Space Cadet

Don't worry, would never consider anything but some form of capital repayment. Not many of this style listed on houseprices.co.uk. Price in mid 2003 for an idential house was £93,500. Hard to make a comparison before that as none listed. Other houses (in different style/area) which sold mid '05 at 140-150K were 85K in mid 2001 and 95K mid 2002. Anyways, thanks all for the advice, downside risks may be greater than I anticipated. Going this weekend to have another look and roughly price up the work needed. Also need to look at nationwide figures again. Any other stats just been released for comparison? Thanks SC

Right, I'm preparing for a flaming here, but just want peoples opinions on the following: 2 bed terrace house in a nice location, good sized living/dinning room, small garden, adequate sized kitchen, in Devon Asking price £130,000 This place is suitable for my needs for the foreseeable future in terms of size. It needs some work, principally new windows/doors, redecoration throughout, maybe new kitchen, and eventually I would want to knock through the wc/bathroom. The house is a repossession and has been on the market for three months, had one offer which fell through when a chain collapsed (according to EA so taken with a pinch of salt). I’m a FTB and want this place to live in, not for BTL. IMO the asking price is too high when compared to other properties in the road (one on at £137K few doors down, with garage, new interior, DG, etc) so there is definitely room to beat them down on price. According too www.houseprices.co.uk, the ceiling price for the road was £140K in march 2005, all the houses are the same style and size. I think vendor would accept an offer of 115K, which is my top price anyway. I start my offers at 100K. At 115K it’s a little over 4.5 times my salary, repayments would be £150 more than my current rent and manageable. I need to factor in some higher IR (6-8%) to see what happens with the numbers, but think its probably still not unreasonable. I’m about as secure in my job as I’ll ever be. I am in a good position to increase my earnings above inflation, and would think the debt burden of such a house would not significantly increase if IR where to go up (unless I am made redundant – a risk that I’m prepared to live with). The latest round of house stats would indicate some price drops in this area. They’re certainly not rising at present. If I purchased at 115K, this is 85% of asking price. Working on a worst-case assumption of 30% decrease in all prices, this house might be worth 91K at the bottom of the cycle. I would quite happily start a family in this house, so probably not looking to move for at least 5 years plus. Should I buy? Anything fundemental Ive missed?

Port Solent - that place always makes me laugh. Its got a motorway on one side, an active landfill site on the other, a disused gasing landfill in close proximity, is built on reclaimed (ie - shit) land and is close to some of the worst estates in Hampshire. Also, travellers have set up camp next to it on several occasions, and it will probably be all under water in about 80 years. When every I went to the cinema down there, I got the impression that it was inhabited by the chin-less yacht set who all wish they were Ellen McArthur (sp?). You couldn't pay me to live there. When I worked for an engineering practice down that way, one of the senior guys was involved in the orginal development told me that the construction quality was some of the worst he had every seen, so Im suprised they are still standing. What a joke, and still they are sold as 'luxury'...

I know of a number of couples in similar situations. A friend of mine has just brought at 95K on a 20K salary, although he got his missus pregnant so in a way his hand was forced. Anyway think they may struggle as they are on a single wage with 4 times mortgage and babe due. A bloke that I work with has just brought a 140K refurbished ex MOD house from a developer (fees paid, stamp duty paid, 5% deposit paid), hes on 18K a year and his girlfriend on 20 something K. Incidentially the developer was not accetpting offers due to 'incentives' avaliable, and the day he signed the papers they raised the asking price on all the remaining plots by 2K (which was the same day that the media had it slashed all over the front page that 'houses increase by £2000 quid this year', strange coincidence, no?). Another friend of mine (recently married) is looking at the moment, he will definately buy as his other half really wants to, and there parents are fronting the deposit. His budget is 'around 150K', he earns about 20-22K and his other half about 16K. All these are in the southwest (Devon and Somerset), none of them seem to think houses will do anything but rise. I have discussed this with a few of them but the 'houses always rise' mentailty remains. On a side note, my G/F also really wants to buy (as do I), but I'm not prepared to commit until I see which way the market heads in the next 6 - 12 months. However, persuading other halfs of such a course of action is troublesome, to say the least! So I'm hoping for tangible falls in value this year... But there are still FTB out there, willing to sink themselves up to the eyeballs in debt, coz 'rent is dead money'.

Well, considering she brought the place for about 5K you'd think she would be over the moon, greedy bi*ch... Really does show how some people feel its there 'right' to make shit loads on a house, when in reality they have just been lucky. All in all a good programme - Ive never given much thought to the whole right to buy era before (I was still in nappies at the time it started), but it did well to highlighted the social changes brought about, as well as sowing the seeds for the mess we now find ourselves in.

As Pricedout mentions above, if you are looking at a new build (or anything built after late 1980's) then suitable precautions should have been taken during the planning process. Currently, any obvious or suspected brownfield development will be subject to a planning condition basically stating that the developer has to adequately investigate the site, and remediate any contamination present, all of which needs to be approved by the planning authority before the planning conditions are signed off. Best to check that all planning conditions have been signed of before buying. Also if the house carries a NHBC guarantee, then the NHBC will have ensured that all such conditons are signed off before issuing their guarantee. With regard to areas affected by historic mining, Local Authority in these areas are usually on the ball when it comes to this sort of thing (especially in traditinal mining areas i.e. South Wales and the northern coal fields), and will stipulate that adequate investigation for the prescence of mine workings needs to be undertaken and measures put in place to prevent subsidence etc. I think the grey area exists in older properties that where constructed before much of the modern legislation is put in place. So its probably worth doing a bit of your own research into the local area to see if there are any problems evident.

In a word no. It was never designed to last forever (rather had a predicted design life over which it would protect the upper Thames), the problem is it appears that the incidents of storm surges combined with sea level rise will make it redundant alot quicker than original thought. As you've pointed out, it is closing alot more frequently, which appears to be indicative of greater incident of storm surges/extreme high tides. Now, at some point the Gov will have to build a new one (probably under some hideously inflated PFI intiative as seems to be the current fashion), the favoured location being downstream and having a bigger barrier. Like others have posted, the problems are compounded by the fact that London is sinking, along with the whole of the south/south east of England, while Scotland is rising due to the 'crustal rebound' following the last ice age. Also London itself may be sinking due to weight of buildings on the underlying Clay. If the current estimates of sea level rise are correct, which they probably aren't, then some time long after were all dead, London may become undefendable, as the cost of defense will probably be 'uneconomical' (love to be alive when a goverment has to make that decision!!), or just physically impossible. However, the current sea level rise prediction may be incorrect, and that never happens, only time will tell. But in the interim, a new barrier will be built. I looked at this in a bit of detail when I was at uni, but unfortunately dont have any data to hand.

Yeah, I don't wish that kind of misfortune on anyone. Having said that people looking to sue their surveyor because prices are dropping.... someone needs to give her a slap, I mean what f*****g planet are these people on.

Just when you thought you'd seen every incentive going, stamp duty, fees, free carpets, deposit, free football tickets.... Now, free farm animals!!?? And you get the option of turning them into sausages.... The world has gone mad. http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/england/glouces...ire/4216392.stm

Yeah, I do. As per your other posts, no big price falls down here yet. Although it seems that alot of properties are sticking on the market and I'm seeing a good deal of 'new price' ads in the homeseeker. Ive looked at buying several times over the previous 2 years down this way, each time not quite going through with it as I had a gut feeling it was all wrong. A couple of places I looked at 4+ months ago Ive had my eye on since and there not shifting, although the vendors are starting to shave the price on some (although not by nearly enough, just 2 or 3K). A friend of a friend works for any estate agent on Mutley and Ive been wanting to sound him out about the state of the market, although not had the chance yet (weather he tell me the truth is another thing ) He said some time ago that it was pretty on/off, one week no customers and the next busy, etc. Anyway, sit tight and it will happen eventually, just gonna take a few years or more.

I was just sending a fax in the reception area at work and happened to over hear a conversation involving one of the office juniors. Office Junior sat there looking at something on internet, another colleague walks past - Q "What are you buying/looking for" A "My bf has just brought a house, and is doing it up to sell on, and i'm looking for some furniture. He's going to do up 2 or 3 before buying his own, and has given up his job to do it..." I kept my mouth shut as she's a nice girl and dont really know the boyfriend, plus hes already brought the house, but couldn't help thinking he will probably be alot poorer by the time he comes to sell it than he is at the moment. Poor fool...

£420,000? What's wrong with that? It's only 30 times the average wage for the area. Surely the price can only go up, especially with an IR cut...

In todays Guardian: http://money.guardian.co.uk/creditanddebt/...1529921,00.html Like this bit towards the end - "Then he says that a friend of his recently compared the credit card industry to slavery - that the lenders are the new slave masters and the borrowers the slaves." And demostrates how a well intended husband with (persumably) little family savings or appreciation of debt can go from owing £4000 to £130K in 6 years. 22 credit cards each being used to pay off the others. I think a bit more regulation in the industry and education of the masses would not go amiss.

The consensus of scientific opinion would suggest otherwise, as the IPCC (and many others) have produced significant peer reviewed reports, which suggested that global warming is occurring and human activity is, in part, responsible for the change. As you point out, global climate fluctuation is natural and has always occurred. However, this problem (and our contribution to it) is going to bite us on the ass, but the people who primarily pay for the damage caused be the west will be in the third world, as they can least afford to 'buy' there way out of trouble as we will be able to (at least temporarily). Personally I think the kinds of political initiative required to force meaningful action upon this country, and on the west as a whole, are so drastic that no political party proposing such measures will every win the popular vote.