London prices are not too hot not too cold

cells

yertiz wrote: »

Not much hope then for 2 teachers on a starting salary of c£27000.

Should 21/22 year olds be buying homes? I didn't own my own home when I was 21 did you?

Not to mention that very few 22 year olds are in a serious enough relationship to commit to buying a house together

cells

MARTYM8` wrote: »

The median household income in London was £39k in 2013 - and was less than £30k in several boroughs. Given most people don't live alone that suggests that your assumption of £70k being the typical median income for a couple is a bit optimistic.

http://data.london.gov.uk/apps/gla-household-income-estimates/

Even in Knightsbridge and Belgravia ward the median household income is only £88k.

Why should pensioners and unemployed folk count and drag the median down?

yertiz_2

cells wrote: »

Should 21/22 year olds be buying homes? I didn't own my own home when I was 21 did you?

Not to mention that very few 22 year olds are in a serious enough relationship to commit to buying a house together

You are assuming that all newly qualified teachers are 21/22, many teachers I know havn't started teaching until well into their 20's and 30's, after working in other occupations. Even teachers who have qualified for a number of years are not exactly in a position to buy in London.

Qualified teachers' pay scales:
https://www.tes.com/article.aspx?storycode=6000186

economic

the problem that everyone misses in this whole argument of whether prices are expensive or not is that there only needs to be enough people that can afford to buy. so median wage doesn't even matter. the examples given in this post so far are fairly low paid earners, lets try using solicitors, bankers, doctors, dentists and quite a few other professions as examples. they would have earned quite a bit more, saved up for a fairly large deposit (some probably getting help from their baby boomer parents) and can afford quite comfortably.

I don't believe prices are a bubble in London (except for maybe new builds and super prime). having said there are clearly risks of prices going down as there are risks of them going up.

mwpt

economic wrote: »

the problem that everyone misses in this whole argument of whether prices are expensive or not is that there only needs to be enough people that can afford to buy. so median wage doesn't even matter. the examples given in this post so far are fairly low paid earners, lets try using solicitors, bankers, doctors, dentists and quite a few other professions as examples. they would have earned quite a bit more, saved up for a fairly large deposit (some probably getting help from their baby boomer parents) and can afford quite comfortably.

I don't believe prices are a bubble in London (except for maybe new builds and super prime). having said there are clearly risks of prices going down as there are risks of them going up.

There are clearly enough people of means able to buy houses in London at current prices, simply because we are transacting at current prices.

I don't know about other bears (I'm not a bear but that is my classification on here), but I'm not claiming London has found a top or that it's too pricey. What my concern is, is that the standard of housing in a persons affordability range has been decreasing in modern times.

The people who are least concerned about this and most likely to be calling people like me as "entitled" are naturally those that already own expensive houses, who paid far less for them as a % of earnings. These same people will complain when train services deteriorate, if energy prices get more expensive or doctors waiting times are longer, or roads get more crowded.

But people are not allowed to complain that the housing situation gets worse. They need to just suck it up and hand the money over to the seller.

economic

yep lifes not fair. just try to enjoy the ride

lisyloo

Agree with you mwpt.
The problem is that London attracts the wealthy from all over the world, so just because there are enough people richer than me to price me out doesn't mean it's not grim for anyone who needs to be in London whether for career or family reasons.

I don't believe there is an entitlement to own, although the benefits of being a Stakeholder are well recognised.

GunJack

economic wrote: »

the examples given in this post so far are fairly low paid earners

sums it up nicely.... if you think £39k is low-paid, you'll never get that housing in the UK is too expensive.

A for cells thinking that 6.5x £70k joint makes something "affordable" don't take up comedy, you'll kill people via laughter....

mwpt

economic wrote: »

yep lifes not fair. just try to enjoy the ride

Well, life is decided mostly by a cosmic dice roll. Hard to get more fair than that. Of course it doesn't seem very fair to the unlucky ones born into poverty in the middle of Africa.

economic

but perception of life is all relative. how many times have you felt life is unfair for your first world problems?

point is property ma indeed look expensive to you but it is still affordable to enough people to create demand. the thing is this demand came out of no where since 2012 in London. so there is the risk hat this demand could go away at some point and then you may have your price correction in nominal terms. but of course no one really knows when that will happen.

also when I hear people saying prices fall but then only rebound back quickly after are only looking at recent history. anything can happen - you could see a very long term continual decline in prices.