Cogs

It hasn't always been like it is today. Perhaps I've got this wrong but I thought mortgages used to regulated (in the sense that they were deregulated in the late 1970s/early 1980s) with lenders only issue set quotas of loans, usually to existing customers in good standing who had joined a queue, basically. This was something of an incentive to save I'd imagine, so if politicians are scratching their heads over why people don't save so much any more perhaps they are forgetting this. I was under the impression that this was due to the rules governing lending rather than the individual building societies. Perhaps OP is being a little strident but isn't he really just talking about a return to that? I'm not sure I'd like it either as one would assume it would snuff out competition (with the banks, as ever, pocketing the difference rather than the consumer) but then I guess they had their reasons for this restriction back in the day and that concern may have been predatory lending and/or stability in the housing market(?). The idea of only lending to people in 'good standing' and so on seems a reasonable one to revisit again but then I guess that is the business of banks and building societies to worry about and they don't seem to give a stuff.

Meh. I don't think rents will shift much. The market is very fluid. I don't even believe perceived shortages in specific areas are necessarily a big deal (these things seem more seasonal to me than anything, in fact in trying to find a place to live I've found glut followed by shortage over very short time scales, I think it might even just be random cycles etc). There may be increases/decreases passed onto the rental market from house price fluctuations but I think by the time they are passed on to tenants these will be much reduced in magnitude owing to the flexible position of tenants. People will just slosh around fluidly. Bottom line is there are lots of places I'd consider renting that I wouldn't touch with a barge pole as a buyer. Rent goes up too much, worst case is I'll move down a postcode or put 10 minutes on my commute or do without a spare room. In the chaos of a HPC I think that barely counts as suffering much. How much is "too much"? I don't know I could put a figure on it but LL's are well aware it is quite easy to frighten people away and the reward for that is a void. Not a big deal to the tenant though, for good and bad the state of play for them is only temporary. When people think of the individual landlord of the past having a bit of power to be a tyrant they are forgetting he usually had a rather captive market. People typically own cars these cars and are less distressed at the idea of being a little geographically mobile.

I'm just tacking this on here because i can't start thread apparently and it might be the next media thing to look out for; Tuesday 9am, new series on Radio 4 "The Price of Property" British homeowners are now in the majority - 70% of our homes are owner-occupied, a figure that's doubled in the last 50 years. Evan Davis explores the rise and rise of the home-owner and the growing influence of the property market on every aspect of life in Britain today. He begins by asking why politicians of all parties now champion home ownership, and whether the rise in owner-occupation has made us a more conservative nation, a wealthier nation or a more divided nation. http://www.bbc.co.uk/radio4/priceofproperty/pip/smy22/

Hi all. I see the topic has shifted but it took me a while to join. I don't think the issue is strictly speaking why finance isn't taught in schools. If it were I don't think it would make a lot of difference. The key (and what the interesting part of Rich Dad, Poor Dad is really about although I'm not a huge fan of the book/cult) is a form of "cultural capital". Facts about finance won't help you nearly so much as if you grew up in a household where mum and dad talked investments in front of you. Its how you think about money that matters, not so much the technical stuff associated with handling it. Its a set of attitudes and values. The technical knowledge is not much good to you without this (c.f., healthy eating; everyone knows what is good for you, some people still shovel down rubbish, they don't how the attitudes and values that the Islington set have). In this country I think its class based. The lower orders save (rather fearfully), whereas the upper middle confidently invest. The Etonian in the gutter will nearly always end up wealthier than the chav with a few grand burning a hole in his pocket (even if they both failed all their O-levels) the question to answer is why this should be the case. As an example, i read this anecdote in The Times ages. During national service the lads were given the task of getting as far away from the base as they could on a small amount of money. Most of the guys raced off, hitch-hiked, walked, lived on bread and stream water etc. The public schoolboy spent all his money on a train trip a few miles up the line to see his mum and dad and as it was only a short trip opted for 1st class. Wherein he got talking to a Wing Commander in the USAF and wound up flying to America the next day in the back of a B-52. He returned home, at the army's expense, by cruise liner some months later.