My Grandad never owned his own home and had always lived in a council house After my Nan died he decided that he was going to move to a small flat, which I agreed with as there was no need for him to have a 3 bedroom house now he was on his own.
Move forward to present day and The Intergenerational Foundation Charity has now suggested that older people should be encouraged to move to smaller accomodation to help with the housing crisis. They have called for tax breaks as an incentive for people to downsize to free up an estimated 25 million unused bedrooms.
More than half of over-65s are in homes with two or more spare bedrooms, which could be used by families, says its report based on government figures.
Why focus on the over 65’s, they may not want to give up their family home, why not focus on the wealthy who own mansions but only live there six months a year. What about those who have second holday homes? Whenever ther is a crisis, focus groups always suggest changes that will affect those who don’t necessarily have the financial clout to fight them. If you own your own home you have a choice, if you are in council accomodation this may be taken away from you. There are usually more obvious simple solutions but this may impact on the wealthy 1% of the country.
My Grandad did downsize, however this was his choice after he weighed up all the possibilities, but at least he wasn’t encouraged.
Jason E Cooper 