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Comment by samizdis | Hacker News Reader

> The "tax cuts for the rich" aspect of the mini budget was miniscule

In the grand scheme of things, that is true. However, that isn't the only issue - and public perceptions count. Here's how it's put in an article [1] in the Economist:

> Cutting taxes is the politically easy bit of a growth plan, in other words. But by needlessly cutting the top rate of tax on the highest earners and whacking homeowners with higher mortgage payments, the government has associated growth with unfairness in the public mind. That impression will strengthen as Ms Truss slashes public spending to regain market confidence.

[1] https://www.economist.com/leaders/2022/09/28/how-not-to-run-...

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Not surprised to see the the whining over-mortgaged home "owners", who've had it far too good for decades, at the expense of priced out renters, cited as victims in this riposte. Seems to be a common theme in the wall of media-driven protest against this turning of the economic tide.

You can hear the worlds tiniest violin playing from my rented London flat.

Can't wait to see the housing market crash to through the floor.

Can't wait to see the housing market crash to through the floor.

If this happens then private equity funded businesses will sweep in and buy as many houses as possible, for cash with no upward chain and no mortgage issues. You can't compete with that; a serious price crash will probably lock you out of home ownership forever.

There are already companies doing this. A crash will accelerate it. Eg https://slate.com/business/2021/06/blackrock-invitation-hous...

Realistically I am already locked out of the housing market. Companies are already buying as many houses as possible to rent them out. It won't be worse than the current situation we have in UK.

So you'd prefer to see millions in negative equity unable to sell while companies buy up the ones that are repossessed? I think that would actually be worse than the current situation.

If large businesses owned a huge number of rental properties, it would be politically easier to regulate them -- limiting rent increases, requiring insulation etc.

Conversely though, it would also be easier for them to lobby the government to deregulate the rental market. A company with £50bn of housing stock on its books would be very powerful.

Even ignoring that though, and assuming that companies could be regulated well, you'd still be looking at a situation where all young people would be transferring most of their wealth to the owners of these companies forever. There would be no way for people to use property investment to fund their retirement, people would never feel secure enough to have kids, and ultimately whether or not people would be able to live in an area would be at the whims of whether a business will rent them a home. It's a massively dangerous situation for a society.

People use the equity in their homes to do things like funding startups. Loads of successful business started out with founders mortgaging their properties. This is would bring about the end of that being an option.

Housing market should crash through the floor AND private equity funded businesses barred from using housing as an investment vehicle.

I think you can both complain about long term problems in the UK housing market and seek a long-term solution while realising that a sudden and unexpected tripling of mortgage rates isn’t likely to help anyone.

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