I am not an UK national, but a Belgian national.
I can show you the emails that I had with the Belgian authorities, proofing everything I said, but that would be against the rules of ASEANNOW, because they are written in Dutch.
Anyhow, it would be against the law to copy the emails here.
About the housing in Belgium (and I think that would be similar to the UK) do a simple search on houses/apartments for renting and you will see it for yourself.
When I left Belgium and settled in thailand, I sold my house in Belgium for about 25,000 Eur.
The cheapest house you can buy now starts at 250,000 Eur.
Crazy but TRUE.