The housing shortage in big cities can cause severe social consequences. Some people think only government action can solve this problem.
Sample Response
The population in cities is constantly increasing, and thus a housing crisisand thus housing crisis is one of the most common problemsis a most common problem big cities are facing today. This is a major concern for governments as it not only increasesincrease the cost of living but also affects the quality of life for cityits residents. I do agree that only governments can solve this problem by taking various measures, such as restricting the construction of landed housesrestricting landed houses to save spacesave the space, encouraging high-rise residential buildingsvertical residential buildings and gradually expanding the city. In the olden days, people lived in landed independent houses as there were a great deal of spacelots of spaces in the city. However, this is not possible in modern citiesin the modern cities as the city population is increasing rapidly, resulting in, and resulting in a shortage of spacea space shortage situation to provide housing for everyonefor accommodating housing for all. One of the actionsaction governments can take is to discourage building new landed houses and encourage people to live in apartmentsapartment flats. For instance, the Singapore governmentSingapore government has built thousands of high-risefloor residential flats through its housing development boardthrough housing development board to accommodate its growing populationits ever-growing residents in an affordable way. It also stopped granting permission to buildstopped permission for building new landed houses to deal with the space crunch. Some governments are also looking at options for expanding the city to create more residential properties. For example, Bangalore, one of the fast growing cities in India is continuously expanding by incorporating more residential properties and other infrastructure at the outskirts of the city, which gradually becomes part of the growing city. However, this option is viable only when there are enough spaces surrounding the city. For cities like Hong-Kong and Singapore, which are islands, the only option is to grow vertically within the city. Solving housing shortage is an issue that requires proper planning and big investment and residence of a big city have very little to do and the government seems like the appropriate authority to solve this problem. In conclusion, the cities are growing rapidly and so the residents of the city also grow. Thus, it is the responsibility of governments to take appropriate measures to create better living place at an affordable price for its city residents.
Why this response received Band 6.5
The response is strongest in proposing concrete government measures and illustrating them through relevant examples from Singapore and Bangalore, including a useful qualification about geographic limits on expansion. Its main limitation is that the single-paragraph presentation weakens organisation and the claim that only government can solve the shortage is asserted without seriously considering developers, employers, communities, or market incentives. The highest-priority improvement is to evaluate those other actors before demonstrating why government coordination remains indispensable.
IELTS Writing Criteria Scores
Task Response
The response presents a clear opinion and develops several relevant government solutions with specific examples, though the exclusivity of government action receives limited evaluation.
Consider what private developers or residents can contribute and explain why regulation, infrastructure, funding, or coordination still makes government action decisive.
Coherence and Cohesion
The ideas have a clear overall progression from the problem to vertical development and urban expansion, but the absence of paragraphing makes the discussion dense.
Separate the introduction, vertical-building solution, expansion solution, evaluation of government responsibility, and conclusion into purposeful paragraphs.
Lexical Resource
The response uses a suitable range of housing and urban-development vocabulary, but several inaccurate collocations and word forms reduce precision.
Refine phrases such as “landed independent houses,” “high-floor residential flats,” and “residence of a big city” into natural forms.
Grammatical Range and Accuracy
A range of structures is attempted, but recurring errors in agreement, articles, plurals, relative clauses, and sentence construction limit accuracy.
Check subject-verb agreement and noun number systematically, especially in sentences about governments, populations, actions, and residents.
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IELTS Writing Task 2
The housing shortage in big cities can cause severe social consequences. Some people think only government action can solve this problem.
Your response
Write the task yourself, then compare your choices with the annotated response.