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Evening Standard: "buyers shun ‘vanity’ prices"


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HOLA441

Saw this in Friday's Evening Standard but couldn't find it online at the time - don't think it's been posted in the meantime.

The headline is odd - it starts off making it sound like the market is strong ('all-time high') only to then mention the fact buyers are shunning the prices.

https://www.standard.co.uk/business/business-news/market-for-london-homes-over-1m-hits-alltime-high-as-buyers-shun-vanity-prices-a3863971.html

Couple of things struck me.

1. I've read a lot about 7 years of new-build 'luxury' appartments in the pipeline causing a glut - but this article focussses on the second-hand market and says at current sales levels there are 7 years worth of those too. Plus this is a period when the market is meant to be very restrained as far as stock.

2. This quote leapt out "... people have often spent lots of money on their property but all have pretty much the same flooring, the same type of kitchen, it’s all very similar, and what was stylish four years ago is just going out of fashion. They think because they have spent X on their home it is worth X more, but it’s not necessarily the case.”  Anyone who reads the Evening Standard or any of the mainstream press' property sections will have seen hundred of articles on families doing up a cheap London terrace houses slapping on a tasteful modernist extension - and the articles always end with an 'estimated value' of somewhere over a million. Looks like those estimates values may about to be tested. I imagine they'll find it a bit galling too to discover that four years after spending x thousands on a trendly extension its already gone out of fashion!

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2 hours ago, lostinessex said:

I imagine they'll find it a bit galling too to discover that four years after spending x thousands on a trendly extension its already gone out of fashion!

I'm not sure that space ever goes out of fashion (well, unless you're a house-builder apparently), but aside from that, yes. My mum keeps trotting out this notion regarding general 'improvements' - I just smile and wave, boys, smile and wave...

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4 minutes ago, tomandlu said:

I'm not sure that space ever goes out of fashion (well, unless you're a house-builder apparently), but aside from that, yes. My mum keeps trotting out this notion regarding general 'improvements' - I just smile and wave, boys, smile and wave...

Space doesn't although the style its built in does but I'd be surprised if that's that significant a factor, seeing as houses of all ages sell well enough (at least compared with each other). A clash of building styles on the same house might put some off. But new kitchens and so on to sell? That's just expensive twig-in-vaseishness unless the old one is a completely unusable disgusting wreck.

Edited by Riedquat
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HOLA447
12 minutes ago, shavedchimp said:

Buyers may be shunning 'vanity' prices because they're to embarrassed to haggle for a discount:

https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2018/06/17/british-reserve-means-20-per-cent-haggle-house-prices/

Incredible really - biggest purchase of your life and all that, and 80% of buyers won't do it.

a wise woman once told me, if you're not embarrassed by how low your offer is then its not low enough

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HOLA448
8 minutes ago, shavedchimp said:

Buyers may be shunning 'vanity' prices because they're to embarrassed to haggle for a discount:

https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2018/06/17/british-reserve-means-20-per-cent-haggle-house-prices/

Incredible really - biggest purchase of your life and all that, and 80% of buyers won't do it.

I tried to haggle on my recent house purchase by submitting an offer of 10% below the 'offers over', the solicitor has advised about 5% as a cheeky initial bid. Unfortunately the seller just wasn't in the mood for haggling.

He accepted my first offer (I'll be paying roughly 60% what he did four years ago). I should have been cheekier.

Interestingly, the place has a new kitchen and bathroom fitted despite the previous kitchen and bathroom in the historical EA listings looking perfectly OK.

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26 minutes ago, shavedchimp said:

Buyers may be shunning 'vanity' prices because they're to embarrassed to haggle for a discount:

https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2018/06/17/british-reserve-means-20-per-cent-haggle-house-prices/

Incredible really - biggest purchase of your life and all that, and 80% of buyers won't do it.

simple programming for the plebs, mass scale

 

haggling is presented as getting a £25 item for £20 on bargain hunt or whatever state propaganda they churn out now

 

houses are presented as "with a value of" 

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19 minutes ago, Diver Dan said:

I tried to haggle on my recent house purchase by submitting an offer of 10% below the 'offers over', the solicitor has advised about 5% as a cheeky initial bid. Unfortunately the seller just wasn't in the mood for haggling.

He accepted my first offer (I'll be paying roughly 60% what he did four years ago). I should have been cheekier.

Interestingly, the place has a new kitchen and bathroom fitted despite the previous kitchen and bathroom in the historical EA listings looking perfectly OK.

Where was this?  I doubt that would be true for London.

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HOLA4412

i would never buy a property with a service charge attached like a lot of these london flats are like. thats a large bill you never get rid of. whats the point of that, might as well rent. infact best thing of all get yerself a campervan, thats the future.

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11 minutes ago, iamnumerate said:

Where was this?  I doubt that would be true for London.

Aberdoom. Sales volumes are through the floor and inventory rising constantly, but most sellers don't seem to have realised that their houses are overpriced and they continue to hold on for months (and years in some cases) for a buyer to come along. Part of me worries that I've bought a pig in a poor, because the seller let go too easily. Not reassuringly expensive enough.

Still the 10% means I can buy a pot of Farrow & Ball instead of B&Q trade emulsion.

Edited by Diver Dan
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Buyers of apartments in new-build towers not only have to pay sky-high prices but also face soaring annual service charges that now average £2,777 a year, according to new research.

Some of the worst service charges are found in new apartment blocks lining the River Thames in London, where residents will have to pay nearly £7,000 a year on a two-bed flat.

The research, by Direct Line for Business, found that property service charges have jumped substantially, with a third of management companies increasing fees in the past two years.

 

 

so stick service charge and council tax and yer £100 a week before you turn the light on or pay the mortgage. 

 

i honestly dont know how people do it. im on a decent wage but time all the leeches take their slice it dont seem very decent anymore, im amaxed at folk with 300k mortgages and all these other bills on top

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2 hours ago, shavedchimp said:

Buyers may be shunning 'vanity' prices because they're to embarrassed to haggle for a discount:

https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2018/06/17/british-reserve-means-20-per-cent-haggle-house-prices/

Incredible really - biggest purchase of your life and all that, and 80% of buyers won't do it.

I am put off enquiring about houses because I am too frightened to haggle at the moment. I still fully expect that any low offer (say 10 -20% below asking) will be dismissed out of hand. In many areas, sellers either do not believe their kite flying prices are delusional, or else they refuse to acknowledge it and will just carry on waiting for the 'right' offer to come along. I think there need to be more news headlines about falling prices before I have the confidence to haggle, backed up by those headlines.

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7 hours ago, lostinessex said:

 

2. This quote leapt out "... people have often spent lots of money on their property but all have pretty much the same flooring, the same type of kitchen, it’s all very similar, and what was stylish four years ago is just going out of fashion. They think because they have spent X on their home it is worth X more, but it’s not necessarily the case.” 

Kitchens and bathrooms are depreciating liabilities, and are usually chosen/installed by people who have no eye for design. I cringe when I see cheap particleboard and plastic bench tops, creaky orange laminate flooring, aeroplane-sized bathroom sinks etc. etc. etc.

Extensions that add space are much better and do increase the selling price, especially if you get another useable bedroom, a downstairs toilet etc.

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2 hours ago, jimmy2x3 said:

i would never buy a property with a service charge attached like a lot of these london flats are like. thats a large bill you never get rid of. whats the point of that, might as well rent. infact best thing of all get yerself a campervan, thats the future.

Very tempting......I would not choose to buy something with a service charge, CT is quite enough service to pay for.......freedom to choose home insurance or no insurance, freedom to do own home repairs and maintenance or no repairs and maintenance......no communal areas apart from the road.?

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21 hours ago, tomandlu said:

I'm not sure that space ever goes out of fashion (well, unless you're a house-builder apparently), but aside from that, yes. My mum keeps trotting out this notion regarding general 'improvements' - I just smile and wave, boys, smile and wave...

Anything that's the height of fashion will be out of fashion in a few years. 

Grey, and in particular grey kitchens are one that will soon IMO be going the way of avocado bathrooms.  Apart from anything else, what possesses people to want grey, when on so many days of the year you only have to look out of the window? 

Decking is another. Every other b*gger was installing decking not long ago - now it's widely seen as naff.  Still, it's provided nice cosy residences for lots of rats. 

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19 hours ago, Diver Dan said:

Aberdoom. Sales volumes are through the floor and inventory rising constantly, but most sellers don't seem to have realised that their houses are overpriced and they continue to hold on for months (and years in some cases) for a buyer to come along. Part of me worries that I've bought a pig in a poor, because the seller let go too easily. Not reassuringly expensive enough.

Still the 10% means I can buy a pot of Farrow & Ball instead of B&Q trade emulsion.

Thanks, I don't understand how people can hold on to a house for years.  If it is empty you pay council tax, if you want to move then any reduction you can ask the vendor of your new house for.

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1 hour ago, Mrs Bear said:

Anything that's the height of fashion will be out of fashion in a few years. 

Grey, and in particular grey kitchens are one that will soon IMO be going the way of avocado bathrooms.  Apart from anything else, what possesses people to want grey, when on so many days of the year you only have to look out of the window? 

Decking is another. Every other b*gger was installing decking not long ago - now it's widely seen as naff.  Still, it's provided nice cosy residences for lots of rats. 

Tattoos. The blue man generation in his grey kitchen with his rat-infested decking rotting away outside. A capsule memory of the early twenty-first century.

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2 hours ago, Mrs Bear said:

 Decking is another. Every other b*gger was installing decking not long ago - now it's widely seen as naff.  Still, it's provided nice cosy residences for lots of rats. 

Think I'll keep the decking mind you, it's the only way of getting usable level ground at the back near the shed. Might be full of rats underneath it for all I know (not that I've seen any sign) but there's plenty of overgrown steep bank around for them to live in anyway.

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2 hours ago, winkie said:

It is not what the decor is inside four walls, it is what the environment is like outside four walls......easier to change one, not so easy to change the other.........?

Plummeting rapidly just about everywhere. Still, that's progress for you.

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4 hours ago, Mrs Bear said:

Anything that's the height of fashion will be out of fashion in a few years. 

Grey, and in particular grey kitchens are one that will soon IMO be going the way of avocado bathrooms.  Apart from anything else, what possesses people to want grey, when on so many days of the year you only have to look out of the window? 

Decking is another. Every other b*gger was installing decking not long ago - now it's widely seen as naff.  Still, it's provided nice cosy residences for lots of rats. 

Retailers encourage outlandish colours and styles knowing that they date quickly and another sale will follow before long...

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