House Price Crash Discussion Thread

Vincenzo

neilhew wrote: »

Hi All,
Housed prices are too hight principally due to the money lender encouraging high lending, after all they only way they increase sales, is by lending more money. We need lower prices so that our children, and grandchildren can afford to buy a decent home. Why is it that people make such a fuss about rising fuule prices etc. and yet seem to do little about rising house prices? And yet this is for many people the largest outgoing. If we pay less on a mortgage, then there is more money for the rest of the economy. It is bad for the economy, when too much money is lent out, that happende with Northern Rock. And yet some so called 'Housing Experts' claim that hight prices are good for the economy, quite the reverse, they are only trying to talk up the market, for their own benefit. Prices need to drop by 50% in most areas, for the noraml type of house. The multipliers used to borrow money should go back to 2.5 or 3.0 as was the case many years ago.
By the way, I am a surveyor, and I do not benefit from high house prices. The lower the prices, the more houses will sell. After all, that is how retail business works. Drop prices by half, and sell three times as many. It is good business sense.

Hmmm - a fall in the market of anywhere near 50% would be disastrous for the economy. We are talking negative equity, repossessions and major recession.

I agree that affordable housing for future generations is important and there are a number of ways to achieve this which, frankly, is another topic altogether.

I would also point out that there is nothing wrong with having a large section of society renting their living accommodation. This is quite common in many other western countries. It is a relatively modern attitude in Britain that people should be able to buy their own homes. A large part of which, I believe, is due to the Thatcher Government's sell off of council houses.

Sisyphus

adr0ck wrote: »

but if thats true

then were not building enough and therefore we have a housing shortage

we're bulding plenty - go to the site plenty of stats

abaxas

Sisyphus wrote: »

we're bulding plenty - go to the site plenty of stats

Both arguements are true (and all inbetween) depending where in the country you live.

Some areas have a housing famine, while others have a huge glut. Therefor it is wrong to generalise.

adr0ck

Sisyphus wrote: »

we're bulding plenty - go to the site plenty of stats

could you give a link cant find it

i will say though

we are building too many flats

but no where near enough family homes (this is where the shortage is)

and yes what abaxas says is also true

adr0ck

the governments target of 240000 homes a year is a joke though

were going to be lucky if we get anywhere near 120000 this year

nelly_2

Vincenzo wrote: »

I don't think we can dispute the government figures

WHAT?

I think if there is one thing you CAN guarantee and its goverment figures are crap

Vincenzo

nelly wrote: »

WHAT?

I think if there is one thing you CAN guarantee and its goverment figures are crap

Well the report I was really referring to was the 'independent' Barker review.

And my point was that it is fairly unliklely that the government would engineer a report to make both themselves and the crisis look worse.

It is undeniable that there are acute housing shortgages, both in terms of the type of stock available and affordability.

Turnbull2000

Vincenzo wrote: »

And my point was that it is fairly unliklely that the government would engineer a report to make both themselves and the crisis look worse.

Maybe not, but perhaps they would engineer a report to missrepresent the truth. They've being doing a grand job with inflation figures for at least 12 months.

beingjdc

Here's an interesting little graph, data from Case Shiller.

The little lines are the average US house price in some major areas, rebased in each case so that January 2000 = 100. The big yellow line is the UK.

What it suggests to me is that people who think their house won't fall in value because it's in a nice area are wrong, and that in fact what goes up fastest comes down fastest.

Generali

beingjdc wrote: »

Here's an interesting little graph, data from Case Shiller.

The little lines are the average US house price in some major areas, rebased in each case so that January 2000 = 100. The big yellow line is the UK.

What it suggests to me is that people who think their house won't fall in value because it's in a nice area are wrong, and that in fact what goes up fastest comes down fastest.

FWIW, Goldmans did a survey of the US house price indices and Case Shiller, whilst not perfect, they saw as by far the best.

My feeling is that the Northern hell holes are going to see the biggest %age falls. Prime central London looks pretty toppy too but a lot of that is foreign cash purchasers so it may dance to a different tune.

My feeling is that prime commuter belt may be hit pretty badly, the Sevenoaks and Guildfords. A lot of mortgages in those areas need two top whack salaries to keep getting paid - if one or other lose the job (or I suspect in many cases the City bonus) the mortgage is going to be tough to keep up.