Housing Interests and Housing Justice

The new government has set out to tackle the housing crisis predominantly through deregulation and planning reform,^[1] despite mounting evidence that such interventions on their own would do little to curb sky-rocketing housing costs.^[2] It has taken some welcome steps, such as the additional funds for the Affordable Homes Programme and the legal changes to eviction procedures in England introduced in the Renters’ Rights Bill,^[3] but much remains to be done to make housing safe, accessible and affordable.  Some of this work is happening on the ground, where renters’ unions have made strides in organising tenants, publicising injustices and holding landlords to account. It is likely, however, that the government will resist calls for progressive housing policies such as rent controls until such a time when these are vocally backed by a broad coalition spanning renters and owners.  

[.fig][.fig-title]Most UK Households Live in a Home They Own[.fig-title][.fig-subtitle]Tenure type of UK households[.fig-subtitle][.fig]

[.notes]Source: Census 2021 (England, Wales and Northern Ireland) and census 2022 (Scotland).[.notes]

On the one hand, the intensifying and widening housing crisis is likely to drive support for more thoroughgoing  interventions in the housing market. On the other, the political economy of contemporary Britain gives many an economic stake in rising house prices. Whether people own assets such as their home increasingly determines how much wealth and security they enjoy.^[4] Average UK house prices can rise by tens of thousands of pounds per year — more than many workers’ annual salary.^[5] These price rises are driven in significant part not by the demand for homes to live in, but by the demand for real estate as an investment opportunity.^[6] Over the past 15 years, housing biographies have diverged further as more people have become landlords. Best estimates suggest that in 2012/13, 1.63 million individuals reported UK rental earnings.^[7] By 2021/22, based on analysis of broadly comparable HMRC data, the numbers had risen to 2.86 million.^[8] Under pressure from rising mortgage rates, they dipped slightly to 2.84 million by 2022/23. Yet we still find ourselves in a situation where many have a direct stake in high rents and house prices. Campaigners and researchers have pointed out that, as the result of government policies over the past four decades, landlord incomes now provide twice as many people’s livelihoods as did the coal industry at its very peak.^[9] Analysis of the most recent data, conducted for this briefing, reveals that one in every 19 UK adults is a landlord.^[10[  

Meanwhile, the private rented sector has swallowed up growing numbers of people. In England, the number of private renter households has more than doubled between the 2001 and 2021 censuses, rising by 135 per cent,^[11] with Scotland showing a similar trend.^[12] The rents extracted from tenants both reflect and drive myriad inequalities. While London accounts for approximately 13.4 per cent of the UK population, HMRC data show that London-based landlords claim 23.8 per cent of all property income.^[13] As a general rule, rents tend to be an income transfer from the young to the old and from the poor to the rich. Among older citizens, it exacerbates inequalities between those receiving ample rents and those dependent on our inadequate pension system^[14]  — with pension saving the most commonly cited reason for becoming a landlord.^[15] Tenants are more likely to be black and brown Britons, while at least in England, the only UK nation for which comprehensive data are available, their landlords are disproportionately likely to be white.^[16] This closely maps onto what we know of the racial wealth gap, of which housing forms a major part.^[17] This implies that taxing or redistributing the housing wealth of the richest would be an effective way to reduce the racial wealth gap.

[.fig] [.fig-title]White People are Overrepresented among Landlords[.fig-title][.fig-subtitle]Population by ethnicity vs landlords by ethnicity, England (%)[.fig-subtitle][.fig]

[.notes]Source: English Private Landlord Survey 2021 and census 2021.[.notes]

Support for Housing Reform

Efforts to tackle housing inequalities are hampered by a widespread belief that housing is a legitimate and useful investment opportunity. For instance, in 2021 NEON commissioned polling on rent controls and hosted a series of focus groups on the housing crisis, concluding that “the public thinks of housing as a consumer good that is provided by the market”.^[18] The Frameworks Institute conducted a similar study in partnership with Joseph Rowntree Foundation and Nationwide based on twenty interviews. Their research found that the public tends to see housing as a commodity, to be bought and sold for financial gain.^[19] Policies such as right to buy continue to be overwhelmingly popular.^[20] This leads to a pessimistic prognosis, as an ideological commitment to commodified housing limits support for measures which enforce shelter as a basic right.  

By contrast, new public opinion data collected for this briefing offers cause for cautious optimism. In October 2024, YouGov polled 2,157 participants on their tenure status, social circle and views on housing policy. In addition, it polled 4,369 participants on support for rent caps. The three proposals we polled — rent controls, increased social housing and higher capital gains tax on additional homes — all enjoyed high levels of support across categories of age, income and tenure status. In other words, progressive housing reform is popular. There is widespread recognition of the unaffordability of housing and virtually no one (two per cent of respondents) thinks house prices in their area are too low, although homeowners are more likely to say the price level is appropriate. Outright homeowners are an outlier: they are as likely to consider house prices in their area “too high”’ (43 per cent) as “about right” (also 43 per cent).

[.fig][.fig-title]Support for Rent Controls Vastly Outnumbers Opposition Across all Tenure Types[.fig-title][.fig-subtitle]Net support for progressive housing policies, by tenure type (strongly/somewhat support minus strongly/somewhat oppose)[.fig-subtitle][.fig]

[.notes]Source: YouGov polling of 2,157 UK adults on CGT and social housing and YouGov polling of 4,369 UK adults on rent controls, both October 2024.[.notes]

While generally very high, support for the proposals varies by tenure status along predictable lines. On questions such as rent controls and increasing the social housing stock, those who are furthest removed from housing insecurity are least committed to combating it. Outright owners are most likely to oppose rent controls, followed by owner-occupiers with a mortgage, while renters are most expressly in support, regardless of who they rent from. Data on those who part-own through a shared ownership scheme are limited, but the data tentatively suggest this group is much closer to renters than to other owners in terms of their views on housing reform. This group could make for a valuable part of a progressive housing coalition. Renters, whether renting from a private landlord, a housing association or their council, are strongly in support. Finally, those who live with their parents, family or friends (13.3% of our sample, or 287 individuals) are similar to renters, if slightly less likely to support the policies. This is driven in part by the younger average age of those who live with family and a greater propensity to answer “don’t know”. It also suggests, however, that renting can be radicalising, not merely for lack of access to property ownership, but also due to the experience of renting itself and the specific character of the tenant-landlord relationship.

Nevertheless, many of those polled express policy preferences which cannot be explained by their by their immediate individual financial interests. The most striking example is the proposal for rent controls, which enjoys considerable support even among the 184 landlords in our sample.^[21] 44 per cent of landlords expressed support for instituting a cap on the amount of rent that can be charged, based on the location and quality of a property. With 47 per cent opposed, those land We asked whether respondents would “support or oppose implementing a cap on the amount of rent that can be charged, based on the location and quality of the property”. This is a hard “first generation” rent control proposal — that is, it proposes a ceiling on prices, not just price increases. As such, the level of support it commands is remarkable.  

[.fig][.fig-title]Landlords are Split on the Question of Rent Controls[.fig-title][.fig-subtitle]Would you support or oppose implementing a cap on the amount of rent that can be charged, based on the location and quality of the property? Answers from landlords only.[.fig-subtitle][.fig]

[.notes]Source: YouGov polling of 184 UK landlords, October 2024.[.notes]

It is sometimes suggested that even those who enjoy housing security might favour progressive housing policies because they see their friends or family struggle in the housing market. The polling bears this out. There is a 22 percentage point gap in support for rent controls between those whose social circle consists largely or entirely of renters and those who do not know any renters at all. Even if we include only homeowners, we see that the more renters a person counts in their social circle, the more likely they are to support rent controls. Nevertheless, this strategy has its limitations, as a sizeable part of the population moves in social circles entirely devoid of renters. For example, our polling shows that over one in five 2024 Conservative voters do not know a single renter. A further half (51 per cent) admit to knowing “not very many”. This may help to explain why Tory voters, along with Reform UK voters, are the least likely to back rent controls. Yet even among these groups, healthy majorities back the proposal, with over six in ten Conservative and Reform voters expressing support.

[.fig][.fig-title]The More Renters You Know, the More Supportive You Are of Rent Caps[.fig-title][.fig-subtitle]Would you support or oppose implementing a cap on the amount of rent that can be charged, based on the location and quality of the property?[.fig-subtitle][.fig]

[.notes]Source: YouGov polling of 2,157 UK adults, October 2024.[.notes]

[.fig][.fig-title]Support for Rent Controls is High Across Political Parties[.fig-title][.fig-subtitle]Would you support or oppose implementing a cap on the amount of rent that can be charged, based on the location and quality of the property?[.fig-subtitle][.fig]

[.notes]Source: YouGov polling of 4,369 UK adults, October 2024.[.notes]

Assembling Coalitions

Despite a deep-seated belief in private homeownership and a widespread view of houses as investment opportunities, the British public is overwhelmingly supportive of housing reform. Implementing rent controls, raising capital gains tax on second homes and buy-to-lets and building far more social housing would represent a departure from the current model of housing provision which is pushing more and more people into unaffordable, unstable and unsafe housing situations. Those who are less affected by housing insecurity (or indeed benefit from others’ housing woes) are less likely to support progressive reforms, but even among those groups, support is remarkably high. Region, age and social grade make little difference. As policy proposals such as rent controls gain prominence and become more politicised, levels of support may drop somewhat, but there is a solid core of support.  

Scholars have argued that rising house prices, especially in expensive cities like London, are “the linchpin of a new logic of inequality.”^[22] As the trajectories of wages and asset values have diverged, those who rely on assets such as property for their income have become better off while those who work have seen their ability to make a living eroded. This “asset economy” can have self-reinforcing effects, as people come to view property investments as the sole route to financial security. Yet our data also show a broad-based concern for fairness and an interest in the wellbeing of friends and loved ones. These function as cracks in the present ownership coalition. Out of these cracks, people can be brought into progressive housing alliances, inviting them to identify with the mass of people whose lives and livelihoods are threatened by the current logic of inequality. This broad coalition for housing reform will include not just the renters who are most affected, but also those who part-own their home, those who count renters among their friends and family and those who believe in state intervention for fairer markets.