What's their secret? With transactions down 25% on last year and at a two-year low in August (RICS figures), Foxtons - after a good year - continue their march. This time, a new branch in Stratford, their eighth new office since 2010 and their 32nd in total, due to open its doors on October 1.

Technorati Tags: property, real estate

It's courtesy of the Daily Mail... the tale of immigration officer Julia High who returned from the Proms (my God, it's getting better) to find a family of Romanians in her house, claiming they had a tenancy agreement with the son Miss High never had. She's owned her Leytonstone home for 30 years. When she turned up, they apparently offered her a glass of wine. She appears not to have encountered any problems having them evicted the next day, but they've caused chaos in her house and been through all her things, which must have been very upsetting. More here.

Technorati Tags: property, real estate

The epicentre of the violence in Hackney has been around my house. Police in barricades have battled rioters outside the church 50m down my road in sporadic melees. Every local shop for miles has been shuttered. Cars and recycling bins have been set on fire. Helicopters constantly hover above, filming and surveying the unfolding damage. This is not what estate agents were referring to when they described local streets as “cosmopolitan”.

It's a short but interesting piece by the FT's Tony Tassell, and worries about the element of rioting as "spectator sport" he witnessed in Hackney, the cheering (of the rioters) as they attacked the police. Has Hackney, he asks, really changed?

Technorati Tags: property, real estate

Ron Adams is 72, he's lived in the same council house since he was 8, but his council want him out. More than a thousand local residents have signed a petition demanding he be allowed to stay, but the three-bedroom flat is apparently "under-occupied" since the death of his mother and brother, and Ron - despite suffering from depression and panic attacks - can expect the bailiffs. More here.

Technorati Tags: property, real estate

This is St Margaret's Road in Tottenham, normally a quiet row of terraced houses, but more recently the theatre for a battle that has been rousing the tabloids. It's where Julian and Samantha Mosedale and family were apparently turfed from their newly renovated home by a gang of Romanian squatters, forced to rent locally and called racist by the police when they complained. They're now back in their home, which - according to reports - has been trashed... and the squatters have moved down a few hundred years to Strode Road, where they're either renting or have taken over an apartment. The reporting has been distinctly manipulative (suggesting there was nothing the Mosedales could do... when - in fact - they received a fast-tracked court order and the squatters were forced to leave, and resulting - in the case of at least one Daily Mail comment - in calls for the BNP to sort this out). Obviously, their position is upsetting, and the fact that they've been put to considerable expense very unfair. But - at this point - the tabloids are in danger of starting a race riot in a quiet corner of N17.

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... Bow, Walthamstow, Clapton, Harringay, Deptford and - that old chestnut again - Tooting... apparently.

Technorati Tags: London, property, real estate

Developer in hot water for bulldozing historic Wanstead building [This Is London]
Glenda Jackson: Social housing policy can beat the Fascists [Independent]
Tweetlister: tweets your property [Tweetlister]
Footballers who lose on property [Realestateweb]

The Rat and Mouse - it's about your house

Technorati Tags: London, property, real estate

Nothing. Apparently.

If these walls could talk... Beckham house redux [April 28, 2009]
Update on the Beckham house [November 18, 2008]
Celebrity caché adds £650,000 in Leytonstone, apparently [November 17, 2008]

Technorati Tags: celebrity, London, property, real estate

First it appeared on Gumtree, with an asking price of £850,000. We scoffed, until we heard about a £1m bid from an anonymous Austrlian football fan. Now, David Beckham's one-time family home - a three bedroom terraced house in Leytonstone - is on the market again, and it looks like we were right to scoff. Lot 57, to be auctioned Monday May 11, guide price £215,000.

Technorati Tags: celebrity, London, property, real estate

Perhaps we were being a little cynical. According to this, the owners have already received a £1m bid from an Australian Beckham fanatic. But really??!!

Technorati Tags: celebrity, London, property, real estate