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How are the young ever going to be able to afford property at the current prices? I think they are not so the only solution is for prices to drop.
Might seem a tad harsh but you don't have to buy a house if you can't afford it and most if not all of the people in my age, range 25-30, that I am friends with could happily afford to get a mortgage if they'd either a) saved a deposit instead of drinking it away while they were 20 or b) chose to live in a smaller house instead of expecting to live in a 3 bed semi in a top notch area right off the bat. Yet they all whine about house prices and call me lucky...
I escaped my wife and a workmate discussing their return to work plans last night by going round to my local with a couple of tricky crosswords. 2 prize plums sat down beside me then promptly and rather too loudly began to discuss every boxset of DVDs they had ever owned/watched...One of them then, who seemed to really, really like Heroes, got a bit lairy, changed the subject to workplace politics and then engaged in a lengthy, obviously very well planned kill-spree fantasy involving his boss and her PA...I left shortly after this.
Ruined my pint and my crosswords...
coffeeking +1
Owning a property is not an entitlement. Prices crashing would create so much negative equity for so many people that it would be an absolute disaster for our economy. Wishing/hoping that to happen to people is a terrible thing.
toby you jammy bugger.
Tax relief on buy-to-let mortgages? Don't think so. Tax Relief on domestic mortgages was stopped maybe 20 years ago - certainly seems a long tome ago to me.
Well if you want to be a pendant, the ability to offset interest costs of a buy to let mortgage on a property against income earned from it 🙂
Recently while sat in the Stretford End watching Bilbao hand Utd our arses, the two gents behind us never let up from discussing their pensions. Far more inappropriate conversation given the setting!
I bet that was the most noise from the home crowd ever heard at Old Trafford. 😉
Well, it's Friday and I've just eaten a bag of Pickled Onion flavour Monster Munch, so all is well
This sort of thing does baffle me... there does seem to be a substantial amount of money sloshing around still (would previously assumed that it was credit, but that seems unlikely at the mo).
Even amongst our friends there seems to be sufficient funds for 25k on a conservatory or 50k on an extension / kitchen 😯
I have come to the conclusion that there is an unseen element of funding from elderly parents, who find themselves unexpectedly well off, with good pensions and outright owned homes that have increased in value from circa 3k to circa 300k.
We've looked at extending, but short of doing the work ourselves, can see absolutely no way of funding
MrsBouy is currently working on a contract for an InvBanker, now it seems he never talks about money, goods, what he has, what he wants, in fact in the two conversations I've had with him he's been a jolly nice fella...
I know, there are some around right.
you've changed your mind and want to cut down to 20 metre so there's space for the snooker room to have a cinema behind it
really? how poor are you? why not just put an offer in for the local schools playing field next to your garden and extend into that? chubby little fekkers don't use it anyway since the tiger enclosure was installed and turned out not to be completely escape-proof. Surely the expected phone hacking settlemment from Murdoch's Mob will cover it?
ciaou sweeetie, mmmmwwwah mwwwwah
Cheers DONK 🙂
Prices crashing would create so much negative equity for so many people that it would be an absolute disaster for our economy. Wishing/hoping that to happen to people is a terrible thing.
Errrr, how is that then? A proper house price crash would bring about massive improvement in affordability. That should get the housing market moving again and in turn would mean that all the industries that rely on this market (construction, solicitors, estate agents, furniture and DIY stores etc) should all see a nice upturn with the creation of thousands more jobs as a result.
Cheaper housing would mean that those buying a home will also have some disposable income left (rather than all their spare cash being piled into their house). They can then spend this on holidays, white goods, eating out etc - again supporting the economy and creating jobs.
You can't really feel sorry for people in negative equity can you? If they took the risk to overstretch themselves then they have no-one to blame but themselves. Sorry it may sound harsh but that's just how it is. No-one forced anyone else to take on a mortgage did they?
A house price crash is probably good for most of us. The only exceptions are possibly:
Those who blindly bought at the peak of the market because they just had to get on the ladder at all costs.
Those that have recklessly borrowed too much or taken out big loans against the paper equity in their property.
The banks who will sooner or later have to write down their balance sheets.
Those property developer types jumping onto the BTL bandwagon and hoping to make a fast and easy buck.
Seems insane for the media to have been portraying price rises in housing for years as a good thing. I mean we don't celebrate price rises in fuel, bread, beer, mountain bikes or any other of life's essentials do we? If you like to buy or own a home [b]'JUST TO LIVE IN'[/b] then lower prices are a good thing surely?
Errrr, how is that then? A proper house price crash would bring about massive improvement in affordability. That should get the housing market moving again
Apart from the fact no one would move if everyone was stuck in negative equity......
Houses are still affordable. As said well above - people need to adjust expectations - my first house was a two bed mid terrace and I thought I was doing well!
Mussed. You had a pen, you could have gone all Pesci on them, or Hopkins. Would have made a mess of the local though.
i think toby1 wins this one 🙂
Nope - you have to play Pat Benetar loud ...Because the night lah de lah de lah
Don't you mean Patti Smith?
Moses - Member
I blame Thatcher!
For a) kickstarting the whole "housing Ladder" thing, by encouraging purchasing and the selling-off of council houses. If it's a ladder, it should only have 2-3 rungs.
I blame William the Conquerererer
Edit... Dont wanna sound like the knobs on the train.... sorry
Errrr, how is that then? A proper house price crash would bring about massive improvement in affordability.
Do you understand negative equity?
A house price crash is probably good for most of us. The only exceptions are possibly:
With the exception of homeowners with mortgages. Interest rates would go through the roof. People wouldn't be able to afford their mortgages and become homeless and bankrupt and banks would make massive losses triggering another recession (this is what started it all remember?) but you'd be able to afford a place so it'd be good yeah?
Those who blindly bought at the peak of the market because they just had to get on the ladder at all costs.
This is complete bollocks. Sorry but prices have been what they are for 8-10 years and people need to buy houses.
House prices are what they are and there won't be a crash as it would **** the whole of the UK badly. Either you can afford one or you can't. If you can't, it's not the markets fault.
Apart from the fact no one would move if everyone was stuck in negative equity......Houses are still affordable. As said well above - people need to adjust expectations - my first house was a two bed mid terrace and I thought I was doing well!
No people in negative equity can still move just fine. It is more difficult yes but there are plenty of lenders who will take this into account - they are having to these days.
Don't forget too that the house they move to will have also dropped in value so it's not quite as big a problem as you make out. Plus the amount of mortgage payers in negative equity at present is around 5%, so hardly a significant number.
Houses are not currently very affordable. Two bed mid terraces where we are currently sell for around £230,000. The same houses were selling for around £90,000 ten years ago. That's an 155% increase in 10 years. Average wages have gone up by 26% over the same period. So how is that affordable in anyone's book?
It's all very well saying why not buy in a cheaper area, but funnily enough the locations where house prices are a lot more reasonable tend to also be those places where it's very difficult to get a job - any job. And even in those crummy areas, house prices will have risen by a massive 3-400% in the recent boom.
Affordable - not likely!
Houses are not currently very affordable. Two bed mid terraces where we are currently sell for around £230,000.
Two bed mid-terraces where I am sell for 100K, 8 miles outside a major city centre. Move to somewhere you can afford is the simple answer.
Also be those places where it's very difficult to get a job
I guess so to some extent, but maybe that depends on what your job is.
What I did was find a job, then find a place nearby that was a mix of nice to live and cheap. I couldn't find the ideal so had to compromise. That's life, but there were certainly affordable properties on an average UK wage.
This morning one was commuting to ones second home for ones well earned 4 day weekend, and one noted that whilst one was in discussion regarding ones latest kitchen installation with good friend Rufus one did behold a person of a lower class who did scowl rather at our observational comments, one does feel somewhat for these poor folk but I do so wish they would recommence the third class carriage for these unfortunates.
£160,000 will get you a nicely finished two bed end terrace 1.8 miles from bristol centre.
£140,000 will get you a two bed end terrace with garage(!) 3 miles from Gloucester centre.
http://www.rightmove.co.uk/property-for-sale/property-32638309.html
http://www.rightmove.co.uk/property-for-sale/property-22458408.html?premiumA=true
And then loads of people would see these newly affordable properties, and demand would soar as BTL and first timers scrambled to purchase it.A proper house price crash would bring about massive improvement in affordability. That should get the housing market moving again and in turn would mean that all the industries that rely on this market (construction, solicitors, estate agents, furniture and DIY stores etc) should all see a nice upturn with the creation of thousands more jobs as a result.
- So prices would rise quickly again creating a house price bubble.
- Then prices would be unaffordable again and people would start defaulting on their debts
- The banks would have to write down the loans, and make huge losses.
But you would be OK as you will have managed to jump on the ladder at the bottom of the market and ride the bubble.
You are Gordon Brown and I claim my 5 pounds.
Maybe we would be better off if we changed the British perception that home ownership is a basic human right and that renting is just a waste of money. As demand drops, house prices will drop naturally, creating more affordable housing, with a higher proportion of it being rented at lower rents (no get rich quick schemes for landlords). However it would be very painful in the short term as our economy is so reliant on house prices continuing to rise, so its not going to happen.
- So prices would rise quickly again creating a house price bubble.
Only if the banks allow it, I'm not sure that there are huge reserves of people in the public domain who can afford cash buys.
I don't know whether I want to kill myself or them.
should of gone for some fresh air aP
prices are about spot on as well...
I hope the OP is keeping up with this thread and its going the way he hoped!
£25,000 does seem an excessive amount to pay for a kitchen, as most of these type of kitchens are mainly for show and are hardly used.
My first property (a 1 bed flat) in a very nice area was just over £25,000. To get the deposit for that I worked 6.5 days a week for 2.5 years, then became self employed and had a part time job to pay the mortgage.
As some have said above, it's hard to get a property but not impossible if you work hard and get a good deal.
Interesting what floats some people's boats 😉
I just thought that the constant braying in public about how much one's house has increased in value this week was a bit passé, if not rather arriviste.
Let's look at the really high housing prices in York then. If you're born here, and educated here, if you want to leave home you're likely to have to move away. There aren't high paying jobs. The 'average' wage here is £12,400.
Now we have to talk about benefits, because there's a sizeable number of families on benefits, and even some workers claim some benefits. Most of the created jobs over the last few years were part-time, and lots of workers have had their hours and pay reduced.
There are approximately 8,900 households in private housing and claiming housing benefit here. The new government system to cap housing benefits is going to take the average rents over an area to work out the max the government will allow. York is a spike in rents. Go 12-16miles away and the rents drop, a lot. One local MP has just gone to Lord Freud, who is in charge of the new system to come in and asked him to get the government to re-zone where they calculate rent averages, to take into account the extremes, and has shown a specific option to consider.
Lord Freud said that the approx 50% of those 8,900 families who will find under the new system that the government will not cover all the rent should move from York to Tadcaster (12m), Selby (13m) or Malton (16m) and commute in.
The bus services aren't affordable really, the local government does not currently subsidise buses in York. There aren't buses for people who work unsociable hours. And this is nothing more than social engineering, removing the working class types from York, 'transportation' that will free up approx 4,450 properties for nice middle class people to move in. Not entirely sure what they'll be doing for jobs though, maybe they will be commuters to London, or second homes.
So, £25,000 on a kitchen? Some people do that. But house prices are silly and a lot of people blame greedy home owners and the estate agents and their friends for artificially increasing the prices to make money, London daily commuters and second home buyers.
One thing is for sure though. The shop staff, cleaners, factory workers, the working class, they were born here, educated here, and work here and if they're forced to move 12-16miles away because of the seeming artificially high housing costs to make way for 'privileged' people, there'll be a lot of anger!
If you were educated in the nice schools in York and can only earn £12400 then you clearly were no t paying attention in class. There is no "right" to live in a particular area just because you were born and raised there.
12 miles not commutable? I cycle nearly twice that distance each way (in London).
And 20% of York's populace on benefits living in private housing? Surely the biggest issue with benefits is that what they do is subsidise employers who can happily pay minimum wage in the certainty that the state will make up the difference and that market rent is increased to the maximum that the state will pay for. If there's 20% of York households claiming housing benefit and the majority of them are forced to move 10 miles away then that will cause rents to drop because there won't be enough other new paying tenants. So yet again we stop enriching private landlords and reduce rents for all?
Tadcaster and Malton are lovely areas too! I live in Leeds because I cant afford a family home in Harrogate where I work. Should the government subsidise me to move to Harrogate?
(The fact I prefer Leeds shall be left out of this for arguments sake!).
@CHB "nice schools"? There's a rank 90 university here you know. Not just the rank 10 one on the outskirts!
@aP There used to be 125,000 residents here, that may have gone up. With the old number that's still 13% in private rented accommodation AND on some benefits. Might want to start reading the Joseph Rowntrees Foundation reports on rising problems here.
@CHB (again) There's no way to cycle from Malton without turning into roadkill. There is a way from Selby, and Tadcaster, but can you see the "average" worker suddenly coming up with 1) enough cash to get a decent bike to do the trip? 2) the knowledge to maintain the bike 3) the fitness level. Don't forget, retirement is at 67 and climbing, and there are a lot of disabled workers, plus I haven't seen one workplace yet in York with showers for cyclists coming in that far.
You can't ask minimum wage workers who previously walked to work to cover the busfares from 12-16miles away round here. Something would have to give, be it their food, their kids clothes, etc. And what are you going to do with the part time workers? The upcoming move from 16-24hrs (to qualify for £3,900 a year more in your pocket) is going to cause no end of trouble for many workers, and the businesses that can't afford to employ them. We're a services sector community supplying a tourist economy.
Why not just build affordable housing here? Cheaper housing, employing local tradesmen, producing jobs, investment for the government, money poured back into the local economy. Don't need £25,000 kitchens, just need to be suitable for basic needs. It's been done before, Rowntrees and Railways workers, it can be done again.
Looking forward to selling my house, sucking up the negative equity, and renting for a while. Home ownership is a pain in the arse.