London mayor launches unprecedented inquiry into foreign property ownership

[webfact]

London mayor launches unprecedented inquiry into foreign property ownership

Matthew Taylor in London and Tom Phillips in Hong Kong

 

Exclusive Sadiq Khan tells the Guardian he will carry out ‘the most thorough research on this matter ever undertaken’ amid widespread concern over rising housing costs and gentrification

 

LONDON: -- London mayor Sadiq Khan is to launch the UK’s most comprehensive inquiry into the impact of foreign investment flooding London’s housing market, amid growing fears about the scale of gentrification and rising housing costs in the capital.

 

Khan said there are “real concerns” about the surge in the number of homes being bought by overseas investors, adding that the inquiry would map the scale of the problem for the first time.

 

“It’s clear we need to better understand the different roles that overseas money plays in London’s housing market, the scale of what’s going on, and what action we can take to support development and help Londoners find a home,” Khan told the Guardian.

 

Full story: https://www.theguardian.com/cities/2016/sep/29/london-mayor-sadiq-khan-inquiry-foreign-property-ownership

 

-- THE GUARDIAN 2016-09-30

[Yoram]

 

The same should be in Australia really, with those Chinese buying anything and everything with cash on the table and leave many properties un inhabitants and empty,  causing the Aussies battlers to go out further and further to find properties they can afford.

[SaintLouisBlues]

Yep and then the Chinese will leave and take it all with them

[Alive]

Workers have to compete with foreign workers and they even have to pay more for rent because of all this driving up prices. For those who deal in land and property and the wealthy who own so much, they just say more more more and higher prices. The poor get screwed.

[RuamRudy]

A problem that has affected the rest of the UK for a long time - highly paid southerners buying up homes in the countryside to use on rare occasions, forcing locals out because they cannot afford to live where they grew up, and depriving local businesses of year round customers.

Edited September 30, 2016 by RuamRudy

[DrTuner]

Put a heavy tax on uninhabited property. Sorted.

[Anthony5]

5 minutes ago, RuamRudy said:

A problem that has affected the rest of the UK for a long time - highly paid southerners buying up homes in the countryside to use on rare occasions, forcing locals out because they cannot afford to live where they grew up, and depriving local businesses of year round customers.

 

 

Last time I checked for every sale there must be a buyer and a seller, so those locals who are forced out must have realized a huge profit by selling their property otherwise there wouldn't have been a sale.

[NongKhaiKid]

8 minutes ago, RuamRudy said:

A problem that has affected the rest of the UK for a long time - highly paid southerners buying up homes in the countryside to use on rare occasions, forcing locals out because they cannot afford to live where they grew up, and depriving local businesses of year round customers.

I remember a gentleman in London, a Dr. Green, who bought a Scottish island which he visited once a year.

The local authority on the mainland which covered the island proposed building a proper ferry pier to help make supplying the island easier but Dr. Green blocked the idea saying it would  spoil the beauty of HIS island irrespective of disadvantaging those living there all year round.

[RuamRudy]

3 minutes ago, Anthony5 said:

 

 

Last time I checked for every sale there must be a buyer and a seller, so those locals who are forced out must have realized a huge profit by selling their property otherwise there wouldn't have been a sale.

 

Shocking to believe, I know, but not everyone owns their own homes. However the aspiration is still there for many, especially young families, and they cannot get a foot on the property ladder because prices are too high.

[ourmanflint]

Sadiq is a moron.  I doubt this report will ever see the light of day

[NongKhaiKid]

Just now, ourmanflint said:

Sadiq is a moron.  I doubt this report will ever see the light of day

People already saying he'll lead the Labour Party one day and then PM. Not sure if a viable Labour will be around in future.

Maybe it won't be him but a Muslim PM is a given.

[ourmanflint]

Not a chance! This is one time in the sun. I don't know anyone who doesn't already regret voting for him

[SaintLouisBlues]

Just now, ourmanflint said:

I don't know anyone who doesn't already regret voting for him

Lots of my Tory friends paid the pittance asked so they could vote for him; they still believe it was money well spent

[simple1]

1 hour ago, Yoram said:

 

The same should be in Australia really, with those Chinese buying anything and

everything with cash on the table and leave many properties un inhabitants and

empty,  causing the Aussies battlers to go out further and further to find properties

they can afford.

 

Already under way, plus some additional legislation enacted regards foreign ownership of residential property. Don't know if it applies to the London market, but a lot of foreign property ownership is due to parents buying property for their student children. Doubt whether foreigners buying property effects the "Aussie battler" or indeed the low income segment of the London property market.

[bluebluewater]

Just like here in Thailand -  It's those darn foriegneers that are causing the problems.

[Baerboxer]

1 hour ago, NongKhaiKid said:

People already saying he'll lead the Labour Party one day and then PM. Not sure if a viable Labour will be around in future.

Maybe it won't be him but a Muslim PM is a given.

 

There have been Jewish PM's so why not a Muslim?

 

The only issue with anyone who holds a particular religious view or belongs to a particular sect is if that is a conflict of interest source or prohibits there taking of appropriate oaths. The Mason's have certainly had plenty of PM's from within its secret membership.

[williamgeorgeallen]

property prices are going crazy because interest rates are being kept so low. everyone thinks low interest rates are great and make borrowing cheap but they never think that it has caused house prices to soar. the next property bubble is well on the way already.

[elgordo38]

5 years and millions of pounds short. I think the Russians are done buying there.

[phantomfiddler]

He is probably checking to see if any white anglo saxon property owners exist, prior to having them evicted

[HauptmannUK]

I work in China a lot and know a fair number of wealthy Chinese. With the crackdown on corruption a lot of Chinese are sitting on vast piles of cash that they can't be seen spending in China. Spiriting the money out of China and buying overseas property is what they are doing.  Foreign ownership in the UK is amongst the least regulated in the world.

My Chinese friends are all familiar with Rightmove. Its not just London, they are buying properties in provincial towns too.

The Mayor is right to investigate - we are just at the start of a trend. Chinese ownership is set to become a huge issue as specialist advisors set up in China to facilitate the process.

 

[BuaBS]

Maybe throw all the immigrants out .... I'll bet there will be a lot more affordable housing in the cities.

[elwood]

He is jumping on the bandwagon begun by Private Eye some while ago. Their website has a very interesting chart showing  UK houses and land bought by overseas buyers, hiding under a  multitude of registered companies to make it extremely difficult to discover the real owners. It seems that several large tracts of Scottish land for example, are now owned by Chinese and Arab lairds!

 

If I remember correctly, the chart has been referred to by MPs worried about the secret sale of UK to foreigners, and especially worried that Russian, Chinese etc are using it for money-laundering.

[louse1953]

6 hours ago, Yoram said:

 

The same should be in Australia really, with those Chinese buying anything and everything with cash on the table and leave many properties un inhabitants and empty,  causing the Aussies battlers to go out further and further to find properties they can afford.

And who sells the houses to the Chinese.

[louse1953]

1 hour ago, BuaBS said:

Maybe throw all the immigrants out .... I'll bet there will be a lot more affordable housing in the cities.

Then you would only have the useless left.

[sanuk711]

3 hours ago, Baerboxer said:

There have been Jewish PM's so why not a Muslim?

.

I don't think so beeboxer....There was a person from a Jewish background who left Judaism after a dispute at his synagogue & became an Anglican at the age of 12.

But that was in the 1800s...a practicing Jew as prime minister of Britain....... No can not see that this has  happened.

Edited September 30, 2016 by sanuk711

[bumpkin]

The Vendor sells to whom he pleases.  He could choose to sell to a "deserving local"  at a reduced price.    Maybe the "problem" is with opportunistic vendors.

 

How many readers here  would sell their Thai property at below market rate just because many Thai couldn't afford the market price ?

[blazes]

6 hours ago, Yoram said:

 

The same should be in Australia really, with those Chinese buying anything and everything with cash on the table and leave many properties un inhabitants and empty,  causing the Aussies battlers to go out further and further to find properties they can afford.

 

Ditto Vancouver and Toronto

[blazes]

5 hours ago, NongKhaiKid said:

People already saying he'll lead the Labour Party one day and then PM. Not sure if a viable Labour will be around in future.

Maybe it won't be him but a Muslim PM is a given.

 

We haven't had a Jewish one since Disraeli....luckily most of us reading this will be dead long before a Muslim is allowed to be the PM.   (Mind you, when you consider some of the sh!te we've recently had in #10, a Muslim could hardly do worse.)

[blazes]

3 hours ago, Baerboxer said:

 

There have been Jewish PM's so why not a Muslim?

 

The only issue with anyone who holds a particular religious view or belongs to a particular sect is if that is a conflict of interest source or prohibits there taking of appropriate oaths. The Mason's have certainly had plenty of PM's from within its secret membership.

 

How would we know he or she was a Mason if they are belonging to a secret organization?  (However, I understand that the UK police are heavily Masonic.  Well, even Mozart wrote the odd piece for them.)

[maxcorrigan]

5 hours ago, ourmanflint said:

Not a chance! This is one time in the sun. I don't know anyone who doesn't already regret voting for him

Since most of them that voted for him were moslems i don't think they regret, with 420 mosques and growing in London that makes for a hell of a lot of moslem supporters