frozen_out

One thing's for sure - these cars aren't finding their way to the 2nd hand market. The model is a dream for manufacturers, they extract all the value from high value economies then ship the cars or parts out to places where they can extract the maximum value from lower value economies. This is really just a reflection of the fact that business models have become extremely sophisticated in all markets.

The right move index never goes down. Ever. It's a complete waste of time mulling over it. Move on, there's nothing to see here.

Seedy? This describes pretty much every marriage I know!

On the smoker barges point - I was really tempted to buy a Phaeton, until I found out that lightbulbs are main dealer job. Mate of mine bought a second hand Aston Martin, cost him a 5 figure sum in the first year. If you can't afford to buy it first hand, you can't afford to run it second hand.

No, that's entirely my point! The resulting bust will be much bigger - to the point where if/when it happens owning a house will be the least of your/our worries.

I've been thinking more about this, and it's not so straight forward as the cost of buying vs renting starting from *now*. There's an alternative, more relevant question which is 'will it cost less to buy now or buy at some point in the future?' This makes the assumption that some people are speculating, implicitly, if not explicitly on the cost of renting now+buying in the future being lower than buying now. In order for buying to be cheaper you pretty much have to discount the cost of maintenance (or at least the cost of upgrading) to zero, mainly because from an accounting perspective it's not really legitimate to discount outgoings with respect to time (although there are circumstances where you could). Personally I spend significant (to me at least) amounts of money on decorating etc. which is pretty much ongoing. That means for me at least, buying will always be more expensive than renting. However, if the question is 'will it cost less overall to buy in the future' then these costs pretty much net out to zero in the consideration and you get a 'fairer' comparison.

If someone had told me in 2008 that London prices wouldn't fall by 10% in 5 years, but would actually increase I'd have thought them a clown. We live and learn.

I understand where you're coming from. I guess my intent is different again, the renter's reasoning isn't of a great deal of interest to me (or I could start whining on about security of tenure etc., which is a valuable intangible in the current climate). My intent is to highlight what I consider to be an almost unconsidered risk of those intentionally sitting out the market with the intention of minimising medium-long term housing costs (of which there are many) - namely that the market might not fall as far or as fast as you either need, or want. And then you're really ******ed, sat on a stack of cash, renting and then still buying in at a higher price than you'd like because you got fed-up. You then have the additional worry of having mistimed the big one. It's a ******ing minefield - my gripe (I'll admit it's a gripe) is that it's not often that this is expressly discussed on HPC. Having been round the block a few times and been stung myself because I didn't properly consider the sums in this way it's something that: a) I feel I can talk about comfortably and knowledgeably about Something I should talk about, if only to give someone the opportunity to consider a slightly different viewpoint. Regardless of whether I'm right or wrong. That's why I pop up occasionally on these types of threads.

So you're going to buy when you buy when you can buy a really great, cheap house? Well done you. Seriously, all the best. I'm sure you've got a price and some metrics that you'll be using to judge your entry point. Best of luck.

And therein lies the risk. I think it was Buffet who said that markets can stay irrational for longer than you can stay solvent. Never a truer word spoken.What i will say is that the party seems to be over for know. It's just a question of how far and how fast. Some people just don't see that there is a very real possibility of 'not far enough or fast enough' if your aim is to minimise your long term housing costs.

I think you're being a touch unfair. I can't claim to know the OP or his intent (which may or may not be as you describe) but assuming that people are aiming to act in their own financial self-interest with respect to buying a house, then the risk of not buying, even at somewhere approaching 'the top' is underappreciated. As is the time value of money.

Like everything else in life, it's all about intent. I'm making the assumption that in the medium-long term people would prefer not to lose money. Or to lose less money. Or spend less. Depending on your POV.

Interesting... do you not see it as speculating on not buying? From memory there are many posters on HPC who claim they *could* buy, but won't. Hence all the guff we get about the opportunity cost on all the savings that people have.

If people aren't buying it's because they can't access the necessary credit (a subtle difference I would argue between that and 'not being able to afford it'). But that's pretty much begging the question. The kicker is the consequences... can the volume hold up well enough for long enough to avoid serious nominal falls?

Race for equity. That's why to come out ahead the drop has to be short and sharp. I agree that from this point on i.e. 'the top' all we're debating is the speed of the crash. Doing the same maths from 5 years ago though and the renters have been toasted.