The UK hyper-inflated private housing market is the worst in Europe. After independence Scotland can fix this.

Private housing in Europe is much better value

Private houses in mainland Europe are:

• Better designed, to higher standards;
• Larger; and
• Cheaper.

In the UK we get by far the smallest houses for our money. Looking at it the other way around, the same size house will cost by far the most in the UK.

What’s more UK house builders are purely profit motivated. They “bank” land and only use it for houses when they need to – not because people want them to. This means they can keep prices artifially high and make more money. They use the same unimaginative cheap-to-build plain box designs everywhere – whereas in mainland Europe builders take pride in the architectural innovation they put into house designs.

Social housing

Scotland builds many more Social houses than England – but still not enough to counter the hyper-inflated UK private housing market. Councils are hindered by the UK Government with right-to-buy legislation and barriers to investing in new stock. Land remains expensive and mostly owned by large private landowners who prefer sporting estates to supporting the social good.

Reform and investment

After independence Scotland can introduce the land and private rent reforms it needs to properly support social and long term private rental sectors. This will also stimulate house builders who can be more imaginative and competitive in their offerings.

Sources

https://www.buzzfeed.com/albertonardelli/8-charts-that-show-the-difference-between-the-uk-housing-mar

https://www.ons.gov.uk/peoplepopulationandcommunity/housing/datasets/ukhousebuildingpermanentdwellingsstartedandcompleted