Charlzy

Thanks for all the comebacks. I'm off on holiday to Slovenia in 2 weeks time and will see how we like the place... It does sound like a great palce to buy as long as you avoid the major earthquake zones...

Dogbox Where was this? We're looking around Lake Bled and/or clsoe to the Italian border.

We're booked to go to Slovenia in August. The Cape Verde option has come up on the blind side and just doing a bit of research now. Many thanks Dogbox and Soup... You don't say much about Slovenia. What put you off that one?

I'm looking at buying a small place in either Cape Verde or Slovenia as a holiday home that me and my young family can enjoy over the next 10-20 years. Obviously we'd like to rent it out when we're not there. Does anybody here have any experience or knowledge of buying/living in either of these 2 locations. many thanks...

It's articles like this that make me believe that we're already in a declining market. When the market is truly strong there is no need to dig around in these kinds of stats to prove that everything is okay because increasing values are so obvious. In the last few months expert after expert have been clinging to these kinds of reports in an attempt to convince everyone that all is okay. There will be blips along the way but I suspect it is going to be a long and slow downward spiral from here.

100 years ago, if you'd have said the British Empire would be finished in a few decades then people would have laughed at you. The US has been living on borrowed time for a while now. Super powers are never crushed by opponents they generally rot from within. You only have to look at the "have it now", "me me me" society in the UK to understand that the cult of the individual, so prevalent in the west, makes pretty much any major, long term war impossible. Power balances shift throughout history. It will always be so. China and India will become more powerful but it will not be a smooth ride to the top. There are many problems for them to overcome yet. The two crunch moments will be 1 after the Olympics (which the Chinese believe will be the start of a new era in the world) and 2 when the first stirrings of dscontent occur within the population. Historically governments look for a small war with which to rally the population and distract them. This is when things will become problematic for both China and the world order. Many people talk about Taiwan as being the crucible of these changes. Maybe, maybe not, but the question will be whether China can bring about their will or whether they siffer a US-Vietnam/USSR/Afghanistan black eye.

The birth-rate in all nations has been seen to decline in proportion to female literacy rates. Education (as well as infrastructure and opportunity) is the key to managing population. Western nations have a huge problem with falling populations.

In Reigate 3 years ago there wasn't even tie for the for sale signs to go up. Anything advertised in the papers were already sold by the time it hit your door mat. You basically ahd to turn up on the day a property was listed and offer the full asking price to get the property you wanted. These days it has all changed. These new builds TS is talking about are going to hang around for a long time. There's always money moving in from London but they want period hosues, not these new builds.

This is exactly right. In 1993 I was studying for my PhD and My wife and I considered buying a house. In fact we had the surveryors report done and everything. All the homes we went to look at had people in with negative equity. I was so nervous about it. In the end we called it off. The banks couldn't do enough to try and get us to change our minds. Nobody was interested in property at all. I couldn't believe that anyone would buy it off us. Didn't actually buy until 2002. We got a small 3 bed terrace in Surrey. We knocked them down from 180k to 160k. An EA tried to tell us it was now worth £270k I laughed all the way to my front door before putting my toe up his backside and sending him out into the street. We had our second child this year and suddenly we feel that the hosue is too small and we need a garden. I look at the next jump up and it just seems way out of reach. Only a crash could allow us to move on without signing our life away. I keep telling my friends who are about to embark on BTL that prices can't go up again until they come down. You can't have unprecedented rises for year after year and then 18 months of flat prices and then huge rises again. They keep telling me that now is the time.

I know a BTL professional who had retired to Mallorca when the last crash happened. He relocated back to UK within 6 months and says that he made more money during the crash than at any other time. He's back in mallorca now, i wonder for how long.

I'm not sure if this has been thought through properly. having read the book "The Long Emergency" based on peak oil theory. People will desert urban spaces. There will be no work there as we know it now.

Doogie, could it be that there are more divorces and people living alone than back then so more proeprty is needed? Also the two income family means that there is mroe money in households so more money tos epnd on houses (hence nobody is actually any better off).

House prices go in cycles. I've now seen a couple of them in my lifetime. Despite the ups and downs the trend is gently upwards. Is this because of population growth? As population declines (a serious issue never discussed by politicans) and the spectre of peak oil hovers, will the trend for house prices be down?

Hi JY I think the problem is a failure in innovation. The car, TV, home computer, refridgerator are things that have changed our lives massively. These are vital innovations. Now that our societies are no longer so innovative they have to rely on design and lifestyle as a way of selling us the same things. So we want a new TV becasue its flat screen, or remote control or just a nicer colour with better looking dials and buttons. What we need are true innovations.

I have to say that this really winds me up. US rates are going higher; inflation is on the horizon; there are whispers of an attack on sterling... IRs have to go up and yet in the press so-called experts are predicting a drop. Everything points to the fact that they have to go up. BUT I am cynical enough to know that this might not happen. If The BoE do not put rates up by the end of the year then we have to ask what their real raison d'etre is. The BoE should not be there to protect fools who have borrowed too much money.