The part ownership schemes in my area are all in undesirable locations and are brown fill sites, where the price of land is cheap. Whilst paying part mortgage/rent sounds attractive, in reality it is still really costly. Better to rent and live in a nicer place than to own half of something manky!

Lois, Hemel Hempstead, UK

Rescue plan - Give me a break.

Looks like one more gasp effort to drown a few more people of my generation while they still have a chance of getting in the lifeboats.

House Prices are only going in one direction at the moment.

In two/three years time housing will be affordable.

Andy Hawk, Liverpool, UK

I'm a first time buyer and work in a housing association on delivering the homebuy schemes - i wouldn't touch them with a bargepole, rent half a house and pay a mortgage!?! Whats the point!!

Lara, southport,

Had the Government reatained GOVERNANCE of the credit & finance industry several decades ago, the grabbing banks and niaive buyers would not have got us, as a nation, into this dire predicament.
WE should return to the days of 3 times one partner's salary and let the banks and builders take the hit

Andrew, Portsmouth, UK

It is disgraceful what this government is doing prop up the housing market.
Compulsory development orders on developer's landbanks and substantial tax on BTL rental income would be wiser policies to correct the grossly overinflated property market.

Allan, Inverness,

Wierd innit. GB tries to entice suckers to waste their money for his own political gain, even though HE KNOWS that in time the same outlay will buy the property outright.
This has become a horrible country to live in, run by a bunch of amateurs. No wonder peeps are leaving, including the Poles.

Pike, Cornwall,

Since the goverment themselves predict house prices are likely to fall 20% plus, it seems deeply cynical to entice people to buy now. It seems that destroying future well being of the young is a price Gordon Brown feels is worth paying to save his own position. Pathetic

P Higgins, Iver,

I was looking for my first flat in Dulwich until recently.. A 2 bed flat costs <£900 a month to rent, a 200k mortgage costs circa £950.

I can find a 2 bed flat for £900 easily, but theres no 2 bed flats for 200k. I can afford but why would I buy something that represents zero ROI?

Peter, london, england

As a FTB I am disgusted with this. Why help people buy at the top of the market? We are at most risk from negative equity. Is it to prop up the market a little longer? Make no mistake, house prices are extortionate and should be steered well clear. Get rid of him!

Paul, harrow,

Alternative headline;
'Brown lures first time buyers to prop up housing market'

I'm looking to buy a house at some point in the near future, but you'd have to be bonkers to for the next year or two, possibly more.

Rob, Hull,

Is this £60k household income or the income of one person?

£60k may sound good, but remember that there will be about 19k in direct tax on that, plus the family will not get the benifits a family on say 16k will get.

Wappers, cardiff,

Buying a property is just an investment. Sometimes you win and sometimes you lose. The fact that some people have made a wrong investment decision is not the fault of the government. So why should taxpayers' money be used to rescue them?

john, Hong Kong,

Why would anyone want to buy half of something that costs twice what it's worth?

Dave Hall, Stafford, UK

So £60k pa is poor! I must be living on another planet. What more damage can this man do before the county is completely ruined by labour? Maybe a few more public holidays for our "hard working families". We are in a world market and only swim by our efforts

William, London , UK

they just predicted a massive drop in home prices...why on earth are they suggesting first time buyers purchase homes now? they will be in negative equity so fast their heads will spin and the government will need to use MORE tax money to bail them out. labour is hopeless

Tom, London, England

The best thing for the Government is allow the market to correct. Yes, there will be loosers, but FTBs will be far bigger winners than this garbage idea of shared ownership that puts taxpayers money at risk to help housebuilders and banks.

Labour - Time to go.

Bobby, London, UK

Why is the government so keen on helping first-time buyers buy houses on which they are going to lose money?

Seems that when Brown is against the wall, the old 70's style socialist comes out and tries to nationalise everything. Surprising to see "New" Labour's architect is actually Old Labour.

Matt, London,

Why buy 50% now when you could have 100% for the same money in a couple of years?

Willum, Torbay, UK

So Gordon will now use taxpayer's money to prop up property firms by buying their over-priced boxes that they can't sell because not enough people earn enough to pay for them (thanks in part to rising taxes) - and will then sell them back in part to the very people he is pricing out of the market!

Huw Sayer, Norwich, England

Please change the title of this article to reflect the reality not New Labours deceitful spin - it should read:

"Brown announces taxpayer funded BAILOUT of property development companies."

It should then point out that these companies that are sitting on 500,000 plots in their landbanks.

Huw Sayer, Norwich, England

Stop wasting taxpayers' money!!

Richard, Maidenhead,

Josh, Sheffield - absolutely right.

Brown needs to learn very very fast that excessive taxation is killing the economy, no matter how he tries to carve up the money and decide in his microcosmic world how to put it back into people's pockets.

MarkS, Leeds,

Isn't that what people with NR mortgages are,shared ownership?

stephen hulton, eure, france

How utterly ludicrous If you offer buyers additional lending then prices just rise to compensate

Also note that the 200M earmarked would only purchase a 1000 or so average homes!

Labour has been kicking FTBs in the teeth for many years now in favour of their BTL pals. Nothing has changed today

A Hariis, Kettering, UK

If you buy fifty per cent of a property worth £160,000 that subsequently drops in value to £130,000 who absorbs the loss? You can bet it won't be the party that owns the other fifty percent. Sounds like a way to leverage up your negative equity to me.

RBF, Essex,

Why doesn't the government just scrap stamp duty so buyers can put down a bigger deposit?

It is irresponsible to try to encourage first time buyers into a market which even the government now has acknowledged is going down the drain.

Josh, Sheffield,