Tax on 3,000 empty houses to fix the housing crisis?

Tuesday 03 February 2015

A tax on Jersey’s 3,103 empty homes could be the way to fix Jersey’s housing crisis and bring down rents, and the Housing Minister is due to face questions on the subject this morning.

Deputy Montfort Tadier has listed a question for today’s States sitting about a tax on empty properties, which he says could be administered through the existing rates system.

The 2011 Census showed that 7% of all homes were vacant – that works out at 3,103 homes, including almost a thousand with three bedrooms or more. The same figures showed that just over half of the empty homes were just waiting for a new tenant or being renovated.

Deputy Tadier said that he had received a good response to the issue when discussing it with States colleagues ahead of formally putting it to Housing Minister Anne Pryke.

He said: “We know that we need to build more housing, but certainly no-one wants to build on green fields unnecessarily. So maybe we should start to look at properties that already exist but are not being used as a way to tackle the housing issue.”

The last Housing Needs survey showed that there was a serious need for new homes. It said that there was a potential shortfall of more than 1,000 units in the owner-occupier sector, and a potential shortfall of more than 400 units in the social housing sector, where demand has increased in recent years.