article_snippet: A scheme offering starter homes for sale at 20 per cent below the normal market price is to be doubled in size if the Tories win the election.
article_snippet: The estimated discount on a typical £200,000 house would be a hefty £40,000.
article_snippet: The scheme for 100,000 such homes was announced at the Conservative Party conference in September.
article_snippet: Pledging to produce a Britain ‘where everyone who works hard can have a home of everyone who works hard own’, David Cameron will say: ‘There is a particular kind of security that comes with having a home – and that’s what I want to talk about today.
article_snippet: David Cameron is also considering a radical idea tabled by Work and Pensions Secretary Iain Duncan Smith to extend the right to buy to 2.5million tenants in housing association properties.
article_snippet: The Tories’ Starter Homes initiative is due to begin today.
article_snippet: First-time buyers aged under 40 are eligible to apply and can register First-time buyers aged under 40 interest at www.starter-home.co.uk.
article_snippet: In an interview with Conservative Party chairman Grant Shapps initially suggested homebuyers would be offered government-subsidised mortgages, before saying ministers would ‘get together’ with developers and landowners to finalise details.
article_snippet: But Tory sources said there was a clear plan to keep prices down by allowing construction in areas where planning permission would not normally be granted for housing.
article_snippet: Hundreds of acres of unwanted commercial and industrial land are to be turned over for the scheme, which Mr Cameron has said will help ‘unlock home ownership for a generation’.
article_snippet: In some cases, developers will be allowed to build a small number of homes for sale on the open market to subsidise the cost of the new starter homes.
article_snippet: Developers will also be spared infrastructure levies which add about £20,000 to the cost of a home on a normal development.
article_snippet: Conservative Party Chairman Grant Shapps said that the move was designed to ensure ‘common sense on home extensions, so families aren’t crushed by expensive red tape’.
article_snippet: Councils will also be forced to help find plots for people seeking to build Councils own homes, as part of a scheme that ministers believe could produce up to 20,000 new homes a year.
article_snippet: Ministers say Ministers want to offer new starter homes in both towns and the countryside –
article_snippet: The price of homes available in the scheme will be capped at £250,000 outside London and £450,000 in the capital.
article_snippet: Mr Cameron will pledge that design standards will not be allowed to slip, saying that people will not be offered ‘rabbit hutches or shoe boxes, but decent, well-built homes with gardens – places to start and raise a family’.
article_snippet: But industry sources questioned whether the scheme could be delivered and pointed out that the scheme has been doubled in size before a single home has been built.
highlights_snippet: David Cameron to announce housing policy in speech in today .
  
highlights_snippet: Councils to be forced to free up plots for people who want to build house .
  
highlights_snippet: Ministers claim it could lead to an extra 100,000 houses over five years .
  