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Entries in July 2007
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I know. It's tomorrow. I just wanted to be the first to say it, because, well, you mean a lot to me.
Technorati Tags: property, real estate
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Mr Cent... I know exactly where you're coming from. Except I'd have to add the tubes are a cxxt. Apparently, 50 Cent is hot to become 25 Pence and find a place in Marylebone.
I have a top guy searching for the perfect house for me right now beside the Landmark Hotel, where I always stay. I love the Marylebone area, it's great around there.
Right on, 25. Here you go, mate:
[via SoundGenerator]
Technorati Tags: celebrity, London, property, real estate
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Over 50 celebrity homes, over 70 film locations, over 20 musical landmarks... it's the London Star Map.
Technorati Tags: celebrity, London, property, real estate
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I enjoyed it... although I'd liked to have seen something about the detrimental effect of developer-led arsitecture on the urban and suburban environment. Another blogger - a northern property writer who knows his patch - is less impressed.
Tonight's must-see TV [July 30, 2007]
Technorati Tags: property TV
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... which you can find here.
She owns a smallish landlocked house at the end of xxxxx xxxx in St John's Wood but rents a flat locally if she's having any work done in her house. The number of the house is xA so perhaps that's why it seems that it is an apartment.
I can tell you a couple of intriguing particulars about the house if that's what she's selling and if it's of any interest as I have been there a few times.
I don't blame her for moving on from there, it's easy for anyone to track down her address and she lives at the end of a t-road. Her only escape is through the front door and gate as the site is blocked in at all sides. I can't imagine why she'd bother with the hassle of selling it, she could just buy another house locally and leave her assistant there.
Technorati Tags: celebrity, London, property, real estate
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The rallying cry - reported in Estate Agency News - comes from Paul Smith, chief executive of Spicer Haart:
Tesco might think that ‘‘Every little helps" — but it won’t be at my expense.
Love it. He calls on estate agents to stick together and prove their worth. More controversially:
Estate agents with sole agency contracts need to be careful. There’s nothing to stop their vendors from sellling privately. You need to consider reverting to sole selling rights and include a clause which prevents the seller from using an Internet Property Retailer at the same time.
Technorati Tags: estate agents, real estate agents
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According to The Mortgage Lender - "debt solution providers" for those in "special circumstances" - young people are expressing their bravado by taking their mobile phone bills, shredding them, packing them into the carriers' pipes, and lighting them. Except it's not funny.
A County Court Judgement (CCJ) can be recorded against their name without them even knowing about it because of a small unpaid mobile phone bill, for example, or outstanding student loan - in many cases, purely because the company has been unable to make contact to arrange settlement because of change of address.
Then - when you're all grown-up and thinking about ditching your Nikes for your first pair of proper shoes - up it comes and bites you on the arse... all those affordable homes courtesy of Gordon Brown, but you can't get a mortgage. Yeah... thought you were clever sticking it to the man... now look at you! Needless to say, I'm paraphrasing.
Technorati Tags: property, real estate
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It's Dispatches: Britain's Bad Housing, on Channel 4 at 8pm. Andrew Gilligan - yes, that Andrew Gilligan - apparently demonstrates why the private sector doesn't have the answer to the country's so-called housing shortage. (A trip up the M5 will demonstrate something similar.) But there's more... have a look at this piece by Gilligan himself. The programme promises to reveal some very interesting evidence that lobby group PPS have been forging signatures, bugging council officials, bribing, bullying, writing fictitious letters from fictitious residents in support of planning applications... while working for high-profile builders including Berkeley Homes, Barratt, Taylor Woodrow and others. Interestingly, there appears to be a whiff of unpleasantness surrounding Fulham's Imperial Wharf.
Technorati Tags: architecture, design, London, property, property TV, real estate
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... the Rat and Mouse still needs your help. Keep that property porn coming.
Technorati Tags: London, property, real estate
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More in this Category - Linkage
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How about some good news to take with us to the weekend? In January, the Rat and Mouse called on its readers to write in protest at plans to demolish Joseph Rykwert's last remaining London building to make way for a luxury residential development by Foster & Partners.
The planning inspectors have moved to save Inner Court (Old Church Street, Chelsea), and criticised the Foster plan as "inward-looking", "monolithic" and potentially resulting in "a poor neighbourly effect".
[via Building Design Online]
Technorati Tags: architecture, design, London, property, real estate
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The Rat and Mouse continues to enjoy the BBC series The Tower - which, as far as we're concerned - is a very moving and sympathetic view of the life on the Pepys Estate, and an effective indictment of the insanity of the London housing market... the very insanity the Rat and Mouse is here to document. Apparently, though, not everyone's delighted with the series:
What's been going on in this programme is not really good enough. They have turned some of these drug addicts into film stars but they should have been looking at the pensioners round here instead. We're not the best in the world around here but we're not as bad as all that.
... the words of the leader of the local pensioners' group. He's retired, himself. Apparently he used to be a gangster. But he wasn't a drug addict.
[via This Is Local London]
Meet you new landlord, excuse the drooling and the nappies [July 17, 2007]
Technorati Tags: London, property, property TV, real estate
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Just a fortnight ago, the Rat and Mouse pointed its whiskers at Earlsfield, and it smelt good. Now - here's the Times - with a few more reasons why buyers looking for a value foothold into the London's south west might want to look at SW18.
All eyes on Earlsfield [July 11, 2007]
Technorati Tags: London, property, real estate
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More in this Category - Linkage
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Jeez, I can't believe I'm still printing speculative HIPs news... like 20 months isn't enough time for the Government to get their story straight. Anyway, HIPs are finally (probably) arriving - in a mutated, stupid, inbred version - on Wednesday. And still people continue to debate methods of HIP-avoidance. Here's Henry Pryor - founder of TheHipExchange - blowing smoke into the eyes of those who think they can go HIP-less:
I can describe my fourth bedroom as a study.
The RICS suggested doing this might save you the cost of the HIP but according to the property website Primemove.com, the difference between a three bedroom and a four bedroom house in London is about £160,000.
I can take out an advert before the end of July and even if I don't market my house until next year, it will be exempt.
The transition period is for property on the market now but will extend to any property being marketed in 2008
The fine if you don't have a HIP is only £200 so why bother?
Trading Standards officers have the power to refer an estate agent who fails to comply to the Office of Fair Trading who can take steps to ban an estate agent from practicing.
So long as I order one then I am covered. I can cancel it if I decide not sell.
An order made for a HIP cannot be cancelled unless previously agreed with the Pack provider. It seems unlikely that such an offer would be acceptable and the provider would successful sue to recover the cost though the Small Claims Court.
If I sell the house myself I don't need a HIP.
The Act defines 'the responsible person' as either the homeowner or his agent if one is instructed.
No one is going to bother checking if every property has had an HIP.
By recording the details of every property advertised on the Internet in the same way that property aggregators like Primemove.com and then cross referencing them with the central register of Energy Performance Certificates it is possible to identify any qualifying property that requires a HIP and by extension which ones have not. The HiP Exchange offers a compliance service based on this model to larger solicitors and estate agents who want the reassurance that they are not missing any properties.
Okay, then, Mister... what about this?!! The Rat and Mouse has been made privy to some very interesting email correspondence between a UK search agent and somebody within the DCLG. Presumably - the search agents asks - since we're paid by, and acting for, the purchaser, we're not technically "estate agents". The DCLG grey-suit concurs. So - continues the search agent - if we place the details of a property against our database of clients and find a match... and are then paid by the purchaser... we can complete the transaction HIP-free. The civil servant gives them the nod. So - there you (appear to) have it. HIPs... good for search agents.
Technorati Tags: property, real estate
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Just 0.1% in July, according to Nationwide, leaving the annual inflation figure at 9.9%. These figures compare with 1.1% for June (and annual inflation at 11.1%).
Technorati Tags: property, real estate
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Doesn't it bring it home to you? I mean... it hardly seems real until it effects somebody off the telly. If you thought hundreds of thousands of people without drinking water sounds bad, yesterday it was TV chef Anthony Worral-Thompson who was worrying about his farm near the Thames in Henley, and Virgin chief Richard Branson's Kidlington estate was partially submerged. More here.
Technorati Tags: celebrity, property, real estate
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In brief... because I'm about to leave for meetings... it's Kate Moss - and who can blame her? She's apparently selling her flat and looking for somewhere, in St John's Wood, that's more private. A link to particulars, as always, welcome.
[via ShowBizSpy]
Technorati Tags: celebrity, London, property, real estate
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So... soon, I'm going on holiday. It's always a problem. What to do about posting to the Rat and Mouse? The London property market doesn't stop just because the London property blogger's lying on a beach with matchsticks between his toes watching Charlie's Angels lookalikes pit his olives. So for a full 12 months I've been working secretly on... a device. A computerised, roboticised, fully-automated property-blogging device. I'm now in a position to announce that it still needs work.
Last year, as an experiment, I ran nine days of extraordinary property - daily listings of the great, the good, the interesting, the available. I expected a small drop-off in traffic... disappointed Rat and Mouse readers angered by my absence and voting with their browsers. In the event, readers arrived in droves. The experiment was a success, even if I was a little offended to see the traffic rise during my absence. No matter.
So this year, I'll be doing something similar. Which is where you come in. I need particulars... send me links to London properties that you think other Rat and Mouse readers might like. They don't have to be expensive... just interesting. You'll remain anonymous, unless you specifically request a credit. And estate agents (I know - for a fact - you're reading this)... you're welcome, too. You don't even have to pretend to be somebody else. I'm off in less than two weeks, so please start sending your links, now... here. Thanks.
Technorati Tags: London, property, real estate, theRatandMouse
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"Why not cut the crap?" asks one of the Rat and Mouse's favourite property bloggers. If a toaster costs $20, it costs $20. Why don't houses come with fixed retail prices? Wow. I don't know.
Technorati Tags: property, real estate
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If you've visited Portsmouth you've probably spotted that circular fortress, known as No Man's Land, lying about a mile off in the Solent. (And if you haven't visited Portsmouth, why not visit somewhere else instead?) Not being the kind of person who carries binoculars, I've never had the opportunity to get a closer look at it... until now. Apparently, it's for sale... and it's not just a weird rock in the ocean; it's a very cool luxury home fit for a Bond villain. Twenty-one bedrooms, two helipads, swimming pool, gym, amusement arcade... but the best bit is the giant atrium in the middle. No Man's Land dates - apparently - from the 1860s, when it was built to keep the French out. Its more recent history includes Doctor Who and commercial property fraud. It's now being sold to recoup some money from the aforementioned fraud... and it's on the market listed at £4m. A bit of historical perspective... here.
[photos via FindAProperty]
Technorati Tags: property, real estate
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From RIBA:
While today’s headlines on the green paper are all about numbers and flooding, the lasting story has to be about good design. We certainly need more homes – but unless design quality is built into the Government’s plans, I’m worried we’ll be repeating the mistakes of the past when volume housebuilders packed estates with boring boxes, and lining ourselves up for some pretty devastating consequences.
Right on.
And the Guardian carries this interesting range of responses from bodies with an interest in social housing.
Technorati Tags: property, real estate
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(Which, of course, there might not be.) According to figures from a trade body representing 90% of the equity release industry (the other 10%, let's not think too hard about them) are reporting 7,400 new plans taken out in the second quarter of the year, amounting to £300 million. That's the highest figure to date, and up from £262.8 million the same period in 2006.
Technorati Tags: property, real estate
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It's the data we've all been waiting for... buy-to-let mortgage broker The Money Centre's Landlords' Chuckle Index, measuring the chuckle level of a nation's landlords. The headlines? Seventy-three per cent of UK landlords are reporting a high or very high level of chuckleness, compared to 71% last time. That means landlords are 2% happier.
Technorati Tags: property, real estate
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More in this Category - Linkage
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If I've read the very good housing strategy PDF for Hammersmith and Fulham correctly (here) only 3,000 people have registered for affordable housing despite the maximum wage [with which you're allowed to apply] being £60,000.
But 50% of residents rent...
The posters for the affordable housing scheme are all over Hammersmith. So why aren't people signing up??
Technorati Tags: London, property, real estate
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The auction catalogue included half-a-dozen flats barely two years old at Henry Laver Court, part of a Barratt development in the heart of Colchester, Britain's oldest town and a popular commuter zone for City workers. The flats sold, with incentives, for between £224,995 and £249,995 last year. Their reserve price at the auction last week was £140,000; five sold for £145,000, the other for £155,000. Local estate agents have similar flats in the development on the market for £180,000.
The Telegraph has an interesting story about novice buy-to-let landlords getting their fingers burnt by on new-builds - falling for tempting "Stamp Duty-paid" and "guaranteed-rental-income-for-two-years" offers on off-plan apartments. The Rat and Mouse has written before about the dangers of buying new-builds off-plan - and covered instances of flippers in a flap. Don't believe everything the developer tells you (obviously). New-builds are notoriously hard to value. And the evidence was all around when Paul Farrow, of the Telegraph, visited an auction in Covent Garden.
Technorati Tags: property, real estate
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Whatever they are, Brits - collectively - had six and half of them wrapped up in assets as 2006 drew to a close, according to the Office for National Statistics. And of those trillions, 3.9 of them come in the form of property... that 60% of British wealth.
Technorati Tags: property, real estate
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More in this Category - Linkage
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He's likely to be moving in with girlfriend Kirsten Dunst now that his Camden home has... er... collapsed.
A main wall inside his home in Camden, North London, had collapsed leaving the place looking like a "bombsite". Johnny is said to be so fed-up, he wants rid of the place altogether. He and 25-year-old Spider-Man star Kirsten already have their eye on a £5million townhouse nearby.
[via the Mirror]
Technorati Tags: celebrity, property, real estate
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What should Brown do? Publish, as is? Or "tweak" it before release and deny everything?
Technorati Tags: property, real estate
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Two very interesting snippets, by Graham Norwood, writing in the Sunday Times. There is an Olympic Effect, but it's not what some people were hoping for. Estate agents are apparently blaming The Games for a drop-off in interest in east London. And - despite all the buy-to-let hateration - we need landlords as much as first-time buyers need properties. According to Hometrack, renters need another 600,000 landlords by 2021.
Technorati Tags: London, Olympics, property, real estate
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Apparently, the Blairs' new Connaught Square neighbours haven't exactly had their concerns laid to rest since the couple moved in.
One of Blair's neighbours Dr Shella Arora was approached by a cop with his gun pointing at her while she was parking her car outside her apartment.
Dr Arora is a 72-year-old ex-GP. The policeman apparently asked her why she was parking her car outside the apartment. She explained that it was because she lived there. The policeman couldn't think of any more questions. There's been more gun-pointing, too... enough for residents to be concerned that one of them might be shot by accident. Blimey, if this was a council estate in Manchester they'd be looking at serving the Blairs with an ASBO.
Technorati Tags: celebrity, London, property, real estate
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More in this Category - Linkage
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In case you're wondering, the criteria:
Relationship to surroundings and neighbourhood.
Response to site constraints and opportunities.
Layout, grouping and landscaping.
Planning of roads and footpaths.
Handling of garages and car parking.
Attention to safety, security and accessibility.
External appearance and internal planning.
Sustainability in construction.
Finishes, detailing and workmanship.
Awards are also made to projects with planning permission but that haven't been built. We're going to look at completed projects.
[image courtesy of Design For Homes]
The Overall Winner is London-based Tabard Square [illustrated], behind London Bridge Station, by architect Rolfe Judd and developer Berkeley Homes. At it's heart: a 22-story tower with a clever built-in barometer... LEDs that change with the weather. There's clever management, too, including a deal with a hotel, resulting in a better, more complete, concierge service for residents. What's more, there are 212 high-quality affordable homes included in the development.
Other London winners are Pimlico's Tachbrook Triangle, by Barratt and Assael Architecture - a hi-tech development that managed to retain and protect an historic and endangered Georgian terrace - and Islington's Melody Lane, by developer London Wharf and architect Julian Cowie - copper-clad townhouses on the site of a former garage.
See the complete list - with illustrations - here.
Technorati Tags: architecture, design, London, property, real estate
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According to research by online mortgage brokers mform (for an imformed mortgaged choice) 10% of those planning to take out a mortgage in the next three years will be hoping to borrow more than five times their salary. Average mortgage repayments are now £7,000 a year.
[via Daily Mirror]
Technorati Tags: property, real estate
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It's a five-bedroom home in Harrow-on-the-Hill, listed with Savills at £1.75m, and it comes with a double-hit of celebrity. The current vendor is Kay Burley - of Sky News fame. It was previously owned by Kenneth Connor, of Carry on Matron (and a whole belly-laugh of other Carry On films).
[via Daily Telegraph]
If these walls could talk... Welsh edition [July 17, 2007]
If these walls could talk... Elton John edition [July 16, 2007]
Technorati Tags: celebrity, London, property, real estate
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More in this Category - Linkage
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In fact, if all goes to plan, it will beat the UK's current most expensive home - Updown Court - by a full £75m, to become the country's finest and most beloved symbol of excess. Currently, though, it's where they make Fame Academy.
According to this in the Telegraph Witanhurst - the mock-Georgian, slightly dilapidated mansion on West Hill, in Highgate, has just been bought - all 5.5 acres and 65 rooms - by developer Marcus Cooper for £32m. The plan is to restore the 1920s building, which you might have seen starring in Nicholas Nickleby and/or Tipping The Velvet (it played a house), to its former glory and then sell it for £150m. Sounds like a lot of money? It is - of course - a lot of money. But Witanhurst is also the second largest private house in London after Buckingham Palace. Whoever buys it will be able to look down their nose at considerably poorer neighbours George Michael and Sting. The Rat and Mouse would like to offer its congratulations to Knight Frank for their involvement in the sale.
Technorati Tags: London, property, real estate
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That's apparently designer Richard Hywel Evans's pet-name for the New Atlas Wharf (Isle of Dogs) penthouse, currently for sale with Knight Frank at a guide price of £1.95m. Details? Polished stainless steel reception room. Top floor hot-tub with views across London. Putting green. Gas fire pit.
Technorati Tags: design, interiors, London, property, real estate
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According to the results of a survey, here, first-time buyers are stumbling into property purchases without the facts. Almost a half don't know the difference between leasehold and freehold, and only 7% commission a full structural survey. (Does anybody know what the percentage would be, looking at the market as a whole?) The real headline is that two-thirds express regrets less than 12 months after moving into their new homes. Noisy/annoying neighbours are the number one reason, and the Rat and Mouse is pretty sure that even a full-structural survey won't include that. But others include rising damp, drainage problems, leaking roofs and rotting windows.
Technorati Tags: property, real estate
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Simon Heffer's stoking up emotion over at the Telegraph, on the subject of "Brown's plans to concrete over large parts of England". Is it that I'm just starting to notice the phenomenon, or is there an alternative view of the housing shortage just now starting to make itself heard? Much of what Heffer has to say is entirely sensible... if provocative in the wording. His main points are:
- previous, rushed social housing projects have resulted in slums or ghettoes, or just been despised and pulled down.
- there's too much empty property for there to really be a housing shortage.
- there's too much brownfield land to necessitate building on greenfield sites.
- we shouldn't build in the over-crowded south east... if we build elsewhere jobs will follow.
- nowhere is it written that homeowning is the natural state of being... there's nothing wrong with renting.
This made me wince:
And why, since we are so crowded, and since five million employable people live here on invalidity benefit, are we further crowding ourselves by having an open-door policy towards immigrants?
I wonder why [it made me wince]? Considered dispassionately and separate from the host of associations that pop up when confronted with such a statement, there's nothing wrong with highlighting the relationship between a housing shortage and immigration (although the logical connection to invalidity benefit defeats me). The comment thread that follows the piece is fascinating.
Technorati Tags: property, real estate
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More in this Category - Linkage
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 Charlie - featured in the Telegraph - might just be (let's hope) London's youngest landlord. He's 12 weeks old. His mother bought him his Fulham flat while still in labour. The piece features other pint-sized homeowners, too... and offers useful advice to those in a fortunate enough position to be able to think about buying property for their kids... an investment in the future. But... hard-nosed and realistic as any good property feature should be... it goes on to warn, it's not just the value of your property that can go down as well as up:
The child whom you treat to a leg-up the property ladder might not grow into the adult you had hoped for. What if that sensible one-bedroom flat turns into a venue for riotous parties, or, instead of getting a job and taking up residence in the home you bought for him, your good-for-nothing 21-year-old announces he is going to bum around the world instead?
That's right. Your child could grow into a lazy shit with zero talent for landlording.
And on the subject of buying property for your kids... has anybody been watching The Tower... a moving (depressing) and remarkable BBC 1 documentary about the "regeneration" of the Pepys Estate? The wealth gap is back in the news, but nothing illustrates it better than the contrast between the worries and strains of those buying at the top of the refurbished tower and those struggling to create something like a life in the surrounding neighbourhood. It's compelling documentary-making.
Technorati Tags: London, property, property TV, real estate
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We're not afraid of living in London.
Good for you. The Rat and Mouse might be a bit alarmed about moving to Sheffield.
Technorati Tags: London, property, real estate
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Dylan Thomas's former home, Sea View, in Laugharne in Carmarthenshire, was picked up for £232,000 at an auction last week. The new owner, architect Graham Milsom, plans to restore the house to the way it was when Thomas entertained TS Elliot and Arthur Miller there in the last years of the 1930s. More here.
Technorati Tags: property, real estate
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A two-bedroom, two-bathroom let, on Pembroke Road between Kensington High Street and Cromwell Road... apparently rented by Sir Elton John and David Furnish during 2005 when their usual Holland Park pad was being refitted. It's 2,450 sq ft, and rents for £2,000 a week. For more details, go here.
If these walls could talk... 17th Century hooker edition [June14, 2007]
Technorati Tags: London, property, real estate
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Remember Patrick Dixon, whom you can watch here as he asks... what affordability problem? Well, Simon Jenkins can't seem to locate a housing shortage, either. In an audacious column in the Sunday Times, he rubbishes Gordon Brown's house-building plans, wonders what's wrong with renting, suggests house price inflation isn't all it's cracked up to be and blames Brown's pension-plan plundering for an obsession with homes as investments. You might not agree with him, but the piece is a great read.
Technorati Tags: property, real estate
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They knew it was never going to be easy. But, perhaps, the Blairs' new Connaught Street neighbours were hoping there'd at least be a little settling in time to soften the blow, before the ex-Prime Minister's presence started to impinge on their everyday lives. Well, he's been in his new home just over week, and they've apparently had their parking bays suspended.
Technorati Tags: London, property, real estate
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It's the one that's late, but the one that matters... based, as it is, on completions. The headlines are:
In May, house prices rose 0.7%, with flats (1.8%) leading the charge (contrary to almost all the current chatter about a surplus of apartments and a shortage of houses). Terraced houses were next best (0.9%), followed by semi-detached homes (0.6%) and detached properties (0.3%). The annual inflation figure fell from 11.3% in April to 10.9%; and for the three months to May, the figure was 11%. In London, the May-to-May figure was 14.5% (from 14% in April).
Technorati Tags: London, property, real estate
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In the Sunday Times, Rosie Millard introduces us to Paul Ainsworth-Lord... a young man (38) with a posh name and 39 houses worth £5m in a small town in Lancashire... plus a local newspaper shop which he uses to sniff out available properties before they reach estate agents. He even once wrote to an entire village, asking if he could buy their homes and rent them back to them. Ouch.
Technorati Tags: property, real estate
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More in this Category - Linkage
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The Bank of America - armed with a recent property market slump experience - has been looking at the UK market. Apparently, it's all about the 20%. UK houses are overvalued by 20%, and there's a 20% chance of a catastrophic crash. But - mostly - they think prices will stultify... offering "very subdued" inflation until 2010. More here.
That's it from us until Monday - have yourselves an entirely unsubdued weekend.
Technorati Tags: property, real estate
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More in this Category - Linkage
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Flaky, capricious, wobbly – to hell with private buyers!
Says Libby Purves, in the Times. She wanted rid of a studio on the Old Kent Road, and fast, so - after a period of vendor hell - she signed up with one of those companies who'll buy on a handshake if it's cheap. The company she used pay for a valuation (you pick the surveyor) and offer 15-17% less, take it or leave it. I can't make my mind up about this kind of a deal. I can see how, under some circumstances, it can be useful. And I can see - especially at a time like this - that the buyer's position, even with a 15% discount, isn't without risk. But I still feel uncomfortable about the vendors who aren't media personalities selling a second or third home.
Technorati Tags: property, real estate
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Despite a fairly neutral report from Savills, recently, it seems the luxury end of London's property market has more than enough heat left in it. Knight Frank are reporting the highest monthly increase in their luxury property index since their records began 31 years ago. In the £2.5m and above sector, prices rose 3.1% in June, leaving the annual inflation rate at 35%. More here.
Technorati Tags: London, property, real estate
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 Do any of you use the Foxton's podcast/vidcast service? I've got to admit, I wasn't actually aware of it before reading this interesting if slightly confused piece in the International Herald Tribune. Foxtons believe in rss, but their Web manager, Leo Lapworth, is sceptical about video tours:
If I'm a buyer, I don't really need to see someone opening a cupboard door, what I need to see is the floor plan, the room-by-room descriptions, and that's what's going to help me decide whether I want to see the property or not.
Which explains why their selection of vidcasts and podcasts are such a strange hybrid... an automatic computer-generated voice reading particulars, accompanied - in the "video" version - by still photographs. It's functional, fast and cheap, which has got to be right... but the dalek does nothing for Foxtons' friendly image.
More news to me from the IHT piece is BuyAssociation - a website offering advice about buying houses and, er, other stuff. Here, you can listen to podcasts by Adrian Mills and Maggie Philbin interviewing industry experts on property and cosmetic surgery. What?!! Oh yes, it's a homebuying and facelifting site... an impartial buying guide for the property-hungry and slack-joweled. And what's odd about that?
Your particulars - the movie [July 6, 2007]
Technorati Tags: estate agents, Foxton's, real estate agents, Web, Web2, web2.0
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The Telegraph runs this interesting piece about how developers are responding to the co-buying trend. Duet Apartments, as St George have dubbed them, feature identically-sized bedrooms (presumably to halt arguments before they begin) with en-suite bathrooms and they're apparently enjoying a lot of success at developments in West Drayton and Colindale.
Technorati Tags: property, real estate
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Nestoria - the property search engine responsible for powering the Rat and Mouse's own search facility (front page, top right, give it a whirl) - have added a clever new feature. Partnering up with ParkAtMyHouse, they now offer information about local parking opportunities - not just conventional carparks but privately rented parking spaces - with each and every property search.
Technorati Tags: property, real estate, Web2, web2.0
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According to Rosalind Russell, writing in the Telegraph, estate agents are deliberately populating property listing websites with homes that were sold weeks ago or - in some instances, she hints - were never on the market. The idea is to appear useful and relevant during a property shortage, and to encourage the phone call in order to register the details of a potential buyer. The result for us? A waste of time. For estate agents, should the public get wise to this? It's put succinctly by Nick Goble of Winkworth:
Credibility is being undermined by more than one agent, and if we lose our credibility, we are snookered.
Technorati Tags: estate agents, property, real estate, real estate agents
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The RICS's system is tortuous, but this is how it goes: the number of surveyors/agents reporting house price increases outnumbered those reporting declines by 10.6%, and the headline is that 10.6% is the lowest figure reported by the RICS since January 2006... when we were in the middle of a mini-slump that most commentators appear to have forgotten. It's all about interest rates, says the RICS... buyers are spooked.
Technorati Tags: property, real estate
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 Property portfolio managers Young Group have bought into The Retreat - a gated development of 26 apartments by Findon Urban Lofts off Garratt Lane, on Furmage Street - and are extolling the virtues of Earlsfield as south London's next hotspot. Although the Rat and Mouse knows little about The Retreat, it agrees with Young that Earlsfield has everything going for it in terms of location... situated, as it is, close by the Wandsorth-Putney-Clapham triumvirate, which has been making astonishing ground in property prices recently. Young Group buys properties off-plan for private investors, and lets them out for them too. They claim to have "successfully let all investors' apartments within a week of completion". The Retreat will be ready in the summer of 2008. More here.
Technorati Tags: London, property, real estate
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An interesting thread over at the Channel 4 4homes forum... what does a cemetery at the end of the garden mean for a house's marketability? Would it bother you? Aren't quiet neighbours what we all want?
Technorati Tags: property, real estate
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Property search engine Properazzi appears to be heading further and further afield to find the sunshine promised in their logo. Rat and Mouse readers will find properties from Egypt, Morocco, Algeria and Tunisia added to their already extensive roster.
Technorati Tags: property, real estate, Web, Web2, web2.0
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The story is that she's tired of Hollywood and her boyfriend - Essex model Paul - is tired of having to jump through hoops to find parts for his pimped out white Astra - so what's stopping a move to London?
[via Fametastic]
Incoming celebrity alert - P Diddy yo! [July 9, 2007]
Technorati Tags: celebrity, London, property, real estate
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The industry has reacted to Alistair Darling's comments about short-term profiteering with a kind of weary amusement:
Here's John Charcol:
A lot of his comments seem like he hasn’t done his homework on the mortgage market. There are a lot of 10, 15 and 20 year products and three lenders are offering 25 years. But the reason why there’s only 3 lenders offering this is because there’s no demand. Lenders are desperate to keep customers for longer term contracts. But the fact remains that a lender can’t afford not to be in the 2 year market as it has the most demand.
And here's Hamptons' Jonathan Cornell:
Whilst I am sure the new chancellor means well [you see, "new" chancellor, "means well", I like the way he's done that], I think he is flogging a dead horse... despite brave attempts from a couple of lenders very few long-term fixed rates were sold.
The problem - obviously - is that lenders need to factor in the risk of interest rates rising, and so 25-year fixed-rate mortgages always look a bit, well, expensive. But, of course, the "new" Chancellor - being the new Chancellor - obviously knows that...
[via MoneyMarketing]
Technorati Tags: property, real estate
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