Yesterday’s edition of The Times (3 December 2025) carried an interesting and limited article by Neal Hudson. He is a housing market analyst. Interesting because his descriptions of the market failures, explaining why UK houses are not getting more affordable are correct. With some frustration they do not explain the root causes: why this gloomy … Continue reading More about house prices & market failure

Matthew Pennycook, housing minister says early in the new year the government will publish new plan regulations. This announcement gives a glimmer of hope, that the government will grasp the housing nettle. Let’s just repeat the basic problem. You cannot build lots of new homes without local support. So the question which must be asked … Continue reading New plan making regulations to come soon

And are not the solution. To England’s broken housing supply market. This is the reality. So it is desperately sad that Matthew Pennycook, Minister of State for Housing and Planning has just re-stated the government’s commitment to their retention. Today, (27 November 2025) he made a Statement about their future role which includes this quotation … Continue reading Local plans are the problem

On 30 October 2025 I published a blog (Why land prices will not fall) explaining why despite growing negative sentiment in the house selling sector sellers of building land will not respond to falling land values.That instead they will wait for the inevitable sunny uplands that, based on past post war experience, always return regardless … Continue reading Why house prices won’t fall

Happened to be reading about Warren Buffet’s imminent retirement, at aged 95. What vigorously caught my attention is a quote attributed to him. Its message goes far to identify where responsibility for England’s broken housing supply system lies.. Here it is ’The single most important decision in evaluating a business is pricing power. If you’ve … Continue reading Monopoly house prices.

On 30 October 2025 Neal Hudson, the housing market analyst wrote in the FT a thoughtful piece about housing market failure. The headline summed up his analysis the problem New homes: even if you build them, there’s no one to buy them. The writer’s explanation was to focus on the distinction between housing need and … Continue reading Why land prices won’t fall

The two previous blogs (31 October and 5 November 2025) talked about the dangers the New Towns Taskforce recent report faces, from landowners and local residents. There is a third threat, from a source overlooked in the report. It is what I call phoney political polarisation, or if you prefer phoney political posturing. Wokingham Borough … Continue reading New Towns Report: one more threat! No 3.

My last blog (31 October 2025 New Towns Report: land ownership) made recommendations to head off local landowners opposition to the New Towns Taskforce recommendations in an equitable way.. In particular its focus was on Recommendation 22 which says landowners need to know what value they can expect first their land. There is an another … Continue reading New Towns Report: securing local support

The New Towns Taskforce report needs a lots of careful thought by experts. Rules me out! A quick overview of the two key barriers I see merit comment. Here is one comment, responding to the sensible recognition that new towns ought to own the land, during the delivery phase. Recommendation 22 says ‘Delivery bodies should … Continue reading New Towns Report : land ownership

The last blog, Barriers to building (27 October 2025) has set me thinking afresh. The political climate needed to build lots of locally liked and welcomed new homes looks so bad I am coming to the view that the taxation system must be used to switch the incentives around. Put bluntly existing local residents must … Continue reading Time to pay?