sanddancer

I feel simliar, but I think it alot of it is because our flat was furnished when we first started to rent it. Gradually we have persuaded the landlord to remove bits of the furniture as we have put in our own, and that makes it feel a lot better. When we first moved in, it even had pictures on the walls in a strange attempt to make it more homely, but they were awful. Lots of our storage space is taken up with hiding these things. But when things break it is great not to have to worry about paying for them.

From what I can see on the property sites and agents own sites, I would agree with this, but equally there does seem to be lots of properties with no chain or pictures of rooms with no furniture, which suggests BTL trying to sell up - these properties are hanging around quite a while. Also agree with the comments about Ealing Broadway not being a good place for a night out anymore - I haven't really been there much myself in the last year, but the before that it seemed to be full of under-age drinkers, who I can only describe as being Ali-G types.

Not really what I would have described as a townhouse though.

Friend of friend has just bought a 2 bedroom garden flat in Ealing Broadway for £340K. I think they probably paid the full asking price as they didn't seem too savvy, are new to the area and have very wealthy parents who are pretty much funding the whole thing. Their only comment was that they could have bought a 4-bedroom house ten minutes down the road for the same price, but decided that they wanted to be closer to the bars and restaurants of Ealing Broadway, so it was a lifestyle choice. I didn't know whether to laugh or cry.

I would say that culture is one of things I would miss most about the UK, but it certainly isn't the things you've listed. Andrew Lloyd Webber musicals I would say are mainly for tourists, but we do produce some great theatre, (I am biased as I work in the theatre industry) and some brilliant music is still from the UK (I think it moves in cycles between here and the USA as to who is leading the way). I think the culture is there - you just have to prepared to look beyond what the media are spoon-feeding the population. However, these things are probably true in all other countries as well and my main reason for staying in this country is simply that the rest of my family are here and speaking to them on the phone isn't the same as being able to see them regularly.

My partner is currently looking for a savings accounts and we realised that while not a day goes by without one of us receiving a junk mail offer of a credit card or a loan, you never get similar things about saving money. A sign of the times.

This is compounded by the further threat of interest rate cuts, which makes you feel that the government has something against you!

I'm a would-be FTB too. I was getting ready to start seriously looking to buy somewhere when I found this site and have now decided to wait around for another year or so to see what happens. My partner and I have a decent deposit saved and could afford to buy a 1 bed flat now, but as we may want to move in the next 2-3 years, we don't want to risk negative equity and by waiting we hope that we can buy a 2 bed place rather than 1 bed.

On another thread a week or so ago (sorry, can't find it), someone mentioned that alot of Estate Agents aren't putting up For Sale signs anymore as when they stay up for months it shows their failure, so they are only using the SOLD signs. I'm looking at the Ealing Common/West Acton area and this does seem to be true as I've seen a lot of properties on the web that don't have For Sale signs outside of them. I have been browsing for about 6 months and there are alot of properties that have been advertised for this whole time, but the better properties (of their type) are going to Sale Agreed on the property sites fairly quickly, but it will be interesting to see if they actually complete and for how much less than the asking price.

Are you an Offshore Engineer?

I was just thinking the same. Even worse is when there is just a picture of the view.

Have you asked your landlord to make improvements to your flat? If you move out, he will probably struggle to find anyone else willing to rent it in its current condition. Worth a try asking him I think.

Which is missing the point that a lot of people can not afford to buy without resorting to 5x joint salary mortgages over 30+ years and even then cannot afford a good area.

I was talking to someone in the north east of England about house prices at the weekend and they said that they could see them falling in London where they are ridiculously high, but thought they would stagnate in the north east, not decrease. They offered no reasons for this, other than that London prices were very high. If anything, I would have thought that London prices will eventually drop less than other regions. The north east does have a high percentage of people employed in the public sector, which might be fairly secure, but it also has a lot of call centres which may go overseas. So where do people think will be the worst and least affected parts of the country?

This is my experience of people I know who are buying now - mostly well-educated, intelligent people, but who don't really look at anything beyond their own lives or see how factors beyond their control can affect things. Of the people I know who are buying now or have recently bought in London, one couple think they have got a good deal because their offer of £5k less than the asking price was accepted after 2 years of having this turned down, but they don't believe prices will go down any further - they can't offer any reason as to why they think this though. I suppose they are just sick of waiting and will avoid looking at house prices once they've bought. However, another couple I know actually paid over the asking price (in London earlier this year) to gazump another buyer and have furnished the flat (everything brand new, top of the range) entirely on credit. He works in recruitment sales though, so while he can often earn alot in the good times, it will certainly be effected by any downturn. I am still constantly hearing 'rent is dead money' and 'get on the ladder as soon as possible', but am ignoring it and continuing to save,

My partner has had the same problem with his dad, which is made worse by his younger sister being willing to take out a 105% mortgage and move to an 'up and coming' area miles away in order to be able to get on the ladder. We could just about afford it somewhere half way decent at the moment, but are waiting. Reassurances that the you are saving money somewhere fairly low risk might help.

I think it was more to do with noise than damage as it was a conversion where noise travelled. Information on those sites is very useful for future reference - thanks.

I rented one place where they have specified in the agreement that no one under 18 was allowed on the premise, so we would have been forced to move if we had decided to have children.

This is exactly why I wanted to buy somewhere (before doing the maths and then discovering this site). I don't mind about landlords profitting, but all too often they don't want to do anything for the money. If its a business, then the tenant is the customer, but in no other industry is it so much the norm to treat the customer so badly (at least not so openly).

Quite by accident as it was mentioned on a thread on the Glastonbury Festival website when someone there was having trouble with the house they were trying to buy. Feeling very relieved that I did find out about it as so far not much has been said in the mainstream media about crashes and we were thinking about buying in the next 6 months - this plan has been shelved.

The bath has now been replaced, but when the very old bath cracked, it took 3 weeks for it to be replaced and we don't have a separate shower, so were having to go to the gym every day to wash properly. The letting agent sent a plumber out fairly quickly to look at the problem and he said it would need whole new bath, but he could do it the next day subject to the landlord's approval. It then took another three weeks before it was done and only then after I rang the letting agent about it. They claimed they hadn't been able to do anything sooner because they were short staffed as it is the summer so people were on holiday. Are we entitled to any reduction in our rent for this? We pay by direct debit so they have actually already received the money.

In the case of people I know think this is probably right then this is compounded by their parents who believe that property is always a good investment.

Not at all (all earning below the £45k you give as average), but they are mostly in their early 30s so not that young for buying their first property and have been saving for a deposit for years. A few have moved back in with parents for a while to be able to save more money or didn't ever leave home to rent in the first place, but I think what is making the difference is that the 2.5 x joint salary isn't what is being offered anymore. People in London seem to have accepted the stupidly high property prices as a fact of life.

I realise this is purely anecdotal and maybe the people I know are out of synch with rest of the potential FTBs, but I know lots of couple who have either bought in the last year or are in the process of buying somewhere (mainly in London). The main factors influencing their decision to buy seem to be that they have been promoted at work so now have more money or are in long-term relationship so have someone to buy with. Those buying now seem to think they are getting in at a good time in London because prices do seem to have steadied, although they all admit that they will be paying alot more than they are now while renting. My partner and myself were also hoping to buy early next year, but having come across this site now purely by chance, I'm quite keen to sit tight renting for a while, but my partner is less convinced as his parents are constantly nagging us about buying and everyone else we know seems oblivious to any thought of a crash. One couple we know even paid £5k over the asking price for a property 9 months ago. If there still are these people willing to buy at silly prices, will there really be such a major crash? I can see it happening easily in other parts of the country if a major local employer makes redundancies etc, but will London be badly hit?