Thousands of Britain's offices sit empty while thousands of homeless Britons sit on the streets. A proposed solution is to turn those offices into housing. A report from property agency CBRE (US:CBRE) made headlines last week after it claimed 28,000 homes could be delivered if all of London’s currently vacant second-hand stock was converted into housing. It is a compelling argument, but it is riddled with problems.
For a start, this is not a new idea. The government expanded permitted development rights (PDR) to allow offices to be turned into housing in 2013. I live in Croydon where plenty of homes for rent and sale have been delivered this way.
On the one hand, more homes are generally a good thing. On the other hand, the living conditions in many of these homes are appalling because, under PDR, developers do not need to achieve full planning permission, allowing them to cut corners and build scores of cramped flats without ventilation or even windows.