Fancypants
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Posts posted by Fancypants
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I love Schwalbe Marathon Plus tyres. I have been using them for commuting for a few years. Two punctures in 20k miles and they last for ages (8k back, 16k front).
aye, I'm amazed anything else ever sells, to be honest!
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I cycle around 20 miles a day. 10 miles each way about 45 minutes each way.
I have to admit, I don't think I would like to go any further than that, pretty much nakkers me out for the weekends.
I live 15 miles from work at the moment, and cycle it sometimes. Used to do it daily.
I'd have to agree, I think 10 miles each way is probably a sensible daily limit if you want to have some form of life in the evenings. Cycling is great, but when I do the 30 mile round trip, I get home so late and so zonked that I'm fit for nowt but eating and slumping.
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I quite like that way of thinking about it, but I don't think people always look at it like that.
For example, trains from Woking in Surrey take under 30 minutes to get to Waterloo, despite being many miles outside the zone 6 border. This is actually slightly quicker than the commute time from Kingston which is in zone 6. The season ticket costs from Woking are £1k more each year, but this extra cost would be massively outweighed by the saving in rental/mortgage costs which would be 25-30% cheaper in Woking. This would suggest that Woking is relatively undervalued, but I see no signs of that changing.
I am sure there must be more extreme examples than this, I just picked this because it is close to my area.
there are plenty of wrinkles (some sizable, for sure) where express train connections are concerned. The general point is though, that people usually see the obvious price differentials, but tend not to accurately value their time. Clearly, my suggested method is crude and doesn't account for a number of things, but hopefully it makes the point that what may actually seem like a tactic to save money could end up costing you! The cost may not be directly financial, but it may manifest itself that way because of one's depleted energy and vitality.
In my case, I have recently started a family - and the inate contrarian in me is wondering if it might not actually make sense to move closer to town, now that I have a very real reason to get home earlier in the evenings. Currently, I rarely see my daughter during the week, as she is very often asleep by the time I get home from work. Sucks for me, and her development would probably be assisted by having Daddy around a bit more.
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In areas that interest me (i.e. those where I could realistically afford a home of sufficient size to raise a family) things are currently pretty stagnant, and have been for a couple of years. The good stuff, realistically priced, sells quickly.
These are pretty modest areas, but fundamentally decent (i.e. traditionally respectable working class, not ex-LA, in the ghetto etc).
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In discussion with a friend about this recently, I thought of another way of evaluating the merits. Lets say you were comparing living in Zone 6 London with Zone 3 London, and similar properties in the latter cost £50k more. If you earned c£25/hr (a little more than the average) and worked in the centre of town, you would spend approx. 1hr less a day commuting from zone3 than from zone6.
OK, so you may place a different value on your time at home, or while en route, but if we accept that time spent commuting is totally wasted and that your time is accurately valued at £25/hr, you effectively award yourself a payrise of c£6,000/yr by living in zone3 rather than zone6. Over the course of a 25yr mortgage, that easily justifies the extra outlay for the more expensive property there, suggesting that it is relatively undervalued - all the more likely if travel poverty continues to add to the various strains of long distance commutes that became embedded during the cheap oil / cheap credit era.
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I don't think I should be able to buy a central London place. Though on a decent salary you should be able to buy some zone three place. I'd be quite happy paying 2003 prices. I'd probably be happy paying current prices, just as long as they left the base rate where it is for twenty five years
I hear ya bruv. If I could get a 25yr fix at the same rate I can currently get a 3yr fix, I'd almost certainly take the plunge. But we have a 10m old bairn, so waiting to get close to the bottom of the market has become less important - living somewhere we feel confident we can afford and enjoy a decent quality of life is the new black.
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The two tier economy is not simply a London/SE vs rest of UK dichotomy - its very clear within London too. The less sexy parts of London are falling almost as fast as provincial England - the "prime" bits (such as they are) are near peak prices it seems.
Thankfully for me, that was never realistic or desirable anyway. Leyton/Leytonstone here I come!
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Our gaff got turned over on Boxing Day. Part of a spate that began a few weeks before Christmas. Pretty senseless really, as they stuff the little sh1t pinched would have been more or less worthless to him, but some of it was of heightened personal value to the folk it was robbed from.
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Its all about League One nowadays chaps.
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What meritocracy?
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Actually, I'm rather a fan of Clapton - and I don't think that place is too bad. It would be quite attractive at half the price (and if I didn't have, or wasn't planning a family)
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I have been following him for 6 years and find he must draw pieces of paper with different predictions from his hat when making his personal predictions with the first out.
This is what mystifies me. He does occasionally (and perhaps more often than a stopped clock) get things right - and more so of late. But he has got such a variable track record - and is so inconsistent with his views - that its hard to take him seriously.
How you doing Charlie?
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So, with monthly affordability the easiest it has been since the last real trough over a decade ago, prices are still meandering down because lenders are reluctant to fund the UK housing market. That speaks of just how weak the market truly is.
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Good idea. If you don't like the Glazers, stop giving them your money
precisely what I, and a number of my fellows, have been doing since May 2005.
Not one penny.
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Very good program. Well worth watching.
Indeed - I was vvery pleasantly surprised to see this. About time BBC!
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My mate from Ghana tells me there is a lot of shady business and shenanigans involving property speculation at the moment.
I'm not sure this ever stopped - although the discovery of oil offshore there does seem to have supercharged it.
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I thought the decision was about whether the OFT could rule on the matter...not about the charges being legal per se.
this could go on...or not.
I can't be bothered to trawl through 12 pages at this hour, most of which will re-hash stuff I've heard countless times today - but props to Bloo Loo for sussing this out within a few minutes of the thread starting
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Hargreaves is always excellent value
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The old Woolworths in Solihull (nr Birmingham) is now a New Look - last time we shopped there it was busy
That in Enfield Highway is now a Turkish supermarket (part of a successful and growing chain) - those I have seen in more "upmarket" locations (eg Colchester/Loughton/Whitby) remain empty, although the same can be said for Redcar (which seems to be suffering more than even in the blighted 80s) so I don't know if one can discern a trend there.
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Just been looking at their website. Yuck!
They are tiny flats in a tower block in the east end of London. Haven't we learnt a lesson about the desirability of tower blocks in the east end of London once before?
May they enjoy their "bargains", for they are welcome to them. I don't envy them.
Yeah, they're near my work - I go past these from time to time. Minging.
You'd probably have to pay me to live there.
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Damn. I was hoping this thread would become a discussion on the merits and demerits of male genital mutilation.
if so, it would have a better chance of not being shifted to off-topic.
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Turner dumped on Brown from a great height. He's basically saying there WAS no regulation to speak of. That was the FSA's raison d'etre. Brown's tried to pin it on the bankers - They're going to nail him.
Thank the Manc for actually getting the point of this story
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£360K mortgage for a flat.....its a long way to fall, but dont worry, some renter is going to pay £1500 per month to cover it....NOT
my thoughts exactly
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No good talking shit and being part of the problem when you are in post and have the power and influence and then only afterwards to start saying anything sensible.
This country has been sold down the river by many like him.
Yes. Particularly poignant was his sign off that the government "needs to do more" to deal with the problem... and yet, and yet, he has spent much of the last decade arguing vociferously that the government needed to do less and keep their stinking hands off all his & his mates lovely lucre.
London Up And Up?!
in England - Greater London
Posted
Yeah I saw it, I saw it, I tell you no lies