eyes wide open

a question for our tame EA as an agent who's received an offer on a house, who would you contact first; - the vendor to see if the offer will be acceptable, and then the 'keep informed' list to seek higher bids, or; - the 'keep informed' list to get the highest offer first, and then the vendor? I'm assuming its the first way, but I can think of benefits with both approaches.

i had a hsbc mortgage, and what i can say for definite is they don't assess on salary multiples, unlike other lenders they assess on the ability to pay. before securing my previous mortgage i had to demonstrate that i retained 40% of my salary for 'living' i.e. food, clothing, fuel etc, with the 60% including all other committed to bills, such as the mortgage itself, insurance, direct debits, loans, credit cards etc. that mortgage was secured in 2006 during silly season for lending, as i think we all know hsbc were one of the banks least stricken by the practise of irresponsible lending.

only had chance to visit briefly today and made a beeline for this thread - keep em coming!

welcome along, will be very interested in what you have to say

still waiting too, i intend to start making cheeky offers from May.... but that may change

that is the stupidest development i've ever seen, what a mangle of layout and design considering their percieved target market.

yeh really surprising, unexpected but welcome, makes an interesting comparison with last years lead in to christmas. maybe this suggests vendors are becoming more concious of the maket conditions.

Perhaps worth pointing out that valuation surveyors are only one discipline within the wider RICS organisation, so don't tar them all with the same brush.

certain types of conversion, repair and maintenance works are at a reduced rate of VAT, suggest you check the HMRC website and approach the works accordingly.

/\ ..... if its in china and if it is being renovated. what's your point?

Didn't want this to be lost in the main board thread. I heard an interesting anecdotal from a colleague today. Husband viewed a house in Belfast last week, stated to agent the house was overvalued given condition, agent freely admits valuation was 6 months out of date and needs revising down, husband mentions 2005 LPS value, agent indicates they are currently valuing at 2003/4 levels, and they expect a further fall in values from now until summer 2011. I nearly fell off my chair. Not all doom and gloom though, apparently more FTB's searching, and BTL'ers securing sub £100k bargains.

welcome to forum neets7, don't listen to BVI, he underplays his role here, he's a very good foil to us perma bears the reason why the boat is so uninspiring at the rear is to do with privacy rights. to the rear of the boat is a potential development site, and therefore there is limitations on the extent of glazing one is allowed to provide overlooking this site, of course, when the next development is built they will position their bland rear to the same aspect and they will both therefore hide each others weak sides.

that 1bn will likely secure £1.3bn's worth of 2007 output or more, certainly over the initial years, tender prices are through the floor. some limited material prices in construction may be inflating, but they are more than offset by deflating labour and equipment rates.

that's fine, and i completely agree, our relatively temperate climate does not force us to meet the standards that others achieve, this is one of the good reasons alluded to in my post. having managed a number of timber framed schemes, albeit education rather than residential, i still believe we have lessons to learn from the continent, besides that i've no probelm with it, apart from maybe increased fire risk during construction, particularly for structures over two story's.

belfastvi is absolutely correct, the typical UK and Irish versions of timber frame are miles behind the continent, in some ways there's good reason for it, in others its simply because we're seriously lagging. as far as i am aware code for SH is only mandatory for social housing in NI, irrespective refugee, do you disagree with legislation that strives to preserve the environment and our limited energy sources.