British homes 'smaller, older and less affordable' than those abroad

https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/british-homes-smaller-older-and-less-affordable-than-those-abroad-l6b0ngrcl

https://archive.is/OYHwf



Britain’s “expensive, cramped and ageing” housing offers the worst value for money of any advanced economy, a report warns. An analysis by the Resolution Foundation think tank found that people in England, on average, lived in smaller homes than those in France, Germany and Japan. Yet the cost of housing in the UK was nearly 40 per cent higher than comparable countries. The foundation described the situation as a “crisis” and warned the main political parties that policies to tackle the problem needed to be “centre-stage” at the next election.

The report compared British housing with the 37 other industrialised nations in the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD). It said that homes in the UK were smaller, older and less affordable than those in the vast majority of other comparable countries. For example, it found that homes in England had an average floor space per person of 38 sq m compared with 66 sq m in the US, 46 sq m in Germany and 40 sq m in Japan. London, meanwhile, had no more floor space than Tokyo at 33 sq m and less than New York at 44 sq m.



Housing in the UK is also the oldest in Europe, with 38 per cent of homes built before 1946 compared with 21 per cent in Italy and 11 per cent in Spain. The foundation pointed out that such homes tended to be poorly insulated, which leads to higher energy bills and a greater risk of dampness. “Given that older properties were constructed when environmental standards were either nonexistent or far weaker than today, it is unsurprising that UK homes perform very badly compared to our European peers when it comes to energy efficiency,” it said. The report also said that the amount of housing “consumed” by people in the UK as a proportion of income was lower than almost any other country. It said this was the result of the overall cost of housing, where again the UK lagged behind in terms of affordability.



To ensure accurate comparisons between countries the researchers used the rental value of each home. In monetary terms, only Australia and Switzerland had costlier housing but those countries’ gross domestic product per head was greater, and drove higher price levels for all goods and services. When an adjustment was made for that, house prices in the UK were the most expensive. The report said: “If all households in the UK were fully exposed to our housing market, they would have to devote 22 per cent of their spending to housing services, far higher than the OECD average (17 per cent) and the highest level across the developed economies with the solitary exception of Finland.” Adam Corlett, principal economist at the Resolution Foundation, said that while housing was a major political issue in many countries the data suggested the problem was worst in the UK.



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