More average salary stats to argue over.....

andykn

Bloo_Loo wrote: »

are you sure...that makes 30million earners.

I thought it was less than 20million and falling.

We're both near enough:

http://www.statistics.gov.uk/pdfdir/lmsuk0709.pdf

p2 "The number of people in employment was 29.00 million in the three months to May 2009"

"The number of people in full-time employment was 21.47 million in the three months to May 2009"

tommy75

andykn wrote: »

FTBs do not buy "average" houses, they buy 1 or 2 bed flats.

Utter rubbish. In 2003 I nearly bought a 2 bed terrace in the north west for under 35k that didn't need any work and was in a good area. That same house would command over 100k today and what about the extra interest to be paid back on top of that?

1 and 2 bed flats have sprung up in their thousands over the last few years mainly in city centers built by greedy companys making a quick buck, and lots of them still lie empty.

Most FTB's have always bought terraced housing or 2 bed semi's as a first home. 1 and 2 bed flats have been built on a large scale in the last odd few years.

Edit : Also, I didn't need a massive deposit in 2003 to get a decent mortgage rate.

You obviously haven't thought this argument through..

Bloo_Loo

tommy75 wrote: »

Utter rubbish. In 2003 I nearly bought a 2 bed terrace in the north west for under 35k that didn't need any work and was in a good area. That same house would command over 100k today and what about the extra interest to be paid back on top of that?

1 and 2 bed flats have sprung up in their thousands over the last few years mainly in city centers built by greedy companys making a quick buck, and lots of them still lie empty.

Most FTB's have always bought terraced housing or 2 bed semi's as a first home. 1 and 2 bed flats have been built on a large scale in the last odd few years.

Edit : Also, I didn't need a massive deposit in 2003 to get a decent mortgage rate.

You obviously haven't thought this argument through..

I also bought a 3 bed end of terrace with my very average wage at age 24 with 3 times and 1 times multiples and 10%

now, even with my way above average wage, id need a couple of income multiples more to buy it.

andykn

tommy75 wrote: »

Utter rubbish. In 2003 I nearly bought a 2 bed terrace in the north west for under 35k that didn't need any work and was in a good area. That same house would command over 100k today and what about the extra interest to be paid back on top of that?

1 and 2 bed flats have sprung up in their thousands over the last few years mainly in city centers built by greedy companys making a quick buck, and lots of them still lie empty.

Most FTB's have always bought terraced housing or 2 bed semi's as a first home. 1 and 2 bed flats have been built on a large scale in the last odd few years.

Edit : Also, I didn't need a massive deposit in 2003 to get a decent mortgage rate.

You obviously haven't thought this argument through..

I just haven't included the small print. A 35k house in 2003 was still a long way from being an "average" house.

The "average" ftb (on 3 times income plus deposit) buys a "below average" house.

carolt

Actually, andykn, FTBs don't usually buy 1 & 2 bed flats - the vast bulk of those built in the last few years were built for and sold to BTL investors. 2/3 of newbuilds built in London recently (mainly small flats) were sold to BTLetters - I posted on this a few days ago.

carolt

andykn wrote: »

But a market of 17 million owner occupied houses cannot be simplistcally matched with the income of nearly 30 million earners.

Is it not reasonable to assume that a the 7 million or so rented households will be disporportionatley occupied by lower earners?

Why can't "a market of 17 million owner occupied houses be simplistcally matched with the income of nearly 30 million earners" - do all owners buy alone?

I thought the crux of the argument for many on this thread was that historical notions of affordability based on income multiples were meaningless because everyone buying nowadays was doing so as a couple, both in full-time work? You cannot have it both ways.

And what is your evidence for your supposition that "the 7 million or so rented households will be disporportionatley occupied by lower earners". My household income is many times that of my parents who own a million pound house - they are retired; I rent. Difference - they bought years ago; I wanted to buy at what turned out out to be a peak in house prices. Our income is excellent by any standards; we're very far from loaded, but far above average, either for the UK or our area. Yest we cannot comfortably afford to buy in our area.

The simple fact is that it has been shown many times that very few people could now afford - on their current earnings - to buy their current home at its current market price. This is why house prices have to fall.

You seem determined to endlessly repeat your error, which is to fail to notice that all the variations you see have always existed (eg some people unwaged, pensioners on low incomes, etc) BUT the income multiple has remained static over time.

That's why we're headed back to 3.5 times income average house prices - or less.

Thrugelmir

carolt wrote: »

Actually, andykn, FTBs don't usually buy 1 & 2 bed flats - the vast bulk of those built in the last few years were built for and sold to BTL investors. 2/3 of newbuilds built in London recently (mainly small flats) were sold to BTLetters - I posted on this a few days ago.

FTB's probably would have , had prices been affordable. FTB's progressively became fewer between 2000 and 2007. Only in April 2007 did they reach a number last seen in any month since 2003.

There is still a major correction at the lower end of the property market to come. As it should be cheaper to buy a 1/2 bed flat than rent the equivalent property.

wolfman

andykn wrote: »

Where do you get median house price data from?

Erm... from the same data used to calculate the average house price maybe...

andykn wrote: »

And nearly 15 million people earn more than the median earnings figure; there are only around 17 million owner occupiers.

From what I've read (think it was on the bbc) owner occupier numbers are actually lower, at around 15 million. Does that mean much in the context you are implying though? Maybe if prices were cheaper, there would be more owner occupiers. The fact is people can't afford to which is why the number is lower.

Either way, my point was that the average is not a representative figure. The average is often used used to mean something like typical or normal, when it's not.

It's like saying, how many legs does the average person have. It'd actually be under 2 (maybe 1.8??), whereas the median would be 2. It reflects data better.

IveSeenTheLight

wolfman wrote: »

Erm... from the same data used to calculate the average house price maybe...

LR average house prices are mean average house prices

I believe the Nationwide and Halifax use Median from their proportion of house representations.

wolfman

IveSeenTheLight wrote: »

LR average house prices are mean average house prices.

?

That makes no sense. If you're inferring I don't know the difference between median and mean, re-read my posts.