Catch22

I've seen one house on the Crofters Mill development in Sutton-in -Craven change EA's three times in 10 weeks. Still suffering from the, it's not the market, its not the price, it's the EA's that the problem, syndrome. It's a three bed on three floors end of three town house. first sold new 30 sep 2001 @100K re sold 31 Jan 2003 @ 130K now asking 180K Alot of "for sale" boards went up on that estate, plus a 495K coach house across the road has just gone on the market. I actually suspect that development is suffering a double whammy, 1> a declining market, and 2> a "close care" unit being built at the back of the development, but sharing the same access road. Close Care? is that a posh term for a "home for wayward kids" PS. Someone just bought one of those type of houses for 179K on the 15th March 2005, they will be able to chat to the little scallywags over the garden fence.

I ring a mate of mine up, he tells me he invested 28K on the tech stocks, starting Nov 1999.....and at the time of the call end of Feb 2000 he is sitting on 65K. I say, bloody hell I must come over and pick your brains about stocks and shares. He sez......I know bugger all mate....I just buy the Mail on Sunday, they tell me to buy...I do and it goes up...its that simple. In fact at one point his pot stood at 83K but the market had slipped back a bit.........well they do do don't they do.....calm down calm down.......it's a buying oppertunity sez he............much like they would have you believed this " topping out " proccess in the housing market is a buying oppertunity. Anyway when his pot got down to 14K his Wife pulled the plug on him. Here are the facts regards the Tech Bubble crash...well its not strictly true as I'm quoting the Dow, the tech index faired far worse. Last week August 98 theDow is 7,400 Second week Jan 2000 Dow high is 11,750 In 16 Months the Dow increases in value by 59 % or an extra 4,350 points. The Dow then drops back a bit, and in the third week March 2000, the Dow stands at 11,235 First week April the Dow hits a lower high at 11,418 and then its down hill all the way. As concern grows amoungst the share buying public [and for their ears only] Bush attempts to steady the market, by saying the Stockmarket was like a long distance runner, its just pausing for a rest. 30 Months from its peak the Dow hits a low of 7,200 in the first week of October 2002 It had lost 4,550 points, a decrease of -39 % making it lower than it was in August 98 4 years 2 months earlier Much like the directors of Enron did with their employees, telling them to buy the stock, whilst they the Enron Directors were off loading their stock allocations..........as the saying goes..........THE REST IS HISTORY Stay resolute and keep your powder dry

things to do tomorrow.............................go to the shops and buy hat..................yer right ....do I look that stupid...........................or hungry

Kirsty Allsop !!!!! Well I was "investing" in the housing market ..........when the Producer of "Location Location Location" was a 16 year old schoolgirl working weekends and holidays in our shop on Skipton High Street ............and what a lovely, hardwoking, honest Yorkshire Lass our Katharine was/is.....used to dress a bit old fashioned mind, she liked her frills............but she is a Dales Farmers Daughter......So its not surprising she picked Kirsty to "Front" Location, Location, Location. Regards this site................well I just found it a week ago..................and all I can say is ................It was about time something emerged to counter the garbage that is constantly pumped out by those in the pay of "Vested Interest" groups. All markets are cyclical, and the housing market is no exception. And IMHO the present Housing Market, is in the process of topping out. You can measure cyclical markets from peak to peak, or trough to trough. This one has been fifteen years in the making, 1989/90 to 2004/05 peak to peak. This UK bull run was [like in the USA] massaged by low interest rates, to induce Joe Public to spend spend spend. It was needed to prop up the Stock Markets with consumer spending, in the absence of corporate spending. Such market massaging can not be sustained indefinitely. Value has to return to any/ all markets before buyers will buy the market, and that means a market sell off has to take place before this can happen. .........Kirsty love....wise up.

Hi guys, Silsden West Yorkshire reporting here [ in the middle of the Skipton/Ilkley/Keighley triangle] I've been monitoring the executive 4 bed detached market in the town. Most notably in the area of the town that has the biggest concentration of such houses. I think it is important to use such monitoring criteria, because one off sales that don't represent "like for like" sales can misrepresent the reality of the situation. Anyway the last Land Registry record of such a house, surrounded by houses of same type, went to the Land Registry on 27 August 2004 @ 285K. Since then same type houses have been pitched in that price range 265/295K [excluding one off's at both extremes of these figures] Latest one to actually exchange contracts [at its third attempt, on the market since 11th May 2004] was priced at sold time [early March 2005] at 265K, I do not know what price was agreed though. We sold at 250K-50 the day it went on the market, March 5th and have exchanged contracts for an end of June completion to the first buyer through the door. People thought I had undersold, but I pointed out that it was the overvalued houses in the town that made mine look undervalued. So who was right, was it me or was it the other sellers in the town ? Well at the time of my sale, 9 weeks ago, the biggest "For Sale" cluster was 4 houses @ 285K. Two have since been withdrawn from the market, and I watched one of the remaining two come down 35K to 250K-50 in a 5 week period. In fact the day we exchanged contracts 29th April, that house and another previously for sale @£265 were competing at the 250K-50 price point. The reduced 285K one had an "agreed sale" sticker on it on 6th May. What are we going to do? Well since we bought our first house 37 years ago, we have always moved straight into another purchase [ 7 others in total] For the first time, we are joining the "Sell to Rent " clan. A 5% return on 245K is alot better than being in this overvalued market. I'm not frightened of risk, as I trade "Index Futures" on the Financial Markets, so you could say I'm "Shorting" this market.