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A comment on As New York Rents Soar, Public Housing Becomes Lifelong Refuge. Parent comment

Re:As New York Rents Soar, Public Housing Becomes Lifelong R... by gaius on Tuesday August 04, 2015 @03:49PM (#10005782)
Here in the UK, once you're in social housing (which we call council housing) you're in for life - which leads to situations like the late Bob Crow earning £150k/year (probably $250k/year equiv) and yet getting his rent paid by taxes levied on people earning a fraction as much. This, he was fond of saying, was in accordance with his socialist principles.

I'd like to see a system where a council house is on a fixed term, say 5 years or 10 years, then it goes to the next person on the waiting list, and you can rejoin the queue at the back if you so desire. That's more than enough time for anyone to make a smooth transition to the rental or homeowner sector.

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Re:As New York Rents Soar, Public Housing Becomes Lifelong R... by switch007 on Tuesday August 04, 2015 @04:06PM (#10005918)
(Social housing covers local authorities and private housing associations)

I believe many new tenancies are "starter" tenancy agreements; a probation period of 12-18 months. There are also fixed-term assured shorthold tenancies.

Tenancies started before 1989 are somewhat controlled by a council Rent Officer. Applications must be made to increase rent. Tenancies after 1989 experience yearly rent increases, capped to CPI I think.

There are also 'affordable rents', basically a way for housing associations to charge more for rent.

Not disagreeing with you, but social housing is quite different to the pre-1989 era.

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Re:As New York Rents Soar, Public Housing Becomes Lifelong R... by hollerith on Tuesday August 04, 2015 @07:02PM (#10006883)
In the US, tenants in subsidized housing pay 30% of their income as rent, which avoids the specific policy failure you describe.

(Actually, I think they have the option of paying the "contract rent", which is an approximation of the market rate, if that is cheaper for them.)

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Re:As New York Rents Soar, Public Housing Becomes Lifelong R... by bradleyjg on Tuesday August 04, 2015 @04:15PM (#10005979)
I'm a pretty strong critic of NYC's housing policies, but when I read about "Right to Buy" in the UK, I had to conclude that we may be far from the worst!
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