London Has Peaked

lisyloo

CLAPTON wrote: »

I'm not sure whether more properties is likely to happen either.
Fewer people is simply a matter of political will

How does that work?
We would have skills shortages of surgeons/doctors/nurses/dentists if we stopped all immigration.
Let's say we reduce it but let the doctors/dentists in.
How do you get to fewer people with 776k births a year?

CLAPTON

lisyloo wrote: »

How does that work?
We would have skills shortages of surgeons/doctors/nurses/dentists if we stopped all immigration.
Let's say we reduce it but let the doctors/dentists in.
How do you get to fewer people with 776k births a year?

we import over 600,000 immigrants a year : stopping the majority would be a good start.

lisyloo

I agree, but I'm saying it won't necessarily mean fewer people.
I've looked up the immigration, emigration, birth and death figures And if you stop most immigration it still won't result in fewer people.

So what political will is required for fewer people?
I don't think euthanasia or sterilisation are going to be acceptable so I'm trying to understand what you had in mind.

cells

he probably thinks if people coming here are slowed 80-100% and people leaving stays about the same then the population will stabilise or fall.

However I think if we reduced the numbers coming over 80% then its a good chance the number leaving would also crash maybe 80%. Also any time it was likely that the near future would see a stop to free movement between uk and europe then I feel that year is going to be the biggest net migration in the history of the uk. people who were thinking maybe i will go or maybe i will go in a few years would have no choice but to do it now and they would imo so ecpect over a million people the year it looks possible that the uk will ban free movement between uk/eu

borborygmous

cells wrote: »

The next twenty years will be interesting. Either London is going to start building 3 x as many new builds or we are going to see prices double in real terms (quadruple in nominal terms) and a rapid shift to more renters and less owners.

Or people will really start working from home in significant numbers, and prices will fall.

People do talk about these things for decades before they happen. That doesn't mean they won't happen!

Remember, we've only had modern smartphones since about 2008, things are changing. Cheap telepresence robots and "deep learning" (smarter, less clumsy robots) are the new things to watch.

cells

borborygmous wrote: »

Or people will really start working from home in significant numbers, and prices will fall.

People do talk about these things for decades before they happen. That doesn't mean they won't happen!

Remember, we've only had modern smartphones since about 2008, things are changing. Cheap telepresence robots and "deep learning" (smarter, less clumsy robots) are the new things to watch.

if working from home got popular prices could be lower but probably not for the reason you think

offices would be knocked down and replaced by flats.

likewise self drive vehicles could allow a lot of infrastructure which is dedicated to cars and their needs to be knocked down and replaced by housing. also parking standards post self drive car tech will be such that developments can be 2-3 x as dense

so yes maybe there is some big changes in land use for offices and retail and transport but thats quite a way off like 30-50 years methinks

setmefree2

Central London Real Estate Losing Haven Status as Bears Move In

http://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2016-02-12/central-london-real-estate-losing-haven-status-as-bears-move-in

onthehill

Central London is an irrelevance as far as the vast majority of people are concerned. It's a separate market/planet. Much of it commercial.

lisyloo

cells wrote: »

if working from home got popular prices could be lower but probably not for the reason you think

offices would be knocked down and replaced by flats.

My personal experience (I work in IT and have recently been job hunting and talking to multiple employers) is that WFH is if anything less popular with employers mostly for reasons of collaboration, although employers are generally flexible.

With my last employer we only reduced office space a little as we still required everyone to be on the same day on occasion, plus meeting rooms, kitchen, bathrooms, shower were all still required.

It would be great to find some figures, but I think ideas of knocking down loads of offices is a pipe dream.

Ironically if it did happen and people like MPs and London office workers did not need second homes, then there would be less demand for residential property.

N1AK

lisyloo wrote: »

My personal experience (I work in IT and have recently been job hunting and talking to multiple employers) is that WFH is if anything less popular with employers mostly for reasons of collaboration, although employers are generally flexible.

With my last employer we only reduced office space a little as we still required everyone to be on the same day on occasion, plus meeting rooms, kitchen, bathrooms, shower were all still required.

It would be great to find some figures, but I think ideas of knocking down loads of offices is a pipe dream.

I've worked with a number of firms who have implemented more open approaches to remote/flexible working and in practice the space required in offices doesn't change hugely.

A couple of examples that involved companies in new offices have seen space per full time worker decrease by 10-20%. There is scope for this to go higher if there are companies providing ad hoc desk / meeting space nearby that you can use to handle high desk demand days.