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@handtightenonly
The need to own our homes is an age-old one. It's a question of "bettering" oneself. Mad Margaret allowed people the right to buy and Council tenants took full advantage of this when they could. The issue is that of all the homes that were sold under "right to buy", about twenty thousand new homes were built. This is why we have a housing shortage, which in turn is why rental costs have in the past and will in the future increase.
In a previous life I was involved in the satanic art of Estate Agency and whilst I have had the pleasure of some truly breathtaking property, I did have the misfortune of seeing property that was bordering on habitable. I saw one flat in a building that was later condemned. There are three reasons for for the manner in which prices have increased how they have, particularly in London:
1) Banks took the risk (reasonably quickly) to lend people more and more money. I bought my tiny house out in the sticks around 11 years ago and fought to borrow three-and-a-half times my salary. I had a thirty percent deposit (check my earlier posts in this thread for how I was able to amass that!) In 2009 I sold a flat to a bloke who'd borrowed seven times his salary. I had to question my morals and risked screwing the deal when I asked him what he was going to do when the market actually turned. He just shrugged.
2) Estate Agents have long been the whipping boys (along with the banks) for the issues with both rental as well as property value increases. My former landlord put the rent up by just under 20% and then said it was on the advice of the agent that he did this. I spoke to the agents (face to face) and asked them. They obviously denied all knowledge of this and we moved out. His flat was empty for 8 weeks and he lost rental revenue for that period.
3) Greed has driven prices higher. Unless you have a team of contractors who can move walls, property is a long-term investment. Thanks to the quick fix programmes on TV and the pneumatic chested Sarah Beeney, everybody thinks they're a developer. I used to see it every single day. Someone comes into the office, registers and says they're a developer and I'd show them some potential projects and they'd vanish. La Beeney always said that anyone can make money in a rising market, but the real skill is not losing money in a falling or static market.
Finally, all those fucking idiots who assumed that remortgaging and taking £250k out of their property and buying a rental investment in 2008/9 are in serious shit now. Their two or three year deals are expiring and they're trying to find finance for properties that they had valued at £750 and are now only worth £650k. Also, all the people who bought a house for £350k sat on it for a while, extended it and then had it re-valued for £500k and then took equity out to by themselves a Porsche (a depreciating asset, no less) - I have no sympathy for. Money made that quickly will vanish that quickly.
As the small print always says - "The value of an investment can rise and fall. Failure to keep up with payments may result in you losing your HOME". Don't look at your home as an investment - it's your home. Also, your property is only worth what somebody is prepared to pay for it. All well and good getting Fuckstons round to blow smoke up your arse and tell you it's worth between 10 & 15 percent more than what anyone else values it at. It'll still sell for what everyone values it for and you're still stuck paying 2.5% agency fees. If only you'd have avoided your greed-ridden, fast-buck desires and listened to the bloke who's done it for years and not a pimply oik in an M3.
Rant over.