Bluebells, we could go round and round your arguments forever. It is nowhere near as simple as you seem to think. I am of course, very much aware of the history of public built housing in England. Most of it came to a halt when Frau Thatcher, decided to sell most stock off to tenants at a 50% discount. Not utilising any of the proceeds to replace these properties. Many of the schemes to build public housing started around the early 30’s I think. It was a part of the plan to clear the slums in London and other cities. This major building of public housing continued until 50’s. Apparently the government borrowed huge sums of money from the USA to pay for this.
A relative of mine lived in a very nice, well built council home. The council took care of all repairs, including completely repainting inside and out at no cost to the tenant, so they were well maintained and comfortable.
Now I have just been reading about the history of public housing in Australia. A most interesting article tbh. Immigrant builders were brought over from the UK and there was a major mission to build many homes from 1943, I think. You can read it for yourself, I will put the link up. It took a great deal longer than planned of course and many obstacles had to be endured, a shortage of building materials eg. These immigrants were I am told, housed in makeshift uncomfortable accomodation like old Nissan huts and they lived rough. But presumably were placed on the list for new housing as it became available. Eventually a scheme, similar to Thatchers was brought in. Many tenants bought their homes again taking more product out of the market. Which was not replaced.
Of course. since then, the population of Australia has increased a great deal. And even this year, has got completely out of hand. These are not builders, they are professional people, accountants, doctors, IT specialists etc. Plus the idiotic government has allowed far too many Chinese students in, the profits made from these people is astronomical, but it is a back door entrance for wealthy Chinese parents to invest and leave many properties unoccupied.
But what is very apparent is that both the UK governments and Australian have figured out that the cost of providing public housing and maintaining it is prohibitive. That is why they do not have any interest in reenacting any of these schemes again. The tax payers would actually be up in arms at the costs. I am certain that many have run the ruler over the figures. So they do not care! I do not believe it will ever happen.
As for your suggestion that new investors buy only new builds, that is the road to ruin. I would never touch a new build nowadays. We did an owner build one several years ago, some units and also had our farmhouse built. But builders are going broke almost on a daily basis, plus the the quality is appalling.
If an elderly person wishes to continue to live in their old family home, where they feel safe and have nice neighbours and precious memories. That is their right. We are not living in a communist country......yet! Where people have all their freedoms taken from them, so forget that. You should be thinking about how YOU PERSONALLY are prepared to do something to help to change the situation and you could if you wanted to. Not continuously barking on like an old dog blaming everyone else. That is pointless and not taking an iota of responsibility for helping anyone is it.
