Second homeownership banned in Whitby and Brighton - looking for mortgage adviser comment

An impact of Covid has seen wealthy city property portfolio investors buying property in seaside or rural towns to benefit from the UK staycation craze. This pushes out the locals who wish to own a property in their local area further pushing up the house prices due to short supply and huge demand in their hometowns. I have had several disappointed clients in the past couple years who have been gazzumped by investors paying over the odds for a property that will become a holiday home instead of a family home. Restricting second homes in certain hot spots will mean first time buyers and movers have more opportunities to buy a home where they live and work, perhaps small Cornish beach towns could also benefit from this limit.

Tourist hotspots have always struggled to get the balance right between welcoming those who want to visit and own second homes in an area, without then creating an overheated property market where locals are priced out. With the way house prices have increased over the past few years it is not a surprise to see some local Council take steps like these.

There's obvious logic to this which is designed to protect locals from over inflated house prices. I completely agree with it and think home ownership should be prioritised over holiday/second home ownership. It will be interesting to see if more hot spots follow suit and if this opens the gate for other rules around property ownership designed to protect buyers.

With the local council being elected to protect the interests of local people it makes perfect sense. Locals being priced out of the market doesn't help anyone. The real problem though that none of these sticking plasters ever address? We need to build more houses nationally and where they are needed. We can't cover every bit of land in concrete but how about building upwards like they do around the world? And how about some investment in public transport outside of the capital to make denser living a possibility? The Elizabeth line just cost £18.9 billion. We've just had our already sparse local bus service cut further. If 10 year old me understood the concept playing Sim City on the family computer, why can't successive governments?

We have seen a surge in enquires with clients based in London buying second homes across the country, predominantly in seaside towns. I had a client that recently purchased a second home in Brighton. Whilst I understand the positives for assisting first time buyers, it can negatively impact other people. For those who have properties already, their house value is higher due to demand from people buying second homes. If the area is restricted to locals, this could reduce the local prices, making existing home owners worse off. It is worth noting that people who buy second homes will invariably have a good income to afford having another property. Those who have second homes can bring value to the local area. They spend money on local goods and services that help the businesses, this in turn provides jobs to the local economy. This happens in a number of areas in the UK including London (with foreign nationals buying a second home). If you change the rules for one area, where do you draw the line?