Poor old Wilsons

ninky_2

macaque wrote: »

worry about your own posts and stop telling people you've never met what they should or shouldn't write.

isn't there a contradiction here?

ninky_2

Graham_Devon wrote: »

Every mortgage I think Mr Wilson said was Interest Only, that was part of the plan of keeping payments low.

and avoiding tax.

ninky_2

torontoboy45 wrote: »

I
here's my wishlist:

krusty and phil are declared bankrupt and wind up selling the big issue on street corners,

.

sorry off topic again but has anyone seen that 'kirsty's homemade home'?

basically posh bird allsopp blagging loads of freebies for her new country pad off the back of a tv show all about her new country pad.

the episode where she went into her parents castle-like home dripping in antiques to show off her ancestral tastes whilst saying "you don't need money to do this" made me puke.

torontoboy45

Alan_M wrote: »

Hmm, maybe you could also organise public stoning.....There could be a market there for me importing the stones.....

But no one stones anyone until I blow the Whistle!

I don't brown-nose around these 'people'. strange that others would choose to do so.
don't stone them -just support the idea that they shouldn't be pedestalled, there's a good chap.

Alan_M_2

torontoboy45 wrote: »

I don't brown-nose around these 'people'. strange that others would choose to do so.
don't stone them -just support the idea that they shouldn't be pedestalled, there's a good chap.

I did chuckle at that comment....

I guess my failure to understand the British mentality of putting people on pedestal just so we can knock them has been drawn to this thread.

I don't know enough about these people to know if I like them or not....but I just don't understand the hate and vitriol that pours out against these people. If it isn't jealousy as is often denied...what exactly is it?

Dithering_Dad

ninky wrote: »

and avoiding tax.

How does being on an interest only mortgage help avoid tax?

I put my mortgage on interest only when I was freelancing. I meant that during periods where work was scarce, my outgoings were at a minimal level and during boom periods I overpaid the mortgage.

I suspect this couple are doing the same. They have all their mortgages on interest only to reduce their monthly liabilities, but they then make overpayments with spare cash. This is exactly how I would do it if I were interested in building a BTL company.

This is not the same as someone buying a house on an interest only mortgage because that's all they can afford to do.

JayScottGreenspan

Alan_M wrote: »

I did chuckle at that comment....

I guess my failure to understand the British mentality of putting people on pedestal just so we can knock them has been drawn to this thread.

I don't know enough about these people to know if I like them or not....but I just don't understand the hate and vitriol that pours out against these people. If it isn't jealousy as is often denied...what exactly is it?

It's probably not a million miles away from the feelings towards "the bankers":


People resent that fact that speculation on housing destabilised the economy, made some sort of recession inevitable, and forced everyone of a certain age to gamble vast quantities of £££s (to buy an overpriced asset and risk massive falls, or not buy an overpriced asset and risk 'missing the boat').

I'd much rather have a stable economy with stable house prices. In order to achieve that you'd need at least one of the following:
1) A government that makes good long terms decisions. One that won't happily look on as an asset bubble boosts their short term popularity (UK and USA, LOL).
2) Lenders who were born sometime before the last crash, and aren't given huge bonuses encouraging the 's**t ot bust' philosophy.
3) Property speculators who aren't idiots, who don't buy property all the way up to 2007. Not only woud they make more money that way, but it would also keep prices at 'fair value' and much more stable.

The Wilsons are category three villains. Amongst the least culpable, but nevertheless the world would probably be a better place without their little empire.

Alan_M_2

JayScottGreenspan wrote: »

I'd much rather have a stable economy with stable house prices. In order to achieve that you'd need at least one of the following:
1) A government that makes good long terms decisions. One that won't happily look on as an asset bubble boosts their short term popularity (UK and USA, LOL).
2) Lenders who were born sometime before the last crash, and aren't given huge bonuses encouraging the 's**t ot bust' philosophy.
3) Property speculators who aren't idiots, who don't buy property all the way up to 2007. Not only woud they make more money that way, but it would also keep prices at 'fair value' and much more stable.

The Wilsons are category three villains. Amongst the least culpable, but nevertheless the world would probably be a better place without their little empire.

I'd also like to live in that nice fluffy cloud utopian world......but whilst humans exist there will be greed and avarice.

The alternative is communism/socialism....which I find rather unpalatable...

So I chose to accept that boom and bust will occur, that governments will make poor decisions and that people will take advantage of whatever facilities are made available to them.....call me a realist.

Do I dislike the bankers?

Well I dislike the way the aftermath has been handled and I would like to see people made accountable for their actions as any normal business owner or member of the public has to be, but I'm not surprised in the least we've ended up where we have. We as a race, will also not learn from this and it will occur again and again and again.......I either embrace that fact or live my life in a delusion that it could somehow all be put right and every day is a lovely day and there are no nasty people running the country or our financial institutions....

So I don't waste energy hating people I've never met, I do what I can to carry on in whatever way benefits my family and myself.

JayScottGreenspan

Alan_M wrote: »

I'd also like to live in that nice fluffy cloud utopian world......but whilst humans exist there will be greed and avarice.

The alternative is communism/socialism....which I find rather unpalatable...

So it's either extreme laissez faire or communism, is it?
No middle ground.
(Or do we live in a mixed economy...?)

In an efficient market "greed is good" (I know, it's only w***ers who say that, but there is some truth in it). But the housing market is currently so inefficient that, unfortunately, the opposite is true. I suspect some of those close to power would like to make policy changes that will help make the housing market more efficient in future. But you're right, they'll probably forget about it all soon enough, like the proverbial goldfish going round the bowl, and we'll have another big recession in 15-20 years time.

Alan_M_2

Accountability is the issue......

There are a very large number of people on the outside looking in at what has occurred in the financial industries of the world, particularly London with a feeling of disbelief.

How could these professionals have got it all so badly wrong...we'll that's been chewed over quite a lot.

The problem is accountability, no one appears to have been held to task for any of this (unlike America where there have been some very high profile arrests).

Leaving aside Sir Fred Goodwin's financial compensation.....why has he not be asked to account for his actions? Or any other chief executive of any of these banks.....other than a "We're terribly sorry" in front of the parliamentary select committee or whoever it was why is there no accountability?

I own and run my company...if I get it wrong, the accountability I have is I lose my house, all my possessions and my ability to support my family...then my credit record will be tarnished in such a way that it will be constructively hard for me to try again.

What this does is concentrate my decisions to a high degree.

Boom and bust will continue whilst people are effectively unaccountable for their actions.