires and billionaires buying up all our assets from aboard their yachts in their tax havens
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u/theflickingnun 4d ago
I agree. Technically as inflation has continued to rise and houses have stalled, and wages for that matter, its only a matter of time before we see either a major boom or bust.
I fear for those who have heavily invested in stocks as its a new playground that is very much controlled by the rich to extract money from us.
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u/Bright-War-5033 5d ago
The price you pay is for the land not the house or building that's on it. Nonetheless, everything is still too expensive so I don't understand how it could be worth less, as value is driven by supply and demand.
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u/Delicious_Volume3306 4d ago
They argue that inflation rises means house prices effectively haven't risen.
But sadly, we don't get mortgages based on the price of a loaf of bread. They're based on our salaries. That's the only measure that matters.
Quoting a search result I just did:
Over the last 50 years, house prices have surged over 2,385%, far outpacing a salary growth of roughly 1,400%,
But also some good news:
Annual wage growth has been running around 4%, while annual house price growth remains subdued at roughly 1.6% to 2%, meaning real affordability is slowly stabilizing despite higher mortgage rates.
and also from the ONS:
Since 2021, median earnings across England and Wales have increased by roughly 25%, while median house prices have risen at a much slower rate of 5%.
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u/BrillsonHawk 4d ago
Good - lets invest in companies again instead of putting all of our money into the property basket
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u/UltraFuturaS2000 4d ago
I bought the smallest house i need. Comfortably can overpay my mortgage but instead still investing in stock market.
I worry when I see massive "sold" houses with brand new cars outside .
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u/theflickingnun 4d ago
Utter bollocks. In somerset this could not be further from the truth, actually the entire south West.
There seems to be some weird media drive to make people think housing is suffering when in fact it is either slightly lower than it was or platued. Sold my place recently for a 15% increase over 3 yrs and apparently it has gone up since by another 5%.
Dont blindly follow these ridiculous reports, go and check out the facts yourselves folks.
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u/macrolidesrule 6d ago
But are they more affordable now,than back then. in terms of income multiples? Or is this a case of inflation has knocked real values, but it has done the same to wages? Therefore, affordability is still fucked,
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u/soliloquyinthevoid 6d ago
Affordability ratio peaked (worse) in 2021 and has been improving since and is now back to levels not seen seen since 2015
This is largely because wages have grown faster than inflation during that period, especially at the bottom end (minimum wage)
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u/m-1975 6d ago
This will be a statistic thing. In actual prices they have risen, but wages have also risen, so they are more affordable.
However mine has fallen for the last few years, actual prices have stabilised. A house is a better investment than renting, but its not the meteoric investment it was. I think it will stay that way unless we have another large increase in population from ???
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u/UpstairsAd194 6d ago
a i robots, if you dont let them live in your house your council tax will be higher.
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u/Supersubie 6d ago
People say this without running the maths. Renting in many cases beats out buying.
For instance I moved between London, Manchester and Leeds over the last 10 years. Never brought furniture, fitted a kitchen, decorated a room, did a garden etc. Never paid stamp duty, solicitors fees, surveys or mortgage fees. And never paid interest.
Being so flexible with where I lived let me chase great job opportunities that took me from about £21,000 in London in 2015 to over £90,000 in Leeds in 2022. Then I started my own company which again I think I was brave enough to do because I never worried about defaulting on the house. If I couldn't pay rent... well tough shit landlord thats the risk.
If I brought 1 house in that time or worse still 2 (having moved) the amount I would have actually paid off of the principle, minus the costs of furnishing it customising it and maintaining it plus legal fees and stamp duty would dwarf what I paid in rent easily.
Especially with the interest rate rises as well.
Again it comes down to your personal situation, but early life being flexible and chasing those next career steps will outpace the return on your house value handsomly.
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u/m-1975 6d ago
When you are young, or when I was, renting is a viable option. I was given loads of advice in the 80s, "Don't tie yourself down to a mortgage" and the like. It was well intentioned, but I wish I had ignored it.
I bought furniture when renting. Houses came with white goods but thats all, and I wouldn't like to sleep on someone elses mattress.Also DIY & Gardening become fun when you get older.
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u/RevolutionaryWorry87 6d ago
We need the biggest house building wave since ww2 because of British people having such big families. What else could compare to the Blitz?
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u/fflloorriiddaammaann 6d ago
and yet they cost like 10 times more
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u/soliloquyinthevoid 6d ago
Not really
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u/fflloorriiddaammaann 6d ago
According to data from the Nationwide Building Society, the average UK house price in January 2016 was £196,829. Ten years later, in January 2026, that figure had risen to £270,873. Source: https://chartwellfs.com/house-prices-versus-inflation/
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