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I don't understand why people can't be bothered!

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  • Glen_Clark
    Glen_Clark Posts: 4,397 Forumite
    Thrugelmir wrote: »
    The real root of HPI goes back to an earlier Governments wider fiscal policy policy. ;)
    True, but if I had known this Government was going to inflate house prices even further I would have bought Barratts instead of supermarket shares. But I couldn't afford to hire a politician to find that out.
    “It is difficult to get a man to understand something, when his salary depends on his not understanding it.” --Upton Sinclair
  • Thrugelmir
    Thrugelmir Posts: 89,546 Forumite
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    edited 15 November 2015 at 6:53PM
    Glen_Clark wrote: »
    True, but if I had known this Government was going to inflate house prices even further I would have bought Barratts instead of supermarket shares. But I couldn't afford to hire a politician to find that out.

    QE and cheap credit has been the driver of house prices. Same with share prices. Fundamentals of many companies look weak. Yet investors happily pile in chasing yield. Timing the exit is the difficult part. Not jumping on wave of the latest fad.
  • Pincher
    Pincher Posts: 6,552 Forumite
    1,000 Posts Combo Breaker
    redux wrote: »
    Yes and no.

    The Chinese government encouraged loads of modest investors to leap into the stock market for the first time.

    It surged upwards, and more people put more money in, some even borrowing to stake more

    Things were fantastic for a while, then it went down, leaving some of them with only half their previous fortune.

    So it might not be 1.3 billion people in the next gold rush


    The minnows get destroyed by the whales all the time, but they still pile in when prices are shooting up. Plenty of lemmings left, after the last batch have jumped out of balconies. Insecurity is a great motivator.

    When the RMB becomes freely convertible, and they can trade online on the NASDAQ in Chongqing, I would worry a lot. Rumours can trigger buys and sells that destroy a company.
  • jimjames
    jimjames Posts: 18,922 Forumite
    Part of the Furniture 10,000 Posts Photogenic Name Dropper
    Thrugelmir wrote: »
    QE and cheap credit has been the driver of house prices. Same with share prices. Fundamentals of many companies look weak. Yet investors happily pile in chasing yield. Timing the exit is the difficult part. Not jumping on wave of the latest fad.

    I agree on house prices but share prices? Yield still seems exceptionally high for the price to have been driven to crazy levels.

    Anyway back to the original question, I guess if people can't be bothered to find the best home for their savings and happily chug along getting 0.1% from them sitting in a old bank account, then making the effort to investigate investments and the like is probably expecting a bit much. I can't knock it though, the best deals wouldn't exist for long if everyone was switching to them.
    Remember the saying: if it looks too good to be true it almost certainly is.
  • Thrugelmir
    Thrugelmir Posts: 89,546 Forumite
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    jimjames wrote: »
    I agree on house prices but share prices? Yield still seems exceptionally high for the price to have been driven to crazy levels.

    As far as an individual share is concerned high yield reflects future prospects. Yield also reflects risks of which there any many. Deepwater Horizon is a timely reminder of high one single event can change an entire company's fortunes.
  • Glen_Clark
    Glen_Clark Posts: 4,397 Forumite
    Thrugelmir wrote: »
    QE and cheap credit has been the driver of house prices.
    along with putting local Nimbys in charge of planning decisions to restrict the supply....... whilst Osborne intervenes to pour petrol on the fire by throwing taxpayers money at the housing market to stoke up demand.....
    “It is difficult to get a man to understand something, when his salary depends on his not understanding it.” --Upton Sinclair
  • justme111
    justme111 Posts: 3,531 Forumite
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    Actually if you think of it not many people would find investments that relevant . Median wage recently been said to be 26000. Which equals of take home pay of £20.767. Average house cost 180000 with very common 90% ltv means 10 000 gone a month for mortgage leaving around 10000 . Which is not far cry from full basic state pension of about £6000. So that hypothetical person does not have that much disposable income while working to be worried about having to face drastic drop of living standards when retiring and neither need for additional income when retired nor reason to make present life even harder so that future life will be better.

    Many people have access to occupational pensions which would provide enough so as not to see standard of life dropping at retirement - why would they be concerned with investments ?

    Some chose to invest in children - unis , houses etc. Who is to say it is worse return than stockmarket ?

    Some overpay mortgage - simple and obvious thing to do .

    So for an average person investments are neither needed nor most appropriate .
    The word "dilemma" comes from Greek where "di" means two and "lemma" means premise. Refers usually to difficult choice between two undesirable options.
    Often people seem to use this word mistakenly where "quandary" would fit better.
  • Thrugelmir
    Thrugelmir Posts: 89,546 Forumite
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    justme111 wrote: »
    Actually if you think of it not many people would find investments that relevant . Median wage recently been said to be 26000. Which equals of take home pay of £20.767. Average house cost 180000 with very common 90% ltv means 10 000 gone a month for mortgage leaving around 10000 . Which is not far cry from full basic state pension of about £6000. So that hypothetical person does not have that much disposable income while working to be worried about having to face drastic drop of living standards when retiring and neither need for additional income when retired nor reason to make present life even harder so that future life will be better.

    CML figures for September 2015 for first time borrowers are as follows:

    Avg Mortgage: £127,800
    Avg Income : £39,270
    Avg LTV: 82.2%
    % of salary in mortgage repayments: 18.3% ( capital and interest).

    So no where as bad as you are suggesting.

    Life is about choices. Most of us have the ability to make them. We live with the ones we individually make.
  • justme111
    justme111 Posts: 3,531 Forumite
    Part of the Furniture 1,000 Posts Name Dropper Combo Breaker
    Exactly. They are not the same for people on £24000 as they are for people on £39000 though. Original poster was surprised how come people don't invest - I done the math explaining why. You figures do not dispute my figures (apart from ltv but it is a bit of a splitting hairs exercise).
    By the way what average was that £39000 one ? Because if it is mean it is meaningless in the context of this discussion. Was it combined household income by any chance ?
    The word "dilemma" comes from Greek where "di" means two and "lemma" means premise. Refers usually to difficult choice between two undesirable options.
    Often people seem to use this word mistakenly where "quandary" would fit better.
  • Glen_Clark
    Glen_Clark Posts: 4,397 Forumite
    There are basically 2 ways of stating average income. One is to take the income of the person in the middle with the same number of people earning more as earning less than him - the median average. Or you could divide the total income by the number of people - the mean average, which in countries of high inequality like Britain is much higher than the median average.
    Which one do you think politicians prefer to quote :D
    “It is difficult to get a man to understand something, when his salary depends on his not understanding it.” --Upton Sinclair
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