Preparedness for when

Frugalsod

fuddle wrote: »

Frugalsod go easy eh? That maybe so but reading that put the wind up me and I don't even have a mortgage.

Life is a git anyway without worrying about ifs and coulds.

If you do not have a mortgage then you are safe. It was the fact that people had assets in excess of liabilities that allowed Royal Bank of Scotland to liquidate businesses that had assets that could be seized. I know of a company that had invested in a shopping centre in Ireland that failed in 2008, and the mortgage allowed claims on other business assets. The mortgage was sold at a significant loss to a hedge fund who wound up the business and are currently selling off assets locally. They will make considerably more from winding up the company than by retaining ownership.

Frugalsod

calicocat wrote: »

Apparently, there has been a spate of people hacking into house ownership now it's all electronic and no longer on paper deeds. People have had their house effectively taken off them and it suddenly has someone else's name on the ownership. This is much harder to do if it still has a mortgage attached to it. So anothe reason I thought I would hang onto it a bit longer.

That is a very real risk, and why many suggest a £1 outstanding mortgage so that this risk is eliminated. It is very much easier to repay a £1 than several thousand when things really SHTF. Plus you can always hide that £1 somewhere just in case. It would be a very serious problem if you cannot find £1.

fuddle

I just think we need to be mindful that this prepping thread is on OS. I would like to suggest that, going from my own experience, people come to OS in dire circumstances hoping to learn OS ways in order to get through really tough times.

Yes this thread is full of very astute OSers who have learned the importance of preparing but, again going by my own experience, there will probably be very vulnerable people lurking here too.

I just would l Iike for us all to be mindful of that when posting about ifs and coulds without the back up of a reference of where that information comes from. Sometimes fact is clouded with opinion and that in itself can be worrisome.

Frugalsod

moneyistooshorttomention wrote: »

Frugalsod,

What do you define as a "small bank" without any investment interests?

I left the Co-op Bank before all the ruckus started one way or another on that one and have been with the Nationwide Building Society for some time and feel that's probably about the best I can do for a "bank".

Both of those have no investment banking arms. So would be suitable. I am opting for Metrobank as they have a branch locally.

It is the big four banks and their subsidiaries that you should be aware of. Also keep an eye on which banking license they operate under. For example Coutts was part of Natwest and now part of RBS, so you would want to avoid that one.

Use this as a starting point.

http://www.moneysavingexpert.com/savings/safe-savings

It is the ownership of an investment bank that is the thing to be aware of. All the big banks have investment banking arms and some are riskier than others. Barclays would be the first to avoid as they have more derivative exposure than the world GDP.

nuatha

Property fraud is far more of an issue if you don't live in your property. There have been several cases where someone has left a property empty and lived abroad to find that a third party has rented the property out (without the owners consent or knowledge) I've heard of one case where the property was in the process of being sold when the owner returned to the UK. However there does not seem to have been a large number of these and none of them involved hacking the Land Registry per se (false and fraudulent filings yes).
Its potentially much more of an issue where businesses have been stockpiling land for later development.

Repossessions, there is more incentive for a bank to repossess where there is a relatively small outstanding mortgage in relation to the property value - that way they make money. Taking possession of a property where the outstanding mortgage exceeds the possible sale price is not generally in the banks interest.

Leaving a small amount owing on a mortgage used to be the cheap way of having your deeds looked after by a bank. The minute amount of interest that accrued on £1 was far cheaper than renting a safe deposit box. Building societies used to count the whole value of every property they had a mortgage on as an asset, so all those £1 mortgages added up to a substantial property portfolio - they used to be limited in how much they could lend in relation to their assets.

[Deleted User]

I'm one who prefers to deal with things as they happen in life, it's no point in worrying that things 'might' happen and running scared because you have a possibility of something happening at the back of your psyche! Life throws enough bad stuff in your everyday path anyway. Not to say that flagging up things that pop into the media isn't a good thing but too much emphasis on the doom and gloom side of finance is depressing especially if you don't have a great deal of finance in the first place!

greenbee

fuddle wrote: »

I just think we need to be mindful that this prepping thread is on OS. I would like to suggest that, going from my own experience, people come to OS in dire circumstances hoping to learn OS ways in order to get through really tough times.

Yes this thread is full of very astute OSers who have learned the importance of preparing but, again going by my own experience, there will probably be very vulnerable people lurking here too.

I just would l Iike for us all to be mindful of that when posting about ifs and coulds without the back up of a reference of where that information comes from. Sometimes fact is clouded with opinion and that in itself can be worrisome.

There's a whole board (Debate - House prices & the economy) for discussion of speculation on what might happen to the housing market and the economy as a whole, which is a good place for erm... 'robust' discussion about the various opinions and theories there are floating around about what is and might be happening.

And yes, I agree, sources and evidence are important when making these kind of statements. That way readers can form their own opinion of the reliability of the source. The safest thing to do with any assertion made without supporting evidence or sources is to ignore it Otherwise life will get very stressful!

culpepper

here is the link if you want to sign up for property alerts with land registry
https://propertyalert.landregistry.gov.uk/

mardatha

Meanwhile back at the peasant hovel, it's been steady horrible nonstop sleety ran all night and has now turned to snow. And WE ARE LOW ON PORRIDGE

Frugalsod

fuddle wrote: »

I just think we need to be mindful that this prepping thread is on OS. I would like to suggest that, going from my own experience, people come to OS in dire circumstances hoping to learn OS ways in order to get through really tough times.

Yes this thread is full of very astute OSers who have learned the importance of preparing but, again going by my own experience, there will probably be very vulnerable people lurking here too.

I just would l Iike for us all to be mindful of that when posting about ifs and coulds without the back up of a reference of where that information comes from. Sometimes fact is clouded with opinion and that in itself can be worrisome.

The most successful preps are avoiding any such need to resort to actually using the preps. For example if you can manage your finances so you can avoid the coming financial collapse so much the better. It does not mean running to the hills. I am clearing debts so that when the crisis strikes and that deflation starts shrinking my income that I will be able to cope with a significant drop in income. This is not what most people are doing. Greece is a perfect example of what will likely happen. Wages have fallen 40% and high unemployment is now permanent. So this is my main reason for prepping. The significant drop in income that will come if there is another crisis, even if you avoid unemployment. Once debt free I will be able to cope with an 80% drop in income and still be able to save. OS techniques have allowed me this flexibility to cope.

OS techniques are what helps me maintain that large disposable income and minimises my normal monthly expenses. So for me OS techniques are a means to an end. I am not expecting things to be so bad that I will be making soap living in a yurt on some exposed hillside. I am looking at the ideas of making my own soap as it could be a very good way to cut the costs of living which sounds like your reasons. Same with dehydrating food as it will allow me to save excess food during the season to use when it is much more expensive. Making my own bread has meant my costs of living have fallen an allowed me to plough those savings into other preps like water storage and camp stoves for power cuts. Even the simplest OS techniques like cooking from scratch can make sufficient savings that people can start to build food stocks as they start saving. Reducing food waste is another, but by doing all these things before they are forced on you is also better. It allows you the time to work out what works for you and what does not all before you have no options and little free money to experiment. Though for me it had got to crunch time before I looked into it. Though over the last few years I have cleared a large expensive loan and am now concentrating on my last debt.

When I started out in prepping I had a plan to bug out but that has changed and my plans revolved around bugging in. Peoples plans have to adapt to what is most likely. Unemployment, a cut in wages and a financial crisis are probably most likely apart from extreme weather events. So prepping for these is most likely to pay off. It is why I try and keep my costs of living to the level of unemployment benefits so I will not have to make drastic cuts should that happen to me.

As for the vulnerable the biggest thing that people need to learn is that since the financial crisis your main priority should be return of capital not return on capital. If you are getting 8% from some high risk investment that might be what you are looking for but if it is lost in the next crisis then you will have nothing to live on afterwards. With the new bail in laws I may not be at risk as my cash holdings are well below the £75 000 limit. Though if the banks have big derivative losses then would even this limit be safe as they raid depositors balances to repay derivative bets gone bad? That is why I am looking at moving accounts to a smaller bank without such risks. It looks like happening then I can transfer all my funds to a safer bank.

Everything is if or could, but prepping is a way to minimise its impact on you. You only have to see the basic data on Zero Hedge to know that things are not right. The fact that the vast bulk of commentators on their have also predicted a collapse of the US dollar and a return to the gold standard is a sign that many there do not know what they are talking about. So you need to work things out for yourself. Look at what is happening globally and then locally to see if signs of trouble are there already. For me it was particularly telling that online deliveries were being delivered within a couple of days rather than a week during the last few days of Christmas shopping.

The other way to look at prepping is low cost self insurance. You pay premiums in the hope of never having to make a claim, but if you do then you are covered. That is just like prepping. You build up food stocks in case of shortages or a crisis that clears the shelves. You do not have to ever make a claim on that insurance but it is there should you ever need it. You know that food will be eaten one day so not as if it is never going to be used. It also allows you to reduce the costs of food overall as you buy when there is plenty and use stocks when there is a shortage. OS techniques are particularly useful here. The point being to avoid trouble that causes panics. OS is a tried and tested way of doing many things that helps prepping or otherwise.