It's mad how London focussed the UK economy is. So many jobs in London with insufficient housing and people unable to afford to buy and having to rent whilst other parts of the country have too many houses and not enough jobs.
Just saw the news that 300 tenants fought for one property in Bristol. Also my friend had to go through a bidding war for her rented studio in London last year. The only modern solution will be to make remote working more common so people can scatter around the country more. Because many workers down south were people who fled dead northern towns, surely many wouldn’t mind moving back if the towns were made nice. Problem is the locals left behind, they usually don’t understand how this could have happened and are extremely bitter towards outsiders or non poor people, which is scaring away any redevelopment efforts
I do some remote work (freelance video work) and one issue with it is people from other countries can do the same work as you for a $1phr which makes it nearly impossible to find ok paid jobs let alone good paying ones. I'm not sure if this would become a problem for uk companies working in other fields but I do wonder if they would get to the stage when they question why they would pay uk staff 30k plus a year for a job they could pay somebody 5k a year for overseas.
Never forget that its no accident this is the case. So long as the right people are making a fortune they really don't care about the human cost elsewhere. The UK is one of the most corrupt countries in the world.
What annoys me is that developers gobble-up green land for housing, when brown sites like this, with infrastructure - roads, shops etc - in place, are left to rot and communities to die. Your video proves how pitiful our planning laws are - developers need incentives to regenerate ares such as this, rather than rape yet more of our green-and-pleasant land.
What annoys me is when people like you have opinions but are totally clueless. There is a mass housing shortage on our tiny island and the government have a quota to construct 300,000 new houses per year, but consistently fall short.
Coal miners were proper people I’m from cardiff my great great grandfather was a coal miner killed in the massive mining disaster in 1913 universal colliery senghennyd
Once again it is a case of continuous change of local government. I dont know why it is that when ever I see an old town/village in decline in the UK , it seems to always have had its own local council taken away from them.
So I assume someone once owned the empty properties? Or are they council properties? I'm curious to what happens if they're owned by someone, do they just get absorbed back into the government once empty?
I remember moving to Liverpool a couple of decades ago and in some areas there was block after block after block of boarded up houses. I remember walking around the Welsh Streets in Toxteth (of Peaky Blinders fame) and it was a surreal experience. Walking through the completely abandoned streets you could almost hear the sounds of bygone eras in the silence. I think that between High Park Street and South Street there were 10 streets or around that many and I walked up one and around the corner and down another occasionally finding a single house occupied in an otherwise completely abandoned street it was eerie. The streets were renovated a few years back and the houses are back to their former glory.
Take me back to the Welsh Streets as a child and live a few streets away from Madryn Street no/9 home of Ringo Starr before they moved to Admiral Grove around the corner....This all happened late fifties ...memories
I live in Peterlee (the neighbouring town to Horden) and have all my life. Just let me say thank you for recognising out history and treating us and our home with respect.
Used to live there. My older brother was born in Horden in 9th Street I think it was. And later we moved to Peterlee, my Grandfather and Uncles worked down the "pit". We went to a school in Horden and through the windows we could see the wheels turning as the cages took the miners down into the mine. My brother and I went to the miners canteen and had chips there for our dinner if we didn't want to eat at the school. I remember seeing the Colliery & Working Men's Club bands marching through those Streets on holidays - the streets were packed and nothing like what you saw when you made this video.
And how they loved grafting down a pit? They didn't wish for a cushier job. If the won the the pools or lottery they would have soon got bored and begged to go back and work down pit?!
Unsettling to see what happens once the heart & soul has been ripped out of these once busy, lively neighbourhoods. The world has changed but not for the better.
Wow, this exactly the same reason why here in Russia in northern Siberia bunch of semi-abandoned towns like Vorkuta and Norilsk. These towns were literally built from the scratch by the soviet government around the mining facilities. Workers could only work in these facilities. These towns were prospering but after the fall of the Soviet Union workers stopped getting their salaries which was the reason why many people left these towns.
Its a bloody crime to see so many empty properties with so many homeless people on the streets .You give these to people to do up themselves and take care of it would bring new life to these streets and 100% would stop any vandalism .
It's a noble and altruistic cause but homelessness is an extremely complex problem and nearly all those who are have huge health problems both physical and mental. Plus government would rather spend the money they are quite happy to steal from us benefitting the rest of the world before our own.
lab: Stoke on Trent has an area the same as this - The Council sold them for *£1* but the catch was that you HAD TO take on a mortgage of £30k, from the Council, to do up the house which you bought. Yes, it did work, but the area is still the worst one in Stoke, and many buyers went on the dole ... and so the downward spiral begins - again 😒😒
Some of those properties could be made bigger. Two properties next to each other could be made into a really good large family home, and that also gives a larger yard or made into a nice garden. Some places have taken a street and gutted, which made disabled accessible and all ex military with support group moved into them. They were fab. There is a lot that can be done with those properties. Charities can take them and make good for homeless. It's never ending the way they can be filled and appreciated.
I saw a program a few years ago where they took a street like this, forget where it was, and the would-be tenants were trained in doing up the houses and once finished moved in. Not only did they get a nice home, they learned new skills, created a sense of community and felt a sense of pride in the street they had renovated.
@@LilyGazou it's a crying shame something isn't done about these empty properties going to ruin when someone who is in need could be housed. Because you have a home and comfortable it's easy to scoff at people's ideas. If you were in need of a home yourself would be praying or begging for a property just like that and crying that they were empty when they could be in used with you in one of them.
I wrote similar some time ago, on a similar site - and had to check I wasn't reading my own comment. Every so often, I go to write I agree! and find I'm agreeing with myself! (Blush) Those places could be cleared and 1 bedroom bungalows with no steps put in for disabled, with bigger gardens. Small studio apartments x 4 with small yards, to make it easier for pensioners to have a safe fenced place to let the dog go to the loo. Some streets could have 1 larger house on 3 blocks, to get nicer houses and nicer gardens.
Another superb report, on a Boarded up Seaside Town, heartbreaking to see street after street, of empty houses, many vandalised. The closure of the mines will always be controversial, in the NW town I was born in, quite a few miners lived, and to see them suffering as they grew older, from the conditions of working down the pit, was so sad to see. Remember as a very young child, Mum getting up to get the fire burning, which originally heated the water, struggling in the cold winter months. Coming back from my friends at night, and the road passing a brook, and in the winter there would be smog, all down to chimneys & smoke. My opinion is we should have planned before the pits closes, what industry would replace those jobs? My home town had the largest glass industry in the world, and the major one developed what was known as plate glass, jobs just grew & grew, I was the only boy in my glass not to go into the glass industry, I went into working for a major newspaper group, and was taught in every department, and when commercial radio came to the UK, I had a good background to go into radio. The glass industry was owned by one man, Sir Harry Pilkington, he looked after his workers so well, even when they retired, meals delivered to homes. But, for the first time unions started to control the factory, and for the first time in its history, the Unions called out the workers to strike, and in the end the whole industry closed down? Driving through the town it is unrecognisable, not as many terraced houses, the problem is building new modern homes, on green fields, that once produced crops, but now we rely on importing veg far too much?
It reminds me of a Catherine Cookson book the fifteen streets. Its sad to see so many houses empty when there's thousands waiting for homes to live in .I remember watching a documentary about a whole street Done up by DIY SOS for disabled veterans really made them into beautiful homes .I'm a miners daughter my dad was a miner in the Welsh Valleys and when they closed my parents had to move to Cardiff to find work living in rooms in a shared house until they got there first council house. They didn't want to move from the Valleys where they were born and bread but they didn't have any choice because the Valley were like a ghost town just like this place .I expect these houses will be bought up by these big companies and knocked down such a shame. I really enjoyed your video as sad as it is to see houses empty right by the seaside.
I think what your doing is excellent and the clearness ,enthusiasm you have for your work is a breath of fresh air. I hope you get more subscribers so you can get funds to go all around Britain , your content is top and deserves to be reaching more.
My guess with the 80K ones is that it's a single developer that has bought them up over time for peanuts and is now trying to get permission to demolish them; obviously they'll take 80K if offered, but it won't be. Once the roofs go (by accident of course) they'll have to come down and the land will have value without those houses on it.
It's such a strange situation. Homelessness and housing shortages but then whole streets of boarded up houses. Obviously the ones with the fake doors painted on them are all owned by the same person or organisation, no doubt gradually buying out the area until nobody wants to live there, so they can demolish it and build a new prestigious seaside development full of 4 bed detached houses. The few remaining residents will be fully aware of this too, and known to the "youths" trashing the place, so they get left alone and wait until their houses are the last ones to sell so they can be knocked down, and nobody new ever moves in because of the enormous risk to safety. So many problems could be solved so easily if everyone worked together to bring this area and others like it back to life, but there's no money in that, so they don't. People suck.
@@mradventurer8104 to build new houses there they first need for all residents to be vacated. They also need planning permission in the event that happens. Then they'd need to spend a lot of money to have the area demolished. There are lots of stops along the way that would hinder a large scale development. If you own 4 out of 5 houses in a row but one is owned by someone else, you need to buy it from them. You wouldn't buy it at market value to complete a set if you could just wait a few years for it to fall into disrepair and pick it up for nothing. If a developer is collecting the properties as suggested by the fake door painted boards everywhere, they're playing the long game. It's not a good time for building right now either due to inflated material costs. That will likely normalise within a few years.
@@mradventurer8104 Much easier to get planning permission with the houses down and easier to get permission to bring them down if you can show there is no demand for them.
Yeah, they buy places and sometimes build a bit of cheap crap, but what they are really after is the ground. Then they slowly let the homes turn into disgusting derelict slums so that they'll easily get council permission to tear them down. Then they build something huge and fancy on which they make a whopping profit.
Great real life video, made me smile though when you said, can you imagine when the mines were here people would be enjoying themselves on the beach sunbathing etc. I lived and worked here from the age of 12 until 20 years old, i worked for a company in Horden called Maybelts. Nobody went on the beach when the mines were here only people like me with my air rifle and motorbike scrambler. also you had the men picking and shoveling coal waste from the beach, mine waste that was tipped into the sea on conveyors from the pits. Millions of tonnes of waste and thats not an exageration, I saw some of the gangs of sea coalers hauling the sea coal up the beach banks either with horse and trailer, some were more fortunate and had green godesses, they were the old army fire engines and the guys used to cut the back off of them and turn them into big pick up trucks. I used to see them all the time....was a sight to see. The sea was black with pit waste so you could not go swimming such was the polution. At one point it was one of the most poluted sea and beaches in the world. Having moved up there when i was 12 from Leicestershire i thought i had gone into the dark ages..........Such a tough hard life, these men and women worked so hard and i have nothing but respect for them, the mines did have to close because of two reasons, One being Margarate Thatcher who had it in for the poor mining community and second reason was the environmental disaster involving all the millions of tonnes of pit waste tipped into the sea. The people were the salt of the earth and would do anything to help one another.....i still miss that today. Yes the mines had to close because of the enviromental damage being caused but the past and present government have not given enough help to these people. No wonder they feel displaced.
Oh thanks so much for this. I was actually expecting a comment as such because I realised just after making that comment about the beach that it probably was never like I said due to the mines…so thank you for a real honest view of what it was like 👍👍👍
Has someone from the south it’s a real eye opener to see this video, I cannot believe in a country that is wealthy it cannot invest in these areas and the infrastructure, it must be so hard for the old boy from the pits seeing all the pubs/clubs closing down and still living in the area I wish all the people in these areas the best.
The more pubs which close down the better in my view. My younger brother died at 40 thanks to liver failure due to alcohol and my father beat the shi* out of me and my step mum when I was a kid thanks to being drunk on whisky. Alcohol does more damage to society than anything else I know. Ban it.
All the investment is focused on London and the South East that’s the problem. The cities aren’t doing too badly but most northern towns have just been forgotten.
@@PeacockRhino such a shame, if the government was to revamp these areas it would bring employment to the areas for the people that are tradesman and woman, even if the government came up with a plan to get people involved with money to do it a idea that would benefit all but mostly the local people.
Thanks for doing this and highlighting some of the issues that get absolutely no press coverage, up here really feels forgotten about. Too far away from London for them to care.
Still pisses me off that a house that is a complete wreck inside and needs that much work done in a ghost town area with a drug problem is selling for £39/40k. Absolutely hate this country
@AL I would negotiate that Offer if YOU were seriously interested in buying an abandoned property in this town ! UK Gov't should perform an Experiment on the Albanian Refugees by offering them Permanent Residency in a Work-To-Own Deal if they acquire an abandoned property then fix it up. Those Albanians could wash plenty of Cocaine $$$ thru real estate ventures in this town !
How can you hate a beautiful land as the UK. Surely its the vampire cunts who have stacked the laws against the slaves in the UK that need a wooden stake.
It has a look of Some of the towns in the USA where big industries moved out and the property gets wrecked. It’s a shame and a shame for people living next to these empty houses.
In the late 60’s my uncle bought one of those houses. It was his first home with his wife. It was such a cosy little house with great neighbours and community. So sad to see it like this now.
How crazy that some houses are overcrowded and young people can't afford to buy. Businesses and the gov need to move in and invest in towns like this to bring the people in. It looks like it could be a terrific place to live in and on the coast too. Thanks for sharing
It could be but Levelling up with this government is a complete fraud. Tunbridge Wells has got levelling up money, but Barnsley, because it has a Labour council has not got a penny.
Won't happen except for the usual pound shops, aldi's and lidl's. Our economy is now a low paid service industry and most manufacturing is outsourced to countries with a cheaper labour force.
@@stevenhull5025 True, but before people will live there there has to be local employment. I remember the times before the 1980's when we were a great manufacturing nation. In the post war rebuilding, most of the labour force lived in houses owned by the council, or the employer, at cheap rent which brought down our labour costs. End of coal was the end of cheap source of fuel & steel, & thus manufacturing. The frequent strikes in the '70's, miners, docks, car manufacturers, started it, then the sale of council housing, & increased cost of private housing.
Great video i find it shocking how the government don't turn them back into council houses affordable living as they stand it not viable for a builder to buy and do up . As a Builder myself i know you would need to spend £15k-20 per property to bring them back to life Rewire , Plastering including damp proof , roofing repairs , standard kitchen , plumbing ,new doors and windows. Take care enjoy your videos thank you.
Respectfully, you are far more informed on this than I am, as an American who has no idea what labor/supplies cost there (despite studying abroad in London and having been to multiple UK cities dozens of times over the last 30 years). Yet, I honestly believe 15-20K per property sounds too low? Heck, if that is all it would cost, I'd hire you to renovate and rewire the building I buy there. Seriously.
The state of some of these houses would cost way more than £20,000 to bring up to a livable standard. If people are trying to sell these for £20-30 grand then there is no point in anyone trying to develop these. They will lose money trying to sell them.
20-30 grand sounds like land value only. Being so close to the sea, I can't understand why a developer wouldn't snap it all up, demolish the lot and rebuild. The housing would be a lot more attractive than any renovation to the existing properties. Having said that, my Dad's father's family came from that general area, but more inland, from Evenwood and Ingleton. The Evenwood branch of the family were miners, and his ancestors were either miners or mine blacksmiths. My ggrandfather died young, of TB, from working in the mines and living in damp, overcrowded houses. My grandfather joined the army at 14 and never went down the mines. The Ingleton side were market gardeners, but my ggrandmother deserted her dying husband and their four children, all of whom were under 5 years old, so I don't know much about her family except from what I've traced. Last time we were back in the UK (2015), I visited them both and Ingleton in particular was in a sad state. My direct ancestor left the land for one of the churches there to be built and it was boarded up and the land overgrown. The whole village looked sad and neglected. We didn't stay long, because frankly, it didn't feel safe. Very different from when we visited in 1996.
@@QuentinStephens possibly but you can't see the sea anywhere close in the photos, so it's hard to tell. The other thing is, it's usually higher end housing if it's that close to the sea. These don't look like high end houses.
Sad how the mining community was virtually ended overnight in the 80’s, I’m from Yorkshire and almost followed my elders into that industry but decided to take another route and glad i did. I particularly remember being at my grandparents house in Wakefield where the spoil heap was almost in the back garden, long gone now, thanks for sharing mate, Robbo 👌👍
I worked for a company selling properties about 7 ears ago. These houses in these numbered streets made up the bulk of what we sold for 25k-30k a time. Every last one of them went to private investors, none to homebuyers.
@@wanderingturnip these houses were marketed at an easy 15% yield @ £400 p/m rental. But the sad truth was that most found it impossible to find decent tenants (or ANY tenants) due to the problems you mentioned on the video. We saw people taking losses and putting the houses up for sale again. And I guess it's still happening, judging by the empty houses. Figures looked good on paper, but in reality they were a liability.
Just a caveat: I bought my first house (2 bed end terrace) in a nearby town (starting with F) for £25k, in a similar area with void properties. I specifically chose an ex-housing association property due to minimum legal standards. I improved it and lived there for seven years until last year. Cheap, secure, solid housing. A few ASBO and Albanian weed growers, but those issues now gone. Not all buyers are professional landlords. Best thing I ever did to get a roof over my head for my own space.
All the works of art dedicated to the Horden Colliery are beautifully made and to the point. They succeed in conveying this gratitude towards the jobs Horden Colliery provided during 87 years. They also show the inhumanity of such jobs, which take your heart away like the one of the Marra.
Great video, i live in Peterlee the next town up from Horden, it's a shame to see Horden like that as in the 80's it was a thriving town with community spirit and now is just a sad ghost town.
As someone who works remote, its honestly tempting to move somewhere really cheap as an investment. The problem is, if I ever do lose my remote job thats going to be a stress
that's exactly what I was thinking! These cheap houses would be such a good solution for remote workers who want to own a home, but it also would depend on the security of their remote work.
The problem isn’t the location or the house. It’s the community (the youth) that destroys houses/glasses and door. Unless someone wants to risk their life, it’s doesn’t seem worth it.
This place looks like a good place to have a new industry boom within it. I wonder if one day it'll become a tech hub or similar. I think that'd be really nice and move a lot of people back into the town.
Exactly what I was thinking! With more people working from home (myself included) and the RIDICULOUS house prices, decent houses starting at £250k. Seeing a house for £20k is a bargain!! I'm young and have the DIY mentality. If a bunch of us work from home move there and renovate, I can imagine it being revitalised. But it would take a lot of like-mindedness. The people are friendly. The only issue is the anti-social behaviour "this is why we can't have nice things!" because there's risk of it getting ruined, which is off-putting.
Great vlog, enjoy your choice and interests. My dad used to be a miner down in Staffordshire, hard times then. A lot of good and bad memories for most, but always a good community spirit which is now lost and gone forever! Thanks for this young man!!
Great video. My grandmothers family were miners in co durham like yours. Tough life but proud people. Its like this throughout the north. Abandoned communities left to rot. A real shame.
I had a friend in Sunderland and her mother lived in Seaham. It’s a beautiful area and the people are so friendly and welcoming. I’d be happy to live there.
Awesome video Wow, very impressive. I remember when I bought during the crisis a property for.$9k fed for 50% gain, thinking I was so smart and now with the same amount I could have bought Rolls-Royce and never thought in 1 million years that the market will go up so high
Very Sad and touching. I remember then 80s strikes, thriving mining communities here in Yorkshire. But C.Durham took a massive hit! 😢 TY for the video.
why have successive governments abandoned the people of this country.? They really couldn't care less about anyone. Thanks for the video. I hope the area is regenerated and begins to thrive again
That young man , is a great production - I like the history side of our vlog and also the general style - This was our first watch of your stuff - we will watch more - thanks
Lived in horden all my life, grandad and dad worked them mines until Maggie shut them otherwise I'd be working down them now as the job interview was if your dad works there you got the job. There's still some life left in horden yet, thanks for doing a video on it.
Omg! This is a dreadful situation...so very sad. Thank you for showing everyone this....and thank you for letting us know the history... So informative. Debbi from Western Australia.
It's a shame areas like this are ruined by drug use, break ins and antisocial behaviour. In theory it sounds nice to buy a couple together and do them up but you just know it wouldn't be a pleasant place to live due to the people around you :( And that means normal people won't move in, or will move out, and the area will get worse and worse.
Unfortunately, Maggie took away all the peoples self respect as she just closed down their work and basically their lively hoods overnight with no chance of getting work anywhere else in the area. What could they do, live on the dole or move to another part of the country in search of work and that wasn't easy. I myself was made redundant five times during her reign and I wasn't a miner and lived in Bristol. I know the Unions caused a lot of problems at the time, but she was not interested in alternative employment for these areas, especially in the North, just defeating the Unions at any cost. Believe me we are still seeing the fall out from her policies almost 50 years later.
@@minixtvbox Thatcher was over 35 years ago, where was Labour when they were in power from 1997 to 2009? Then Cameron and the successive lot. Just saying Thatcher while ignoring everyone since then, plus local politicians. That's over 35 years, and all of Durham is under Labour controlled Councils. What have they done for Durham and the North East? What did Blair and Gordon Brown do?
@@occiderisaethiopissa3702 "What did blair and gordon brown do?" Besides leave the country with the highest satisfaction rates for public services like the NHS? How quickly these things are forgotten. Granted Labour didn't come up with a magical solution to fix Thatchers cack handed destructionism...but they didn't aggrivate the situation by closing down youth centres, and social services which the tories did under austerity! My question is, when Tories have been in charge for 20 of the last 30 years and have done most of the worst damage, why are you so dead focused on labour who have served half that time and didn't actively make the situation worse? Seems to me like you're trying hardder to justify something to yourself than anyone else.
You wouldn't think there was a housing crisis if you saw this. This entire region could be regenerated and house so many people desperate for a nice little house.
You are a breath of fresh air, where do we buy up and set up a cash led community? AHH we can but dream. Don't forget to thumbs up and comment spread the word of this wandering wonder 👍👏
Brilliant video as usual mate. I just had a quick look for the particular area and there are new build (within the past 2-3 years) with houses selling for 160k. This is the same search area. I wonder how/why the council let this specific batch of streets fall into such disrepair yet other areas still seem to sell properties? There still seems to be an appetite to buy and live in Horden on a whole? What I would like you to do next is perhaps identify areas which are still fairing ok yet you can buy a property relatively cheaply? There are plenty of these towns/villages across Yorkshire/Northumberland etc and I think they would make a really positive spin on this type of content; especially with the current cost of living crisis. Thank you, Ryan
Those fake doors and windows are brilliant 😂. 10/10 for creativity. I also think the government need to look at themselves for what they've allowed to happen in lots of small towns.
@UnjustifiedRecs people don't want to live there, they've done surveys in the past that have shown that people waiting on social housing lists won't take these locations
Govt need to attract more jobs into these areas with incentives. Big companies could use the homes for their workers (maybe in a relocation package). All these empty houses while they're building all over agricultural fields is crazy. For a relatively small country, we're hopelessly mis-managed. Missed potential everywhere...
You've made a really good video, and it's obvious that your personal family history was palpable in the first few minutes of the video. Have worked in the area for a few years and you transported me back in time! Lovely and proud people, indeed.
There was me thinking some of the small towns that got swallowed up by Glasgow were bad. But don't think I have ever seen a township in such a bad way. I had 2 friends that bought a couple of boarded up houses very cheap 20 years ago fixed them up but it took another 10 years for other houses and flats to be fixed, but the area is getting better now and more popular with younger families
My dad bought a couple of condemned properties back in the 90s for around £4000 with a bank loan rather than buy to let (Northern working class lad who got a reasonable job). They had to be sold for various reasons when he died suddenly. Nice to see them still there now valued at around £70,000. They are well built houses and it would have been waste knock them down.
I went into this thinking it was going to be poking fun at the less fortunate but fair play, very insightful & respectful. It’s rough living in and around Horden!
How sad things have got. My first job was in Horden in the 70's pretty much near the church, I worked in the bakers, my friend worked in the butchers, both in Blackhillls Rd. My girlfriend lived in 7th street and you stood outside her house. I went to school, about a 5 minute walk away and we used to pop to the chippy in Horden for our lunch,. A lot of my class mates went down the pit. It was thriving back then. I haven't visited there for about 30 years and would not have believed how bad its got. I left the North East in 1978, as did many others to join the forces. Thanks for doing this video, today I am very sad.
Hey thanks for getting in touch. Always really interesting hearing from people with personal history of the place. I actually went up again last week (this video was from march) to speak to the council. Apparently there are some big changes coming…
@@wanderingturnip I look forward to that video. I remember my school mate, bought his first house there in the 80's for about 13k, he sold it after about 9 months as every time he went out he was burgled! This is when drugs started to take hold. We used to go fishing of Horden beach and during the blackouts in the mid 70's we used to collect coal from the beach to help the pensioners keep there houses warm. I wondered if they had plans for the place as they have recently opened Horden train station, it had been closed nearly a 100 years I believe.
This video is a work of art. And like the best art, it speaks to things we hold, or once held, dear. All the more forceful by being told by a young person. Well done!
Our once vibrant village. Sadly it is mainly the numbered streets that are boarded up. The houses are no longer fit for purpose and supposedly the horden master plan is going to do something with them. Other parts of the village are lovely
Aye most of us are a lovely bunch. Absent landlords definitely have a part to play in the mess the streets are in. I just hope they hurry up with this master plan and tidy the place up, sadly though the amount of addiction and criminality probably won’t change so it could just be a waste of money
Saw this video popup on my front-page of youtube, I live here, it's a terrible place being ruined by the youth and nothing will ever change, your video was awesome, thanks for covering my little goblin den of a town
We chase drugos out of our small town in Aus. Nice old town full of old people to protect. As expats we are thinking of buying back home. Thanks for these vids.
Such a shame that there are so many empty properties just sat there, especially when homelessness and housing shortages are such a problem around the country. The problem is obviously that nobody wants to risk investing in a property that will likely get broken into and vandalised by the locals. I'm surprised that the local council hasn't teamed up with the police to sort out the problems in the area.
Just a quick update from Horden David. Apparently, £6 million pound has been earmarked to be demolish Third Street, when the funds are available (if ever). Still watching all the video's mate!
Really impressed with your videos. Sort of a social history of Britain through the lens of today's housing crisis. You're a good and relatable 'presenter'. Wouldn't be surprised if Channel 4 knock on your door with a job offer soon. Keep doing more I reckon this channel could be a real success.
Just discovered your channel. What a great, if sad video. It brings it home to someone who was brought up in the South of England how much the heart was ripped out of these communities in the 1980s. Look forward to your videos now!😊
Inspired by this video I had a wander round the area yesterday - utterly tragic to see what was once a thriving community get like this. I was surprised how many decent well cared for houses sat amongst the mound of derelict properties. The fake windows and doors aren't very convincing.
I just moved to a beautiful small town in Scotland. There used to be one HUGE employer that provided over a thousand jobs for a town with a population of only eight thousand people. The town was an economic hub. Then the plant shut down and shipped out. It took me a while to realise that this place is basically imploding and dying off like an old oak tree that has had its roots cut. I was always shocked by towns like Cumnock. It has beautiful architecture, good people, and its right by the national park.... but its turned into a Buckfast and drug infected shithole. I see this happening in this town now and I dont think the locals realise they are the next New Cumnock. All the bright kids are fleeing this place, there is no reason to stay. All the asshole kids are staying. Nobody seems to appreciate that there will come a time where there is no work, nothing to do, no revenue for the local council, and every kid born here, immediately flee. Its sad watching a town die, especially when the locals dont see it.
My Mum’s family came from Horden and they were all Miners. Many of them left in 1939 at the outbreak of WW2. They lived in miners houses - numbered streets.
Hi i am from horden, my parents still live in horden and we use to live 40 years ago on 13th street, Horden was a great place to live All the familys use to be out the front doors, kids playing in back yard happy, New years eve ya would walk in any 1s front door and he welcomed in and have a drink, the green you walked on we use to get thr sledges out in the snow on the over the road from the church, Now you would walk through horden in the past 20 years its turned it to 1 of the worse villages in the Uk and its very sad, There a lot of lovely familys that still live in the numbered houses that have been there for years who own there property and have to live in the middle of all the problems in these streets, smackheads, people braking in to a steeling stuff, stolen cars and motorbikes, I wouldnt even drive through these houses any more, But i am also a investors and a wouldnt touch these houses , i have thought about it for years but its just not worth it
Brilliant video. I'm a Victorian Terrace house anorak! You can keep yet semis and detached, it's terraced for me everytime. There's only one thing I like more than a Victorian terraced house and that's another one!!! Honestly I think I've looked at every Victorian terraced house on right move. The only stipulation is that they have to be affordable non of yer £100,000 + malarkey. I actually live off grid and not in the UK but if I did live in a house it would be in a Victorian terrace. Thanks again for the video, sad to see them empty, people should get united and occupy them on mass, do em up on mass = instant community!!! Just imagine the government/council starting legal proceedings for 'instant community offending'.
@@joline2730 true, but if they were owned by someone who wanted a home and not someone being financially astute, or marketed for a new financially astute person, can you see what I'm insinuating. The real problem facing our ways, surely? I'm not left I'm not right. Conviction needs to be abandoned and give and take must reign, as if the left or right will ever meet.
It’s always been my dream to live in a Victorian house and at 50 years old i finally got to live in one. I absolutely love it! However it is cold in the winter. Summer is good because the back room is cool, it is however quite dark. I kinda like the closed in darkness of it though. The loo is downstairs at the very back of the house and positioned where the old outside lavatory would have been. I’m sure the temperature in there is still the same 🥶😂 I just love the nostalgia and the Victorian era, so a little cold is worth it.
A really respectful take on this issue. Well played mate. I’m from Hartlepool about 2 miles away and we have plenty of this here too. Regardless, you’ll always find nice people 🙏❤️
Cool that my video has my it over to your side of the world. Yeah I think these types of streets and mining towns are pretty unique in there style to the UK, but always good to hear from people in other countries. Cheers for watching
Looks a bit rough around there 🙄What a shame, when so many people cannot get a house! Great video, all those coal mining families just thrown on the scrap heap! I have been up on Kinder Scout today looking at the dry stone walls and filmed Celtic cross from medieval times. Keep up the good work mate.
This is like a glimpse into my towns future. I'm from a town with a steel works site that's been around for 150 years. In my lifetime I'll probably see that dissappear and this is what we'll be left with
£40k? For a property there? Anybody who paid even £1 would have to be nuts. That place is finished. Even if you bought a house there for one pound, and then refurbed it, what about the surrounding area?
Sadly it's the future of the UK 🇬🇧...it's become a very different place...even from recent times like the 90s for instance..I was having a similar conversation with my eldest son..I'm glad he's got a job traveling the world 🌍 as there's sweet FA here anymore.
I was based in Horden during the Fire Service strike of 1977, manning the Green Goddesses with the Army. Very sad to see what has happened since then. Hopefully those houses will be refurbed to help regenerate the town.
This channel popped up and I wasn't passing it by. This was really engaging - yes, a focus on property but with context of community attrition resulting in almost complete destruction. We all know who and why. It's great to see this fella acknowledging the community as it was and talking to a much older fella in a regular manner with respect on both sides. I'm a cigarette paper away from 60. Originally from NW. I do point the finger at Tory policy for this and for its legacy. Then they did it all again post 2008 GFM. We need to remember this at every general election. I didn't see too many examples of bankers relocating or forced on the streets. Nah - they got taxpayer top ups!
I'm from Horden, lived there my full life - I did what most people who want change do.... I left the area. The north east is clinging to any kind of 'work' identity it has left. I was brought up with a work ethic 'if there's no work... Make work, go to the work'' unfortunately most other people in the area see that as a invitation to become an addict, sell to the addicts or generally wallow. I'm 33, regardless of the pit shutting. Our ancestors would be turning in their grave to see the lack of respect to the surroundings they built and even how we treat each other. Coal dust is absolutely in our blood. But so is laziness and heroin for most. Area has been forgotten.
Mate thank you for this. I always appreciate people from the area getting in touch, and this is one of the most honest responses I have had. Cheers for watching 👍
@@wanderingturnip don't get me wrong. I only moved down the road....to somewhere arguably worse hahaa but if you ask me where I'm from. There is a pride that came with 'am from horden, marra' regardless what they thought of you after.
lived on a similar street in Blackpool back in the 1990's nightmare, junkie yobs trying to break in when your sleeping, robbing your car stereos on a daily basis, chucking paving slabs through the windscreens of parked up Police cars, pensioners getting mugged for their Zimmer frames!... even if one of them houses was for free with a hundred grand chucked into our bank account, we would decline.. You can get a detached house in the countryside on an acre in Sweden for similar money..
This would be a great place to make these properties beautiful for elderly people, they don't need to worry about employment and they are small and cozy, easily renovated and ironically, if it did happen, lots of jobs would be created in the service industries ,what a beautiful part of Britain this is and so close to the magnificent coast and I also notice that it's quite flat and perfect for the elderly .
The tragedy is that there ARE lots of elderly people in this area. They have, like the man in the video, lived there most, if not all of their lives, and have kept their houses beautifully. It's heartbreaking to see them become surrounded by junkies, wasters, alcoholics and no - goods. All because the investment landlords want a fast buck.Which, in the end,is paid for by us the tax payers as housing benefit.
A very educational vid. I used to stay a lot in a place in Somerset in the 1960,s onward. Radstock and Writhington pits and Camerton I lived for 18 years, where the Titfield thunderbolt was partly filmed. All quite dead now no shop in Camerton and it’s a sad area in my opinion. Like you said the heart rip out
The house prices in Somerset don't reflect the emptiness though! 😂 lot of London people moved West and pushed up prices I believe. Jobs certainly don't pay that well down there!
Very sad situation in Horden and many places across Britain and even though these houses are a fraction of the price of a house down south, £20,000 is beyond the reach of many people in an area so badly affected by unemployment. A reflection on the political system that has forgotten the working man, who built industrial Britain. Keep up the good work.
The Country has just spent 200 million plus pounds on a coronation, one family that are born to inherit a lifetime of privilege and luxury for no other reason than an accident of birth....Can someone please tell me how and why the populace excepts that with fawning adoration.....
@@wanderingturnip When a guy who's been unemployed for 7 decades finally gets a job (only because his mum died) and is given a hat worth at least 2 hospitals, you've really got to wonder whats in the tap water.
I live 25 miles from Horden in Seghill Northumberland another mining village .Most of the miners houses were knocked down in 1967 . When the pit closed in 1969 lots of people moved out of the village and others like my family were moved into council property. My Dad was moved from Seghill pit to Backworth then The Fenwick pit near Earsdon village and eventually ended his work days at the Bates pit in Blyth when he was made redundant in 1973. He had an accident in 1958 when there prop holding the roof of the Seghill mine fell on him he never worked down the mine again but was given a job on bank loading the coal from the coal trucks into a hopper which loaded the coal waggons. RIP SEGHILL PIT. We still hold a village Gala every year on the first Saturday of June .
It's pretty shocking to see how the UK government has just abandoned these parts of the UK. How could they let this happen? They need to massively reinvest in revitalising these areas and encourage companies to setup there.
@@minixtvbox The fact that you actually believe voting makes a difference, seriously just think about it. Every single party is two sides to the same coin, they're all in on it, they just want you believing that they're making a difference, they don't want to.
Conservative party Aka Tory party willingly ignore anywhere in the north of Britain for Their heartlands in the south of Britain sadly never trust any conservative party ever
@@truthseeker9587 exactly, all carbon copy clones from the same bubble. People show more passion quibbling over Tories and Labour than the MPs have ever shown representing them. Ants choosing which boot gets to crush them.
I mean the Foundation is top, bricks everywhere! that would probably still stand in a hundred years, just the interiors to swap out, imagine buying like 4-5 of them in a row for a 100k and rebuild a very inexpensive big House for the Weekends on the seaside for Vacations :D
The mines should have been started to be shut down decades before they did. The issue was, they were kept open, just for the sake of keeping them open, Because the Mine unions, donated to politicians. with out which those politicians/ parties would go without funding. so it was a bribe in short. The fact is, the UK moved towards gas as early as the 50 and 60s. the mines started to become obsolete back then, instead of slowly shutting them down as demand dropped, allowing communities to adapt allowing them to start up alternative places of work such as shops. industry. etc etc. The mines where kept open 30 years past their time and then had a sudden cut off. so towns never adapted. they never moved towards alternatives. so when enough was enough. when we had mountains of unused coal piling up. they finally shut down the mines. but the issue now is, it was a sudden shut down, instead of a gradual one that needed to start decades before. which lead to entire towns having nothing. Had the mines slowly shutdown, there would have been no problem at all.
This is the other side of the story no-one really wants to admit. It was never the mines being shut down, it was the near overnight speed at which it was done.
