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silver surfer

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  1. I retired ten years ago aged 55. I'm still pretty fit and active, so those ten years have been fantastic. I'm looking forward to more of the same during the next ten. I thought I might regret leaving an exciting job, concerned that I'd feel irrelevant if I was no longer a mover and shaker. Not a bit of it! If I had my time again I'd pull in my belt and retire even earlier, 50 sounds about right.
  2. Congratulations! I remember you from way back (I don't post much here anymore) so you can't be accused of rushing into this! All the best, I hope everything works out well for you.
  3. Yes, that's my recollection too. Although it might be that when the property market really takes a hit then the lowest layer of property becomes essentially unsaleable at any price. Why would anyone buy a bed sit for example if a two bed flat is suddenly within their budget? Consequently part of the dynamic might have been that during the 90's crash it was the least expensive properties dropping by far more than the average price decline. If that was true in the 90's then it will be even more the case now. Anywhere that's even half way prosperous will have plenty of what are basically "joke" properties, dingy flats above kebab shops for example. In normal times these become unsaleable, with zero potential buyers.
  4. Democracy has many weaknesses, the risk of a majority injuring a minority, acting in haste without due consideration, or emotions overcoming reason. So, for example, what if there were an instant vote on a horrible death for paedophiles and terrorists, a penal surtax on all annual incomes over say £50k, opening fire on foreign trawlers that refused to leave our waters, doubling old age pensions and reducing the pension age to 50, a knighthood for Wayne Rooney, excluding non property owners from ever voting, granting a new bank holiday to commemorate the Grenfell Tower victims, etc, etc. You may agree with some of these, but would anyone agree with all of them? Furthermore, would they be happy to bind themselves for all time to the capricious whims of the voting public?
  5. Maybe, maybe not. The net immigration figures are already dropping and many EU immigrants are reported to be considering a move back home or onto a different EU country. As the pound declines it makes British wages less and less attractive compared to Dutch or German wages. If the EU economy outperforms the UK economy over the next few years (and that'd be my guess) then there's every chance we'll see an exodus rather than an influx.
  6. Your money, your choice. But I knew plenty of people who bought immediately prior to the 1989/95 crash and then found themselves hogtied by debt and negative equity, plus they had the sobering experience of seeing others of their peers, ones who were slightly later to the market, buying much better properties at much lower prices only a few years later. None of us can see the future but my guess is anyone buying today, or in the next year or two, will then face a regretful decade ruing their decision.
  7. Yes it will. S24 won't show its teeth until 2020/21, the next interest rate movement will be up, earnings are lagging inflation. A regional upward blip in 2017 is neither here nor there in the scheme of things. By the end of 2020 it'll be crystal clear that nominal house prices are materially and inexorably heading down.
  8. It will be interesting. But if there's not much to report then it still won't change my views. I'm sensing a growing feeling on the forum that S24 has failed to deliver a meaningful fall in house prices, or at least a rising apprehension that all the hopes invested in S24 might not be realised. Personally I think that would be a premature conclusion. No landlord, no matter how overstretched and highly leveraged, has actually paid a penny in additional S24 taxation yet, and the landlords I talk to are generally deep in denial, and trusting that something will turn up to make the nightmare go away. Consequently I'm not expecting much impact from S24 until 2019 or 2020. But when that impact does arrive it'll be both substantial and rapid. It wouldn't be surprising to read a growing ground swell of opinion on this forum throughout 2017 and 2018 that S24 was a damp squib; and then see a game changing avalanche of BTL sales in 2019 and 2020. The blindingly obvious thing is that until real, actual tax demands start dropping onto landlord's door mats then we're still in a "phoney war". Many leveraged landlords are counting on growing house prices to sustain their entire house of cards lifestyles, so they'll cling to the current model until the taxman takes their legs from under them by demanding a cash fee, in the shape of S24 tax, to stay in the game. At that point their bluff will have been called and they'll fold in a chain reaction of distress selling. But that isn't a scenario that's going to happen this year or next, but happen in 2019 or 2020 it surely will.
  9. Interesting article. It well illustrates why S24 will drive down house prices materially, but not necessarily in 2017 or even 2018. The landlords I talk to are aware of S24, but they're still in the mindset of "something will turn up". I know one who was crestfallen after the recent budget as he'd convinced himself Hammond would abandon S24. So, instead of grabbing the chance of getting out from under a broken business model now, they'll hang on until the tax bills actually start landing on their doormats, at which point it'll be too late for most of them because house prices will be ticking down. Slowly at first, so many will delay further in expectation of brief dip followed by a price recovery, but then the declines will accelerate as the S24 tax bills get bigger and the more leveraged landlords simply run out of time.
  10. Mortgage rates (which are what really counts) are starting to move up, the very cheapest loans are currently being pulled right along the High Street. Don't necessarily expect price falls immediately, but looked at across say a three year horizon, they're now pretty much baked in.
  11. It's just short term noise. Look further out and the picture's clearer. S24 fully implemented by 2020/21 means the current equilibrium can't survive. Add in the strong likelihood that the interest rate trend will soon be ticking up, slowly at first but inching up none the less, and there's an overwhelming probability of materially lower house prices across the next few years. I strongly suspect BTL landlords will hang on too long before selling their property. Not because they've the steely resolve of a band of Trojans, simply because they don't have a plan B. So they'd rather pretend something will turn up and keep the Range Rover (and the BTL that supposedly will pay for it) for another year or two, before reality becomes inescapable. Net result is price falls won't be quick, but they will be sure.
  12. This is becoming clearer by the day. There was always a chance that Hammond would undo S24, but that's becoming a vanishingly small possibility. As far as I'm concerned that means a significant decline in nominal UK house prices is pretty much baked in. I still guess the declines will be back end weighted (i.e. more towards the 2020 full S24 implementation date rather than in 2017 or 2018) but that's just conjecture based on how many leveraged BTL landlords really don't have a plan B, so they'll likely hang on in denial until they can no longer support their after tax monthly losses. What's less conjecture and more evidence based is the conclusion that many thousands of panicked BTL landlords heading for the exit must drive down house prices.
  13. Here's some of the media coverage when it almost happened in 2015, http://citywire.co.uk/new-model-adviser/news/tories-revisit-income-tax-and-national-insurance-merger-plans/a828296 Dig back further and you can see it's been considered many times. As I said earlier, my guess would be the next time a government is confident of re-election they'll press the button and merge NI and income tax.
  14. Apparently Osborne came within a whisker of folding NI into income tax, and it's come close several times before. I guess it'll happen before too long, you just need a government confident of re-election and that'll be one of a slew of tax clean ups. A strong Corbyn win over Smith probably brings the end of NI that bit closer.
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