HPC thread of the week

westernpromise

If I were a low end "recruitment consultant" from Northampton I expect I'd be pretty depressed too.

Not angry, but definitely pretty unhappy with my lot.

irrationalactor

I find all this sneering at HPC rather offensive.

There are a lot of posters over there (like me) to whom the housing market is not a game. Housing is not optional - everyone needs one.

In the 90s people bought decent houses at sensible salary multiples. By the time I left Uni in the early 2000s it was becoming impossible, and by the time I had a bit of a deposit the average salary multiple had gone from 3.5x to more like 7x. In London, now, it's something like 12x.

Even if I eventually manage it, how on earth are people just starting out now going to be able to pay those prices?

Ridiculing posters on another forum because people 'got it wrong' and/or 'missed the boat' and you didn't leaves a bad taste in the mouth when the reason many people missed that boat is because they were born after it had left.

If prices remain crazy and there is no crash, then I will be ending up significantly poorer than my parents, despite having a much more stable and higher-earning career than both of them put together. My entire working life I have been saving towards a house but at the end of every year I end up farther away than when I started.

I don't find anything to celebrate in that.

HAMISH_MCTAVISH

irrationalactor wrote: »

I find all this sneering at HPC rather offensive.

There are a lot of posters over there (like me) .

Perhaps you should spend more time examining why HPC was so spectacularly, catastrophically, wrong about almost everything rather than being offended when others point it out.

Just sayin....;)

mystic_trev

irrationalactor wrote: »

I find all this sneering at HPC rather offensive.

Really? So I suppose you find this OK?

http://www.housepricecrash.co.uk/forum/index.php?/topic/206992-im-going-to-buy/?p=1102817984

brilliant. now, #### off to mse where the greatest fools post.

irrationalactor

mystic_trev wrote: »

Really? So I suppose you find this OK?

http://www.housepricecrash.co.uk/forum/index.php?/topic/206992-im-going-to-buy/?p=1102817984

No, of course not.

irrationalactor

HAMISH_MCTAVISH wrote: »

Perhaps you should spend more time examining why HPC was so spectacularly, catastrophically, wrong about almost everything rather than being offended when others point it out.

Just sayin....;)

Doesn't help me now, does it?

Still priced out no matter who was right or wrong.

MFW_ASAP

irrationalactor wrote: »

Doesn't help me now, does it?

Still priced out no matter who was right or wrong.

I was booted off the HPC site when I suggested that while the posters on forums like HPC are concerned soley with cost price and were ok to wait for the right price, the vast majority of buyers will buy for other reasons such as school catchment areas and job commute options. As such (I argued), these people will continue buy when they can afford it, forstalling any crash. I lost my logon the same day I posted that. I was amazed that they are so fragile that they want absolutely zero movement from the HPC 'message'.

On here, I have found that the posters ridicule the hard-core members of HPC, not the people who are struggling to simply raise the monies to buy a home. The people who get targeted on here are the ones on HPC who claim that they have enough of a deposit to buy a house now (or indeed some who claim that they could buy a house outright), but choose not to do so because they have an almost religious faith that house prices will fall, and that they will 'coin it in'.

These people are not 'priced out', they want to gain from the misery of others who may have to sell their house to the HPCers at a loss because of economic issues out of their control (i.e. recessions, etc.).

I hope you reach a point where your deposit is sufficient to buy a home (perhaps not the size you want or the location you desire), but if you then sit on that deposit in the belief you know better about the house market for years, when the house market goes exactly opposite to what you predict. If you then sit for years pouring derision on the 'sheeple' who just buy when they can afford it, then yes, you will, in turn, be derided on here.

HAMISH_MCTAVISH

irrationalactor wrote: »

Doesn't help me now, does it?

Nope.

But it could well have helped you a few years ago had you not listened to incorrect analysis and based your decisions accordingly.

Still priced out no matter who was right or wrong.

Your profile says you are from Dundee. One of the cheapest markets in Scotland with plenty of stock available where a mortgage would be cheaper than rent.

There are properties available within a reasonable commute of every major employment hub in the UK that are affordable for most people in that region.

It is of course the case that property remains out of the reach of some, but this has always been the case, the lowest earning 30% or so have never been able to afford to buy.

So whilst some are indeed priced out, and they have my sympathy, the unfortunate reality is many today that claim to be priced out are no such thing, they are either 'mortgage excluded' or have 'champagne taste on a beer budget'.

Jason74

irrationalactor wrote: »

Doesn't help me now, does it?

Still priced out no matter who was right or wrong.

You're absolutely right here, and I think the tendency of some posters to be (to say the least) a little insensitive to the issues faced by those on the wrong side of the HPI equation is probably the least appealing aspect of this board.

But MFW also has a point, when he says that there are a group of posters on HPC (albeit quite a small number, perhaps best personified by the Count of Nowhere) who actually deserve a large element of derision. Claiming year after year that "collapse is inevitable" and that people who buy are losers, and actively wishing people to lose their shirts so that they can pick up a bargain. While all the time prices keep rising around them.

HPC as a site has a problem in that having previously been an excellent source of debate (with discussion encouraged to the point where people could declare themselves bull or bear at sign up), it's now become little more than a cult. The hard core zealots promote a message, and anyone posting anything contradicting that is either banned or abused to the point where they just don't bother posting. The Count and others then claim that they have "called out a troll" while failing to realise that sensible people just don't bother to engage with people with their mentality.

A sensible forum would have reigned in the behaviour of that group, and probably eventually banned them if they hadn't toned it down. Had they done so, the forum would have continued to be a good source of debate. Instead, it's simply become a "safe place" for the disaffected or bitter to rant unchallenged.

None of this changes the fact that you are right in what you post. The situation with housing in this country is nothing short of a national scandal. Sadly I don't see it being resolved any time soon ,as most of the meaningful solutions imho involve policies that would by today's standards be considered "socialist" and that is of course a dirty word in the current climate.

I dont blame you, or anyone else under 35 (people older than that perhaps have to look to themselves to some extent as to why they're where they are, with this being more true as people get older) who is absolutely fuming at the current situation, and if HPC provides a place where people in that situation can vent very justified frustrations, then it still serves some form of purpose.

But much as his way of saying it is imho more than a little distasteful, Hamish is dead right when he says that HPC have a pretty poor track record of predicting the future, and the increased concentration of extremist posters means that this is only likely to get worse. In terms of finding actual solutions to the problem you find yourself in, HPC is imho pretty much the worst place you could look.

TheCountofNowhere

Jason74 wrote: »

You're absolutely right here, and I think the tendency of some posters to be (to say the least) a little insensitive to the issues faced by those on the wrong side of the HPI equation is probably the least appealing aspect of this board.

But MFW also has a point, when he says that there are a group of posters on HPC (albeit quite a small number, perhaps best personified by the Count of Nowhere) who actually deserve a large element of derision. Claiming year after year that "collapse is inevitable" and that people who buy are losers, and actively wishing people to lose their shirts so that they can pick up a bargain. While all the time prices keep rising around them.

HPC as a site has a problem in that having previously been an excellent source of debate (with discussion encouraged to the point where people could declare themselves bull or bear at sign up), it's now become little more than a cult. The hard core zealots promote a message, and anyone posting anything contradicting that is either banned or abused to the point where they just don't bother posting. The Count and others then claim that they have "called out a troll" while failing to realise that sensible people just don't bother to engage with people with their mentality.

A sensible forum would have reigned in the behaviour of that group, and probably eventually banned them if they hadn't toned it down. Had they done so, the forum would have continued to be a good source of debate. Instead, it's simply become a "safe place" for the disaffected or bitter to rant unchallenged.

None of this changes the fact that you are right in what you post. The situation with housing in this country is nothing short of a national scandal. Sadly I don't see it being resolved any time soon ,as most of the meaningful solutions imho involve policies that would by today's standards be considered "socialist" and that is of course a dirty word in the current climate.

I dont blame you, or anyone else under 35 (people older than that perhaps have to look to themselves to some extent as to why they're where they are, with this being more true as people get older) who is absolutely fuming at the current situation, and if HPC provides a place where people in that situation can vent very justified frustrations, then it still serves some form of purpose.

But much as his way of saying it is imho more than a little distasteful, Hamish is dead right when he says that HPC have a pretty poor track record of predicting the future, and the increased concentration of extremist posters means that this is only likely to get worse. In terms of finding actual solutions to the problem you find yourself in, HPC is imho pretty much the worst place you could look.

Post reported.