Sheer Heart Attack

Loving your avatar, Turnbull2000. GERALD HOWETH (MP) : Last night a DJ saved my life. How? By writing this music which contains advice on avoiding strangers. And who was the DJ? It was none other than DJ Bob Hoskins Going Mental in a Dustbin. MUSIC : Stay away from the guy with the funny eyes. Keep away from the funny eyed guy. ANDY McNAB (ex SAS, author) : Here's a quick checklist to help you spot a paedophile. PHIL COLLINS (singer): And they're all taken from police reports in the last 6 months. ANDY McNAB (ex SAS, author) : If someone tells you to take your clothes off in case your thumbs get too hot. PHIL COLLINS (singer): If someone shows you a model of your hometown and all the houses look like penises. ANDY McNAB (ex SAS, author) : If someone thinks goldfish are the same as flatfish, there's something very wrong. PHIL COLLINS (singer): Nonce-sense. GERALD HOWETH (MP) : (turns off music) Put that in your ears last thing at night because the lesson trickles in. And behavioural psychology tells us that in the morning you will be 17.8% safer.

There do seem to be loads of properties in the North East up for rent. I am Geordie but exiled in another NE city. I am considering moving back up there once my sale goes through although the Missus won't be happy about it. There are some houses in Gateshead for £450 a month rent - and in not bad areas like Bensham.

I have recently heard 3 interesting things about a high street bank. I MUST stress this is word of mouth - I have not heard them directly but rather I have been told by other people who know me... I am not naming the bank because this is just hearsay and I don't want to get the site into trouble. 1) Lending is at a standstill or near as damn it... I heard, from a customer, that one of his customers applied for a £20,000 loan in April and was approved at a low interest rate. He needed to produce his yearly to get it though. He did and the bank aren't getting back to him about the loan. 2) Corporate expenses scaled back... I heard from a friend of a friend that staff now have to stay in 2 or 3 star hotels when on the road, not the normal 4 or 5 stars. Travel expenses are also being scaled back greatly. 3) Costcutting exercise underway... The bank are in the middle of a 6 month exercise to trim back on as many expenses as possible. This was initiated in mid August because the bank fears it is massively overexposed in the dodgy debt debacle. Anyone else heard any interesting rumours?

I can't tell you - we've used this company for years, we get on well together and it would be deeply wrong for me to start talking about their business when they revealed it in confidence to me as their customer. There seems to be genuine surprise among the neighbours. They all know what I do (businessman) and think I've got some special insight into anything economics. Of course, I don't - I try to tell them I've been wrong about it for the last 3 years (indeed I only bought this place in the 1st quarter of last year) but that businesses generally seem spooked at the moment.

My house going up for sale has become the talk of the close, apparently. My newsagent and I get on well and he asked me why I put the place up for sale. I explained that I thought there was a crash coming in the next 12 months and I wanted to extract all the money from the house I could. Asked where I want to live, I said I'd live in the same street as there are two houses for rent on it. I then explained that my mortgage was £700 a month and the rent on one of these two places would save me around £2000 in living expenses. The thing that really spooked him though was the story of the call centre we used which 300 other companies use that had experienced a 25-50% in call volumes compared with this time last year. I said that I had been predicting a HPC for over 3 years now and had a consistent history of getting it wrong - it was only right to mention that. How have other people reacted when you put your house up for sale to go into rented accomodation?

I think the HPC is another 6 to 12 months away because, although at some level, people and companies know what's happening, they are now in the state of denial. Our company's turnover is starting to recover slightly. The call centre we use told us that their call volumes (handling calls for 300+ companies) were 50% down on last September, but 'only' 25% down on last October. People seem to be forgetting NRK. If I were a betting man, I would say the real crunch will occur when those with small mortgages who put their houses on the market are willing to drop price dramatically because they will still be left with a large amount of equity. I don't think we're there just yet. It will take the Middle England monied readership in their 50s of the Daily Mail to declare that HPC and the recession has begun.

That response was even worse than the previous one! Smoking a cigarette is not the same as throwing your beer over someone or relieving yourself on them. Are you for real? You're forcing your choice on me - you want to be centre of the universe by disallowing me and 14 million others the choice to smoke in a venue you do NOT have to come to. And how is it a non-issue? It wasn't about not being "bothered" to fight it - we live under a government that casually takes away our freedoms and lies through its teeth to us. What chance do we have against that? This lunatic and scientifically groundless ban on a personal freedom is part of a creep where the government is micromanaging our existence more and more - can you make the connection? Can you join the dots? Which freedom will be taken away from us next which does no one any harm? So, just to be precise, would you be in favour of the creation of bars with smoking licences that you wouldn't want to go to anyway and I and 14 millions other who smoke could?

Unfortunately, it's that type of attitude that sums up the erosion of civil liberties in the UK. "If it doesn't affect my freedom, then it's alright to ban it" - great take on things there, fella. Most people have never walked outside Parliament on a protest before - I know I haven't. But just because I don't do it doesn't mean that I don't mind it being banned. There is absolutely zero proof that passive smoking is a health risk. Therefore, why ban it totally indoors? Why not create separate areas? You're probably not the pub type anyway. Smokers, although on 25% of the population (14 million adults) spend 50% of all the takings in a bar. So, you'll sacrifice my right to carry on an activity that is NO harm to you, NO harm to the bar staff, NO harm to anyone else except me inside a bar because it's a bit "smelly". ****** me, ****** the bar owners, ****** the fired bar staff when turnovers down - as long as you're alright, that's all the counts. Says it all really.

I've always wondered about the inflation figures - there seem so many different measurements of it and depending on the economic condition at the time, different governments choose different measurements. For example, are government 'services' included in the inflation figures, as they represent real and present costs that have to be met by citizens and businesses? We are all compelled under threat of imprisonment to pay for them. Given the mass manipulation of figures by governments in general, particularly the one that started with Bliar and continues with Brownshirt, could one make a reasonable case for arguing that the country has been in negative growth for the last six months?

That's totally cleared it up for me, jdc. Cheers!

Thanks for that explanation, brainclamp. I was wondering if the growth figures were another ZaNu Labour manipulation - saying that the country's turnover had gone up but not factoring in the cost of inflation. Apparently it isn't, so I appreciate you clearing that up for me. I run a business myself and I've always loved the vanity-sanity saying. Unfortunately, the way things are going at the moment, I am neither vain or sane!

UK Economic Growth for 2008 - BBC "News" When is growth growth and when is it not? Let's say a company turns over £1,000,000 a year. Next year, it turns over £1,025,000. This represents a growth in turnover of 2.5%. However, the inflation rate is at 4%. Has the company grown by 2.5% or shrunk in real terms by 1.44% once inflation is taken into account? Therefore, would some forum member kindly explain to me the following - • If UK plc's economic turnover increases by 2.1%, as Ernst & Young's Item Club suggest it will in 2008, will the economy be considered to have grown or shrunk if the inflation level is higher than 2.1%?... • ...and which measure of inflation would be most reliable to use as a measure against economic turnover increase? My understanding is that recession is 2 consecutive quarters of negative growth. Is that negative growth defined as the "turnover" of the country decreasing or can it still count as a quarter for a recession if the "turnover" goes up but the inflation rate is higher. If that makes any sense, your answers would be welcome!

Very true, vicmac64. Gordon's fiddling while Rome is burning (and the fire was not caused by a cigarette butt).

Silly question, perhaps, but all my accounts are with Barclays. Is it worth moving them to be on the safe side?

WAR IS PEACE FREEDOM IS SLAVERY HEALTH AND SAFETY LAWS ARE SENSIBLE AND EVEN-HANDED RESPONSES TO DANGER IN EVERYDAY LIFE.

ZaNu Labour pisses me off no end. I can't tell you how frustrating, petty-minded and sickening bureaucrats I find this bunch of liars in charge of us. The smoking ban enrages me. Most smokers, myself included, accept readily the right for non-smokers not to be exposed to our cigarette smoke. For the last 20 years, the number of places we could smoke in has been diminishing - 99.999% of smokers happily went along with that. But not to allow us to have a ciggie with our pint really is the last straw. There is no real evidence that "passive smoking" causes any harm. The WHO says that smoking up to 6 cigarettes a day does no harm to the smoker. The most you can "inhale" through "passive smoking" is around 1 cigarette. Even if it did do harm and could be shown to do harm without fiddling the figures, why not just allow smokers their own separate room which is well ventilated and closed off by doors from the non-smoking bits? Every non-smoker I know is perfectly fine with that suggestion. Why must we be made to stand outside in all conditions becoming the new social lepers? But, oh no. We can't have a choice. We can't trust the owners of commercial premises to decide what legal activities they allow in their establishments. ****** off, Gordon.

Actually, the original poster (Lets' get it right) is correct to a large degree about how companies behave when they feel squeezed. We are getting perhaps two thirds of the calls we would expect at this time of year (and we're advertising and marketing ourselves more than usual), not as many people are buying and when they are, their order value is far down from the historical average this time of year. I agree with you - the time to advertise more is when you're selling less. Not everyone seems to though. We do mailshots and B2B telesales primarily for other companies - so we're quite direct!

Perhaps I should! :-) It's funny out there - I'm pleased your place is doing well, but most of my customers are doing terribly.

You may or may not remember that I posted last week to let you know that our business and the business of our customers had not recovered since the usual summer slowdown. We're picking up bits here and there so we've broken even this month, but 3 of our customers phoned me this week to say they are throwing in the towel saying that they haven't seen anything like this since the early nineties. If it continues like this, we'll really have to scale back our fixed costs (we all know what that means) and take a really defensive position while this storm rides out. I am pretty certain now that I will put my house up for sale on Saturday. I am sure that I will hopefully be selling at top or near top of the market so that, even if the great crash doesn't occur quickly or even slowly, I will earn more interest on my money in a savings account and I'll certainly have lower monthly running costs. Feel the fear, people! It definitely seems here.

I have nothing against where I live - I like it most of the time - but it's not a dream home, as an earlier poster mentioned. I currently pay a mortage of £690 a month for it. Two streets away, I found a similar size house for £450 on rightmove. The savings on the rent alone would be £2,880 a year. I am uncomfortable paying that much extra a year for a property I believe will fall in value on its ticket price over the next few years and in real teams with the effect of inflation.

Thanks for your reply, guys. I've given myself a week to think about it and I'll come back and let you know what I have decided. So far, this is my thinking on the next few years... • The crash has begun, but it will take 6 or 7 years to hit its lowest point and ticket prices will reduce by a minimum of 35% • Ticket price means the actual pound sterling amount the house is being offered for, taking into no account loss of value of money in inflation. • I bought the house for £120,000 in Feb 06 with £18,000 equity. By the time my redemption penalities end (next Feb), I will need the house to sell for £125,000 to cover costs, deposit on a new rental house and sundries and get back my original deposit. • Because it is a house with two gardens, a garage and a driveway, my chances of receving decent bids are higher than those of new build flats. • The falls will be gentle over the next few months, but there will be a load of BTL properties which will come onto the market from next April (following the CGT changes). • In the six months after that, the falls will become sharper. A load of new properties on the market will suppress prices further as the BTL contracts by 5-10%. • This fall will be pushed on by lender's unwillingness to borrow in the reckless ways they have done. • If the crash follows the same course as the last one, my current house will have a ticket price of £120,000 next in 2017-2018. Of course, the value of money will have reduced about 30% in that time taking its value in today's money to £80,000. Any arguments anyone has for and against would be welcome, including those who disagree with my assumptions.

I bought my little two bedroomed shoebox in Feb 06. The redepmtion penalty expires in Feb 08. When I "got" my house, it was at £120,000 with an £18,000 deposit. Should I do the place up now (the floors and kitchen need doing badly) and try to sell the place for what I bought it for plus the costs of doing it up plus the usual moving costs? My lovely GF is against it (she's a tenant here, not a joint owner). Is now the top of the market? PS. I am NE based.

As an exiled Geordie myself, I would love to see the Pilgrim Street area redeveloped. Everytime I come back to Newcastle, I am still struck by its magnificence and its beauty in its architecture, except for the T Dan Smith inspired monstrosities around Swan House. I will happily bore people for hours about the wierd buildings, the "chares" everywhere, street names like "Close", "Sandhill" and "Side", the Cooperage, and so on and so on. If Pilgrim Street can be smartened up creating extra office space for the city, excellent. Just as long as it's nothing like those horrible new student flats in Manors. They should make it the "business" end of Newcastle - a beautiful, elegant, presitigious place to work - just like they've done with the Quayside.

From all the responses, it seems like a mixed picture, although with the negative outweighing the positive. I've been lurking on HPC since 2004 and only decided to join up yesterday. I have wished for a house price correction for years. I have a mortgage on my current place - I can't believe I paid as much as I did for a little shoebox two bedroom house. There is real fear stalking business out there, from my experience. In advertising and marketing, you tend to speak with businesspeople when they are high as a kite and want to push for more sales, or scrabbling around looking for a way to raise some cash. There's a whole load more of the latter at the moment. A house price correction is fine. An ecomonic crash would be terrible. I wish for the former without the latter, but I fear I am wishing in vain.

Thanks for your advice, madasafrog, and everyone who has contributed so far. It does seem to be endemic at the moment. We've used a very good telephone answering firm to take some of our sales calls for the last four-and-a-half years and they say the call volume for the 300-odd businesses they handle are down about 50% too. We've had some very rough times in the past (more down to my mismanagement of the business at certain points than anything else), but nearly going under 3 years ago sorted my brain out and I became far more focused. We saved up a stack of cash in the busy times, but we've had to dip into it over the last 4 months and it's gone down 40% in value (a lot of that down due to the sheer cost of moving but now we're dipping into it for everyday cashflow). right_freds_dead - I know what you mean. One of our competitors, been around for as long as we have, went under and sold itself to another competitor in the last couple of weeks. There's also a real price war going on too. Our customer numbers are down on this time last year and average customer order is about half of what it was last year. Mr Rose, thanks for the link - that is worrying. Our VAT bill is normally around £18,000 a quarter - the last quarter was £2,500 due to much reduced turnover and moving costs. We insist our customers pay up front so we don't really have that much of a problem with that, fortunately. Let's all keep at it - it's tough enough being in business. It's very scary actually - we have found a way of making our business produce consistent and high profits, but there's price competition, wary customers and fear around now.