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Are we building the houses that no one can afford?
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According to the former Housing Minister, it is reasonable to set aside around 58 vergées for future homes for the over-55s. According to the current Housing Minister, there is an urgent need for States and social rented housing for people who have lost their job during the recession and/or find themselves without the means to put a roof over their heads.
But according to the Planning Minister, it seems that the amount of land required for the over-55s has been overestimated.
I’m not sure who will prove to be right, but from what I hear there is general consensus that the amount of building work going on at the moment should be more than adequate for the number of people who will need ‘luxury’ homes. Time and again I hear people lamenting the number of empty flats and houses that have been unoccupied for months, even years.
Furthermore, there is general dismay about the number of residents that Jersey is already accommodating, with the belief that the population is already too large.
Of course the decision to rezone the 58 vergées for the over-55s was taken two years ago, before the recession had started to make real inroads into employment prospects. At the time it was probably believed that things would not take too long to turn around, whereas at the present time it looks as if job losses are more likely to increase than decrease, not least in the public sector.
And despite recent assertion that the housing market in Jersey is not in such dire straits as the UK, those in the know are seeing little improvement in the buying and selling of properties. Amazing though it may seem, in just two years the situation has changed from boom on the horizon to stagnation on the horizon.
This is unfortunate for developers who were hoping to continue to make a killing out of little old Jersey, even when the rest of the world had come to a full stop.
There is, of course, the Waterfront project to keep them occupied, but the gains elsewhere are likely to be past their peak. You only have to listen to the warnings coming from some (more honest) sectors of the construction industry.
Jersey would be well advised to steer clear of the situation which now exists in Ireland, or California, where over-zealous developers have produced houses that no one can afford to inhabit.
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