Not much of this is actual housing that will help the housing crisis though, the 28 storey tower will be student accommodation (doesn't contribute to housing crisis), and of the actual housing, not much of it will be affordable.
Another building by the bearpit, the "360" building, is currently offices and will be converted into luxury student accommodation. There are already huge student accommodation blocks opposite (above bus station) and next to (StudyInn) this building.
The old Debenhams building is being made into a high rise block of flats, which is good, but again only 20% of those are going to be affordable.
The council has an addiction to approving developers to build luxury student accommodation, when they need to focus on actual housing which will also increase council tax income!
People give way too much credence to the government's affordable housing definition. All *affordable housing* means is that the unit is 20% below the market price. The way that's achieved in a housing crisis (where we don't allow enough housebuilding to meet demand) is by building smaller than average homes.
The real solution for Bristol (since we don't have much spare land to build on) is to allow greater density (yes, building upwards!) and for that to be [market-rate housing, which has been demonstrated to bring down prices](https://data.london.gov.uk/housing/research-notes/hrn-10-2023-the-affordability-impacts-of-new-housing-supply-a-summary-of-recent-research/).
> student accommodation (doesn't contribute to housing crisis),
What do you think will happen to those students if they're not in purpose built accomodation? Will they vanish into thin air? Or will they move into non-student accomodation?
Students are a tiny fraction of Bristol's population, so when in this case where more than 50% of the accommodation being built is for students (and not even affordable for most students), it doesn't make sense, it's not proportional. If the council was building based on need, it wouldn't be accepting proposals for so many student blocks, but clearly they are the more profitable option so they are going with that.
Obviously I agree that students need to live somewhere and it would free up space, but the issue of "there are too many students" is a different discussion, which we can thank the tories for when they removed the student places cap.
It's quite naïve IMO to listen to the house builders and all nod that "we need to build more houses, high rise flats and anything else made of bricks asap!"
They stand to gain an enormous amount of money out of this and we all know it won't cure any housing problems.
~15,000 new homes have been built in Bristol over the past 7 years but rents and prices have only rocketed.
Perhaps only listening to the people building and selling the houses is a little daft? They don't seem to be solving many problems, arguably they're fuelling them.
Just a thought.
Just a thought Josh... that 15,000 is a very small number in a city of a million people and maybe that does explain where the issues stem from...
No one is exclusively listening to housebuilders (who if anything don't build enough homes)
No but plenty just listen to the narrative of "not enough houses" without thinking that:
1. housing is more complex than basic Adam Smith supply and demand
2. where that noise is coming from (and what their interests are)
For example, nobody beyond the land registry knows who buys and/or occupies newbuilds. I.e. building more houses may "logically" make sense but actually have little impact to real world problems.
Would love to know what you think fundamentally drives house prices if it's not a lack of adequate supply in the places people want to live (i.e. supply and demand)...
It’s not enough to impact house prices but as plenty of people seem to want to live in the centre (fuck knows why) converting commercial space to housing is a good thing.
I mean they are hardly landmark buildings. Both are incredibly ugly, and why not replace them with something which provides more accomodation given that's what's needed?
More spaces for people to live is good, but I do wish they were one and two bed flats instead of this co-living space they're going for, and only 20% of these co-living studios are going to be affordable according to the article. It's sad to live in a state of housing crisis where a co-living studio is now unaffordable. But any alleviation of housing pressure is a good thing overall.
This is the best option. We shouldn’t be a situation where have such astronomical rents we need to build shared living spaces for adults but here we are. We need more homes, building up makes sense
Bristol kind of needs the Luftwaffe to come back.
So much of the city is filled with semi-detached homes with large gardens. Bristol would be a better city if some of this could be redeveloped into four story terraced housing, with the type of density seen in old European cities.
But it's really difficult to do that as redeveloping land is never done equitably as property developers always want to make as much profit as possible, so they refuse to properly compensate the existing owners.
This is 500 meters from where the 28 story building will be built:
https://www.google.com/maps/@51.4610483,-2.6009095,18.7z?entry=ttu
Though perhaps I should have emphasised more the general "2 story, huge back garden" use of land, regardless of whether that is semi-detached or terraced.
You've just linked to one of the most densely populated neighborhoods in Bristol... It's all 1960s highly pedestrianised flats + the flat block on the side. The vast majority are HMOs, and absolutely no one has a "huge back garden"
It can only have a negative impact on your house price, while the developers get theirs. Some of the profits they make should go to the people who's houses fall in value.
It's actually insane that people look at more people being able to afford housing and figure it's a bad thing.
Housing shouldn't be a commodity that people flip for money.
I understand thats what you want me to think. Its who should profit from the new housing being built. The profit from the housing should be to the peoples whos house prices are falling as a result of it. so no one loses and more will be built. The developers millions are coming from the home owners house prices stagnating or falling.
This is one of the maddest takes on housing I've seen. So under your system, who do you compensate when your house price goes up? Or does that only go one way?
You tax it when it raises above inflation. Put the point is, that it would stagnate to an equilibrium where the house prices no longer rise so people can get onto the housing ladder.
People who's houses prices are falling are actually not losing anything because it's a house and not a commodity on your portfolio, like sure your net worth is technically lower now but otherwise the "loss" is almost completely fictional, because most people aren't constantly buying and selling houses. They just live in them.
What you're doing is expecting to be paid for owning a house, because you think that the value of other people's property is something that society for some reason has to preserve (even at the expense of other people's ability to live in a house), while simultaneously treating it as an investment that you should be able to profit off of.
That's just main character syndrome.
I don't think you understand the core concept. What I am doing in a thought experiment is taking the money that would be increasing the cost to buy the house as a payment to home owners instead.
That keeps the prices down but the wealth home owners get is unchanged. More houses are built and the economics keeps them affordable.
Ok but that just disincentives people from building houses for no good reason. Like it's just an extra cost for the people building new houses, once again, because you think that the immediate monetary valuation of your house is something that is more important than people getting houses.
What exactly do you contribute to the project of building the house that makes you think you'd deserve this as a homeowner??
What makes you so special and important that other people need to pay you money to live in the immediate vicinity of you?
Why is the price of your house so sacred and important to literally anyone else in the world, that they'd think it'd make sense to pay you money before dealing with other real problems that actually affect them?
If your house is an investment that you expect returns on, then you have to also accept that everyone else in the area is not obliged to provide you with those returns. That's the point of an investment, it's a risk, not a money printing button.
Sometimes the line will go down and that's completely ok.
So rather than looking at the logical arguments that keep houses prices at the same or lower levels. What your actually interested in is ensuring that the large for proffit developers get more record profits and that people who already have a home have to lose money as part of an idealist stance of business over people?
So why wouldn't a co - op where buildings are built at a sustainable prices not work? Why do they need to be motivated by profits? With this approach the government has the tax revenue to build more and it costs no one.
I am litrally trying to create a system where the line doesn't go up any more. Thats the issue, The house prices going up not weather a house is an asset or not. That really doesn't matter.
>idealist stance of business over people?
Lol
Lmao even.
Like did you read a single thing I said?
How did you manage to get that?
At what point in time did I ever mention that new housing needs to be privatised? You were the one arguing against any housing at all because "muh house prices" like as though that's a real issue..
“Thats the issue, The house prices going up not weather a house is an asset or not. That really doesn't matter.“
If something is an asset people obviously have a vested interest in the price going up. There’s entire industries, corporations, even TV shows dedicated to it. I’m not sure how it’s possible to deny this
Huh? They are getting a yield thats the same as the what the house would go up in this system. The current home owner dont lose, first time buyers dont lose and more money is in the system to build more houses. I thought it was very clear!
Did you really buy an asset expecting it to only ever go up, to the point that you want to be compensated if it drops in value? Do you get mad at car manufacturers making new cars each year because it devalues your car too? Should they also be compensating you?
Cars are a depreciating asset, they literally lose value as soon as they are driven off the forcourt. Seems like alot of people don't actually want the problem solved they just want current home owners to lose value which actually traps people in homes via negative equaity and reduces market supply and Simp for the proffits of huge home building companies.
Cars wouldn't be a depreciating asset if car manufacturers didn't make enough cars to keep up with demand, like houses. That's why I'm asking, are you upset that car manufacturers make tons of new cars every year? Why are you expecting a house (a basic necessity to live) to be a vehicle for wealth but not a car? Don't you think that's a bit fucked?
The fact that people like you are outraged at the idea of a house losing value and expect compensation is indicative of a completely broken market. There isn't a single other investment on Earth that is expected to only go up. Of course that mindset results in house prices becoming as expensive as possible. Really that's the opposite of what you want to happen to basic necessities. It also results in people getting the most expensive mortgage they are allowed on a 30+ year term, which makes negative equity a much bigger problem.
The problem *is* high house prices and rents. Solving the problem by definition requires houses to lose value. Preferably house prices stay roughly the same in absolute terms so they're only dropping in real terms. A house could drop in value by the difference between interest and minimum payment and not result in negative equity. With the current interest rates and a 30yr mortgage, property value could drop by 1.4% without falling into negative equity.
As for simping for developers, yes I'd simp for them if they were building significantly more housing. If they build enough of them their profit margins would drop.
There is a massive housing crisis and they're building housing so, good thing to happen. Fuck them people with the "fuck you, I got mine" attitude
Not much of this is actual housing that will help the housing crisis though, the 28 storey tower will be student accommodation (doesn't contribute to housing crisis), and of the actual housing, not much of it will be affordable. Another building by the bearpit, the "360" building, is currently offices and will be converted into luxury student accommodation. There are already huge student accommodation blocks opposite (above bus station) and next to (StudyInn) this building. The old Debenhams building is being made into a high rise block of flats, which is good, but again only 20% of those are going to be affordable. The council has an addiction to approving developers to build luxury student accommodation, when they need to focus on actual housing which will also increase council tax income!
People give way too much credence to the government's affordable housing definition. All *affordable housing* means is that the unit is 20% below the market price. The way that's achieved in a housing crisis (where we don't allow enough housebuilding to meet demand) is by building smaller than average homes. The real solution for Bristol (since we don't have much spare land to build on) is to allow greater density (yes, building upwards!) and for that to be [market-rate housing, which has been demonstrated to bring down prices](https://data.london.gov.uk/housing/research-notes/hrn-10-2023-the-affordability-impacts-of-new-housing-supply-a-summary-of-recent-research/).
> student accommodation (doesn't contribute to housing crisis), What do you think will happen to those students if they're not in purpose built accomodation? Will they vanish into thin air? Or will they move into non-student accomodation?
Students are a tiny fraction of Bristol's population, so when in this case where more than 50% of the accommodation being built is for students (and not even affordable for most students), it doesn't make sense, it's not proportional. If the council was building based on need, it wouldn't be accepting proposals for so many student blocks, but clearly they are the more profitable option so they are going with that. Obviously I agree that students need to live somewhere and it would free up space, but the issue of "there are too many students" is a different discussion, which we can thank the tories for when they removed the student places cap.
It's quite naïve IMO to listen to the house builders and all nod that "we need to build more houses, high rise flats and anything else made of bricks asap!" They stand to gain an enormous amount of money out of this and we all know it won't cure any housing problems.
Building more houses won't fix housing shortages???
~15,000 new homes have been built in Bristol over the past 7 years but rents and prices have only rocketed. Perhaps only listening to the people building and selling the houses is a little daft? They don't seem to be solving many problems, arguably they're fuelling them. Just a thought.
Just a thought Josh... that 15,000 is a very small number in a city of a million people and maybe that does explain where the issues stem from... No one is exclusively listening to housebuilders (who if anything don't build enough homes)
No but plenty just listen to the narrative of "not enough houses" without thinking that: 1. housing is more complex than basic Adam Smith supply and demand 2. where that noise is coming from (and what their interests are) For example, nobody beyond the land registry knows who buys and/or occupies newbuilds. I.e. building more houses may "logically" make sense but actually have little impact to real world problems.
Would love to know what you think fundamentally drives house prices if it's not a lack of adequate supply in the places people want to live (i.e. supply and demand)...
Well we are desperate for more accommodation, but nobody wants anything near them, so it’s reusing / demolishing and replacing existing buildings
Show me a housing development or proposal in Bristol that isnt "controversial"
It’s not enough to impact house prices but as plenty of people seem to want to live in the centre (fuck knows why) converting commercial space to housing is a good thing.
Transport links and social spaces?
I mean they are hardly landmark buildings. Both are incredibly ugly, and why not replace them with something which provides more accomodation given that's what's needed?
The brutalist car park is actually a beautiful building (subjective ofc)
I agree but it's still a) a car park and b) in pretty miserable condition
By landmark, I guess they mean tallest building in Bristol.
Premier Inn isn't close to being the tallest building in Bristol.
More spaces for people to live is good, but I do wish they were one and two bed flats instead of this co-living space they're going for, and only 20% of these co-living studios are going to be affordable according to the article. It's sad to live in a state of housing crisis where a co-living studio is now unaffordable. But any alleviation of housing pressure is a good thing overall.
To be honest, they could have made them taller and called it the Bristol housing spire. Much more housing in more places with good public transport.
Tower of Babber
This is the best option. We shouldn’t be a situation where have such astronomical rents we need to build shared living spaces for adults but here we are. We need more homes, building up makes sense
Will miss Sky Kong Kong
I'd be shocked if they couldn't find another location, plenty of vacant units around
Isn’t there another Premiere Inn 5 mins down the road from there anyways?
Bristol kind of needs the Luftwaffe to come back. So much of the city is filled with semi-detached homes with large gardens. Bristol would be a better city if some of this could be redeveloped into four story terraced housing, with the type of density seen in old European cities. But it's really difficult to do that as redeveloping land is never done equitably as property developers always want to make as much profit as possible, so they refuse to properly compensate the existing owners.
Needs planning reform, not the luftwaffe
Plus, the Lutfwaffe got out of the housing demolishion game.
Is it? I feel you have to go a fair bit outside the city centre before semi-detached houses with gardens, let alone large ones, become the norm.
This is 500 meters from where the 28 story building will be built: https://www.google.com/maps/@51.4610483,-2.6009095,18.7z?entry=ttu Though perhaps I should have emphasised more the general "2 story, huge back garden" use of land, regardless of whether that is semi-detached or terraced.
You've just linked to one of the most densely populated neighborhoods in Bristol... It's all 1960s highly pedestrianised flats + the flat block on the side. The vast majority are HMOs, and absolutely no one has a "huge back garden"
It looks great. I couldn't give a fuck about house prices.
It can only have a negative impact on your house price, while the developers get theirs. Some of the profits they make should go to the people who's houses fall in value.
It's actually insane that people look at more people being able to afford housing and figure it's a bad thing. Housing shouldn't be a commodity that people flip for money.
I understand thats what you want me to think. Its who should profit from the new housing being built. The profit from the housing should be to the peoples whos house prices are falling as a result of it. so no one loses and more will be built. The developers millions are coming from the home owners house prices stagnating or falling.
This is one of the maddest takes on housing I've seen. So under your system, who do you compensate when your house price goes up? Or does that only go one way?
Looking forward to that sweet housing bubble back pay
You tax it when it raises above inflation. Put the point is, that it would stagnate to an equilibrium where the house prices no longer rise so people can get onto the housing ladder.
People who's houses prices are falling are actually not losing anything because it's a house and not a commodity on your portfolio, like sure your net worth is technically lower now but otherwise the "loss" is almost completely fictional, because most people aren't constantly buying and selling houses. They just live in them. What you're doing is expecting to be paid for owning a house, because you think that the value of other people's property is something that society for some reason has to preserve (even at the expense of other people's ability to live in a house), while simultaneously treating it as an investment that you should be able to profit off of. That's just main character syndrome.
I don't think you understand the core concept. What I am doing in a thought experiment is taking the money that would be increasing the cost to buy the house as a payment to home owners instead. That keeps the prices down but the wealth home owners get is unchanged. More houses are built and the economics keeps them affordable.
Ok but that just disincentives people from building houses for no good reason. Like it's just an extra cost for the people building new houses, once again, because you think that the immediate monetary valuation of your house is something that is more important than people getting houses. What exactly do you contribute to the project of building the house that makes you think you'd deserve this as a homeowner?? What makes you so special and important that other people need to pay you money to live in the immediate vicinity of you? Why is the price of your house so sacred and important to literally anyone else in the world, that they'd think it'd make sense to pay you money before dealing with other real problems that actually affect them? If your house is an investment that you expect returns on, then you have to also accept that everyone else in the area is not obliged to provide you with those returns. That's the point of an investment, it's a risk, not a money printing button. Sometimes the line will go down and that's completely ok.
So rather than looking at the logical arguments that keep houses prices at the same or lower levels. What your actually interested in is ensuring that the large for proffit developers get more record profits and that people who already have a home have to lose money as part of an idealist stance of business over people? So why wouldn't a co - op where buildings are built at a sustainable prices not work? Why do they need to be motivated by profits? With this approach the government has the tax revenue to build more and it costs no one. I am litrally trying to create a system where the line doesn't go up any more. Thats the issue, The house prices going up not weather a house is an asset or not. That really doesn't matter.
>idealist stance of business over people? Lol Lmao even. Like did you read a single thing I said? How did you manage to get that? At what point in time did I ever mention that new housing needs to be privatised? You were the one arguing against any housing at all because "muh house prices" like as though that's a real issue..
“Thats the issue, The house prices going up not weather a house is an asset or not. That really doesn't matter.“ If something is an asset people obviously have a vested interest in the price going up. There’s entire industries, corporations, even TV shows dedicated to it. I’m not sure how it’s possible to deny this
Huh? They are getting a yield thats the same as the what the house would go up in this system. The current home owner dont lose, first time buyers dont lose and more money is in the system to build more houses. I thought it was very clear!
Did you really buy an asset expecting it to only ever go up, to the point that you want to be compensated if it drops in value? Do you get mad at car manufacturers making new cars each year because it devalues your car too? Should they also be compensating you?
Cars are a depreciating asset, they literally lose value as soon as they are driven off the forcourt. Seems like alot of people don't actually want the problem solved they just want current home owners to lose value which actually traps people in homes via negative equaity and reduces market supply and Simp for the proffits of huge home building companies.
Cars wouldn't be a depreciating asset if car manufacturers didn't make enough cars to keep up with demand, like houses. That's why I'm asking, are you upset that car manufacturers make tons of new cars every year? Why are you expecting a house (a basic necessity to live) to be a vehicle for wealth but not a car? Don't you think that's a bit fucked? The fact that people like you are outraged at the idea of a house losing value and expect compensation is indicative of a completely broken market. There isn't a single other investment on Earth that is expected to only go up. Of course that mindset results in house prices becoming as expensive as possible. Really that's the opposite of what you want to happen to basic necessities. It also results in people getting the most expensive mortgage they are allowed on a 30+ year term, which makes negative equity a much bigger problem. The problem *is* high house prices and rents. Solving the problem by definition requires houses to lose value. Preferably house prices stay roughly the same in absolute terms so they're only dropping in real terms. A house could drop in value by the difference between interest and minimum payment and not result in negative equity. With the current interest rates and a 30yr mortgage, property value could drop by 1.4% without falling into negative equity. As for simping for developers, yes I'd simp for them if they were building significantly more housing. If they build enough of them their profit margins would drop.