How a modified home information pack could help to make the half a million empty homes around the Country more transparent

The Guardian reported this week that Charities are demanding an urgent rethink of government housing policy after a Guardian investigation found that almost half a million homes are lying empty in the UK – ‘enough to put a roof over the heads of a quarter of the families on council house waiting lists’. The TUC has also argued for financial penalties to be imposed on owners of empty properties.

Some of this empty stock is council owned and according to the Guardian around 11,000 of the property is owned by companies/individuals based abroad.

So what can be done?

As a starter a central register of all property that has remained unoccupied for more than 12 months should be established. Such property could in the main be indentified by Council Tax records. Lower council tax is levied on unoccupied property. Once on the register the owner should be required to produce a modified home information pack on the property to include the sales statement, the PIQ and the energy performance certificate as well as a condition type property.

This modified HIP would need to be uploaded into the register and would then enable Councils and Charities to have a resource for assessing the energy rating and condition of this stock as well as identifying and encouraging the owners to make the stock available to help ease the demand for low cost housing.

The HIP could include as a standard enclosure, information sheets on available energy and general improvement grants as well as details of how owners of private property can register as council as social landlords.

The smoke and mirrors surrounding empty homes needs to be addressed and addressed soon. The cost of maintaining a central register and for producing modified HIPs for public owned property would be minimal compared with the added cost placed on Councils in dealing with and managing the shortage of housing stock and the cost of putting families up in expensive bed and breakfast establishments.