20 to 45 year olds want the Government to do more with empty homes

The survey found that while the majority of them backed the Conservative housing policy overall, the most popular policy promised in the run-up to the general election last month was a Liberal Democrat policy to tackle empty housing stock.
Overwhelmingly, young people want the government to focus on increasing the supply of housing – whether through building new housing stock or by allowing local communities to refurbish empty homes and get them back on the market or making them available for rent.

Housing was a major issue during the general election campaign and all of the political parties acknowledged that more needs to be done to help first-time buyers. However, this now needs to translate into concrete plans during the next parliament.
Earlier this year the independent Commission on Housing identified that the UK needs to deliver at least 2 million homes by 2025 to meet demand.

Getting empty homes back on the market and tackling the shortfall in house building needs to be a political priority and requires a long-term commitment if it's to address the shortage of supply.

As a property guardian company, we believe that there’s another option not being considered by the Government at the moment. We have made numerous approaches to the Government about getting empty housing back on to the market by offering it as affordable housing to this very target market and allowing them to be property guardians.
 
Becoming a property guardian would offer them the opportunity of affordable housing, often in unusual buildings, within areas that ordinarily would be out of their reach, financially. The scheme benefits both the guardian and the landlord as it puts the empty property to use, provides much-needed housing and protects the building from potential damage or occupation by squatters.

The Government needs to start acting now on this very topical and much-debated issue.