House Moving Experiences – Improve all U.K. housing markets locally

20 December, 20238 February, 2024

The best way to solve the shortage of supply of available houses to rent or buy across the whole of Britain

There is a ‘middle way’ between central government trying to coerce local government into granting unwanted planning approvals for contentious residential housing developments and opposition governments becoming elected by saying they would bring back compulsory housing targets!

It is to allow local town and parish councils to determine residential planning permissions and by so doing, manage and maintain the balance of their own local housing supply and demand.

To achieve this I am campaigning for a complete transfer of decision-making powers for the granting of residential planning approvals, which would give local parish and town councils full responsibility to bring forward effective development plans and be able to grant planning approvals in accordance with these without interference by central government.

In other words the responsibility to balance the use of all residential property should be assigned to local parish and town councils in order to meet existing and future demand for the right type of residential development within their area.

This would make such councils active in ensuring that new and existing residential property, within their jurisdiction, would allow for a user-spread which is fully able to accommodate future demand for housing within the local residential property pool under their control.

Enabling this would be enabling real town planning. If given this responsibility, each district and its local planning committees would be expected to balance the demands for each type of residential property user in their area, so that those requiring housing in its various forms should be able to obtain it.

In this way, each area would be empowered to succeed in providing housing for its own residents. This could result in all areas within the Britain becoming able to house its local inhabitants adequately.

What we need is ‘Local’ Democracy, ‘Local’ Accountability.

This proposal would work by completely replacing the current top-down residential planning policies, which are failing and demonstrably insufficient. I ask that this new proposal for root and branch change should be fully examined, scrutinised, debated and after all of that, be inaugurated.

For more details follow the link below:

The house price affordability crisis

Posted by: Peter Hendry, Housing Valuation Consultant

Author of:– The House Price Solution, otherwise known as The Hendry Solution.

All we need are our forward-looking councillors to get together and vote for these changes. Those who want to represent their constituents will be keen to examine these new proposals, discuss their merits, and champion their adoption soon.

This is a no more nonsense solution for housing, by balancing demand and supply in each separate local area within Britain.

22 July, 20238 February, 2024

The house price affordability crisis

To fully resolve this housing crisis requires the following reforms.

To begin, the planning system should be tilted away from its excessively stringent development control method and instead be moved towards a new, open and locally focused, rules-based zoning system, based on ‘types of user’.

I am saying towns and their associated hinterlands should zone all existing and future housing within their administration into the following specific categories:

Owner occupation: (by those working locally or retired)

Affordable to buy: (for those starting off in life and by those working locally)

Private rental: (by those working locally)

Social housing lettings: (by those working locally or retired)

Second homes: (for those not working locally)

Holiday lettings:

If considered advantageous planning-wise, a mix of these user designations, which should be specific to each individual house, might be allowed in the same street or location.

This would give planners, advising and, acting in accordance with democratically elected local councillors, appropriate authority to oversee how the local environment should be developed and nurtured, taking into account present community aspirations.

These criteria should all be enshrined within new and upgraded Neighbourhood Development Plans lasting at least for five years at a time.

Towns and Parish councils which only have the current right to comment on planning applications within their area, should instead be given the power to decide them. This would be an absolute game-changer.

In peacetime (i.e. whilst our country is not at war with another), residential planning consents should be delegated to all local town or parish councils for them to determine, depending upon local housing need.

This way, genuinely democratic decisions may be arrived at using local decision-makers whom are best able to understand what the current needs of the community are at any particular time.

The other primary change must be to improve the way in which houses are actually marketed, by using registered buyer agents instead of estate agents. This equally vital change is covered in detail under the article headed. The House Price Solution.

For more information on the necessary house marketing changes, go to:

The House Price Solution

How to Improve all local housing markets in England and Wales

Posted by: Peter Hendry, Housing Valuation Consultant

Author of:– The House Price Solution otherwise known as The Hendry Solution.

11 May, 202228 December, 2023

The new 2022 proposals by the Levelling Up Secretary Michael Gove were good.

The new 2022 Levelling up Bill was a breath of fresh air and would introduce new ways to speed up housebuilding. It would help new homes get built to a better specification, get built in the locations which need such housing, get them built more to the requirement of the local communities that need them and be priced more in-line with the level of affordability within those communities needing them.

Scrapping the previous and much debated Planning White Paper is therefore seen as being a very necessary decision, as this has failed to stimulate the building of the housing that people actually want in the places they want them and at the prices they can realistically afford.

The new White Paper is expected to change all of this.

Among the features in the new Bill will be:

Design codes enabling local communities to set rules about the layout of new developments and the materials which could be used.

A new infrastructure levy determined locally to raise the funds for projects such as schools, hospitals and roads by basing the levy on the value of the property when it is sold instead of as it gets planning permission.

More will be added here about this, as we hear more about it.

For the correct way to deal with the present and escalating housing crisis, you can simply search on The House Price Solution. This explanation is what would restore the housing markets across our land to rude health at long last. Here is the reasoning set out in brief.

I advocate a complete reorganisation of the way in which houses are bought, sold and rented in this country, which is long overdue.

In full response to the ‘lack of supply’ pontificators, whom are rather prevalent currently, the whole rationale or philosophy behind my carefully considered solution for restoring the housing markets around Britain to good health, embraces the wisdoms of bygone days. How so? There was a time when latin was in general parlance and the words: “Caveat Emptor” were in frequent use. The meaning of this should never have been forgotten.

This used to be an express warning which was applied especially where property or real estate was concerned. The words of the warning mean: ‘Let the buyer beware – unless they are covered by the seller’s warranty in terms of quality and worth’. The meaning of this simple latin saying amply describes why the current failures are occurring, manifesting within all housing markets up and down our still great country.

We should remember this because in actual fact it is the one thing which is required, in order to restore and correct the damaging anomalies surrounding today’s accelerating house prices. As explained, these anomalies arise from our having departed from and forgotten what were previously well-known and established wisdoms, to be relied upon whenever undertaking commercial transactions such as those involving the buying of houses for family use.

The problem of unaffordable house prices today simply isn’t a supply-side matter at all. It is a price-side problem not a supply-side one. A-level students studying economics ought to know this! Once this is understood, the requisite changes to the way in which our housing markets operate across the whole country may be realised so that they may, once again become normality. Central government necessarily would need to take a lead in resolving this current-day house price crisis of course.

In the local area where I live for example, there are clearly more than a sufficient number of houses that certainly could be used to satisfy both present and future demand for residential housing but they are not coming onto the market. Instead they are being used for non-residential uses. It is this that needs addressing most urgently, not the headlong rush to build more houses to satisfy a purely notional lack of supply when in fact, there is a more than adequate supply of suitable property both in our locality and in plenty of other locations all over the place!

Please consider what is being explained here and raise any relevant questions on this for public scrutiny and discussion. A campaign ought to be mounted to bring this matter to the attention of our government should those interested in this wish that to happen.

The right formula for such a reorganisation is what now needs to be fully debated and once arrived at I am confident that the formula for change would embrace much of what I am presenting and is not only worthy of full scrutiny but is a correct formula for the necessary change and is overdue for adoption.

The explanation of how to peg accelerating house prices as well as delivering all the other housing market improvements desperately needed starts here. You can read all about these fresh new proposals at the following link:

The House Price Solution

How to Improve all local housing markets in England and Wales

Anybody who agrees with what is presented here should go and challenge their local MP asking them to properly examine this and get it fully and properly debated in The House of Commons without further delay.

Posted by: Peter Hendry, Housing Valuation Consultant
Author of:– The House Price Solution otherwise known as The Hendry Solution.

14 April, 202218 September, 2023

Are estate agents taking us for fools?

The continuing rise in house prices during and following COVID clearly show that the following proposals for re-shaping house-marketing are fully justified and long overdue.

The severe reduction in the number of sellers putting their houses on the market is a clear indication of their concern for not being able to successfully move house, owing to the unexpectedly rising house prices!

The explanation of how to resolve accelerating house prices begins here. Read all about these fresh new proposals at the following link:

The House Price Solution

How to Improve all local housing markets in England and Wales

Posted by: Peter Hendry, Housing Valuation Consultant
Author of:– The House Price Solution otherwise known as The Hendry Solution.

17 March, 202228 September, 2023

We must face the housing affordability dilemma head on

Yes we must face the housing affordability dilemma head on.

We must very soon deal with the upcoming cost-of-living crisis in energy, fuel, food and housing which are the main essentials of increasing concern to those living on tight budgets in our newly independent country. Housing is the most expensive of these.

House prices have radically outpaced affordability at a time when western economies (both here and abroad), are on shaky ground. This clearly indicates that something is seriously wrong with the operation of our housing markets as far as house buying, selling, renting and letting is concerned.

If you agree with this then what follows is a considered assessment of how best to deal with this problem.

The explanation of how to resolve accelerating house prices begins at the following link

The House Price Solution

How to Improve all local housing markets in England and Wales

Posted by: Peter Hendry, Housing Valuation Consultant
Author of:– The House Price Solution otherwise known as The Hendry Solution.

House Prices v General Affordability:
We are able to offer consultancy services to government on this and other property-related matters.

The pages in this blog deal with the underlying reasons why the most troublesome housing affordability issue of our time has come into being over the years. It’s a marketing error not a national economic one and it is quite different from the old supply and demand argument which is generally trotted out by agents in an attempt to explain the matter away.

Constructive comments are very much welcomed.