Presumably, Gordon is looking to tax tennants to discourage this trend....

mike, northampton, uk

The rental market is anything but healthy. It is dominated by greedy private landlords that push rents up as high as possible. Someone who rents in England will find that their rent goes up year on year (and by more than the inflation figures on which pay rises are based). A home-owner is likely to see their mortgage payments decrease as a proportion of their salary year after year until they own their home outright. Renters have little security of tenure. Landlords in this country are mostly small scale and they think only of their own profit not the wellbeing of their tenants. That is why people want to own their own homes. People are not choosing to rent, they just can't afford to buy. I would love to see the government go after private landlords for every penny they can.

Land is the most scarce and valuable resource in England. The high price of land finds its way into prices for everything we buy not just housing. It is a prime cause of rip-off Britain.

Steve, London, England

The 1.8m extra owners are mainly because they bought their council houses, that policy did not under Tories and not under Labour increase the total housing numbers, its more difficult for those on the housing lists of the RSLs to be allocated a home from the diminishing numbers. Yvette parrots the mantra that we need more homes and while no one is better placed to see that we do, she does not permit Local Authorities to do so - she is the real obstacle to more homes and the policy of leaving the total numbers to entrepreneurs to supply thro the Market has been a failure , that is the fault of the Government. We need to replace old and decaying houses, provide for extra households being formed, house the young with children and stop the B and B horror for theIR sake.. Sky rocketting costs of a new house mocks the minimum wage as even those on the average wage cannot afford to buy nor can first time buyers in 90% of Towns, millions new homes are needed.

Leslie Turner, maidstone, kent

Failing ownership is a bad thing because it means that the property owners are the ones holding the wealth. Those who rent never have any benefit. Good luck to the bloke who doesn't see the problem.

judy, Liverpool, england

@ Bob from Tunbridge Wells.

If the number of properties to let increases, this means that the landlord who owns the property is actually making all the profit and the unfortunate renter makes no profit from it at all.

Considering we have one of the lowest unemployment levels in Europe, being flexible doesn't appear to have any real benfits apart from flexibility itself.

Stuart, Wrexham,

The government need to put the brakes on buy to let. Properties are snapped up to be rented out, by people who have already bought one home and this is what is inflating property prices, especially of starter homes.

This cannot be changed without legislation as market forces on these properties are dictated by the availability of mortgages to buy to let investors, not by the ability of first time buyers to afford such properties.

The overall shortage of property is vastly overplayed by comparison, yet noone seems to want to confront the buy to let nightmare that has taken over house prices in this country.

Claire James, Ruislip, UK

Why is falling ownership a bad thing ?
A healthy rent market, is more realistic prospect, than ever increasing demand for house buys, which inevitably result in excessive prices, and the cost ofmoving impair job mobility. The Europans take a more realistic apprach to home ownership.

Bob, Tunbridg Wells, Kent

Britains have finally seen the light. It is cheaper to rent than to pay three times the asking price over 25 or more years for a house you will never own. An English mans home is not a castle but a stone around his neck.

Jim, York,

I'm not surprised,
the majority if new homes built in my area, (North West) including a complete new village, have all been bought by wealthy Southerners on buy to let schemes. We call them the toilet estates for the sheer number of to-let signs littered along the roadside.
Whenever a new housing development is advertised the houses are snapped up by the southerners as an investment. They don't even sign contracts, just pay a deposit, and by the time the house is built the price has risen. They then put the house up for sale to another group of buyers, and out come the to -let signs. This is repeated time after time.
It's a standing joke here, but not for the poor couples looking to buy their first house, as all it does is puts the price of a buying house beyond their reach.

Denize, Preston, England

This is a sad situation. Our youngest son lives in a two room flat in Putney with his girlfriend and pays £1300 a month. Between they make about £110k per annum gross but cannot afford a mortgage for a property in Putney with two bedrooms.
Since he moved there three years ago, the price has risen from the high £200k's to over £400k for the same property. No matter how much they save, the houses keep moving away from them.

Graham Probert, Camberley, UK

Try stopping massive immigration Yvette Copper instead of blaming everyone else. Labours horrendous mass immigration policy is destroying this country and its services.

The solution from labour is to charge us more such as road and congestion charges!!!!!

Gary, Oldham,