Telegraph: Lending main obstacle for buyers, causing Brits to "give up"

buglawton

Well, prices for £5m type London properties that are in the world market for Russians, Arabs etc to buy are still rising.

Whew! What a relief!

Pobby

How many times do I have to say it. When I first bought there was raging inflation, high interest rates and high wage inflation. Get it. From 1970 my pre tax income was £24 a week, 10 years later it was £200 a week, a car thrown in and expenses paid. There is little wage inflation now, job losses, repos, sad looking pensions if, like me, some of it is in private schemes. Endowments screwed up, stock market like a !!!!!s knickers.

1.4 trillion in debt for the UK. All kicking off again in the middle east. So oil rising at a scary rate. As will most other things that need to be moved about. Checked out food costs now? I have friends in Ireland, North and South, both with a house price crash that would make you eyes water. Oh and McWhatsname, don`t give me the supply and demand bit, it runs a whole deeper than that.

These are important issues. Not just about house prices but about a long term problem that could last for years.

We are no longer a low inflation economy. Had house prices been taken into the mix a decade ago, that surely would have shown inflation at a much higher rate.

I am not sure what happened under Nu Labour, an end to boom and bust, a house market that wouldn`t get out of control? Now saddled with a bunch of toffs, oh and the Lib Dems, funny they came last in Barnsely.

Still we are all in it together. I am sure Cameroon is quacking over his finances. Loved his speach of late.

Looking for risk takers, take on staff and all that old stuff. I was a risk taker with staff, then was totally shafted by Thatch.

Seriously, house prices are one thing but a small part of a much greater issue.

Batchy

Joeskeppi wrote: »

I'm inclined to agree, I think it's time to accept that owner-occupier rates are going to fall a fair bit, unless I'm mistake we're at a much higher level than the majority of other euro countries.

The ownly way owner occupier rates will fall will be if social housing buys some stock back from the market, or builds houses for social purposes...

Or the councils build some more houses, for social purposes, not for right to buy.

(or the banks repossess all the ones in arrears, which wont be happening, as when they do, they will still be selling them back to owner occupiers anyway)

System

Batchy wrote: »

The ownly way owner occupier rates will fall will be if social housing buys some stock back from the market, or builds houses for social purposes...

Why can't it be because more people are in private rented?

Graham_Devon

Joeskeppi wrote: »

Why can't it be because more people are in private rented?

Well were told the current owners simply won't sell. So Investors can't buy.

I realise this is absolute rubbish, but people can't have everything everyway.

System

I think they are saying owners won't sell for silly prices. BTL's seem to be increasing in number (seeing as they are being prefered for mortgage apps), which would suggest to me an increase in the %age of people renting privately as well.

Batchy

Joeskeppi wrote: »

Why can't it be because more people are in private rented?

because it would mean more BTlers are buying rather than FTBers, which I still do not think is the case!

the_flying_pig

Batchy wrote: »

because it would mean more BTlers are buying rather than FTBers, which I still do not think is the case!

i think it works like this, m8:

1 - imagine that at the start of 2011 there are 10 million privately owned houses in the UK [there are more of course but let's keep the numbers simple];
2 - 9 million of them are owner-occupied; and
3 - 1 million of them are owner by private landlords; so
4 - the owner-occupier rate is 90%.

now, let's say that 1 million houses are sold in 2011 [they're an average batch i.e. 900k of them are owner occupied, 100k of them landlord owned*]. here are two scenarios:

(a) 900k of them are bought by OOs, 100k by LLs. at the end of the year there are now exactly 9m OO houses & 1m landlord-owned houses. so we still have an owner-occupier rate of 90%.

(b) 750k of them are bought by 00s, 250k by LLs. now, at the end of the year there are only 8.75m OO houses & 1.25 LL-owned ones. the owner-occupier rate has therefore crept down to 87.5%, despite the fact that three quarters of house sales in 2011 were to OOs - the OO rate will only stay the same if the houses that change hands are both bought and sold in exactly the same OO:LL proportions as exist currently.


* - i actually suspect that LLs probably sell less often, certainly for FTB type properties, this is another reason why the OO proportion could fall over time, but let's keep it simple.