Communities Secretary Sajid Javid sets out plans to ‘hand OAPs incentives’ to downsize from large homes to ease housing crisis
Pensioners who own large houses will be encouraged to move into flats or bungalows so families can find suitable homes
PENSIONERS who own large houses will be given incentives to downsize under new government plans to help ease the housing crisis.
Sajid Javid, the Communities Secretary, will set out proposals for elderly home owners to receive help with moving costs or exemptions on stamp duty to encourage them to move into bungalows or flats.
A White Paper on the plans is set to be published later this month with the hope of freeing up thousands of properties big enough for younger families.
The proposal is understood to be in the early draft stage and has yet to be signed off by Downing Street.
One Whitehall Source told the Daily Telegraph the older generation are now more willing to accept the idea because they want their children to be able to move into bigger homes.
He said: “The attitude has shifted for people for whom the housing market has worked well. They are fed up having their 30-year-old children in their childhood bedroom.”
The details of the plans have not yet been set out but in 2014 a report by think tank Demos proposed a “Help to Move” scheme that would give a stamp duty exemption on properties worth up to £250,000.
Similar downsizing schemes have already been implemented on a local level with a council in Redbridge, north-east London, helping elderly people who want to move to sheltered accommodation cover the cost of moving, renovation and with financial advice.
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Research for the over-50s group Saga estimates there are 3.4 million householders over the age of 65 who want to downsize.
Of that number, 1.1 million had one spare room and 2.3 million had two or more spare rooms.
At the same time, young families are being squeezed into small homes and overcrowded flats as a result of high property prices.
Saga estimates 111,000 family-sized homes would come onto the market if a stamp duty exemption for downsizing was adopted.
The idea of a downsizing scheme was first proposal by Lord Richard Newby, leader of the Liberal Democrats in the House of Lords.
He said: “If we can facilitate downsizing where people genuinely want to do it, society as the whole will benefit.”