Help to buy? Yes please, say bankers!

Graham_Devon

Apparently, city bankers are looking at using help to buy to gear up and speculate on property prices.

Law of unintended consequences I guess. Though I'm not sure it's that unintended, considering the ridiculous 600k price cap. That can only have been designed really to allow the sort of scenario below.

Sandy Chen, banking analyst at Cenkos Securities, said he expected bankers to be some of the most eager to apply for the Help to Buy scheme. "Getting a 95% loan to value mortgage lets you speculate on the expected house price increases a lot more than a 75% mortgage," he said. "Bankers are speculative types and are likely to be highly attracted to the possibility of making lots of money."

James Pargeter, head of residential projects at Deloitte real estate, agreed: "Even in London [£600,000] will get you quite a few options. This allows people to buy a bigger house than they might have done and play house prices more."

However, some claim that even high paid City workers will be using the scheme out of necessity.

Adrian Anderson, director of Mayfair-based mortgage broker Anderson Harris, said he had received calls from young bankers who have "good strong incomes" but little deposit.

News that borrowers who may not need the scheme could be considering using it came as the head of the UK's largest independent estate agency chain suggested banks would need to ration lending to stop demand getting out of control.

Paul Smith, of the estate agents Haart, said the firm had had the busiest start to October for nine years, with 7,281 buyers registering in the first week – a 92% increase on 2012. Smith said there had been "a frenzy of activity" in recent days, with "branches being overwhelmed with buyer inquiries."

He added: "The interest is so great we predict lenders will need to put a cap on the amount they lend under the scheme."

http://www.theguardian.com/money/2013/oct/09/help-to-buy-scheme-to-benefit-bankers

wymondham

City Bankers are smart cookies - they'll use any and every scheme going. I'd probably do the same, after all if the Government thinks I need help buying my £600,000 house then who am I to argue!

CLAPTON

I hadn't realised that the scheme wasn't intended for UK taxpaying citizens who happened to be employed by banks

Graham_Devon

CLAPTON wrote: »

I hadn't realised that the scheme wasn't intended for UK taxpaying citizens who happened to be employed by banks

Nice post.

Who said it was?

Loughton_Monkey

I read this article with eagerness, expecting some substance to it. But I can summarise it here:

"Some of the people who use help to buy may be bankers."

Well I never!

Is this what keeps Guardian readers awake at nights?


If that's not scary enough, I am given to understand that this is only the tip of the iceberg. Other scandals include:

• If a banker is over 60, he qualifies for heating allowance.
• Bankers earning under £50K qualify for Child Benefit.
• When a banker reaches 65, he gets a "state pension".
• If a banker is over 60, he qualifies for a bus pass.
• Some pubs allow bankers in to mix with 'ordinary' clientelle.
• The Church of England has not banned Bankers from attending many of their churches.
• Tesco allows bankers to buy things in their supermarkets.
• Bankers do get Nectar Points.
• M&S Dine in for two for £10 offer also extends to Bankers.

I am absolutely horrified, and will write to my MP. I suggest everyone else does the same. It's a national scandal. WOuldn't happen if Miliband was in charge, that's for sure.

Graham_Devon

Loughton_Monkey wrote: »

I read this article with eagerness, expecting some substance to it. But I can summarise it here:

"Some of the people who use help to buy may be bankers."

Well I never!

Is this what keeps Guardian readers awake at nights?

Maybe the Guardian can see the problems with help to buy if it's used to speculate on prices by those who don't even require taxpayer help?

Even if you can't?

CLAPTON

Graham_Devon wrote: »

Nice post.

Who said it was?

As I understand the situation, employees of banks will be using the government scheme exactly as any another citizen of this country.

One might find that unremarkable and not worth of inappropriate headlines.

Graham_Devon

CLAPTON wrote: »

As I understand the situation, employees of banks will be using the government scheme exactly as any another citizen of this country.

One might find that unremarkable and not worth of inappropriate headlines.

I fear you have completely and utterly missed the point.

It doesn't matter what job they do. It's why they are using it. This isn't a pop at bankers per-se, not from my point anyway, more just real evidence of what I've said before now about the scheme.

It's not saying they need the help. It's saying they will use it to speculate on property prices. That's bad news for us all considering the results of speculation on house prices in 2008. Its also bad news for anyone considering using the scheme just to buy a home, which becomes further and further out of reach thanks to these sorts of uses of the scheme.

I don't think you really need this explaining to you in all honesty. Believe you are an intelligent enough chap. intelligent enough, certainly to do your best to make a mockery of the article....by ignoring it's content and the problems that content exposes.

antrobus

Graham_Devon wrote: »

I fear you have completely and utterly missed the point.

It doesn't matter what job they do. It's why they are using it. This isn't a pop at bankers per-se, not from my point anyway, more just real evidence of what I've said before now about the scheme.

It's not saying they need the help. It's saying they will use it to speculate on property prices....

No, some guy working for an itsy-bitsy little securities firm has managed to get some free publicity by pressing the Guardian's buttons, by speculating on what might happen. (Even then, it's not particularly clear why the world will end just because some guy who works for a bank has bought a slightly bigger house than he might might otherwise have done. Or she, for that matter.)

Please come back and let us know of any actual evidence that emerges of HTB fuelling 'speculation'.

Loughton_Monkey

Graham_Devon wrote: »

Maybe the Guardian can see the problems with help to buy if it's used to speculate on prices by those who don't even require taxpayer help?

Even if you can't?

What the hell do you mean by "speculation"?

The only thing I can think of is that you are talking about people with £120K swishing about in the bank, who may wake up one morning and decide to buy a £600K house. They read that HTB will 'guarantee' their mortgage from 80% to 95%, and so they suffer the extra interest charges to take out a 95% mortgage when they could have had 80%? And some of these rich people might be 'bankers' as opposed to Insurance staff, fund managers, Brokers, Idependent Financial Advisors, Advertising executives.....?

Please explain, in words of one syllable, what exactly forms the "speculation".

Graham_Devon

The itsy bitsy company being the largest independant estate agency company in the UK?

House price rampers won't have a bad word said about help to buy!