geteilt von: https://sh.itjust.works/post/38301389
To try to tackle this, the Welsh Labour government, alongside Plaid Cymru, introduced measures to curb second-home ownership. This included giving councils the ability to push council tax on second homes to 300% the usual rate. They also closed a loophole whereby second-home owners could register as a business in order to pay the much lower business rates.
Gwynedd council used these powers to hike council tax to 150% in April 2023. By the end of 2024, house prices had fallen by 12.4% as second-home owners tried to sell up. In Pembrokeshire, house prices fell by 8.9% after the council increased the council tax to 200% on second homes (though this was reduced to 150% recently).
Yes, but people who live there have been priced out of the area as they can’t afford to rent or buy anymore. People whose families have lived there for generations. It’s actually causing a staffing crisis in some areas too, as some shops/cafes in the area I used to live couldn’t open as they couldn’t find anyone to work there. Everyone has had to move away to find a home and all the people came down to their holiday homes and complained that none of the shops were open. Serves them right.
Turning a place were people live into some kind of theme park for Tourists destroys it as a place to live in and to conduct any business other than Tourism.
You see it in places like Barcelona, Amsterdam and Lisbon, some of which have already started to crack down on it.