UK Property to HALVE Between Now and July 29, 2010

lostinrates

I don't know the area at all, but they all seem decent houses from the outside, and ample for a family. I thought a major city like Manchester the suburban areas would be more than that, dropping more sharply than might be seen in s.e. further away from the city. Thats a pleasant way to be shown my conception might be wrong:) How close are these to the city-ish areas (presuming one of the couple is likely to consider not working on the doorstep, which I think is also a fairish assuption of our commuter society.

Cleaver

lostinrates wrote: »

I don't know the area at all, but they all seem decent houses from the outside, and ample for a family. I thought a major city like Manchester the suburban areas would be more than that, dropping more sharply than might be seen in s.e. further away from the city. Thats a pleasant way to be shown my conception might be wrong:) How close are these to the city-ish areas (presuming one of the couple is likely to consider not working on the doorstep, which I think is also a fairish assuption of our commuter society.

None of them are areas where wannabe WAGS would want to live, but there are all perfectly decent areas where I would be happy living. I could have posted much cheaper houses in Hulme, Salford, Moss Side, Longsight, Burnage... etc. etc.

I think there is a very evident divide between north and south. I would like to think I'm quite worldy wise but the prices of housing anywhere south of Milton Keynes always make my jaw drop and I can never work out why more people don't just move oop north.

For the record, Eccles is around 2.5 miles from the centre and has a £3 tram ride (about 25 mins) in to central manc. Eccles is a bit rough around the edges, but perfectly fine. Me and Mrs C sometimes jump on the tram and go there for a meal if we can't be bothered to go in to the city centre.

Failsworth is around 3.5 miles outside of the city centre. You'd be looking at getting a bus in to the centre.

Beswick is probably the roughest of the 3 areas, but it's where they've built the City of Manchester stadium and Sportcity so it's being 'gentrified'. It wouldn't be my choice of area, but fine for a starter home. It's only about 1.5 miles in to the city centre, so you could be all MSE and walk in to work.

Cleaver

Actually, I'm assuming our couple want to be sensible and buy a house. They may want this, a 2-bed flat slap bang in central manchester near the gay village and chinatown:





On at £120k, so they'd need to borrow about 2.6x earnings. Well worth it for open plan living, laminate flooring, original features, balcony and a building that has the "vibrancy and lifestyle known simply as Manchester".

You'll need to move quick, I've got a lot of couples interested in this one. Do you like my car?

Cleaver

Why has everyone gone quiet?

Graham: I thought I would post up some examples, rather than argue back and forth over stats that can be debated any which way until the end of time. What do you think of my three examples? Do you think they seem affordable and a decent reason why we won't see 50% falls over the next 12 months up here in rainy old Manchester?

ess0two

Cleaver wrote: »

Why has everyone gone quiet?

Graham: I thought I would post up some examples, rather than argue back and forth over stats that can be debated any which way until the end of time. What do you think of my three examples? Do you think they seem affordable and a decent reason why we won't see 50% falls over the next 12 months up here in rainy old Manchester?

I've posted examples myself from up North,just falls on deaf ears,50% falls they'll be giving them away with cereal if that happens.

Graham_Devon

Cleaver wrote: »

Why has everyone gone quiet?

Graham: I thought I would post up some examples, rather than argue back and forth over stats that can be debated any which way until the end of time. What do you think of my three examples? Do you think they seem affordable and a decent reason why we won't see 50% falls over the next 12 months up here in rainy old Manchester?

I personally went quiet because it makes no difference to what I was saying

Manchester is one of the cheapest places around. So of course you will be able to provide examples of cheap housing.

I was talking about the average house price though based on Halifax's index. Not houses in Manchester I also don't know those areas, and still do not believe that 120k equates to 2.8x a houshold income. Do not believe that is average in the slightest. I could pull houses from really rough areas in plymouth and say that a family earning 50k could afford them.

I don't think it's any reason why you couldnt see 50% falls though, no. I remember when you could buy a house in Manchester / Liverpool etc for 10k at the bottom of the last bubble. The very fact you could buy them at 10k, was because they had fallen so much.

Houses being generally cheaper in Manchester did not protect them from falling last time roudn, I don't see why it has to be different this time?

The north suffered just as much in all the other crashes, of course every area wont fall by a certain percentage, but equally, why would the North this time, be somewhat protected?

Houses were cheaper in Manchester at the peak. Manchester has still fallen in line with average falls so far?? They haven't not fallen because they were cheaper on average anyway.

dopester

Cleaver wrote: »

Take where I live, Manchester. And let's take an 'average' couple. One is, I dunno, a police officer earning £30k. The other works part time (so they can look after the kid(s)) and earns around £9k a year working around 20 hours per week as a admin office type person. They want to buy a house as they've spent the last 4 years saving 15% of their net wages and have a £20k deposit.

They could buy this 3 bed semi in Eccles:

Eccles, Failsworth, Beswick. All reasonable for affordability when you assume old-world boom pay and opportunities going forward in to the future, and when you have limited horizons for aspiration.

Pretty dog-rough poor areas imo, although I don't really know Beswick.

If a couple really need to pull in the best part of £40K to have an affordable house, but it having to be in somewhere like Eccles and Failsworth, then there is no hope.

Those properties you rightmove list would be expensive at 50% off today's asking prices. Maybe your police officer is protected for his £30K job, but many a person struggling to find such high-paying job... especially graduates coming through who finding it tough to land a £17K job on what would have been that path. Will the wife's £9K job keep paying, or even exist in the longer term? Plenty of people chasing such jobs.

I know a pair of landlords with properties in and around Failsworth gagging to sell the porfolios, with some of their properties way-in negative equity.

Manchester Evening News. (June 05, 2009)

He said: “I would dispute whether there is any evidence at all that this is about middle-class values and the suburban ideal. These places were devastated back in the 1990s. Many of the streets were 30 per cent vacant.”

And Urban Splash boss Tom Bloxham denied that the renewal programme was insensitive to residents.

He said: “I'm not sure we think in a middle-class or any other way. In Langworthy we saw houses that weren't working. Many were boarded up and unoccupied. Houses were being sold for £10,000 and people were in negative equity. Something had to change.

“The best areas in my view are those where you have mixed communities. Where you have areas that are very poor with lots of people on benefits they tend not to be good places to live. And in very rich areas where there are gated communities, people don't talk to each other.”

Graham_Devon

So a joint income of 40k for a horrible area? Lovely!

Cleaver

Graham_Devon wrote: »

I personally went quiet because it makes no difference to what I was saying

Manchester is one of the cheapest places around. So of course you will be able to provide examples of cheap housing.

I was talking about the average house price though based on Halifax's index. Not houses in Manchester

I would dispute that it's one of the 'cheapest places around'. And if the NW is one of the cheapest places around, it means that 8 million people have access to some of the 'cheapest places around'. Which is quite good isn't it?

And the NW is certainly no cheaper than the Yorks and Humber or North East Areas. So that's around 18 million people with access to cheap housing.

So I don't think you can dismiss the top bit of country as just being a small bit with dirt cheap houses.

Graham_Devon wrote: »

I don't think it's any reason why you couldnt see 50% falls though, no. I remember when you could buy a house in Manchester / Liverpool etc for 10k at the bottom of the last bubble. The very fact you could buy them at 10k, was because they had fallen so much.

Very true. But forgetting history, does your sentiment and knowledge of people in general not tell you that houses in one of Britain's biggest cities falling to around 1x people's earnings would be very cheap?

Graham_Devon wrote: »

Houses being generally cheaper in Manchester did not protect them from falling last time roudn, I don't see why it has to be different this time?

Because a lot of couples in Manchester will earn around 40k a year. If prices in Manchester fall 50% you will be able to get a 3-bed house in a decent area for 50k. Are you really of the mindset that demand and prices stablisation wouldn't kick in before these levels are reached?

Graham_Devon wrote: »

The north suffered just as much in all the other crashes, of course every area wont fall by a certain percentage, but equally, why would the North this time, be somewhat protected?

Protected from 50% falls?

Just to go back and confirm what you are saying. You see houses in Manchester, currently around the £120k mark falling in price by around 4% a month, for the next year? That these houses will be selling for 60k next summer?

Graham_Devon wrote: »

Houses were cheaper in Manchester at the peak. Manchester has still fallen in line with average falls so far?? They haven't not fallen because they were cheaper on average anyway.

The North West has generally fallen in line with what national figures have been showing.

Ah well. I tell you what, we'll come back in 12 months and see if Manchester property has fallen 50%. Fantastic if it does: me and the Mrs will get a penthouse in the centre, pretty much everyone I know who doesn't own a house will be able to get a really, really nice first house and my friends that do own a home now will be able to move to a much nicer home. So it will be good news all round. Can't see it somehow though, as houses here are pretty affordable already.

Cleaver

Graham_Devon wrote: »

So a joint income of 40k for a horrible area? Lovely!

Erm, no. A joint income of 40k getting you a nice house in a decent, first time buyer type area. With great access to the centre and not a sh*tty new build.

I said in my previous post, I could give you 'horrible' areas: Moss Side, Longsight, Hulme.. etc. where you can already buy for anything from £40k if you want. However, I think even these areas have decent bits.