LiveinHope Posted January 4, 2014 Share Posted January 4, 2014 (edited) If your blood pressure can take it, Fergus Wilson and Grant Shapps went head to head on Radio 4 PM tonight. Listen Again here from 11.50 Both have their own unique solutions favouring themselves, of course. Briefly, Fergus won't be taking any more Housing Benefit claimants because rents are rising and housing benefits aren't keeping up. He has nothing against HB tenants, it's a business decision. Instead he will be renting to immigrants because they work harder and can pay their bills. He suggested that we need massive house building no doubt because we need more landlords like Fergus, but that this will be thwarted by nimbys. Shapps said HTB was doing well to help people into housing debt. I think. Edited January 4, 2014 by LiveinHope Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
dances with sheeple Posted January 4, 2014 Share Posted January 4, 2014 If your blood pressure can take it, Fergus Wilson and Grant Shapps went head to head on Radio 4 PM tonight. Listen Again here from 11.50 Both have their own unique solutions favouring themselves, of course. Briefly, Fergus won't be taking any more Housing Benefit claimants because rents are rising and housing benefits aren't keeping up. He has nothing against HB tenants, it's a business decision. Instead he will be renting to immigrants because they work harder and can pay their bills. He suggested that we need massive house building no doubt because we need more landlords like Fergus, but that this will be thwarted by nimbys. Shapps said HTB was doing well to help people into housing debt. I think. My reading of that is - Fergus is getting a margin call and is hoping (dreaming?) that the country will be swamped by immigrants with the wages to pay him more than the HB cuts give him, and erm the other guy is still an a*rse. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
The Knimbies who say No Posted January 4, 2014 Share Posted January 4, 2014 I hope they both lose. Both rentier predators, differing only by number of steps down the food chain. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
beccles Posted January 4, 2014 Share Posted January 4, 2014 No way Im listening to that, only just fixed the laptop. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
dances with sheeple Posted January 4, 2014 Share Posted January 4, 2014 That`s Cameron after he hears that HTB 10 has flopped. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Habeas Domus Posted January 4, 2014 Share Posted January 4, 2014 The comments on this guardian article about the Wilsons has gone mad today - 5100 comments and counting... http://www.theguardian.com/money/2014/jan/04/buy-to-let-landlord-evicts-housing-benefit-tenants?commentpage=1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
dances with sheeple Posted January 4, 2014 Share Posted January 4, 2014 The comments on this guardian article about the Wilsons has gone mad today - 5100 comments and counting... http://www.theguardi...s?commentpage=1 Yes, a lot of differing views on the subject. I get a feeling that the Wilsons have f*ucked up, they are just too overleveraged and didn`t get out in time, they are not "smart" money. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Bland Unsight Posted January 5, 2014 Share Posted January 5, 2014 The comments on this guardian article about the Wilsons has gone mad today - 5100 comments and counting... http://www.theguardian.com/money/2014/jan/04/buy-to-let-landlord-evicts-housing-benefit-tenants?commentpage=1 I'm glad that we have Fergus Wilson. He's such a tedious gobshite that he is happy to spill the beans without giving the matter a second thought. Hence when the banks bail him out after the financial crisis, he just gives interviews explaining how he has been bailed out. Now that the government is attempting to begin making in-roads into the housing benefit spend he just say "I'm going to evict my HB tenants and house immigrants" Now, that's not good press for the coalition. If I was a young whipper-snapper in Whitehall I'd start looking at fire regulations. Surely Fergus's immigrants are good at paying the rent because there are 15 people living in a two-bed flat. I can't believe that there isn't a regulation somewhere that could be used to make life a little harder for Mr Wilson. (There might be something in the mortgage T&Cs about sub-letting.... where there is a will, there is a way...) Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Bland Unsight Posted January 5, 2014 Share Posted January 5, 2014 Yes, a lot of differing views on the subject. I get a feeling that the Wilsons have f*ucked up, they are just too overleveraged and didn`t get out in time, they are not "smart" money. +1 The Wilsons are a canary in the coal mine. They have conspicuously taken a massive leveraged bet on UK property that is definitely not Prime Central London. A shite flat in Maidstone let to an army of economic migrants is not the world's new reserve currency, on that you can rely. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
dances with sheeple Posted January 5, 2014 Share Posted January 5, 2014 +1 The Wilsons are a canary in the coal mine. They have conspicuously taken a massive leveraged bet on UK property that is definitely not Prime Central London. A shite flat in Maidstone let to an army of economic migrants is not the world's new reserve currency, on that you can rely. Nicely put. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
The Knimbies who say No Posted January 5, 2014 Share Posted January 5, 2014 +1 The Wilsons are a canary in the coal mine. They have conspicuously taken a massive leveraged bet on UK property that is definitely not Prime Central London. A shite flat in Maidstone let to an army of economic migrants is not the world's new reserve currency, on that you can rely. I'm failing to resist the temptation to be tedious, but as canaries go, this one has ceased to be. It is an ex canary: Defaults by newly unemployed tenants jumped as the recession began to bite, and he admits October 2008 was the crisis point, when nearly 100 of his properties, 13% of the total, were occupied by tenants who were not paying all or part of the rent. "We asked for a meeting with our lenders. I said, if you think you can run the show better than me, you can have them all back. They said no. They were determined that we shouldn't go under. If we went under, then everyone went under." Every month the couple have to meet huge repayment commitments. They don't disclose their total borrowings, which are spread across many institutions, but say that for one lender alone, Mortgage Express, their monthly payment is £353,000. Mortgage Express was part of Bradford & Bingley, one of the banks whose loans are now in the hands of the taxpayer. So we all own a share of the Wilsons' properties. What saved the Wilsons was, curiously enough, the collapse of Lehmans. In 2008, with banks pulling the plug on buy-to-let lending, the Wilsons were struggling to refinance their borrowings. But after Lehmans collapsed in September 2008, the Bank of England slashed its base rate to 0.5% and the Wilsons found on nearly all their loans they could revert to base rate plus a fixed percentage – typically 1.5% – at the end of the fixed period. "We were going to be, to put it bluntly, stuffed. The reason we were saved was the drop in interest rates," Fergus says. He is now paying an average of just 2% interest. "I earn a yield from rents of around 5% and pay 2% in interest. The average mortgage cost is about £300 per month with £800 income. This gives about £300 per unit per month after paying agent and repairs etc. The renting game has never been better. I do not have one house available to rent in Ashford, Maidstone or Hawkinge." http://www.theguardian.com/money/2010/mar/06/buy-to-let-fergus-judith-wilson ZIRPTM: Keeping Fergus in clover since October 2008. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
okaycuckoo Posted January 5, 2014 Share Posted January 5, 2014 (edited) The comments on this guardian article about the Wilsons has gone mad today - 5100 comments and counting... http://www.theguardi...s?commentpage=1 LOL! Crashed my browser. edit: Just loaded - that is a crazy debate, extreme left v extreme right. HPC is sanity by comparison. Edited January 5, 2014 by okaycuckoo Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
dances with sheeple Posted January 5, 2014 Share Posted January 5, 2014 I'm failing to resist the temptation to be tedious, but as canaries go, this one has ceased to be. It is an ex canary: http://www.theguardi...s-judith-wilson ZIRPTM: Keeping Fergus in clover since October 2008. Yeah, but when he says "everybody" would go under it means him his wife and maybe their bank? Still not the end of the world if that happens? ( and I doubt his bank would actually go under now) Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
TheCountOfNowhere Posted January 5, 2014 Share Posted January 5, 2014 they were very quiet for 5 years...the recovery must be here...return to normal. we are all saved. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
crash2006 Posted January 5, 2014 Share Posted January 5, 2014 lol 150 000 affordable homes what he forgot to say that those 150 000 were social homes moved into the affordable policy, no homes were built. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
tomandlu Posted January 5, 2014 Share Posted January 5, 2014 LOL! Crashed my browser. edit: Just loaded - that is a crazy debate, extreme left v extreme right. HPC is sanity by comparison. The left win by default on this one. The right think they're defending a canny businessman and the capitalist system. lols. I got a couple of comments in yesterday before things went crazy... http://discussion.theguardian.com/comment-permalink/30430927 http://discussion.theguardian.com/comment-permalink/30429346 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
bearwithasorehead Posted January 5, 2014 Share Posted January 5, 2014 I'm glad that we have Fergus Wilson. He's such a tedious gobshite that he is happy to spill the beans without giving the matter a second thought. Hence when the banks bail him out after the financial crisis, he just gives interviews explaining how he has been bailed out. Now that the government is attempting to begin making in-roads into the housing benefit spend he just say "I'm going to evict my HB tenants and house immigrants" Now, that's not good press for the coalition. If I was a young whipper-snapper in Whitehall I'd start looking at fire regulations. Surely Fergus's immigrants are good at paying the rent because there are 15 people living in a two-bed flat. I can't believe that there isn't a regulation somewhere that could be used to make life a little harder for Mr Wilson. (There might be something in the mortgage T&Cs about sub-letting.... where there is a will, there is a way...) Fire regs were in fact linked closely with rent control and the problems of Rachmanism in the 1950s http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fire_Precautions_Act_1971#Fire_Precautions_Act_1971 http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rent_control_in_England_and_Wales#Rent_Regulation_1965_to_1989.23A_new_rent_system_1965_to_1971 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
cybernoid Posted January 5, 2014 Share Posted January 5, 2014 "If house prices go up by 5% rents will go up by 5%" Fergus Wilson Bizarre thing to say. Rents have barely moved in 10 years, what have house prices done? For a man for whom emergency low interest rates prevented his business from going under he has a very limited understanding of how low rates allow for higher prices with stagnant rents. Bizarre. The tenants are just going to stump up the extra cash when borrowing costs rise again to over 100% of their income are they? There is leverage based on nonsense and their are the wilsons… they're going to go pop big time one day, a glorious leading indicator of a non-ponzi based recovery. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
long time lurking Posted January 5, 2014 Share Posted January 5, 2014 (edited) I'm failing to resist the temptation to be tedious, but as canaries go, this one has ceased to be. It is an ex canary: http://www.theguardi...s-judith-wilson ZIRPTM: Keeping Fergus in clover since October 2008. , Mortgage Express, their monthly payment is £353,000. Mortgage Express was part of Bradford & Bingley, one of the banks whose loans are now in the hands of the taxpayer. So we all own a share of the Wilsons' properties. They have three to four years to refinance the above mortgages the squeze is on http://www.propertyt...ugh-t-8904.html http://www.housepric...howtopic=194478 Edited January 5, 2014 by long time lurking Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
JPJPJP Posted January 5, 2014 Share Posted January 5, 2014 "If house prices go up by 5% rents will go up by 5%" Fergus Wilson did he really say that?? but he is right, he can ask what he wants for rent on any of his houses and, given that he controls enough of the market locally, he should be the price setter whether any prospective tenant will accept his offer is something for that prospective tenant to decide Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
SarahBell Posted January 5, 2014 Share Posted January 5, 2014 Which bit is he in? Ashford BRMA Shared Accommodation Rate: £63.88 per week One Bedroom Rate: £116.74 per week Two Bedrooms Rate: £138.46 per week Three Bedrooms Rate: £165.09 per week Four Bedrooms Rate: £219.23 per week Downloads about the Ashford Broad Rental Market Area (BRMA): BRMA map (the area where this LHA rate applies)(2205.9 KB, (PDF)) Information about the BRMA (591.5 KB, (PDF)) List of Rents - view a graph of the rents used to set the LHA rate for Ashford Canterbury BRMA Shared Accommodation Rate: £73.15 per week One Bedroom Rate: £117.92 per week Two Bedrooms Rate: £147.40 per week Three Bedrooms Rate: £176.89 per week Four Bedrooms Rate: £259.43 per week Downloads about the Canterbury Broad Rental Market Area (BRMA): BRMA map (the area where this LHA rate applies)(2152.6 KB, (PDF)) Information about the BRMA (581.9 KB, (PDF)) List of Rents - view a graph of the rents used to set the LHA rate for Canterbury High Weald BRMA Shared Accommodation Rate: £76.27 per week One Bedroom Rate: £132.69 per week Two Bedrooms Rate: £173.08 per week Three Bedrooms Rate: £206.36 per week Four Bedrooms Rate: £330.19 per week Downloads about the High Weald Broad Rental Market Area (BRMA): BRMA map (the area where this LHA rate applies)(1227.7 KB, (PDF)) Information about the BRMA (634.6 KB, (PDF)) Three Bedrooms 321 £108.92 £980.77 £206.36 Four Bedrooms 146 £173.08 £830.77 £330.19 Is he renting rooms out? Are they all HMO? All Ashford would have to do is bring in compulsory registration for private landlord property and he'd instantly have a bill of (is it 600 properties he's got?) x a few hundred quid. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
@contradevian Posted January 5, 2014 Share Posted January 5, 2014 (edited) Has he actually served notice on anyone? I think he's full of hot air. Heaven forbid that anyone 'in the media' should investigate if his threat is true. Maybe someone should tip off his creditors. 200 potentially empty houses could sink his BTL boat completely Edited January 5, 2014 by aSecureTenant Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
LiveinHope Posted January 5, 2014 Author Share Posted January 5, 2014 Wilson is apparently giving notice to 200 housing benefit tenants, so 20% of his 1000 homes (these are the ones he knows about that get all their LHA paid by the taxpayer, I am sure he has more tenants receiving LHA but he doesn't know since they don't receive it in full). What percentage of voids would be needed to bankrupt his business model? I think he has insurance to cover voids - which I think is part of his reasoning for clearing out HB recipients. I don't think he can get insurance to cover voids if the tenants are on HB. So it may all be driven by his vulnerability to voids and requiring insurance like a crutch. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
juvenal Posted January 5, 2014 Share Posted January 5, 2014 I think he has insurance to cover voids - which I think is part of his reasoning for clearing out HB recipients. I don't think he can get insurance to cover voids if the tenants are on HB. So it may all be driven by his vulnerability to voids and requiring insurance like a crutch. He seems very confident he can get European migrants into those properties. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
long time lurking Posted January 5, 2014 Share Posted January 5, 2014 I'm failing to resist the temptation to be tedious, but as canaries go, this one has ceased to be. It is an ex canary: http://www.theguardi...s-judith-wilson ZIRPTM: Keeping Fergus in clover since October 2008. Every month the couple have to meet huge repayment commitments. They don't disclose their total borrowings, which are spread across many institutions, but say that for one lender alone, Mortgage Express, their monthly payment is £353,000. Mortgage Express was part of Bradford & Bingley, one of the banks whose loans are now in the hands of the taxpayer. So we all own a share of the Wilsons' properties. Acording to this http://www.thisismoney.co.uk/money/mortgageshome/article-1689285/Buy-to-let-gurus-see-empire-crumble.html he was paying 5.24% interest in 2012 so £350k interest would make the loan £80 million ? or so if so we own (the taxpayer) just about all his properties Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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