Rapid Evidence Assessment of the Research ... - Rural Housing

42.
How have second homes been defined in the literature and what data sources have been used?
The regulations also provide for one class of dwelling which is long term empty:
Class C: Dwellings which are unoccupied and substantially unfurnished.
43. Classes A and B define those dwellings for which billing authorities may reduce the Council Tax discount
from between 50 per cent and 10 per cent (second homes), and Class C those dwellings where they may
reduce the discount from between 50 per cent to 0 per cent (long term empty homes).
44. Councils compile information on these categories of dwellings and this information is collated by the Office
of the Deputy Prime Minister’s (OPDM) successor department, Communities and Local Government (CLG). In
essence the Council Tax definition amounts to defining second homes as “furnished homes that are no-one’s
main residence” (Gallent at al, 2005, p6).
Definitions used in ONS Omnibus surveys
45. The ONS Omnibus Survey, also known as Omnibus, is a regular, multi-purpose survey which started
operating commercially in 1990. It was set up originally to meet the needs of government departments for a
survey that used short and simple sets of questions, had greater statistical reliability than private sector
omnibus surveys and a properly designed random sample.
46. Omnibus surveys have, from time to time, been used to investigate second home ownership. The
definitions used have however varied and the interpretation of the definition depends on both the questioner
and the respondent. For example, in 1998 the Omnibus survey instructed interviewers as follows:
47.
“Please make sure that you do not include a caravan etc. or anything that is not a permanent structure as
a second home. Most people with second homes are probably quite clear about which is their main home
and which their second home (and, in general, we would expect the main home to be the one in which
they are interviewed). If respondents are in no doubt, let them decide which is the second home. Some
people may not feel sure (e.g. someone who spends 5 days a week in one place because of work and the
weekend in the family home). Where respondents are in any doubt please ask them to treat as the main
home the one which the household as a whole makes most use of and the other as the second home”
(Omnibus, 1998; p6).
In the July 2005 survey a test question for the 2011 Census was included. It asked:
“Does anyone in your household own a second home?” Interviewers were instructed as follows: “A second
home refers to any home the household rents or owns in addition to the home in which they spend the
most time in or live with their immediate family” (ONS, 2005b, p99).
48. This definition might be seen to include, unlike some other definitions, residences that are someone else’s
main home. Thus buy-to-let properties owned by a member of the household would be included.
49. This confusion might not be as great if a clearer distinction was made in general parlance between ‘home’
and ‘house’ or ‘dwelling’. If a home is defined as something that cannot be built or bought or sold but is only
created by the experience of living, then households can own a second (or more) house or dwelling without
owning a second home. In fact it is according to this approach impossible to own another household’s ‘home’;
it is only possible to own the house or dwelling in which another household lives. Second homes then become
genuinely only places where a household creates a home in addition to their main home; but they are also
places that someone else has not made their home. There is, in short, an important distinction to be made
between a house and a home.
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