Our campaigns
We're campaigning to get a better deal for homeowners and aspiring homeowners
We push government and industry to give people a fairer deal – making it easier and more affordable to buy, sell, manage and improve a home.
We speak up on the issues that matter, driven by what homeowners tell us and what our research uncovers. Through hard-hitting reports, media campaigns, real-life stories, collaboration and direct lobbying, we make change happen. Here’s our long list of what needs fixing.
Current major campaigns
Leasehold Reform
- We have campaigned long and hard for the phasing out of the leasehold system. Since 2017 in fact with our report Homes Held Hostage report. Since then we’ve helped shape and drive the Leasehold and Freehold Reform Act.
- But we now want swift implementation of these reforms – leaseholders have been held hostage for long enough and they deserve better. And we don’t want government to backtrack on making lease extensions cheaper because of disgruntled freeholders set to lose out. We’ll continue to campaign for reforms
Keep up with the latest changes on leasehold, consultations, our views and a timeline of what’s to come.
Better new build
- Too often homebuyers have problems with their new build homes, and end up in disputes with their developers.
- We want better quality new homes, and better consumer protection, with an ombudsman to help in disputes between new home buyers and developers.
Read all about our new build campaign and specifically our call for a mandatory snagging retention.
Retirement housing reform
- Retirement housing has been left un-regulated for too long. Homeowners deserve a better deal.
- Read more about the changes we would like to see in the retirement home sector.
Fairer estate agents practices and an end to conditional selling
- Too many homeowners get taken advantage of by estate agents. We need stronger regulation of estate agents, more transparency over fees and sellers’ continuing liabilities to agents, an end to unfair contracts, and a ban on estate agents from offering services to buyers.
- We are particularly alarmed by conditional selling whereby estate agents pressure sell their services in exchange for putting an offer forward or favourable treatment. It’s illegal for estate agents to discriminate against buyers who don’t use their in-house mortgage broker or recommended conveyancer. But this doesn’t stop it happening.
- As far back as 2017, we exposed this issue with a story that included an audio recording of an estate agent pressuring a buyer. We said then—and still believe—that estate agents should be banned from offering financial services, such as mortgages, to buyers on properties they’re selling. Read the piece
- In 2018, our research found that 300,000 buyers a year felt pressured into using in-house services. It may be time to revisit and update those figures. Summary here.
- We’ve published a consumer guide to help buyers stand their ground and avoid being misled. No buyer should feel forced into using a particular mortgage broker or conveyancer. Buying a home is stressful enough without these coercive sales tactics. Read the guide
- Our CEO raised this very issue in Parliament in May 2024, during a session on improving the homebuying and selling process. Watch here (from 14:39)
- We continue to raise this with both NTSLEAT and TPO.
Read more in our guide Conditional selling: Do I have to use an estate agent’s mortgage adviser?
Homeownership for all
- The proportion of people owning their own home has declined to the lowest level since the 1980s, and there are now 5 million people who want to own their home but don’t. Reversing this trend is our foundation campaign, kicked off with our landmark report Death of a Dream in 2012.
- Our latest research reveals that aspiration to own a home has fallen to its lowest level in over 10 years. Only 64% of non-homeowners now aspire to own, down from 71% last year and below the 2013 figure of 65%.
- We need a government that puts homeownership at the core of it’s policy framework so that homeownership is a real option for generations to come.
Reform the homebuying process
- Buying or selling a home is too uncertain, takes too long, and is too expensive.
- One in three house sales falls through, and people can still be left with the costs. We need to streamline the buying and selling of houses by making it easier to share property data electronically between buyers, sellers and their conveyancers, estate agents and lenders.
- Gazumping needs to be stamped out so there is more certainty when a deal has been agreed. If a buyer or seller pulls out of a purchase before exchange, they should be required to pay the costs of the other.
Read more about our campaign for home selling and buying reform.
Scrap stamp duty
- Thought of moving house but looked at the stamp duty and changed your mind? You’re not alone. Our latest research revealed more than 800,000 homeowners shelved moving plans because of stamp duty.
- The government should abolish stamp duty for those buying a home to live in. Currently it’s a tax on transactions and so results in fewer of them, dampening the housing market and means that people don’t move even when they would like to. It is inefficient and deserves to go.
Go to our Scrap Stamp Duty campaign page
Spray Foam Roof Insulation
- We’re encouraged to make our homes more energy efficient but many homeowners who have had spray foam roof insulation installed have been left with homes they can’t sell or remortgage unless they spend thousands of pounds to remove it.
- In some cases, roof timbers have rotted due to damp caused by this insulation.
- The worst of the problems are usually caused by rogue traders, who have installed the wrong type of spray foam or have installed it in unsuitable properties.
- But even when it has been installed properly and the correct paperwork is in place, some homeowners are still facing difficulties if they want to sell their home or remortgage. What’s even more shocking is that many homeowners have had free or low cost spray foam insulation on Government schemes.
- We have written to government urging action.
Read more about why we are warning homeowners to NOT install spray foam at this time.
License to Build: Stop Cowboy Builders
- Thousands of UK homeowners fall victim to rogue builders every year, with contractors delivering poor work, abandoning projects, or disappearing with deposits.
- Our research with the Federation of Master Builders shows that nearly half of UK adults wrongly believe builders are legally licensed, and 65% of UK homeowners expect builders to have insurance to cover damage – but they often don’t.
- As it stands today, anyone – regardless of training, skill, or experience – can legally carry out construction work. This means rogue traders can cause financial and emotional devastation to homeowners, with little accountability.
- As a result of our research with the FMB, we are jointly calling for a mandatory licensing scheme for builders that should include competence assessments and background checks on trading and financial history. Also, we’re call for a publicly-accessible online database of licensed traders.
Go to our License to Build: Stop Cowboy Builders campaign page
Housing affordability schemes
The gap between average house prices and wages has widened and there are big regional variations. The ONS calculated in 2021 that people would need to spend over 9 times their earnings to buy a home. Schemes such as First Homes and Shared Ownership are there to help but fall short of making a real difference. Learn more about our Better Shared Ownership Campaign.
Other campaigns
We continue to campaign on other issues:
Campaign successes
As the main consumer group for homeowners in the UK, we have been extremely successful in getting change:
- a new higher rate of stamp duty for property investors, to help homebuyers compete in the market place. We proposed the policy for stamp duty change in 2013. The government announced it in 2015.
- reform of stamp duty to make it less burdensome on first time buyers. See our 2013 report Stamping on Aspiration. The government announced its comprehensive reforms a year later.
- an increase in the tax-free Rent-a-Room allowance for homeowners with lodgers, from £4250 to £7500. We called for the increase in 2013, and the government raised the allowance in 2016. We have since suggested that it should be raised again in line with rents.
- the ban on the sale of new build houses as leasehold rather than freehold, which we called for in our report on leasehold reform Homes Held Hostage. Our report came out in April 2017, and the government pledged to introduce the changes a few months later. In 2022, government went further and banned ground rent on all new leasehold properties and extensions.
We want to hear from you
Is there an issue you feel passionate about and you think there are others in the same position? Feel free to add a comment below or send an email to hello@hoa.org.uk
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