Twenty years on – the winners and losers of Britain’s property boom

wotsthat

HENRY78 wrote: »

Has there ever been a more despised industry? Estate Agents have always taken this crown. But the BTL brigade have taken this to a whole new level.

Haters gotta hate I suppose but seems like a waste of emotional energy.

westernpromise

Looking at the Grauniad article it seems to me that the woman repossessed in 1996 is now looking at at Breakeven Crash Requirement of > 100% because she's spent more than the house sold for on rent. Pretty unfortunate to get repossessed that late in the cycle - interest rates were already well down at that point. I don't understand why she says "I feel like I’m being taken advantage of", though, given that benefits fund her rent. If it's not her money she spent how is she being taken advantage of?

The remark by the 54-year-old divorcee was interesting as well: "At least we can apply for housing benefit if we’re renting and lose our jobs." It's funny, but although we frequently hear from crash trolls that owning property has been a riskless proposition, we never hear about that.

lisyloo

You can't get housing benefit if you have lots of savings I.e. Saving up whilst staying out of the housing market.

thequant

redux wrote: »

It seems I must repeat what I said.



Let's try and untangle what happened.

I gave an example. I didn't specify where it was, or which party was in control of the council.

I was asked, and I said a Conservative council in Greater London.

Any socialist councils, was the next question, and I said clearly enough that I did not know.

Then you joined in and said you knew where I was talking about, and they are all Labour councils. Maybe you used capital letters for the word all.

So I said I didn't know about everywhere, this was just one example, and you claimed to know where it was, thus your declaration that I am talking about a Labour council was tantamount to accusing me of lying.

Why instead didn't you just answer the question differently, with no disagreement, that you don't know where my example was, but you happened to know these or closely related issues had also occurred in a Labour council area.

But no, now you mention a different scheme somewhere else, and use that to accuse me of ignorance and hearsay.

Seeing as we are talking about completely different places, the facts are not mutually exclusive.

The only falsities in any of this are your assumption you knew where I meant, and your assertion that these are all Labour controlled councils.

Just an extra point though.

The TV report I saw a while ago, and coincidentally rewatched on Youtube only this weekend, didn't make any mention any political parties.

I really didn't intend to turn this dilemma of redevelopment cost gap into a partisan issue about political parties, mainly as I had no idea it might be with respect to certain points. (It's true I did discuss Osborne's Help to Buy subsidies, but even this doesn't have to be as politically one-sided.)

I gave one redevelopment scheme example and at the time didn't actually know whether this was a Labour or Conservative area, so I had to look this up after I was asked on here. You may dislike the answer, but your argument doesn't make what I said wrong.

I respectfully remind you I said I didn't think any political party was getting these things right. That isn't a partisan declaration.

You still haven't cited your sources, please cite your sources.

There may well be a Conservative controlled council in London which is doing the same as the Labour council example I gave. But you have yet to provide evidence, apart from hazy memories of TV documentaries and a rewatched youtube video which you are unable to cite.

HornetSaver

cells wrote: »

Only really true in London and a few other places. Half the country is well within 4-4.5 x salary. Some towns and cities are closer to 2-3 x salary

We weren't talking about half the country. I don't deny that Doncaster, Stoke on trent and so forth are dirt cheap.

We were talking about the South (including London). A bigger a geographic region than Wales, and more populous than Scotland. To talk about the other half of the country as if it's relevant is little different to telling someone to emigrate.

One potential way to address the London problem is to decrease the size of the social stock. It is higher than the national average. 250,000 social homes in London should be sold off (then London would have the same percent of social as the rest of england) and the vacated tenants (pensioners and unemployed) should be moved outside of London. That would reduce London rents and prices relative to what they otherwise would be. Probably the scope to sell off 500,000 social homes in London not just 250,000

I'm not against tightening up the rules for social housing, where alternative options are appropriate. But to do as you suggest in London would reduce the labour pool for lower paid jobs by at least 250,000 (assuming an average of one worker in such housing rather than 1.5/1.6). Perhaps the government should just go the whole hog and ban retail within a mile of Oxford Street, and designate that land exclusively for residential development. That would be no more drastic than what you propose, and have no less impact on house prices.

redux

thequant wrote: »

You still haven't cited your sources, please cite your sources.

There may well be a Conservative controlled council in London which is doing the same as the Labour council example I gave. But you have yet to provide evidence, apart from hazy memories of TV documentaries and a rewatched youtube video which you are unable to cite.

I don't think I'm under any obligation to do provide evidence.

I said something, and you are the one groundlessly calling it a lie, and inadvertently making false comment yourself by making out only Labour councils do this.

However, to try to cancel out your impetuous taunts lasting even longer, Barnet is in Greater London as I suggested, north not south, and has a Conservative council, and incidentally also 3 Conservative MPs in Parliament.

The redevelopment of West Hendon, apparently becoming renamed by some of the marketers of £400k flats as Hendon Waterside, involves demolition of about 679 dwellings and construction of about 2000 new ones.

One allegation made by one of the protestors was that only about 200 of them have been offered places in the new scheme.
Whether that is accurate or not, it was published that the new scheme included 12.5% affordable housing, 12.5% for shared ownership with a housing association, and the rest for sale on the open market. Thus a reduction in social housing despite the scheme being 3 times bigger.

At about the time as the people in Cressingham Gardens were being successful in their legal challenges, the Secretary of State was confirming the compulsory purchase orders in West Hendon.

So basically you certainly did not know where I was talking about, and leapt to a wild guess, and continued making groundless accusations.

Now please stop.

thequant

redux wrote: »

I don't think I'm under any obligation to do provide evidence.

I said something, and you are the one groundlessly calling it a lie, and inadvertently making false comment yourself by making out only Labour councils do this.

However, to try to cancel out your impetuous taunts lasting even longer, Barnet is in Greater London as I suggested, north not south, and has a Conservative council, and incidentally also 3 Conservative MPs in Parliament.

The redevelopment of West Hendon, apparently becoming renamed by some of the marketers of £400k flats as Hendon Waterside, involves demolition of about 679 dwellings and construction of about 2000 new ones. One allegation made by one of the protestors was that only about 200 of them have been offered places in the new scheme.

At about the time as the people in Cressingham Gardens were being successful in their legal challenges, the Secretary of State was confirming the compulsory purchase orders in West Hendon.

So basically you certainly did not know where I was talking about, and leapt to a wild guess, and continued making groundless accusations.

Now please stop.

Well unfortunately you do, that's how internet discussion boards for adults work. It's how we stop going round in circles and have a debate, instead posters throwing their toys out of their pram and wailing "you called me a liar"

I took the time to google what you say, (it only took a few seconds)

Ok so we have established that both Tory and Labour councils do the same. Now like adults can we move on with the discussion?

Graham_Devon

mwpt wrote: »

I'm still waiting for someone to show me some stats on mortgage rationing, not stats on what people are actually borrowing. I want to see something showing that someone trying to borrow to buy a house within historically average price multiples is being refused a mortgage more often now than what was historically normal. I'm not wanting to relate it to the boom of easy credit and 125% loans in 200x-2007. Bottom line: I want you guys to prove your assertion.

No one ever will.

What you will get is a graph showing that mortgage lending (in terms of units) has fallen, which it has.

What you won't get is any context applied to the graphs. All you'll get is "look the numbers of mortgages handed out has fallen = mortgage rationing".

The trouble in all of these arguments is that the stats usually look at peak lending figures, but don't take into account the fact that at that time, mortgages of 125% were available. 100% mortgages were positively the norm.

So of course, when you take those products off the market, you will see a fall in numbers.

This is classed as "mortgage rationing" and the words have been used for years.

The only way to get the numbers back up is to allow a free for all again, which, to give him his credit, at least cells appears to back.

I don't think I've seen anyone else back such mortgages, but they still bang on about mortgage rationing, while at the very same time, completely ignoring why the numbers have fallen.

You can't take a bunch of mortgage products (specifically aimed at people who couldn't otherwise get a mortgage) off the market and expect the same amount of people to get mortgages.

It's just a couple of very convinient words - as it allows people to lay the blame on "mortgage rationing" rather than high prices.

redux

thequant wrote: »

Well unfortunately you do, that's how internet discussion boards for adults work. It's how we stop going round in circles and have a debate, instead posters throwing their toys out of their pram and wailing "you called me a liar"

I took the time to google what you say, (it only took a few seconds)

Ok so we have established that both Tory and Labour councils do the same. Now like adults can we move on with the discussion?

You could already have found it hours ago with a Google search of the accurate details I had already given.

cells

Graham_Devon wrote: »

No one ever will.

What you will get is a graph showing that mortgage lending (in terms of units) has fallen, which it has.

What you won't get is any context applied to the graphs. All you'll get is "look the numbers of mortgages handed out has fallen = mortgage rationing".

The trouble in all of these arguments is that the stats usually look at peak lending figures, but don't take into account the fact that at that time, mortgages of 125% were available. 100% mortgages were positively the norm.

So of course, when you take those products off the market, you will see a fall in numbers.

This is classed as "mortgage rationing" and the words have been used for years.

The only way to get the numbers back up is to allow a free for all again, which, to give him his credit, at least cells appears to back.

I don't think I've seen anyone else back such mortgages, but they still bang on about mortgage rationing, while at the very same time, completely ignoring why the numbers have fallen.

You can't take a bunch of mortgage products (specifically aimed at people who couldn't otherwise get a mortgage) off the market and expect the same amount of people to get mortgages.

It's just a couple of very convinient words - as it allows people to lay the blame on "mortgage rationing" rather than high prices.

Then we are just trying to define a word lets forget the word mortgage rationing and go to basics

Interest only has gone
100% LTV has gone
Self cert has gone
Salary multiples have been caped (self cert in the past would have got around this)
Age limits have been caped (self cert in the past would have got around this)

The artificial removal of those products will clearly mean that people who could buy using them no longer can today


The idea I am putting forward is that their disappearance will mean a certain portion of the population can no longer buy and will have to rent. I doubt anyone disagrees with the above. I choose to call that mortgage rationing you can call it the hookypoky for all I care, the end result is that a portion of the population now cannot buy whereas they could in the past.

I have no idea how many people it impacts but it is significant and I am going to suggest a nice round number of 10% of households you can choose x-percent if you like. That means the rental stock will be higher by 10% or 2.8 million units thanks to the heavy hand of the regulators. That is a shame


I am suggesting that if you want fewer renters and more owners you need a return of honest self cert (ticking a box saying I am confident I can service this mortgage) and to a lessor degree but also important a return of Interest only mortgages. Of course the security for the lender and society is 20% down



my evidence for the above lies in the fact that cheap areas like the midlands and north have also seen an increasing in renting suggesting the 10% on the margin cant get the finance due to mortgage rationing (or whatever you want to call the above)