Transcription
Property is one of those areas, along with education, healthcare, second wives, where people don't look at the opportunity cost. They have a basic mentality, which is, I'll get a deposit, I'll find out the most I can possibly borrow, and I will then add those two sums together, and I will buy a house that costs about that amount.
Now, if we bought cars that way, we'd all be driving around in a Bugatti Veyron, right? Because this is the only way in which you can make a sizeable bet on an asset class by borrowing money. If I went to the bank and said, "Oh, I'd like to borrow 400,000 pounds to invest in Tesla shares," they'd tell me to piss off. If I go and say, "I want to borrow 400,000 to go and buy a house," they go, "Sign here."
So, there are about nine different factors, some of them psychological, some of them that we have a generation of people who've only known property going up. Oh, the other one is that oldsters don't move out.
Now, one of the things I'd instigate pretty quickly is to say, "If you move from your primary residence to a smaller, cheaper residence between the ages of about 65 and 72, you don't pay stamp duty or you sell your house." In other words, you get two lots of stamp duty exemption, and then that it that creates an impetus for people to get the out.
Now, I know this because I've seen data that shows that if you don't downsize voluntarily before the age of 72, you will only do it under financial or health duress. Now, I would argue we need to accelerate that because you go, let's say you're 78 and you're in a off house. You go, "Well, I can move now. I'd I'd pay it then pay a load of stamp duty. I could end up only having to move again into a care home in 2 years' time cuz I'm 78. I don't have enough confident expectation of remaining lifespan to downsize."
My brother lives in a street in Buckinghamshire entirely full of four and five bedroom homes. They're the only person in that street with a kid.