Reader’s letter This is a debate entry, written by an external contributor. The post expresses the writer’s views.
If you cannot get a loan from a normal bank and meet certain requirements in terms of income, for example you are in a so-called “disadvantaged situation”, you can get a so-called “Start-up loan” from Husbanken. This is a good arrangement, and although the eye of the needle is narrow, it has helped many people to enter the housing market.
It is the municipalities that administer the scheme and allocate the loans. Husbanken determines the main guidelines, but in the regulations for start-up loans it is stated that “Municipalities can establish their own regulations in accordance with the regulations”.
Then we approach the core of this post.
Participate in the Oslo Debate
Do you have an opinion on this matter, or another topic? Submit your debate entry here
Oslo people have many opinions about their city, and Avisa Oslo wants to publish more personal and original posts that enrich the public debate.
Must buy housing in the municipality
In the loan commitments to its initial loan customers, Oslo municipality has included a requirement that they “must buy housing in the municipality”.
As a home purchase adviser, I have helped a number of home buyers with Startlån with their home purchase. The loan limit is usually very tight, and there are very few homes available in Oslo for your budget.
The same can be the case for home buyers with private financing. When I have assisted them and we have not succeeded in finding the desired home within Oslo, we have often searched for properties in municipalities outside Oslo where the prices are lower.
This is not possible for people with Startlån. They therefore have less freedom of choice than other home buyers. Is this fair or reasonable?
I mean no. The most important thing must be that the purpose of helping people into the housing market is fulfilled.
Freedom of choice should apply to everyone
I have investigated the matter and also tried to get an answer from Oslo municipality as to why they require that the home that the home loan customers buy must be in Oslo, but so far have not received any sensible answer.
After some searching about the prevalence of the requirement that the Startlånet must be used for the purchase of housing within the municipality where the loan is granted, the following information was found.
“Investigations show that in 70 per cent of the guidelines (the municipal ones) it is an invariable requirement that the borrower must buy a home in the municipality where the user has applied for a starter loan”according to Proba Samfunnsanalyse: The municipalities’ guidelines and practices for start-up loans (2012).
Oslo belongs to this 70 percent. It seems illogical and almost contrary to the purpose of being able to help as many people as possible into the housing market, that in the country’s biggest pressure area with the very highest housing prices, there should be a requirement that those with the lowest financing be forced to buy housing within the municipality.
Freedom of choice is a fundamental right, and it should apply to everyone – regardless of whether one is financed by the public or the private sector.
Oslo municipality should reconsider its requirement that recipients of start-up loans must buy housing in the municipality. They are completely free to remove this provision. It is time to put people first, to open doors instead of closing them. Let’s make the Startlånet what it was meant to be – an opportunity for more people to own their own home.
Read more comments, debate entries and Oslo stories on Avisa Oslo’s debate page Oslodebatten
also read
Oslo cannot sit and wait for the state to fix things, we have to take matters into our own hands
also read
I survived a week outside Ring 3
also read
Bucket life is neither happiness nor a wishful dream
also read
