The Undertaker

I have to agree with you sledgehead, yet another BNP voter polluting this board. So shermenator, what about the 10000 white women who have become muslims, are they uk nationals?

Funny how estate agents have been telling us for the last 5 years its now or never. Surely never has come? The point is when it is "never" for the majority of buyers the market will collapse.

Yeah keep up the good work RB.

Thanks for those links. Im not that familiar with the carry trade etc. But I think there are more than enough home grown reasons for UK house prices to crash, this seems to be another nail in the coffin.

http://www.fnarena.com/index2.cfm?type=dsp...2EEEB836CC60403 Apparently Morgan Stanley refutes the carry trade thesis, according to the above.

What happens if houses start to "under-perform", are those savy investors going to get out of property and into the "next big thing"? I remember in the late 90's people telling me how shares only ever go up, especially internet ones! Plus if you have lost your job, you might not be able to sit it out, the baliffs wont sit around waiting for your equity to return in 10 years. As for the investors, I agree perhaps if they own 100% of their properties they may sit it out. But those with 80% mortgages, who see interest rates rise by 30- 50% (ie about 6%) in say 2 years, might not be able to keep servicing that debt. How many share related programs did you see late 90's? They were everywhere. School kids making millions etc. Now how many do you see? There will come a time when fundamentals (rising IRs and unemployment) will overtake the hype. During the early ninties it was on the news almost everyday showing people's misery as they were being kicked out of their homes, or handing their keys back to the bank. There is only so much distortion of the truth our news/propoganda channels can get away with. People's attitudes may have changed, but banks have not. If you don't pay your debt the big man with the baseball bat is still coming round to claim (a major american bank in India was recently caught sending round thugs to break debtors legs). As before this is EVEN more of a reason for a crash. You know what they say the high you go the further to fall etc. The Government will do all it can to keep house prices up, or rather I think it HAS done all it can. It is running out of options, plus governments change. The more of an investment property becomes the more prices will become cyclical in nature. BTLers only 3 years ago could get yields of 10%, I remember seeing flats in london in 1998 with yields of 20%. Now what do you get 3-4%? If house prices go up these will drop even further. It wont be long before the muppets who are getting in now get burnt? But what is going to push house prices up for the BTLers with such low yields? My friend is buying a house currently, she has a mortgage in principle and agreed a price for the house (despite my warnings), with the rate supposed to be around 5.25%, when she went to complete the mortgage this week, they told her they couldnt do anything less than 5.99%!!!! Tossers. Anyway, they screwed the market in the late 80's, then mid ninties many of them went out of business. Why can't it happen again? Anyone who works in the city will tell you, that GREED and FEAR are commonly used in city jokes etc. They are the two sentiments in investing, and fear always follows on from greed.

The NHS is already being privatised. From 2008 15% of all operations will be done in the private sector. Private companies, usually using NHS funded infrastructure, are running most of the services in your local hospital. Tony Blairs former health advisor is now the chairman of a major US healthcare company that stands to make a HUGE amount of money from the privatisation of the NHS. No connection of course.

As has been said here the percent of first time buyers is falling fast. So our generation is becoming less daft! At the moment many of the people buying are either from overseas (especially in London), or BTL (despite yields of 2-3%). Unfortunately most people don't read the warning with all investments, "past performance is not a indicator of future performance". As houses have become more of an investment, I personally believe this will make prices more volatile. At the first sign of prices going down the investors will panic and sell, leading to further falls. According to the VIs HPI is now about 5% year on year and slowing. With wage inflation at 4%, the idea that if I don't get on the housing ladder now I never will is just lies.

The problem is your generation didn't pay enough social security, the government got the calculations wrong. So we, the younger generation will be left to pay the shortfall. House prices are just another form of wealth redistribution from the young to the old. The problem for your generation is that people are becoming increasingly resentful of this, and sentiment will change sooner or later.

I was watching CBS news on Sky yesterday. They had a segment on a family, who had their house repossesed and was being auctioned off, following a mortgage increase from $2100 to $3000 pm. An estate agent talking to the program mentioned that there were "thousands of foreclosures every year".

My parents recently sold their house. Valuations from estate agents varied between 495k to 750k, final price 560k, after being on at 625k.

Im sure there were many "seasoned" investors adding to their portfolios when the Nasdaq was above 5000. I know one BTLer who is taking out cash advances on her credit card in order to cover the deposit on a new "investment". There are always enough greedy fools out there to be parted from their money, so this report doesn't really surprise me.

Or the people that have been losing their jobs?

Rightmove tells you nothing. They base their figures on ASKING price when the house comes to market. So if your house was put on the market for say £180000, but sold for £130000, according to rightmove stats the 180k is included in the average. So all agents do is keep increasing the figures and there you go "house prices rise". Realist bear, do you have links for those figures, and are those falls for the last year or last quarter?

Why not, happened in Japan.

I don't think there is a conspiracy. Sadly young people do die sometimes. Just like David Kelly and Robin Cook.

Isn't National Savings a form of government "bank"?

Perhaps its easier because you are caucasian? However, I do agree, apart from the few BNP votes out there, compared to most countries British people are very tolerant.

The whole immigration debate is a smoke screen. There are far more important reasons why the economy is being screwed, but its much easier for the VIs to blame it on immigrants. It has nothing to do with the a corrupt government that is selling this country out, or rich wealthy people who legally can avoid paying any tax, or big business. No all our problems are due to immigration! Take the field of medicine, many of the best doctors in this country are "foreign". Madji Yacoub, the best heart surgeon in the world. Prof Ara Darzi, the queens surgeon, who is a leading player in laparoscopic surgery. The list goes on. These people got where they were in a time of racism, simply because they were better than our homegrown doctors in their field. Thats not to say there are not some very good white british doctors. But we have to accept that we are not the best at everything, and that these immigrants have brought considerable benefit to our country. If you needed a life saving operation would the skin colour of the surgeon make much difference to you? The problem with immigration at the moment is that unlike in the past when immigrants have brought skills and knowledge to the UK, the a large majority of the current crop of immigrants have come to abuse the system. I have spoken to "refugees" who said they would go home if their housing benefit was stopped! I think the best solution for the country, and race relations, is to stop taking any asylum seekers at all, and then run a programme where people who will be of benefit to the country can come here.

Do I take it from this they are Jewish? Most people in the BNP wouldn't consider them to be British. Just because someone is not white, doesn't follow that they are a foreigner. Secondly in many healthcare professions white british people simply don't apply to do the job anymore. So if you want to have a clinic that is not 90% "foreign", the solution is simple sack 90% of the staff, as long as you don't mind waiting 10 times as long for your care.

Why should I leave my country because of a bunch of pricks?

Its time to ban housing benefit for everyone.

Which other place?

Have you ever been to the Graham Park Estate? I personally have walked through Harlesden, and the Graham Park Estate, and as I said in MY OPINION. I felt safer in harlesden. I am only talking about the estate not the rest of Hendon. I agree with you that most of hendon is actually a relatively nice place. But the estate is a shithole. Why do you think a FOUR bedroom house is on for 200k If you are so confident I dare you to take a walk there.

Asking prices are up. All that means is people are getting more greedy.