– It's expensive here! So to speak, being a first time buyer here is not that easy.
The home is located in one of the capital's old working-class neighborhoods in Grunerloka, central Oslo. To live in the middle of cafes, shops and restaurants, homebuyers have to pay big bucks even for small apartments:
In the Grünerløkka district, house prices have risen by 287 percent since 2003, figures from Eiendom Norge show. This is much higher than the increase in wages during the same period.
Housing crisis: House prices in the capital, in the district of Grünerlokka, have risen sharply for decades.
Photo: Nadir Alam
– Here in Oslo, a nurse can buy 2.4 percent of the houses in the city center. This means you're pushing certain groups out of the cities, and there's a big difference between generations, says Home.
Extremely high house prices and a demanding rental market mean Home now wants to boost housing policy in Labor ahead of the 2025 election.
The AUF leader is in Ap's program committee and thus sits around the table when the party has to hammer out policies that will give it an electoral victory in a year and a half.
The line is tough
It is known that the AUF favors a national wealth tax in the hope of curbing price growth.
Now the Youth Party will remove the tax concession for second home owners. These are houses that private individuals buy instead of renting.
This will be done by removing the interest deduction, which means that borrowing to buy rental properties will cost more.
The AUF will ensure that large, professional players are taxed in a similar way, for example by companies that cannot claim interest deductions for loans with mortgages on houses.
– We believe that owning more houses was never as profitable as it is today. That could mean more homes coming up for sale, says Home.
– If you tax hard, won't that lead to less rental properties?
– Yes, then we will also have to think about how to create a rental market for the future. Apart from student housing, it is often left to the market, says the AUF president.
Home's list of measures also says that more houses should be built faster than today by reducing the processing time. And AUF will use Top Husbanken very actively.
– We want to double the allocations for Housing Bank. We are talking about almost NOK 30 billion, with which you can actually provide start-up loans to young people who do not have the opportunity to get loans elsewhere.
To “clean up the rental market”, Home will also have a rent watchdog, which will “act like a labor inspectorate”, with the power to fine dishonest landlords.
AUF also comes up with a plan to establish rental collectives, which can negotiate rental rates in Ap's project works.
– poorly thought out
NTNU professor Are Oust backs AUF on one point: if house prices are to fall, more houses need to be built so more people can enter the housing market.
– The plan to build more houses is great. Others will probably create bigger challenges and seem a little poorly thought out, the summary of the home expert.
A plan to cut interest rates on second homes is unlikely to materialize, Oust fears.
— If you have taxable income, you usually get a deduction for that expense, he says — and fears a change could open the way to tax adjustments and tax distortions.
Housing Researcher: Professor sacked at NTNU.
Photo: NTNU
– In addition, this could lead to higher rental prices, and we could risk the rental market
Simply becomes so small that it stops working the way we want it to.
The professor points out that the proposal to increase the housing bank limits also has some confusion.
– Who gets it and who doesn't? Who do we help? We help some and punish others. From now on there will be no more houses.
The concepts of rent monitoring and collective bargaining are not simple:
– It can create a rental survey. The question is what tasks it will have and what will lead to an improvement. But if there is an improvement in the situation, for example, it will raise the price.
– When they come to negotiate, we must have a negotiating partner. Who will it be when we only have small landlords in Norway?
Pledge capture
Housing Minister Erling Sande (SP) will present a report to the Storting with new housing policy before Easter.
– It is now a grotesque situation. Fewer homes are being built and we are seeing more pressure on the rental market and rising prices. It is necessary to strengthen efforts in housing policy, he says to NRK.
He pointed out that the government has strengthened Hasbanken with a NOK 10 billion debt structure.
Housing Minister: Erling Sande from the Center Party.
Photo: Nils Fridtjof Skumsvoll
– Today it takes a lot of time to plan new houses, says Sande.
The minister would not comment on AUF's proposal to scrap the interest exemption on secondary housing. But in the past, the finance minister has refused to increase house tax.
– Actions we take to make more homes available for rent or ownership. For those looking to rent or build, Sande says things should be simplified rather than complicated.
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