<
p>Prime Minister, David Cameron, has announced a new scheme offering 100,000 first-time buyers new homes with a 20 per cent discount.
The scheme is part of a major push to help people onto the housing ladder as aspiring home owners will be asked to register their interest in buying via Starter Home initiative from the start of next year, which is six months earlier than previously planned.
100,000 homes will be available to first time buyers under 40 and David Cameron says that the scheme will be unlocking home ownership for a generation.
“Hardworking young people want to plan for the future and enjoy the security of being able to own their own home. I want to help them do just that,” said the PM.
“This is all part of our long-term economic plan to secure a better future for Britain, making sure we are backing those who work hard and get on in life.”
The government is setting out how the scheme will work with change to the planning system to free underused unviable brownfield land from planning costs and levies in return for below market value sale prices on homes built there.
Currently builders face an average bill of £15,000 per home in Section 106 affordable housing contributions and tariffs, often adding tens of thousands of pounds to the cost of a site.
Developers offering Starter Homes will be exempt from those Section 106 charges and Community Infrastructure Levy charges but those homes could not be re-sold at market value for a fixed period to make sure the savings are passed onto homebuyers.
Already, leading house builders have pledged their support to Starter Homes and Stewart Baseley, Executive Chairman of the Home Builders Federation, said the industry is keen to work with the government to allow more high quality homes to be built in the right places.
“Increasing housing supply is a huge and complex challenge and significant barriers remain,” he said.
“Bringing forward more land for house building, while also enabling more first time buyers to realise their ambition of home ownership would be another positive step on the way to tackling the housing shortage.”
Communities Secretary, Eric Pickles, added that the government is on its way to turning around the housing market after the 2008 crash.
“The 2008 housing crash blocked millions of hard-working, creditworthy people from becoming homeowners, at a time in their lives when they should have been able to expect to get on the property ladder.
“We’re turning that around with Help to Buy, but today’s new Starter Homes scheme will offer a further boost, giving young people (under 40) the opportunity to buy low cost, high quality new homes for significantly less than they would normally expect.”
Prime Minister, David Cameron, has announced a new scheme offering 100,000 first-time buyers new homes with a 20 per cent discount.
Leave a comment