Highest Number of Private Tenants for 30 Years
Highest Number of Private Tenants for 30 Years
The highest number of people are renting their homes from private landlords than at any point in the last 30 years, reveals a new report.
The study, compiled by independent think tank ResPublica and trade body Co-operatives UK, indicates that three decades ago, 61% of people in the UK owned their home.
This proportion gradually rose throughout the 1990s, but started falling from the year 2000 as renting became more popular.
Currently, the homeownership figure is back up to 61%.
The report also suggests that the amount of people renting privately has surpassed the number renting publicly. In 1985, 30% of people rented from public landlords and just 9% from private landlords. Today, 9% rent from a public body and 22% rent privately.
Director of ResPublica, Phillip Blond, says: “Lady Thatcher’s vision of an economy with widespread ownership has not yet been realised. This is a major fault line in our society because where there is ownership there are stakeholders creating decent civilised communities. If we want people and places to flourish, we must have mass ownership.
“It is only where there is ownership that people want to protect and care for what they own, creating a legacy for themselves, their children and their communities.”
He continues: “At the moment, we are failing to extend economic ownership to everyone, ownership is an unrealisable dream for too many.
“Welfare has failed to save the poor from their lot, only the possibility of mass ownership offers the possibility of ending poverty, this is our dream and this should be the aim of all our policy.”1
1 http://www.propertyindustryeye.com/largest-number-of-private-renters-for-30-years/