The housing crisis

Of all the issues facing the country at the moment, how important would you rate housing, on a scale of 1 to 5 (five being the most important issue, one being very unimportant)

What is the biggest housing problem?

Property prices increasingly outpacing incomes
The lack of affordable homes to rent
Not enough homes being built
Stamp Duty costs
Lack of competitive long-term (longer than 10 year), fixed-rate mortgages
Not enough government support for first time buyers
Too many top-end, luxury housing developments at the expense of affordable housing
Something else (please state):

Possible solutions

I've set out a plan to begin tackling our local housing crisis. Please tell me whether you agree with, disagree with or don't know about each aspect of it:

For every council home that they sell off they have to ensure two new public sector homes for rent are built, in order to start to turn around the loss of over 16,000 council homes sold off by the Conservative Council since 1981

All homes worth less than £200,000 in Greater London be exempt from Stamp Duty Even this figure would exclude relatively few local homes from the Duty, but I see this as a first step to ensure that the saving from Stamp Duty isn't just replaced by the seller increasing their price similarly.

Two thirds of all new housing built in London for the next five years be affordable. The current, voluntary target is 50%, but in Wandsworth where the Council is actively trying to build as little affordable housing as possible, it's less than 20%

Affordable housing to be the first call on all surplus-to-requirements publicly-owned land. This would, for example, have meant that the surplus Queen Mary's Hospital land being sold to a private developer for 600 luxury homes, affordable housing could have been provided.

Home Buy grants for first time buyers. Those eligible would receive a grant of up to one third of the cost of any private property worth up to, say, £250,000 only repayable at one third of whatever the value of the property is worth when and if they choose to sell it.

All homes left vacant for more than two years to be returned to use by the council unless an exceptional reason for their being kept empty can be provided by the owner. There are thousands of empty homes in the capital: councils like Wandsworth have powers to get them back into use but Wandsworth hasn't even used them once.

Council or housing association tenants only

How interested are you in buying your council or housing association home?

I definitely intend to/I'm currently in the process of buying it
I'm considering it but have no definite plans to do so
I'd like to but can't afford to
I have not thought about it
I definitely would not consider buying it

If you'd like to leave any other comments, opinions, concerns or ideas about the housing crisis, or want to say more about any of your answers above you can do so here:

About you

How long have you lived in this area, either at your current address or at more than one address?

Less than a year
1 to 3 years
3 to 5 years
5 to 10 years
More than ten years
All my life

And how long do you think/would you like to live here?

Less than a year
1 to 3 years
3 to 5 years
5 to 10 years
More than ten years
The rest of my life

How affordable an area would you say Putney is to live in?

Extremely unaffordable
Unaffordable
Affordable
Extremely affordable

How happy are you with Putney?
Very satisfied
Somewhat satisfied
Neither satisfied or dissatisfied
Somewhat dissatisfied
Very dissatisfied

I currently:

Own my home outright
Own my home with a mortgage
Rent privately
Rent from the Council
Rent from a Housing Association
Own a share of my home and pay rent on the rest (shared ownership)
Live with friends or family
Other

At the next General Election, who do you think you'll vote for?

Labour
Possibly Labour
Conservative
Possibly Conservative
Liberal Democrat
Green
UKIP
BNP
Other
Won't vote

At the last General Election in 2005, who did you vote for?

Labour
Conservative
Liberal Democrat
Green
UKIP
Didn't vote

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