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Why are Brits so obsessed with buying their own homes?

theguardian.com

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Re: Why are Brits so obsessed with buying their own homes?

#11

Post by lkrubner »

abritinthebay wrote: post #5

As a Brit in the US I don't feel the pressure is much different here. It's a little resigned and accepting that in a big city you can't afford it, but it's still expected that eventually you'll move to the suburbs and have a home. That's not surprising though as owning a home is generally about two things: financial responsibility and stability (obviously desirable), and actually owning the place that you live. "A pl…

> but it's still expected that eventually

> you'll move to the suburbs and have a home.

That might be true for the whites, but I don't think that expectation exists for the blacks or hispanics or Koreans or Chinese or basically anyone. I've known affluent Koreans who dream of eventually being wealthy enough to buy apartment buildings, but I don't know any who want to move to the suburbs.

Re: Why are Brits so obsessed with buying their own homes?

#12

Post by nextos »

CM30 wrote: post #8

An Englishman's home is his castle? Maybe it's simply that owning a home lets you do more with than renting one. You can add extensions, remodel much of it, potentially demolish the entire thing and rebuild it, that sort of thing.

Actually, as someone renting several flats in the UK during the last few years I'm still shocked by the lack of rights I have as a tenant.

For example, landlords can enter your property by only giving you a 24-hour notice in writing. I have had real state companies entering my flat without prior notice to show it to potential new tenants several times.

Other countries in the EU would take these incidents very seriously. And I'm talking about expensive flats (>$2000 / month) and reputable companies, so I imagine it can get much worse.

Re: Why are Brits so obsessed with buying their own homes?

#13

Post by ra1n85 »

toredash wrote: post #6

Same situation in Norway. But the tax incentives are so many that if you can you should buy, from an economic perspective. of course there is risks. And if mobility / freedom is weighing more than money, maybe you shouldn't buy?

I find mobility to be a valuable asset. That may be a byproduct of working in the technology industry.

Re: Why are Brits so obsessed with buying their own homes?

#15

Post by s_kilk »

jacquesm wrote: post #10
grecy wrote: post #4

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Relevant: http://i.imgur.com/eIM5o.jpg

The moral of that cartoon is that we should all become beggars I guess. It's a funny way to represent it, but there is one person missing from that cartoon. The person that refuses to go into debt, saves until they have the money to spend on whatever it is they want to buy. Another useful addition would be someone with a mortgage that they actually pay off on, their net worth would likely dwarf the net worth of the b…

> The person that refuses to go into debt, saves until they have the money to spend on whatever it is they want to buy.

Bingo. Never been in debt and glad of it.

Re: Why are Brits so obsessed with buying their own homes?

#16

Post by JumpCrisscross »

> My parents rented the family home in Paris for 45 years, and although they did buy a seaside flat and a cottage in the country in the 1970s, their value has only kept pace with inflation

American home prices only started rising, in real terms, after WWII [1]. This is driven by people wanting to drive more income to buying land, i.e. treating land as a superior good. Growing government intervention is also a cause.

In the long-run, real house prices appreciate at the rate of inflation. This effect is stable across countries, cultures, and centuries [2]. It vanishes in the short term amidst the noise of credit markets.

Can't find the source at the moment, but the most fascinating study on the subject looks at asset prices in Austria-Hungary and surrounding states. The story is uncomfortably familiar. Decade after decade, credit-fuelled gains were safeguarded in the form of development restrictions. This served to transfer wealth to the landed elites.

[1] https://www.dallasfed.org/assets/documents/institute/wpapers...

[2] http://www.amazon.com/Houses-Historical-Analysis-Property-Pr...

Re: Why are Brits so obsessed with buying their own homes?

#17

Post by EliRivers »

CM30 wrote: post #8

An Englishman's home is his castle? Maybe it's simply that owning a home lets you do more with than renting one. You can add extensions, remodel much of it, potentially demolish the entire thing and rebuild it, that sort of thing.

If this were the case, I'd expect to see a lot of this. I don't.

Re: Why are Brits so obsessed with buying their own homes?

#18

Post by cstross »

nextos wrote: post #12
CM30 wrote: post #8

An Englishman's home is his castle? Maybe it's simply that owning a home lets you do more with than renting one. You can add extensions, remodel much of it, potentially demolish the entire thing and rebuild it, that sort of thing.

Actually, as someone renting several flats in the UK during the last few years I'm still shocked by the lack of rights I have as a tenant. For example, landlords can enter your property by only giving you a 24-hour notice in writing. I have had real state companies entering my flat without prior notice to show it to potential new tenants several times. Other countries in the EU would take these incidents very serious…

Those landlords are breaking the law (and the terms of your tenancy) and I believe you can file a report with the police that will get them into very hot water with their local council -- potentially fined and booted off the register of landlords (which means it'd be an offense for them to let any flats out at all).

Source: my sister is a landlord.

Re: Why are Brits so obsessed with buying their own homes?

#19

Post by Mikeb85 »

JumpCrisscross wrote: post #16

> My parents rented the family home in Paris for 45 years, and although they did buy a seaside flat and a cottage in the country in the 1970s, their value has only kept pace with inflation American home prices only started rising, in real terms, after WWII [1]. This is driven by people wanting to drive more income to buying land, i.e. treating land as a superior good. Growing government intervention is also a cause.…

> In the long-run, real house prices appreciate at the rate of inflation.

Some one should tell this to Canadians. Since the early-mid 2000s, house prices have been rising much quicker than inflation, to the point where people think homes are an 'investment' that will always rise, leading to a massive housing bubble (also propped up by foreign buyers, many of whom are using land to launder money gained through corruption, and Canadian banks/government just look the other way) and also unaffordable housing for young prospective buyers and tenants.

Re: Why are Brits so obsessed with buying their own homes?

#20

Post by avn2109 »

ape4 wrote: post #9
outside1234 wrote: post #3

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Your response to that should be: "you are not a responsible adult until you are debt free." That is actually one of the secrets to a lower stress longer lasting life IMO.

There is a stress in renting too. You never know if your landlord might want to change things resulting in a request for you to move out. eg he wants relatives to have the apartment, etc.

This is less of an issue if your landlord is a giant faceless soulless holding company that operates many real estate businesses. Though such landlords have their own problems.
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