A Letter to The Housing Minister

Sarah Cardell, the Chief Executive of the Competions & Marketing Authority (CMA) has, this week, written to the Housing Minister giving details of their market study of the Housing Sector.

The no punches pulled report also gives the CMA’s proposals on how the sector should move forward. They believe that their evidence and findings offer a “substantial step forward” to resolve many of the issues in “Having somewhere to live”.

The study finds that not only is the market not delivering what is required of it by consumers, it has not done so for many decades.

The problems are driven by the intricacies of the planning system; the way in which land is sold and what drives the housebuilders. To combat this they have come up with three broad ranges of actions.

It is obvious to us, at Ringley, that these three complexities, along with other factors such poor design and a lack of local infrastructure has led to a shortage of decent housing stock and has, therefore, pushed housing prices up. We do not see this as sustainable and, therefore, welcome this report

The CMA’s Range of Actions

• Where the problems fall clearly within the operation of the market they offer firm recommendations to the UK, Scottish and Welsh governments.

• Where there are complex interactions with wider policy aims, which are not for the CMA to resolve, such as with the planning systems, they offer options for governments to consider.

• Where there are more fundamental actions that policymakers could take that would affect housing market outcomes, but have implications beyond the CMA’s core remit and expertise, they have not offered recommendations or set out specific policy options but have, instead highlighted considerations for governments.

The CMA’s recommendations to governments include:

• Requiring councils to adopt amenities on all new housing estates.

• Introducing enhanced consumer protections for homeowners on existing privately managed estates. This includes making it easier for homeowners to switch to a more preferable management company.

• Establishing a New Homes Ombudsman as soon as possible and setting a single mandatory consumer code so homeowners can better pursue homebuilders over any quality issues they face.

At Ringley, we really don’t disagree with these recommendations. We have seen high levels of service charges expected of homes in unadopted Estates to maintain roads, green spaces and play amenities. Traditionally these would have been taken over by local authorities but, due to budget constraints, they appear to have been somewhat reluctant to do so in recent years.

This leads on to making it easier for homeowners to appoint their own managing agents. We have always advocated for this. There has to be a simple mechanism for expensive and/or inefficient agents to be replaced.

As for the New Homes Ombudsman, we have been advocating for this for many years. Too many people have had problems with the biggest investment they will ever make and that is just inequitable. An Ombudsman will not be the total solution but will go an awful long way in helping homeowners to sort many of their problem issues.

The CMA’s proposed options for consideration by governments include:

• Ensuring local authorities put in place local plans and are guided by clear, consistent targets that reflect the need for new homes in their area.

• Streamlining the planning systems to significantly increase the ability of housebuilders to begin work on new projects sooner, while not watering down protections such as those for the local environment. Measures to improve the capacity of council planning departments would also enable them to process more applications more quickly.

• Introducing measures to increase the build-out of housing sites by incentivising builders to diversify the tenures and types of homes delivered.

Once again we find it difficult to disagree with these options. The planning system has been hamstrung by staffing issues, a lack of consistency and a lack of forethought and guidance. In many cases the time taken to deliver a decision has stymied development and has even prevented applications from being made.

Allied to this, the government needs to apply light pressure to local authorities to allow the delivery of more housing.

We also approve of the CMA’s incentivisation idea to diversify the homes on offer. Too much of the same if being built throughout the UK and these homes are not meeting that very diverse requirements of its population.

The Ringley Group

We have always strived to be more than just a managing agent, aiming to provide a great service to our resident clients, be they living in flats or on Estates where they are required to pay a service charge.. We enable them, through the use of technology, to have 24/7 sight of what is going on with their homes.

We also work with developers, helping them through their planning journey.

We would be more than happy to discuss this, or any other property related issues, with you.

Please email solutions@ringley.co.uk or call 020 7267 2900. We look forward to hearing from you.