THE PRIVATE HOUSING SECTOR – IS THERE NO ALTERNATIVE?
The private rental market is currently very precarious for most. The number of households privately renting doubled between 2007 and 2017, with rent in England hitting a record high during the pandemic. Tenants are often pushed into unstable rental agreements, where they are made to stump up large deposits before even moving in, and wait unreasonable lengths of time to have their deposits returned when they move out.
But these facts seem almost like an inevitability we feel forced to accept, when housing only appears to be a choice between private rent or personal property ownership in the mainstream. Renting a property is painted in terms of
