Mind The Gap: London V The Rest

[dances with sheeple]

Just watched on iPlayer and it all seemed a bit inconsequential. Looks to me as it was produced to be sold abroad as a travelogue. It should really have been made by a foreigner, not someone all mixed up in it. The usual expensive, panning shots of Canary Wharf, The Shard etc. The North portrayed as an industrial wasteland (there is interesting stuff going on up here, if anyone cares to look).

Lots of things unexplored such as the guy commuting from Stockport but why? I suspect he can get a pretty decent house in Stockport which would be unattainable in London, and he has to work in London, as they have white boards and sticky notes there, and can do brain storming by all standing up in a room and shouting stuff (I've visited the Tea Warehouse a few times and its hardly the Hadron Collider). Seemed a sad indictment that despite all this fantastic networking technology being cooked up in the East End, they still have to meet up.

Been watching a series of video's on Youtube by Anton Kreil, a former trader who has been explaining what life is really like working for an IB. As an analyst starting on £50k per year but you have to work in Central London, as you have to be in the office by six, and stating you will have a sh*t life, and be living from month to month which is probably more of the reality for thousands of Londoners.

One of those shows which in twenty years time (perhaps less) will be totally laughable. Like looking at clips of Picadilly Circus before the car was invented.

It was just London, London, London, London is great. London is going to pop big time IMO. The Youtube links look interesting, for a laugh maybe?

[@contradevian]

It was just London, London, London, London is great. London is going to pop big time IMO. The Youtube links look interesting, for a laugh maybe?

[cock-eyed octopus]

Have to agree with this. I have a table somewhere which shows the amount of government spending per head broken down into regions. London is near the top, higher than Scotland - it was from an article slaying the myth that Scotland is a basket case subsidised by London. What seems indisputable is the UK government is racking up huge debts blowing money into London without a credible plan to get that money back. A diminishing number of high earners in London doesn't make a healthy tax base!

Not borne out by these data:

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/politics/10465138/Chasm-between-English-and-Scottish-spending-widens.html

( I checked them with a pdf from:

Public expenditure by country and region

Standard Note: SN/EP/4033

Last updated: 10 January 2014

Author: Dominic Webb

Section Economic Policy and Statistics Section )

This has to be offset against the GDP of London being 22% of the UK, while having approx. 12% of the population.

As for the argument, finally settled after a decade, about London turning out not to be really economically viable without massive bailouts and government funding, like the miners and the ship builders, only on an epic scale, you're right, I don't remember it.

[dances with sheeple]

Very interesting, wanted to write him off as someone who had been screwed over by a big bank and had a grievance, but everything he said is food for thought. My take away is that the days of Big Banking/Big Bonus are over? Earning over the 40% tax threshold in the UK is pointless, you need to be just under or on benefits, or clued up on how to avoid tax, IMO, the inbetweeners are just being farmed so the chavs and elites can put their feet up.

[@contradevian]

Very interesting, wanted to write him off as someone who had been screwed over by a big bank and had a grievance, but everything he said is food for thought. My take away is that the days of Big Banking/Big Bonus are over? Earning over the 40% tax threshold in the UK is pointless, you need to be just under or on benefits, or clued up on how to avoid tax, IMO, the inbetweeners are just being farmed so the chavs and elites can put their feet up.

No he's made his money alright but the days of making big money are over. As Anton says you have to deal with the market you inherit. Also note all the 'market making' functions are fully automated using algorithms.

Doubt any of this would fit into Evan Davis's view of London which was pure propaganda IMO. "Once Crossrail, is over they are already planning Crossrail2 blah blah", yeh right, I think they will be running empty by then and London will just be a tourist attraction and just maybe a centre of government.

Edited March 5, 2014 by aSecureTenant

[dances with sheeple]

No he's made his money alright but the days of making big money are over. As Anton says you have to deal with the market you inherit. Also note all the 'market making' functions are fully automated using algorithms.

Doubt any of this would fit into Evan Davis's view of London which was pure propaganda IMO. "Once Crossrail, is over they are already planning Crossrail2 blah blah", yeh right, I think they will be running empty by then and London will just be a tourist attraction and just maybe a centre of government.

Yes, his Just Too Happy to be Here vibe gives it away as sheeple manure, all total B.S, but that is what the Idiot Lantern is for after all?

[billybong]

They're being forced to live on rations

It depends what Anton Kreil means by "a very basic life".

The wages/bonus for those jobs even those at the lowest/youngest level are still well above the average for London and the average London wage really does only allow a very basic life (because of property/rent costs) - unless you own your home outright or have private means etc.

Few jobs, even in London,will offer their lowest/youngest level employees anywhere near the sort of money (on Anton Kreil's lists) to start with - even given some increases with promotion.

Of course he means a very basic life for a banker type and that's a completely different thing altogether.

And a two year contract is quite a secure contract compared to some contracts in some other UK jobs including qualified/experienced technical jobs.

Edited March 6, 2014 by billybong

[Neverwhere]

Not borne out by these data:

http://www.telegraph...ing-widens.html

( I checked them with a pdf from:

Public expenditure by country and region

Standard Note: SN/EP/4033

Last updated: 10 January 2014

Author: Dominic Webb

Section Economic Policy and Statistics Section )

This has to be offset against the GDP of London being 22% of the UK, while having approx. 12% of the population.

London figures in line with NE and NW spending makes more sense given poverty levels are equivalent in many boroughs. Not sure I agree with the general tone of the article as it makes sense that the devolved nations would need an additional amount to fund their seperate parliaments, so it would need to present a case for relative need plus parliamentary costs coming in at or under London/NE/NW, which it doesn't make any attempt to do.

A lot of other posters seem to be conflating the City of London with London proper. Bailing out the City hasn't been any better for Londoners than it has been for anyone else i.e. some few have managed to use it to their advantage, while the majority have been severely screwed (though some haven't come down from their debt-binge fuelled high enough to realise it yet).

We would have all been better off had that money been spent elsewhere or not at all.

[(Blizzard)]

London figures in line with NE and NW spending makes more sense given poverty levels are equivalent in many boroughs. Not sure I agree with the general tone of the article as it makes sense that the devolved nations would need an additional amount to fund their seperate parliaments, so it would need to present a case for relative need plus parliamentary costs coming in at or under London/NE/NW, which it doesn't make any attempt to do.

A lot of other posters seem to be conflating the City of London with London proper. Bailing out the City hasn't been any better for Londoners than it has been for anyone else i.e. some few have managed to use it to their advantage, while the majority have been severely screwed (though some haven't come down from their debt-binge fuelled high enough to realise it yet).

We would have all been better off had that money been spent elsewhere or not at all.

Trouble with these spending statistics is that not all spending is 'identifiable'. Some is deemed to benefit the whole country, such as, the 2012 Olympics. Or, presumably, the bank bailouts and hs2.

Also, not all state expenditure is on balance sheet. The BBC spends something like 500 per head per year in London, for example, and then we wonder why the media is such a big industry in the capital.

As to the bank bailouts, no they don't benefit Londoners, but they are the only thing that kept the 'London miracle' alive, after it went bust in 2007.

[lastlaugh]

Not borne out by these data:

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/politics/10465138/Chasm-between-English-and-Scottish-spending-widens.html

( I checked them with a pdf from:

Public expenditure by country and region

Standard Note: SN/EP/4033

Last updated: 10 January 2014

Author: Dominic Webb

Section Economic Policy and Statistics Section )

This has to be offset against the GDP of London being 22% of the UK, while having approx. 12% of the population.

As for the argument, finally settled after a decade, about London turning out not to be really economically viable without massive bailouts and government funding, like the miners and the ship builders, only on an epic scale, you're right, I don't remember it.

I was referring to this document - HM Treasury - Public Expenditure 2012You need to look at table 9.2.

Admittedly your data might be a bit more up to date, but your data also supports the central point that London sucks in a suspiciously high amount of government money.

[Neverwhere]

Trouble with these spending statistics is that not all spending is 'identifiable'. Some is deemed to benefit the whole country, such as, the 2012 Olympics. Or, presumably, the bank bailouts and hs2.

Also, not all state expenditure is on balance sheet. The BBC spends something like 500 per head per year in London, for example, and then we wonder why the media is such a big industry in the capital.

As to the bank bailouts, no they don't benefit Londoners, but they are the only thing that kept the 'London miracle' alive, after it went bust in 2007.

The olympics was a glorified ad campaign that screwed a lot of London businesses because they actually kept people out of central London for the duration, HS2 only benefits Londoners if you think we have a deep burning desire to go to Birmingham, bank bailouts have been just as bad from our perspective as from everyone elses (except fot the tiny minority who are bankers) and not all of the banks involved are even in London. The BBC just spent millions relocating to Manchester, their programmes are available to everyone in the UK and many of them are made outside London in Cardiff and Salford.

None of these things are actually benefiting Londoners above anyone else so it would be deeply misleading to include them in spending on Londoners. The 'London Miracle' (whatever that really is, personallly I think it's just cheap money looking for a home and finding it in the pockets of a tiny minority of people who could originally be from literally anywhere in the world) doesn't benefit the majority of Londoners, many of whom are still struggling. Most Londoners (excluding outright owners) are spending over 50% of their income on basic housing, with increasingly long and overpriced commutes thrown in because they can't afford to live anywhere near where they work, and even then bedroom only multiple occupancy flats (i.e. no dining or living room so basically glorified bedsits) and shared bedrooms are becoming increasingly normal for Britons not just migrant workers, whom btw we have more of to compete with than elsewhere in the UK. I used to live in Brent, it's a sh*thole with a knife crime problem. Do you know how much of the income of the average person living in Brent is spent on housing? It's over 70%! Add to that a large number of minimum wage jobs in a city where the minimum wage bares no resemblence to living costs whatsoever and it becomes really hard to stomach the use of London as some sort of synonym for the City or priviledge.

Apart from the illusory "feel good factor" for owners who are too stupid to know they will be screwed when the bubble finally bursts, or the gains made by the minority who have sold up and moved out of the capital, what normal Londoner has actually gained?

I think a lot of native Londoners would leave if they weren't so universally hated in the rest of the UK. I know I would.

[Greg Bowman]

I think a lot of native Londoners would leave if they weren't so universally hated in the rest of the UK. I know I would.

Do you really think that native Londoners give a tinkers about that ?

I have family all over the UK and never come across it but then I don't look for differences I look for similarities what a funny little set of eyes you view the world through

Edited March 7, 2014 by Greg Bowman

[Neverwhere]

Do you really think that native Londoners give a tinkers about that ?

I have family all over the UK and never come across it but then I don't look for differences I look for similarities what a funny little set of eyes you view the world through

As a native Londoner I have experienced people being knee-jerk nasty and/or aggressive on the basis of my accent. Happens in the UK, has never happened outside of it.

I also have friends who have come down to London and married Londoners and whose families are very belittling and competative with their spouses, feeling the need to constantly denigrate London and Londoners in general and making them feel incredibly unwelcome.

That's not to say that the majority of people aren't nice or in fact that there aren't more similarities in our predicaments than differences (I think if you read the thread you can easily see that I've been arguing that normal Londoners are just as screwed as everybody else which is the exact opposite of claiming some sort of difference), but there's enough bad feeling not to want to live with it, especially from people who feel (most likely quite rightly) that they've been priced out of desirable locations by the more well off Londoners who have moved out (often only having moved in during their working years in any case).

There's quite a lot of bad feeling expressed against London on this site and in this thread so it's a bit weird that you haven't actually noticed it or that you feel the need to try and belittle someone who has. I wonder how you would feel about it if people regularly used your hometown as a synonym for bankers and the overpriviledged?

[Neverwhere]

People have no specific axe against 'Londoners', whatever they are.

However, there may be ill feeling against those who think their own good fortune is down to their personal effort/skill or whatever versus lazy other parts of the country (fill in name) when in fact it is largely down to macro effects that are entirely mismanaged. When you have the London Evening Standard brainwashing its inhabitants that they effectively are paying for the rest of the country, you can see how the attitude of Londoners is affected and how that rubs off on people outside London who only see skimmimng, scamming and paper pushing with no real wealth creation going on.

I certainly have no ill feeling to Londoners. I'm from down there. I, like 1 million others NET, have left London (environs) in the last 20 odd years...but you try hearing that message in the London trumpeting media.

I don't know anyone in London who thinks that Londoners are paying for the rest of the country. I've met some upper middle class people who think they are subsidising everyone in the entire UK, which is essentially the reverse of the real situation, but this belief had no discernable geographic angle to it. In fact almost noone I know in London thinks that they're experiencing good fortune right now given current quality of life has dropped off a cliff because of the housing situation, so would be impossible for them to extrapolate their non-existant good fortune as down to personal effort! Maybe it's a generational thing...

[Neverwhere]

This is a classic. Ignores the fact that most of the 'inheritance' due is on unearned gains.

http://www.telegraph...South-East.html

Clearly aimed at the upper middle class minority:

Older family members are already making big financial contributions to younger generations through school fees, property purchases and so on.

Even with London HPI most people whose parents own outright will not exceed the married couples inheritance tax limit unless their parents are divorced so the house is being judged against the single persons limit, in which case sucks for them but given the maths of the entire situation sucks outright it's just another drop in the ocean of suckiness.

[BlokeInDurham]

I also have friends who have come down to London and married Londoners and whose families are very belittling and competitive with their spouses, feeling the need to constantly denigrate London and Londoners in general and making them feel incredibly unwelcome.

Do they denigrate Londoners, or particular London-esque traits?

There is somewhat of a self-important arrogance that tends to follow people from London to different degrees. I think this is usually unintentional, but it doesn't come across well. There is certainly a tendancy, for instance, for no-one to actually be from London! They are all from X, Y, or Z, which on further questioning turn out to be little particular bits of London. In conversations with fellow Londoners this is probably relevant, but many Londoners seem to do this in any conversation. It's noticeable because no-one from anywhere else seems to do it. I might say which part of Durham I live in when talking to someone else from Durham, but I wouldn't expect someone from anywhere else to know, or quite frankly to care!

Earlier today I got a couple of e-mails from an e-mail list I'm signed up to for work. Someone had noted an upcoming networking session (in London), and had been asked if there were any plans to hold anything, you know, outside of London. Their response was that yes, all of the events were held in London (several per year) at the minute, but that they had big plans: by summer they should be ready to detail a new regime by which they would start special non-London events, maybe even one this year! It's not like it's even a London-centric profession we're talking about. But still, apparently London is a 'default', and the world divides into London and non-London. I don't know of another British city where a mindset exists quite like this.

Or on a more trivial note (but which demonstrates the same line of thinking), how many 'general knowledge' quiz questions have you ever seen about London underground stations? Versus how many about the Tyne and Wear Metro? There is a certain assumption that everyone is interested in the place by the Thames.

There's nothing wrong with Londoners as individuals but there are certain attitudes that tend to be prevalent in Londoners that grate.

[(Blizzard)]

The olympics was a glorified ad campaign that screwed a lot of London businesses because they actually kept people out of central London for the duration...

...None of these things are actually benefiting Londoners...

...The 'London Miracle' (whatever that really is, personallly I think it's just cheap money looking for a home and finding it in the pockets of a tiny minority of people who could originally be from literally anywhere in the world)...

The rise of London isn't an achievement to be replicated, it's a symptom to be cured.

I can't speak for everyone else, but my argument is solely directed against what I called the 'London miracle'. That's a shorthand for the apparent boom in the London economy in the last 20 years, particularly compared to the relative lack of growth in the rest of the UK.

We now know that it is all a mirage. The credit crunch proved that. It was all just a corrupt and unsustainable credit bubble, which is currently being reinflated by government subsidies.

Without the bailouts and the other government spending, and without a blind-eye turned to corruption, the oligarch's theme-park isn't viable.

So who does this benefit? Not traditional Londoners, an endangered species anyway. Certainly not the British people, who increasingly can't live in their own capital. It only really benefits a class of wealthy global elite and, in the short term, the landed British establishment. This comes at the expense of everyone else.

The very way we measure growth and economic activity is designed to measure their growth and their activity. That's why we hear cheers when house prices rise, and boos when they fall.

This is all economics and politics. Londoners are more productive, on paper, but not because they work harder or are cleverer or more ambitious. They are less productive in reality, but not because they are stupid and lazy. The government could have put the money taps in any city, the effect would have been exactly the same. Economics and politics, not people, psychology or, ugh, 'mentality'. Save that crap for mumsnet.

Edited March 8, 2014 by (Blizzard)

[Neverwhere]

Do they denigrate Londoners, or particular London-esque traits?

There is somewhat of a self-important arrogance that tends to follow people from London to different degrees. I think this is usually unintentional, but it doesn't come across well. There is certainly a tendancy, for instance, for no-one to actually be from London! They are all from X, Y, or Z, which on further questioning turn out to be little particular bits of London.

The opposite of this really, although I think it's probably a pre-emptive strike against the assumptions which you discuss. The particular families I'm talking about spend a lot of time pumping the importance and greatness of various aspects of their local area (fair enough) while simultaneously going on about how sh*t everything in London is and how arrogant and priviledged all Londoners are (quite nasty) while the spouse is desperately trying to avoid any kind of geographic conversation whatsoever. One friend has become so depressed by it he essentially shuts down any time they visit his family, which is really not helping his spouse at all!

Don't have anything against development outside of London btw, which I would actually strongly encourage. Any move away from the financial services pseudo-economy in the SE would benefit everyone in the long run, including the majority of Londoners.

[Neverwhere]

The rise of London isn't an achievement to be replicated, it's a symptom to be cured.

I can't speak for everyone else, but my argument is solely directed against what I called the 'London miracle'. That's a shorthand for the apparent boom in the London economy in the last 20 years, particularly compared to the relative lack of growth in the rest of the UK.

We now know that it is all a mirage. The credit crunch proved that. It was all just a corrupt and unsustainable credit bubble, which is currently being reinflated by government subsidies.

Without the bailouts and the other government spending, and without a blind-eye turned to corruption, the oligarch's theme-park isn't viable.

So who does this benefit? Not traditional Londoners, an endangered species anyway. Certainly not the British people, who increasingly can't live in their own capital. It only really benefits a class of wealthy global elite and, in the short term, the landed British establishment. This comes at the expense of everyone else.

The very way we measure growth and economic activity is designed to measure their growth and their activity. That's why we hear cheers when house prices rise, and boos when they fall.

This is all economics and politics. Londoners are more productive, on paper, but not because they work harder or are cleverer or more ambitious. They are less productive in reality, but not because they are stupid and lazy. The government could have put the money taps in any city, the effect would have been exactly the same. Economics and politics, not people, psychology or, ugh, 'mentality'. Save that crap for mumsnet.

Agree, especially with the highlighted section.

[Greg Bowman]

As a native Londoner I have experienced people being knee-jerk nasty and/or aggressive on the basis of my accent. Happens in the UK, has never happened outside of it.

I also have friends who have come down to London and married Londoners and whose families are very belittling and competative with their spouses, feeling the need to constantly denigrate London and Londoners in general and making them feel incredibly unwelcome.

That's not to say that the majority of people aren't nice or in fact that there aren't more similarities in our predicaments than differences (I think if you read the thread you can easily see that I've been arguing that normal Londoners are just as screwed as everybody else which is the exact opposite of claiming some sort of difference), but there's enough bad feeling not to want to live with it, especially from people who feel (most likely quite rightly) that they've been priced out of desirable locations by the more well off Londoners who have moved out (often only having moved in during their working years in any case).

There's quite a lot of bad feeling expressed against London on this site and in this thread so it's a bit weird that you haven't actually noticed it or that you feel the need to try and belittle someone who has. I wonder how you would feel about it if people regularly used your hometown as a synonym for bankers and the overpriviledged?

I am a Londoner so they do use my home town as a synonym for bankers and the over privileged ?

I filter all the bull re London, every capital city seems to have that effect doesn't it ? the Americans talk about New Yorkers, the French about the Parisians etc

If you are a Londoner why would you join in and make such a sweeping. Generalisation that we all want to leave ?

[Neverwhere]

I am a Londoner so they do use my home town as a synonym for bankers and the over privileged ?

I filter all the bull re London, every capital city seems to have that effect doesn't it ? the Americans talk about New Yorkers, the French about the Parisians etc

If you are a Londoner why would you join in and make such a sweeping. Generalisation that we all want to leave ?

A lot is not the same as all, a lot of people in my generation are really struggling and many of my friends talk about leaving but are put off by the amount of anti-London sentiment that generally seems to be around and has been specifically experienced on the odd occasion. That doesn't mean we don't love London btw, just that income to housing costs are so out of whack that living in London means you're taking a real hit to your quality of life right now unless you happen to be part of the minority elite, so it is pretty hard to stomach the assumptions of priviledge and arrogance that are often levelled at London in general. I know that amongst the various nasty comments I personally have recieved was quite a long and vile rant by someone who was privately educated as to how "posh" and "priviledged" I was because I was a Londoner, never mind the fact that I was state educated or that their school fees alone were vastly in excess of the price my parents paid for their house. Very similar rants in terms of relative social positon have been directed at friends of mine, including a semi-annual one from a mother-in-law that I would personally not have the good grace to be able to sit through.

Edit: again, maybe it's a generational thing...

Edited March 8, 2014 by Lo-fi

[Greg Bowman]

A lot is not the same as all, a lot of people in my generation are really struggling and many of my friends talk about leaving but are put off by the amount of anti-London sentiment that generally seems to be around and has been specifically experienced on the odd occasion. That doesn't mean we don't love London btw, just that income to housing costs are so out of whack that living in London means you're taking a real hit to your quality of life right now unless you happen to be part of the minority elite, so it is pretty hard to stomach the assumptions of priviledge and arrogance that are often levelled at London in general. I know that amongst the various nasty comments I personally have recieved was quite a long and vile rant by someone who was privately educated as to how "posh" and "priviledged" I was because I was a Londoner, never mind the fact that I was state educated or that their school fees alone were vastly in excess of the price my parents paid for their house. Very similar rants in terms of relative social positon have been directed at friends of mine, including a semi-annual one from a mother-in-law that I would personally not have the good grace to be able to sit through.

Edit: again, maybe it's a generational thing...

I agree with everything you say me old sparrow

It is generational and 'lucky' I wandered into IT which as an industry has done very nicely in London out of the bankers, media and just about any foreign HQ in London.

It will all go t**** up sooner or later just hope I get my timing right in terms of cashing in.

[winkie]

I am a Londoner so they do use my home town as a synonym for bankers and the over privileged ?

I filter all the bull re London, every capital city seems to have that effect doesn't it ? the Americans talk about New Yorkers, the French about the Parisians etc

If you are a Londoner why would you join in and make such a sweeping. Generalisation that we all want to leave ?

I am a Londoner and so have many generations been Londoners.......but London is only a place where any person Londoner or not feels contented, satisfied, free and safe.....when the sums, along with the quality of life does not add up, those who want and are able can if they want or inclined find better, better connected local community, open and aware than the fast, artificial, unreal, overcrowded place with huge division between the have got lots, and have got very little place that London has now become....technology brings people together and drives them so they are very able and can easily depart......simple is best, real is cool, space is a premium where old space is no longer spacious....

Edited March 8, 2014 by winkie

[Mrs Bear]

I know that amongst the various nasty comments I personally have recieved was quite a long and vile rant by someone who was privately educated as to how "posh" and "priviledged" I was because I was a Londoner,

Sounds like someone with a big chip, not to mention pathetic.

When we were living in Oman we were friends with a couple from Leeds (most of our friends happened to be from up north) but the Leeds woman was always banging on about how 'everyone' from the S of England, (not just London) was horrible and a vile snob. This was despite her being friends with me ( southerner) and Mr B, who is a Londoner born and bred. I once said to her 'So do you think Mr B and I are horrible snobs, then?'

'No, but you're different.'

Fact is, she just had some massive, inexplicable chip on her shoulder. She was something of an arsey type anyway. I dare say she had once fancied that someone from the South was looking down their nose at her. Never mind that this can happen to anyone, no matter who you are or where you're from.

[Neverwhere]

I agree with everything you say me old sparrow

It is generational and 'lucky' I wandered into IT which as an industry has done very nicely in London out of the bankers, media and just about any foreign HQ in London.

It will all go t**** up sooner or later just hope I get my timing right in terms of cashing in.

That is a very tricky call to make, but good luck to you! The few friends I have who are doing consistantly okay are similarly in IT (even the lawyers crash down to below national average wages some years), with the best paid among them having 'invested' in housing with eyes fully open to a prospective HPC on the gamble that he will choose the right moment to cash out. Personally I would have chosen more sustainable investments (as I hope you have) but then I am risk averse and don't like the idea of leveraging good money for hypothetical gains which bear no real relationship to fundamentals.

When I joined this site a few months ago all of the remaining hold-outs in my circle were talking about buying in a very serious way - spurred on by HTB, superficial and largely illusory savings in monthly mortgage payments versus rents, and poor quality private landlords - and while some of them have bitten the bullet and taken on mind-boggling levels of debt (as above) quite a large proportion have backed away from the idea for the near future or ruled it out in its entirety. The realities of the London market have scared them. One, who previously was very keen on getting into a financial position to BTL (if you can't beat them join them was the essential attitude), was even telling me about the possible benefits of a HPC the other day! Pleasantly shocked...