Property by Rowan Moore — it’s never just bricks and mortar

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In 1957, William Myers, a middle-class war veteran and his wife, Daisy, bought a house in Levittown, Pennsylvania, and all hell broke loose. Levittown was a newly developed suburban community about 20 miles up the Delaware River from central Philadelphia. Everyone who lived there was white. William and Daisy were black.

Their arrival was greeted by mobs who gathered by their house, throwing stones and burning an eight-foot cross. “He is probably a nice guy,” said one of William’s neighbours, “but every time I look at him, I see $2,000 drop off the value of my house.” The story is recounted in Rowan Moore’s ambitious new book, Property, which examines our global obsession with bricks and mortar.

Except it’s never just bricks and mortar. For the Myerses’ neighbour, property prices legitimised violent racism, writes Moore. He argues that “property” is, variously, a tool, a myth, a fundamental part of the US Constitution, a weapon, a natural right, a convenient fiction, a Ponzi scheme, a millstone or a mind game.

The book starts by detailing some of property’s triumphs and mishaps. The reference points are all over the map: from the first incorporated black community in Missouri, to a city near New Delhi that has been built by private companies, to the kitchen of 39 Amersham Road in Romford, east London, where prime minister Margaret Thatcher once had tea with Maureen and James Patterson. They were among the first people in Britain to use the “Right to Buy scheme” to purchase their council house from the state at a hefty discount.

The scheme was the cornerstone of Thatcher’s desire to establish a “property-owning democracy” — among people of my generation it’s more often deemed the original sin of Britain’s current housing crisis. Since it was introduced in 1980, about 2mn council homes — local government-built social housing — have been sold through the policy, with only a fraction of that number being replaced. A recent estimate holds that 40 per cent of them are now owned by private landlords, who rent them out at much higher rates.

It didn’t turn out that well for the Pattersons either. When interest rates rose they were unable to pay the mortgage. They sold up, split up and Maureen went to live in a mobile home.

Moore often breezes through the economics in favour of telling us a story — although it’s not always clear what that story is. At times it is all quite dizzying, such as a section where we hurtle from complex financial products, collateralised debt obligations and such like, to “casino capitalism” to the architecture of Las Vegas to Donald Trump’s White House. It would have also benefited from a tighter edit if only to eliminate some annoying echoes and near-repetitions.

The book goes on to examine the philosophical underpinnings of home ownership, examining 17th-century philosopher John Locke’s claim that property is a “natural” right. Thomas Jefferson didn’t think so, writes Moore, which is why the Declaration of Independence numbers “the pursuit of Happiness” among man’s unalienable rights, rather than “property”, as appeared in a previous declaration.

I enjoyed the final third the most: it’s a measured and reasonable rebuttal to TINA, the pervasive idea that “There Is No Alternative”. Austria, the US, even Britain have all tried housing models that stray to varying degrees from the idea of pure private ownership.

Some work, some don’t. Some are pretty radical — such as the all-African-American farm collective in Georgia — others are perfectly hum drum. One is Milton Keynes, a new town north of London, whose infrastructure was funded by the uplift in value of its land through its change of use from agricultural to residential. It’s an idea so simple and effective, it’s difficult to grasp why it hasn’t been tried more often.

And we need to try something. For anyone caught in the gears of the rental crisis in London, Berlin or New York, the situation must seem hopeless, even cruel. After we put aside self-interest, the first thing we need to do is at least believe that a different way of living and of organising and funding society is possible.

Property: The Myth That Built the World by Rowan Moore Faber & Faber £14.99, 336 pages

Nathan Brooker is the editor of FT House & Home

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