Seeing Major Price Falls In W Wales

[Zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz]

I recently had one of my aimless meanders around the smallholding web sites that specialise in West Wales - and things still look mad to me.

Not questioning your 'on the ground' observations - but there seem to be loads of semi-derelict properties that, if they have half an acre, are on the market for a quarter of a million pounds.

Interesting to hear others' observations about the local economy - your problem will be, as it has been for a while, that when prices fall a little you will be inundated (again) with English scumbags like me escaping the insanity of the South East - and prices will, no doubt, stabilise.

Sure, any land (and I mean half an acre plus) even if it's bog land, massively increases the price. I know a few English people who've moved down here and boomeranged back - thought they could at least get a job commanding minimum wage but couldn't - then reality strikes.

[Zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz]

I know every single Welshman apart from me on this site lives in or around Swansea but I'd just like to say that here in East Wales we are not seeing major prices falls. Not by a longshot. Rises if anything. That is all, thank you.

Not sure, I track Chepstow and prices are in a trough, except one house I've seen which was on the market for well over a year for 209 - didn't sell - think it's on at 239 now. Suspect it's the same old story of a ******witted EA flattering the frustrated buyer just to get it on their books. Not joking. Was on with Moon & Co. Not sure who has it on their books now.

Edited March 10, 2010 by gruffydd

[Tired of Waiting]

I know loads of people who work in the public sector down here on 30K to 35Kish - if you are a couple both earning that then 60K to 70K brings you a nice house... add in the 6 week hols, the pension and the countryside and it is a nice lifestyle indeed. In fact, if I could go back 10 years it would be my career aim.

Bus drivers down here are on about 30K basic, same for train drivers. The fire fighters, Police and nurses are all on a tood whack. In fact, you would probably need to gross double their salaries in the private sector just ot equal their package.

That is very interesting indeed. So, they use tax-payers money to price tax-payers out of the housing market. I wonder for how long the private sector workers will be patient about all that.

[Tired of Waiting]

Well, I'm seeing a dying holiday home market - firstly, cash-strapped Londoners are attempting to rent out their previously 'only for the family' cottages. Secondly, loads are being forced to sell coz they can't afford to maintain their properties/mortgages. Thirdly, the holiday cottage market is dead - there's been a collapse in occupancy this year - people are losing money on their 'investments'. Everybody's moaning about it.

Excellent. Best news of the day. Thanks.

[Bloo Loo]

That is very interesting indeed. So, they use tax-payers money to price tax-payers out of the housing market. I wonder for how long the private sector workers will be patient about all that.

I wouldnt worry, modern economic thinking says that if government borrows to make up what the private sector is not spending, that all will be well.

just saw it on the Beeb News 24.

he went on to say that if government didnt spend more, that would be the end of growth and we would be in recession again.

I say...are we just doing this to keep the figures looking good, or are we doing it for the overall good of the economy? If the former, then the Professor was correct.

[The Masked Tulip]

That is very interesting indeed. So, they use tax-payers money to price tax-payers out of the housing market. I wonder for how long the private sector workers will be patient about all that.

I believe I am the only person in Wales not working in the public sector so, um, I will let you know when I run out of patience... Hmm, there it goes...

[TylerDurden]

Excellent news gruffydd!

I'm banking on west wales property plumeting at about the same time I get made redundant from the public sector.

That means i will have milked the public sector in the city for ten years and be kicked out with a big enough redundancy to move back to cardigan bay and retire at 35 where i'll bring my kids up playing on the beaches and farms.

If only. Possible though lol.

[RDW]

I wouldnt worry, modern economic thinking says that if government borrows to make up what the private sector is not spending, that all will be well.

just saw it on the Beeb News 24.

he went on to say that if government didnt spend more, that would be the end of growth and we would be in recession again.

I say...are we just doing this to keep the figures looking good, or are we doing it for the overall good of the economy? If the former, then the Professor was correct.

OT I know, but it's just like if the misses and I lost our jobs, but maintainrd our current lifestyle on our credit cards, and if we didn't spend on our credit cards, we would be in recession. Crazy but that's how the government set's the example.

[Democorruptcy]

Also women do not want to stay at home anymore and be a housewife for 20 years. My mum did it but how many young people are doing it this way now, unless ther are a single mum on benefits. The vast majority of young people service their mortgage with two incomes like it or not.

The woman is working just to pay the extra interest on the mortgage because houses are now priced so much higher. The strange thing is they think they are "rich" contributing to a banker's bonus each year.

[amateursurgeon]

It's ridiculous to compare Canada and Aus to here - average population density in those countries is 8 people per square mile, over here it is over 650 people.

Even after you factor in the large amount of uninhabitable tundra / desert they have, they still have a lot more room for building houses.

Glad to see property prices falling, but the chances of the average 20 something on 15K on owning a house are always going to be slim. The only way it will happen for most of em is through inheritance. It's a shame that most of them are still deluded by the fantasy that the Tories put out in the 1980s.

The house price crash in Wales is cool though - at this rate we'll be able to use the deposit we've saved up to get a London house to buy a house outright in cash in Wales and move over there. :-)

[kingsgate]

Good logic, but still connected to that slightly sneering English attitude about the working man not being entitled to a decent house. Like I said upthread, in Australia and Canada it is a given that the average working schlub will live in a detached house. No reason why this could not be the case in Britain, other than the same snobbery that makes automatic cars a luxury in the UK whereas they are standard in the new world, etc. Class signifiers everywhere.

No , Americans and Aussies drive automatics cos most of them are too stupid to drive a manual.

[deflation]

I know someone who used to regulary rent cottages in Wales for holidays. But, the prices went up and up, and the owners have failed to see reality.

With the recession, hotels have struggled, have overheads and have slashed prices. It is now cheaper to stay in a top class hotel, with meals, than rent a self-catering cottage for a week. Madness.

[D.C.]

Nice place in wales on twice:

1.5 mil & 800k

http://www.rightmove.co.uk/property-for-sale/property-20614321.html

http://www.rightmove.co.uk/property-for-sale/property-24213409.html

Bet the running cost are obscene.

[Guest The Relaxation Suite]

Not spent much time on the "Australia faces its demons" thread, then.

I've even wirtten on it. Australian houses are the most over-valued and least affordable on the planet. But even with that in mind it is still possible for the average worker to buy a detached house as the norm. You can get a decent detached house in Aus for less than $350,000. A house of similar spec in the UK would be £350,000.

[Guest The Relaxation Suite]

Trouble is, they're probably not competing with other local workers, there'll be people prepared to "commute" to the SE, people returning from the SE having sold property there, etc. This particular housing problem emerges from the disparity between economic performance between different UK regions.

Having said that, the more leverage you allow, the bigger the advantage that accrues to bidders with bigger incomes. And the more HPI you have, the more equity becomes available for house-owners in prosperous regions to apply further leverage in expanding into poorer regions.

All in all, I reckon it's going to be a slow unwinding in Wales. I keep looking in EA windows and all I see (still) is overpriced properties, in terms of local wages.

No one is commuting daily to the SE from rural West Wales. It can take up to two hours to get to the M4, and then another hour to get to Swindon, and another 30 minutes to get to Reading. Presumably then would be the usual hour long bumper shuffle into the town centre. So that's four hours each way. It's also 200 miles each way, which at 40 miles per gallon works out to an eye-watering 10 gallons, or £52 pounds per day in fuel.

Or perhaps a knackered late train from Swansea to Reading could be the answer, with a season ticket for 3 months costing just £2600 pounds - a snip at just £43 per day. Don't forget to add the fuel in your car to Swansea and back every day, which is 155 miles, or £20, making the train option £63 per day.

This is why places like Wales are depopulating of course, and that's another serious problem. Many of them are going to Australia and Canada.

By the way - totally agree with your slow unwinding theory.

Edited March 10, 2010 by D-503

[kilroy]

No one is commuting daily to the SE from rural West Wales. It can take up to two hours to get to the M4, and then another hour to get to Swindon, and another 30 minutes to get to Reading. Presumably then would be the usual hour long bumper shuffle into the town centre. So that's four hours each way. It's also 200 miles each way, which at 40 miles per gallon works out to an eye-watering 10 gallons, or £52 pounds per day in fuel.

Or perhaps a knackered late train from Swansea to Reading could be the answer, with a season ticket for 3 months costing just £2600 pounds - a snip at just £43 per day. Don't forget to add the fuel in your car to Swansea and back every day, which is 155 miles, or £20, making the train option £63 per day.

This is why places like Wales are depopulating of course, and that's another serious problem. Many of them are going to Australia and Canada.

By the way - totally agree with your slow unwinding theory.

Maybe they commute at w/e and have a small flat in the SE

[Guest DissipatedYouthIsValuable]

Maybe they commute at w/e and have a small flat in the SE

Pfft.

[The Masked Tulip]

It will be interesting to see what happens in Wales with all the public sector cuts - what will replace those jobs and, frankly, what will Wales be like afterwards?

I think it will become like Eire in the 70s and 80s - mass exodus.

In the meantime the Assembly carries on with plans to make Welsh the official language - they even argue that it is good too speak two languages.... shame one of them is not widely spoken like Klingon... and their green plan to put trains and monorails everywhere... the cost was many many billions which Wales does not have.... Nuts!

[Mal Volio]

I know every single Welshman apart from me on this site lives in or around Swansea but I'd just like to say that here in East Wales we are not seeing major prices falls. Not by a longshot. Rises if anything. That is all, thank you.

Here in SE Wales, prices are falling. No rises.

[Mal Volio]

That is very interesting indeed.

but not actually true

The average salary for a bus driver in Wales seems to be £14k.

http://www.mysalary.co.uk/average-salary/Bus_Driver_366

30k in London, maybe.

Edited March 10, 2010 by Mal Volio

[huw]

No one is commuting daily to the SE from rural West Wales. It can take up to two hours to get to the M4, and then another hour to get to Swindon, and another 30 minutes to get to Reading. Presumably then would be the usual hour long bumper shuffle into the town centre. So that's four hours each way. It's also 200 miles each way, which at 40 miles per gallon works out to an eye-watering 10 gallons, or £52 pounds per day in fuel.

Or perhaps a knackered late train from Swansea to Reading could be the answer, with a season ticket for 3 months costing just £2600 pounds - a snip at just £43 per day. Don't forget to add the fuel in your car to Swansea and back every day, which is 155 miles, or £20, making the train option £63 per day.

This is why places like Wales are depopulating of course, and that's another serious problem. Many of them are going to Australia and Canada.

By the way - totally agree with your slow unwinding theory.

I agree that a daily commute would be most unusual, but a weekly commute is doable, as are short-term contracts where you're able to stay away for some/all of the assignment. I came across several people doing this kind of thing while contracting, perhaps not so much any more now that times are harder. Thinking about it, I kind of did it myself for six months-- approx monthly commute Amsterdam -> Grenoble, staying in a Studio Hotel. Not recommended!

Edit: even putting "commuting" aside, high incomes and HPs in the SE will impact rural HPs elsewhere, since SE income and equity becomes available (and is leveraged) to fund purchases of retirement/downshifter/second homes in the countryside.

Edited March 11, 2010 by huw

[Grimbert]

My parents bought a cottage in a village near Carmarthen in about 2002 when prices where already going up steeply and I had already decided prices were stupid compared with what I thought they should be.

They paid £75,000 for a 3-bed detached house I thought was worth £55-60k at most. That's like 30% over the odds. How could they be so stupid?

Well they sold it in early 2009 (in the mini-trough) for nearly £200,000. They have said I can have £50,000 of that, so once again I am waiting for a house I can afford (in England) but this time I have some unearned capital to help me on my way. It's like Bad Credit, instead of Bad Debt. Just numbers on a screen.

[gus]

I know loads of people who work in the public sector down here on 30K to 35Kish - if you are a couple both earning that then 60K to 70K brings you a nice house... add in the 6 week hols, the pension and the countryside and it is a nice lifestyle indeed. In fact, if I could go back 10 years it would be my career aim.

Bus drivers down here are on about 30K basic, same for train drivers. The fire fighters, Police and nurses are all on a tood whack. In fact, you would probably need to gross double their salaries in the private sector just ot equal their package.

Where did I go wrong? When I was in school it was the guys who "failed" their A Levels that ended up working for "planning" in the local authority, or went into the police force.

These guys are laughing all the way to easy street nowadays and I'm the d@ckhead who's still working hard, with a craapy pension etc.

[gus]

The prices are still ridiculous.

I have relatives in the Carmarthen area, in proportion with local earnings prices are almost up to Cornish levels.

It's not even that nice, it's a godawful climate.

IMO prices will head back to about year 2000 + inflation levels.

Totally agree. I've been watching a house on the outskirts of Carmarthen that's been on for about 2 years and in that time it's dropped from 350K to 300K. It's worth 200K tops on a good day, but will they budge further? No way.

Much of the incentive to move in from England has gone as the price differentials have eroded, so retiree numbers are down and it's the retirees and second homers that are significant supporters of the west Wales market. The pressure is on and prices will continue to fall .

[gus]

I remember seeing adverts in EA windows in Newcastle Emlyn in 2000 offering 30-40 acre farms for £170k.

A bloke could probably make a living with that kind of price.

Actually, you could snap up a 100 acres, the house and assorted outbuildings for that price in 2000. Hell, for that price, if you spoke nicely to him, he'd even throw in a couple of nights with the wife and daughter!