cock-eyed octopus

errr ??? I' m confused, Brian.

Wonderful tributes to a truly colourful character, a Champagne Socialist of the old school. What a man Slimy, hypocritical, lying, self-satisfied, bloated, nasty piece of... Who said that!?

There was a programme on telly, a few months back, putting the case for globalisation. I think it was by some Swedish professor. He was looking at what had happened in places like Malaysia, where the sweatshop scenario was rapidly evolving into a well-educated high-tech one. He contrasted it with Africa, concluding that the major factor in Malaysia's improvement was the enfranchisement of the general population, i.e allowing them to own their own plot of land, which is not happening in Africa. A book I found very interesting concerning Western perceptions about the Third World compared to the author's impressions on actually going there is P. J. O'Rourke's "All The Troubles Of The World". It's very funny, too.

Shortly before he brought the country to its knees. He used to live in 'arlow noo tahn (in the poshest part, in the biggest house, like the good socialist he was). My mum saw him trying to push his way to the front of the queue at the post office: (slimy Welsh accent) "Do you know who I am??" Don't get me started on cuddly Clive Jenkins & his ilk Mutter Moan Grumble

Yes, why is that? Actually I think it's more something about the local accent (awroight ber?) than the yeah but no buts; it was obviously a wealthy town, in Gainsborough's era, but has fallen on hard times recently & the locals prefer bungalows to beams... Mind you, have you been to Haverhill? I like Saffron Walden

Yes , I'm probably being over-subtle. What I 'm attempting to do is to get people to think about how people who are unsympathetic think & why they think the way they do (HELP! I'm turning into Donald Rumsfeld!). Still, thinking's good for you.. I think

Not sure I quite understand this; I'm not sure you read my original post accurately. I was talking in general terms, to try & gauge perceptions prevalent on this forum. Perhaps I should have said "how would one go" instead of "how would you go".

I do think it is part of the issue, possibly quite a large part. Otherwise, what caused HPI in the first place? Houses didn't suddenly become easily affordable. Interest rates obviosly played a large part, but, as others have pointed out, mortgage repayments to buy the same house from scratch will have gone up hugely over the past 5 years. Likewise, without sentiment, houses would now acheive a stable value without HPC.

So, sentiment has no effect on the housing market?

i.e a HPC (actually, this desperately needs some sort of agreed definition) & think it would be desirable. How would you go about increasing this percentage?

Thank you for your replies. They were most illuminating

... a house they'd (realistically) consider buying? As posters here have noticed, there are quite a few places SSTC lately, but I reckon most of these will collapse due to non-affordability for ftbs. I know some of you want Buck.P. for £50, but, think logically, what cash reduction do you think the majority would consider reasonable? If it was, say, £30k, this could be passed up the chain quite easily I think. BUT ... could it happen? Will it happen?

HE CAN'T READ??? Read my lips: HE'S-NOT- BUYING-IT! You're either lying, or can't understand English.

It confused me, too. You'll find a lot of people on here don't bother to read other posts. It devalues much of what goes on here

Don't know about the lump on her lip, never get past the other lumps

Or 3. These people also stop buying, preparing for the worst. The last thing they'll buy is a house at this point. 4. BoE reduces interest rates. ?

No comments anyone? Agree/disagree? Just looking for a bit of feedback (+ve or -ve!).

Sorry, who was that reply meant for?

Top man! And an excellent rebuke to all those posters who assume everybody else is as thick as pigs' droppings. Good on yer!

No property has special protection. However, some are vastly overpriced, some are not. So the not overpriced ones have the best protection you can get.

I was comparing economies to highly developed organic systems, so assumed -ve fb; +ve obviously leads to instability. Sorry if I misled you. If there were no -ve fb economies would bubble out of control - actually they'd probably oscillate! (analogue electronics again) so there must be _ve fb in the system. As FD says, the govt. & BoE are attempting to introduce some more at the moment.

I think my money's on b. still. The rich, however, will always try to stay rich (& keep their children rich), they can't really do anything else. Thinking about medicine, perhaps all we're really doing is fiddling with the controls on an existing, immensely complex & sophisticated feedback system? I don't think economies have that much feedback (conditionally stable?). BTW I remember a sci-fi story (Ray Bradbury?) where robots produced more than we could consume, so the higher up the social scale you were the less your possessions. Bring on cold fusion.

Then again: http://212.50.188.108/cgi-win/vebra.cgi?de...1/ROSSC/13759/1 or http://212.50.188.108/cgi-win/vebra.cgi?de...1/BIRDB/13779/1 50 mins. Liverpool St. , 30 mins. Cambridge look affordable for ftb London/Cambridge commuters to me However http://www.fastcropit.com/mugr/html/templa...m?id=MUsw129600 Words fail me. It is on a busy road, no garden front/house up its bum at back, no parking, Easter Boilerworks next door. It went for £143k in 2000 Worth £200kish? now I think it's difficult to generalise. Some will crash, but then, they always have

SORRY! 1988 It's late. I'm old

Nah, don't worry, you're right. I was in the same situation in 1998; I'd been expecting the (HP) world to end for about 3 yrs. In the end I thought sod it, they must be right, & ploughed a lot of money into my house. I reckon I lost about £90k out of £260k .... sob .... so stand firm. I don't know by how much, but HPs will drop.