Carney would prefer to throw the housing market to the wolves instead of raising interest rates. Clearly, if the central bank itself, which has effectively set housing prices and the cost of credit, starts talking about a dramatic crash then nobody will pay. Nobody will take out a mortgage, and Carney will achieved through fear what he refuses to do from market pricing.

Posted by stillthinking @ 03:09 AM 12 Comments

A couple of weeks ago a colleague was discussing Help to Buy with me and I commented that it sounds to be no different from the Shared Equity schemes builders offered in the late 1980s, which ended up badly when prices stopped going up year after year.

Not sure what the Enfield statistic is though :-) Interestingly, the most highly leveraged landlords - those in London - are clearly not doing a good job at passing on their tax costs to tenants. The business model of a lot of London landlords is making no money or a loss on rent, but hitting the jackpot with a big capital gain. Let's see how this pans out if prices keep falling

You can tell the worthless coins because they are the ones that stay on the floor. 2p, 5p. 10p (depending), 20ps still get picked up by adults. I suppose kids pick them all up. The BoE, clearly an insightful body, must have decided that the populace actually walking around on discarded coins of the realm might be a bit dispiriting to savers.

- London house prices fall at the fastest annual rate since height of the financial crisis - London house prices fall in 5th month in row, worst falls since 2009 - London rents dropped at the fastest rate in eight years - ONS - Brexit, London property slump put brake on UK house price growth - Consumer spending declined in July as inflation increased

Posted by khards @ 04:14 PM 6 Comments

"Chief Secretary to the Treasury Liz Truss blasted “nimbys in Britain” and called for a major overhaul of UK planning laws. But she was attacked by a Conservative colleague who said the party would face an electoral “catastrophe” if it fails to protect the greenbelt. Theresa May has vowed to fix the broken housing market." Good job we have a strong Prime Minister on the case then.

"Pryor dismisses some indices entirely, including one from the Royal Institution of Chartered Surveyors (“the views of 250 people and what their guts tell them”) and those produced by mortgage lenders Halifax and Nationwide (“they’re just kindling”)."