This YouGov survey is interesting

YouGov[/url]

Interesting that the expectations of the general public have swapped very quickly between April to June from continued rises to a falling market.

Looks like all the warnings have scared buyers off sufficiently… and expectations of a falling market tend to lead to people sitting on their hands and waiting to see what happens, which then drives down prices as sellers can’t sell.

Flats in SE London are already being reduced in price – although it’s from absolutely insane (£400k) to still ridiculous £375/350 – which suggests sellers’ expectations are changing too…

Cyclecraft by John Franklin points out that much dangerous driving is noisy – revving engine, harsh braking + the ubiquitous horn from an impatient driver so for basic safety reasons, no.

Personally riding on the road has enough hazards already without reducing my ability to pick up on them…

I suspect sooner or later some lawyer will use contributory negligence against a cyclist who’s been hit by an errant driver because they were wearing headphones – there’s enough nonsense from the Police about telling cyclists to wear hi-viz which isn’t even a legal requirement

I have to go through numerous lights before I get out for a clear run in the countryside

Why is that a problem? Cyclists never stop at lights, remember…

More seriously, coasting up gently and learning to track stand can be a winner during the urban parts of a road ride

ps are you using a brush ? your man doing it originally will have used a roller.

I’m using a small (2 inch) brush. Will a roller spread the water more widely?

Google tells me this landlord has a reputation for trying to rip off his tenants. I wouldn’t be surprised if the cheap paint job is a deal he does with his maintenance man – do it badly, tenant living normally with standard wear and tear means landlord claims a portion of the deposit to ‘re-do’ the paint. Takes more off the deposit than he pays his maintenance man… who then does another half-arsed job

If I can sort it with a roller I will, if not, I’ll find a reputable decorator to repaint just before I move out, including a written statement of their assessment of the original paint job ie: whether it’s fit for purpose…

Not a good sign IMO

With house prices continuing to rise there’s a serious risk of UK consumer getting into seriously unmanageable amounts of debt. We’re there already and low price of debt will make it even worse.

Given all the stories the various policymakers have been putting into the media recently to try and cool down the housing market, you have to ask why they’ve not put up rates this time… it is because it’ll crystalise the personal debt and bring the whole ‘recovery’ falling down just before an election?

If you’re flipping your pedals over regularly then maybe best off buying MTB shoes…
On a typical road ride you barely stop and therefore this shouldn’t be an issue. If you’re using the road bike for commuting then MTB shoes and pedals are your best option – not least so you can walk from bike to desk without falling over as well as wrecking your shoes and cleats

Does this thread make the OP guilty of kittenocide?

Any business model will use marketing to make you buy stuff.

Not true. An ineffective business model will try to cover up the fact their product isn’t that good or doesn’t meet a real customer need. Which is what we have in this instance.

A good business model is one which uses marketing to understand customer needs and orientates every aspect of the business to meet those needs and to make a profit in the process. MTB used to have this – suspension forks, disc brakes, full suss all fell within this definition IMO…

There’ll be no kittens left on planet Earth at this rate

There’s some similarity in the behaviours I agree. Just that one is nasty and the other one innocent.

In one team we have 2 senior managers – one of whom is on the autistic spectrum, the other is showing more than a few signs of being a psychopath… it’s a whole barrel of fun I can tell you!

Going back to the OP – the psycho in this instance has several grievances against her – HR are well aware she’s a problem child – and she’s just been given a big promotion – go figure what HR are trying to achieve with that one.

I had a friend who was trying to exit a psychopath from his organisation and one of the biggest barriers he had was trying to get HR to support him. They were basically so run down by this individual’s manipulations that they didn’t have the strength/confidence to show them the door… my mate ended up leaving HR out of the process and doing it himself…

psychopath/high functioning autistic

There’s no commonality between these aspects of human behaviour at all. One lacks humanity and tends to do evil things to other people, the other is just wired in such a way that they don’t understand normal social behaviours.

If your boss is the former – run a very long way away very fast. If the latter – some compassion and understanding would probably make things better for her, you and everyone else…

Your modern HR department would sack most of us for spending work hours on STW instead of doing what we;re paid to do…

Rather than asking why STW is more interesting and fulfilling than that work!

I was managed out of a ‘blue-chip’ company a few years ago. I was lied to from interview through to leaving by an incompetent manager… a real eye–opener and one of the reasons why I’m now contracting and planning on staying that way – I have no less risk of leaving tomorrow but get paid a lot more and have no illusions about any level of support from HR or management.

Unfortunately for them one of my best friends is an HR director and he said just get out and go, they’re clearly incompetent… he said what happens a lot of the time is HR and the manager cook up a scheme to get rid of an employee who, for whatever reason, has fallen out of favour, present it to the Lawyers before they bring the hapless employee in – the lawyers go mental because they’re leaving themselves wide open to a case of constructive dismissal…

3 really good things came out of my experience:
1. I have no more naive expectations of ethical behaviour from my employer – which funnily enough makes it easier to survive – I’m much more careful who I trust
2. I’m now contracting with a much better work/life balance and income
3. I realised how valuable good friends are – if it hadn’t been from good advice from my mate I’d have wasted my energy on fighting back

+ the incompetent boss and his political boss both lost their jobs shortly after when it became clear where the problem actually lay

There’s a known ‘problem’ boss in my current place who’s most of the way to being a psychopath – 100% staff turnover, totally incompetent, been in front of HR several times with staff grievances… and she’s just been given a massive promotion. Go figure what substances HR are taking 😯

Buy the best you can afford.
The soft ones loose firmness and then shape. The cheap plastic core + foam will break IME
The Grid works for me. £40+ but I’ve not had to replace it after 3 months like I did the others!

Look at this graph of UK house prices since 1975 and tell me there’s no pattern of boom and bust.

What it looks like is the time period over which the market climbs is longer each time…
Transpose the current trend downwards following the same shape as the previous busts and you can expect the bottom of the market around 2016/17

Mortgage lending is already being limited, interest rates have to go up sometime soon… the people at the top know there’s a significant risk of a real problem which will feed into the wider economy as people’s confidence is shot to pieces.

The Nationwide commentary this week was to try and get people to stop making such stupid decisions. Expectations of deflation lead to a falling market as buyers hold off in the expectation of the goods being cheaper in a few months time – especially where debt is involved in the purchase. He’s deliberately trying to raise expectations of a correction in order to bring one about.

I’m not going to say there’s going to be a massive bust but the conditions for one are all in place.

I’ve come to the conclusion that UK house prices will crash once every 20 years as each new young generation makes the same mistake as the previous one but, having not lived through the previous bust, is unaware of the mistake they’re making

There’s a lot of ‘reaching out’ where I work normally used where ‘speak to’ used to be perfectly adequate…

I did stand on the Tube last week listening to a couple of teenagers fit ‘like’ pretty much into every alternate word as they spoke – pretty much double the length of each sentence and they could have had a much shorter conversation otherwise 😀

By ‘special’ do you mean one that offers ‘services’? 😀

I had the plate and screws taken out of my collar bone a few years ago because it was uncomfortable.

Surgeon was happy to do it. Generally they prefer not to have to operate as opening you up is an infection risk so they avoid surgery if possible.

I’m very glad I did it. The morphine hit afterwards was a once in a lifetime experience 😀

The only downsides were I had to take it easy for a few months whilst the screwholes healed over – the bone was weak until that happened + as it meant they cut me open for a third time (I’d had a bone graft as well as the initial op to fix me) the nerve damage to my skin is permanent – although barely noticeable day to day and definitely less uncomfortable than the plate.

If you regularly wear a rucksack – for riding or walking – a plate can be very uncomfortable

By far the best comment:

bw87 wrote:
Reminds me of Swiss Toni on The Fast Show:

“You know Paul, going for a naked bike ride is rather like making love to a beautiful woman. First, make sure your gears are clear of grit and grime – ensure they’re operating correctly and if required, grease them up. Don’t set off with a dirty helmet.

“When you’re sure she’s ready to ride, wipe the saddle, hop on an start peddling. Keep a firm grip on the handle bars at all times. Just remember, the faster you pedal, the faster you reach your destination – better to work the gears appropriately for a relaxed arrival.

“Once you’ve arrived, hop off, park her in a designated are and saunter off – satisfied with your journey.”

But would it lead to a correction in house prices?

I just can’t reach all the way up there.

Me and my brother loved going to France on holiday when we were teenagers and all that stuff was on the bottom shelf 🙂

Much of the fun I had in my late 20s and early 30s was fuelled by Red Bull. Often with vodka.
It’s not supposed to taste nice, it’s supposed to give you wings 😀

I used to buy MBR and WMTB regularly as a source of info about new products, ride ideas and new bikes.
These days I just come on here. I stopped buying any mags about 4/5 years ago (except Singletrack of course)

I trust the advice on here as being more honest/unbiased

I suspect they’re selling because like a lot of print media, their advertising-led business model is bust and readership is going to the web for info instead

It’s very difficult to get any flow – especially on the first part which is mainly trending upwards. I was hoping for something a lot more like Summer Lightning

I own 2 let properties in SW London & live abroad….

Meanwhile I’m contributing to the UK economy, paying UK taxes and can’t afford to buy in London because there’s a shortage of houses to buy – because so many people have bought more houses than they actually need to live in… 😯

In respect of sharing the wealth and allowing your average person to feel some stability, Buy To Let has been one of the worst things to happen in the UK – it concentrates ownership in the hands of few and creates an artificial shortage of houses to buy and therefore drives up prices to levels which are unaffordable without first time buyers getting themselves into excessive amounts of debt.

The 17 year old who sits next to me at work isn’t even bothering to hope he’ll ever own…

Why didn’t you just put your money into an index tracker (or tax-free pension) instead and let someone else buy the houses for themselves so they could have some security, raise a family etc – you know – normal stuff about living a nice life…

Correction is already beginning

Nationwide building society has warned the London housing market may face a “natural correction”.

The mutual’s chief executive, Graham Beale said there was already a “slowing down in the market place”.

I suspect there’s a few people like me – would like to buy but with all the recent talk about a bubble are concerned they’ll be buying at the top of the market so are staying out until things calm down a little… open days, offers over asking and sealed bids are all a recipe for getting yourself into unmanageable levels of debt…

The worrying comment in this story is the expectation that London will stop rising and the rest of the country will catch up – which means rising prices outside London.

The problem with this is London is relatively wealthy but the rest of the country isn’t…and means interest rates will have to rise to give your average first time buyer a chance to afford to buy.

Clearly there’s a messaging campaign being waged here to calm sentiment down

Simple fact is I couldnt afford to rent the house I live in but can afford to pay the mortgage.

Lucky you. I can’t afford to buy the house I rent. Nor can many people under 30…

People are already voting for self-driving cars – just look at existing behaviour:
1. Overtaking without looking
2. Texting/calling when driving
3. Eating breakfast
4. Reading newspaper
5. makeup/shaving

So the minute something comes along which allows us to do these things legitimately, affordably and which other people are doing and we’ll be away…

Every new technology which is truely groundbreaking has its Luddites but they get over themselves eventually.

it’s not like humans are some kind of paragon when it comes to driving cars is it?

But the facts are that the average mortgage guaranteed under help to buy is under £150K – so this can’t be stoking the “bubble” in the South East as the average house already costs twice that.

This is classic example of causality vs. correlation.

I’m not claiming causality in respect of putting more money in the market in London but Help To Buy did send a signal that the government wanted to encourage people to buy… coupled with lax lending policies and off it went like a rocket. It had been flat for 2 years before…

IIRC from Land Registry data a 2-bed flat in Sydenham went for £212k Feb 2013, another for £242 in May and come October, £300k was being asked for (and got). Mar this year, they’re now above £300k… even West Norwood is £350k!

it went for 50k over**.

So did they have £50k going spare or did they just borrow more? I wonder?

It’s kind of obvious where the problem lies with house prices… I mean prices went up 18% but the population of London didn’t go up 18%, nor were 18% of houses knocked down…

I can’t see that ever happening. If you did suddenly build a million 2 bed homes you’d create a huge negative equity problem / bad bank debt as all the huge loans given out over the last few years would be under water.

We didn’t see 2008 ever happening either.

As a first time buyer wanting to buy I’m slightly obsessed about this particular subject and I’m reading everything I can find so I don’t buy at the wrong moment and massively overpay, and there is a HUGE amount of comment from serious people that we’re setting London house prices up for another bust…

From the FT

See pt 5 – this especially:

The risk is magnified because nearly half the mortgage market is on interest-only deals, whose monthly payments will jump dramatically with every rise in interest rates.

Put restrictions on foreign buyers buying in cash who have no UK residency.
Limit the amount banks will lend.

IMO there’s not a shortage of properties (or there’d be masses of people living on the street), but there is a shortage of properties to buy ie: If I own 2 houses, live in one and rent the other out then the 2nd one is unavailable to a first time buyer.

Coupled with banks lending silly amounts, Estate Agent tricks with open days and sealed bidding + panicked naive first time buyers and you have a bubble. There’s basically too much money chasing too few goods – classic inflation. Sellers simply can’t ask for inflated prices if buyer can’t access the debt…

The recent increase began almost to the day that Help To Buy began… (I was looking to buy at the time and prices literally went up in a matter of weeks)

Go figure.

Swiss Tony 🙂

I agree with this though: “Good riders interact with other road users to humanise ourselves.”

A wave or a nod doesn’t hurt. Even if what they are doing is nothing more than what they are legally obliged to. I do the same when someone correctly gives way to me in the car.

Don’t get me wrong, I do this all the time – I figure it encourages the driver to do the same to the next cyclist. But I don’t buy the idea that we should be judged if we choose not to/are too busy riding or staying in control..

I sometimes acknowledge folk for giving way, then often wonder if I should really be thanking them for doing what they’re obliged to.

Depends on the situation of course, as a driver in this scenario I wouldn’t be expecting anything.

Can you imagine if, on a day to day basis, we all said ‘thank you’ to everyone we interacted with who obeyed the law/used their commonsense so they didn’t hurt us… we’d not get anything else done 😯

I’m picturing a Monty Python sketch of people endlessly thanking each other profusely 😀

The solutions are already coming through, albeit piecemeal
1. Lloyds have begun to restrict what they’ll lend for people buying in London postcodes
2. The strength of Sterling is making property more expensive to foreign buyers (up 30% against the Rouble in the last year
3. A public blame game between Carney and Gideon – clearly they’re both shitting themselves things are going to go pop and they’re both trying to protect their own reputations – which is a great motivator to providing a proper solution IME
4. Duke of Westminster pulled a chunk of his investments out of prime London, calling the peak of the market, a couple of weeks ago and made sure everyone knew about it
5. Fear amongst buyers that interest rates will be going up soon, meaning they’re thinking more about what they can afford
5. Looking at Rightmove for Bromley, quite a few sales appear to have fallen through in recent weeks – suggests maybe people are not being able to get the finance, or just refusing to stretch themselves.

tbh we need a drop and whole load of people to fall into negative equity and for the media to make a massive fuss of it just to remind people that house prices are not guaranteed to go up for ever and ever…

Sitting here as a first time buyer with deposit ready I’m really not sure if now’s a good time to buy or not – too much craziness (irrational exuberance) and too many suggestions of an underlying weakness from too many people taking on unaffordable levels of debt (again!)

People who don’t like immigration IME are often rather confused in their thinking I find…
e.g. My Mum being a bit anti immigration in a chat we had recently, even after I pointed out my brother lives in Ireland and is therefore an immigrant and my Dad is 1/4 German and comes from immigrant stock (and I’m an 8th German). So she doesn’t like immigrants but she’s fine with her husband and sons…

Or the bloke at work who was triumphant when UKIP did well this week. He doesn’t like immigrants but he works in the European HQ of a very well known financial services company and gets on perfectly well with his colleagues who are immigrants – sits next to a South African lady and a lad who’s half Serbian… He’s basically afraid of ‘the other’ but when they’re real people who he knows, it’s ok… 😯

by singuling up your showing your doing your best not to impede other road users.

Depending on the specifics of oncoming traffic/blind bends/pinch points etc the cyclist(s) may also be putting themselves and the driver at risk by giving the driver the impression there’s space to overtake when there isn’t.

Sometimes primary/2 abreast is safer for all concerned… it’s very much a matter of the specifics of the situation and discretion rather than principle IME

Being in a car doesn’t give you right of way… good that you waited till it was safe to pass but not sure why thanks should be expected… <not having a pop at you OP, you’ve thought about it and posted here>, but there seems to be this expectation that car drivers are the most important traffic and any other vehicle impeding their progress is somehow secondary – whether it’s a slow lorry, tractor, horse, pedestrian, cyclist etc

What I don’t understand is where this idea has come from that anyone slower than the a car driver is somehow ‘in the way’ and must give thanks if someone does the obviously safe thing and waits until the road is clear. Surely as a driver you’d rather not have a massive crash and kill yourself and the oncoming driver?

One of the most extreme examples I’ve seen of this recently was cars overtaking a traction engine just as the road narrowed(from double to single carriageway). The last car through very nearly got squashed between the traction engine and the railings in the central reservation 😯