Government’s HomeBuy scheme “too small”

2 October 2006

The Government’s new HomeBuy scheme – designed to help key workers get on to the property ladder – has come in for criticism, with claims that it’s too small to help many people.

According to the Royal Institution of Chartered Surveyors, the scheme will only help 20,000 buyers over five year. Milan Khatri of the RICS, said: “The scheme is so small that it will account for less than half of 1% of transactions per year, benefiting only 20,000 buyers over five years.”

Meanwhile, the scheme has attracted criticism from another quarter, for only scratching the surface of the problem of property affordability. Helen Adams, who’s managing director of the property website FirstRungNow.com, said: “The concept is excellent but the scale and eligibility of the scheme falls short of widespread expectations and hopes.”

She added: “Today’s first-time buyers, unless they can be described as a key worker, will still need to look for a solution amongst the array of new property and mortgage “deals” being offered – or go cap in hand to their parents.”

The Housing minister, Yvette Cooper, pointed out at the launch of the scheme that HomeBuy is a short-term solution to help people on to the property ladder. She stressed that in the long-term, the only solution to increasing home ownership was to build more houses.