Or beat them at their own game
This is basically the green proposal.
Massive social housing build. With 2x taxation (council tax I assume) for empty houses.
Idea being landlord are either forced to rent at reducing prices. Or sell the property at reducing prices. Rather then hold on and force a housing shortage while the gov tries to build housing.
blackn1ght@feddit.uk 2 days ago
I do like the idea of permits. Landlords must have a permit per property within a local authority (LA) and reject applications if they see fit, such as having too many permits already or blacklisted. The LA should be free to set whatever cost they want per permit. Tennants can raise issues in a centralised portal where the landlord can view them and resolve them, and if they’re not actioned upon or done properly the LA can intervene and start charging additional fines, or failure to deal with serious issues like mould could see the LA taking possession of the property.
The LA set the rental price so landlords don’t just wack up rent prices.
This might provide some income for cash strapped councils without having to purchase their own housing stock and managing it.
There could even be some funds available for well rated landlords that have to use the money to improve properties as an incentive to be proactive in their repairs etc.