A WOMAN says she is about to be made homeless and points the finger at tourists for snapping up holiday homes. Jasmin Or, 24, grew up in the beauty spot of St Ives, Cornwall, but is set to be without somewhere to live next month. Landlords and businesses have been buying up properties in the […]
A WOMAN says she is about to be made homeless and points the finger at tourists for snapping up holiday homes.
Jasmin Or, 24, grew up in the beauty spot of St Ives, Cornwall, but is set to be without somewhere to live next month.
Landlords and businesses have been buying up properties in the area and converting them into summer homes, meaning there is nowhere left for locals to rent.
Jasmin cannot find a new place to rent and her tenancy is due to end on May 10.
She has exhausted letting agents and spare room sites, and fears in three weeks she will be sleeping rough.
The hotel worker said: “I’m wondering if this place will seem as beautiful to me when I’m sleeping on a bench in three weeks.
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“There’s no homes left.
“Everything has been turned into second homes now and that’s the issue.
“They’re all Airbnbs and a lot of locals have been driven out of their homes now to accommodate for the summer.”
Cornwall Council said there is “an imbalance in supply and demand” that the county has never seen before.
St Ives MP Derek Thomas said in December last year that around 100 families compete for every available three-bedroom home in parts of Cornwall.
The housing problem was accelerated during the pandemic when “staycations” boomed.
Increased demand for second homes in the beach town drove prices up even further – with rent now being comparable to that in London.
Jasmin pays £800 rent, not including any bills, for a room in a two-bedroom house.
She has no family home she can return to and is now faced with sleeping rough until finding somewhere, though believes this will be a miracle as summer approaches.
Renting a property in St Ives through popular lodging site Airbnb will cost her £150 a night at the moment – or £4,500 a month.
Cornwall Council paid out almost £170million in Covid-19 grants to holiday let businesses in Cornwall.
It is estimated that more than half of that money went to people who live outside the county.
Many owners of second homes qualify to pay business rates and not council tax, which qualifies for rates relief.
This means the landlords were able to cheaply run their properties in St Ives without contributing anything to the local area.
Jasmin said: “In lockdown, I’d go for a walk and look up in the evening to see only a few homes with lights on in town.
“I could see how many actually are holiday homes.
“I’ve watched a lot of my friends struggle with homelessness – friends in my age group who work a lot harder than I do.
“They all sofa surf, it’s not just myself.”
Jasmin urged tourists to consider holidays elsewhere this summer to give locals a chance at finding somewhere to rent for a reasonable price.
A spokesperson at Cornwall Council said: “The Council is taking a multi-faceted approach to address the housing crisis in the medium term and moving on into the future.
“This plan will involve more than £300m of potential investment.
“We are working to get the legislative changes we need at Parliament to be able to control the number of second homes.
“And give us the ability to set a Council Tax surcharge against those homes.
“The Council has proposed to the Government that planning permission should be needed to turn a home into a second residence or holiday let.
“And the authority should be able to charge double Council Tax on second homes.
“The lack of decent affordable housing that residents are experiencing all over Cornwall has been exacerbated by the pandemic.
“There is an imbalance in supply and demand that we have never seen before.
“The boom in house prices and the demand for holiday accommodation is causing a significant reduction in the availability of homes to rent.
“It matched sudden escalation in rental costs.
“Private landlords have been moving away from long-term letting and instead moving towards the short-term holiday market.”
The council told how it has made a number of home purchases to turn into social housing.
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Jasmin has turned to social media to raise awareness of what’s happening in St Ives.
Her TikTok video shave garnered thousands of views and a hoard of advice from people across the country on what she can do to avoid sleeping rough.
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