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Entries in December 2007
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Here's what they're saying:
Assetz 5%
Savills 3%
Knight Frank 3% (Prime London)
CML 1%
Hometrack 1%
RICS 0%
Lombard Street Research 0%
Rightmove 0%
Nationwide 0%
Halifax 0%
The Rat and Mouse -2% (national)
John Charcol -2%
Citigroup -3%
Global Insight -3%
Capital Economics -5%
Morgan Stanley -10%
What a difference a year makes. This time, 2006, the most pessimistic view was courtesy of Cluttons agents, and a 3% rise. Up at the top was Assetz, with a prediction of an 8-10% rise. The Rat and Mouse likes to hold fire for a few weeks and wait until the accurate DCLG figures before announcing a winner, but - after a late 2007 correction - it's looking as if the bears, including Cluttons and Capital Economics, are likely to walk away with the glory. However, it's probably okay to say right now that the general consensus was wrong. Just as it was wrong the year before, when a very bearish spread of predictions for 2006 misread the market entirely. The message? The experts' record for predicting house prices is very poor.
Another question entirely for 2008 is what should we wish for? The consensus is that it would be foolish to consider further bunker-busting house price rises a good thing, that they'd merely put off the inevitable, and make it more painful. The best we can hope for is, in reality, not very much... stable prices that allow general inflation to create a gradual, stealth house price correction in which nobody gets hurt, sanity is restored and first-time buyers profit. But that may take some time.
In the meantime, all that remains for the Rat and Mouse to do is wish its readers a very Happy New Year. Next time we meet, it'll be 2008.
Technorati Tags: property, real estate
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Incoming squillinaire alert - Lev Leviev [Diamonds.net]
Monopoly and our London [Zoomf blog]
The Rat and Mouse - because Londoners think about property every three seconds
I'll be back on Monday with the much-anticipated 2008 property price predictions. Until then, have a great weekend.
Technorati Tags: London, property, real estate
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An interesting email to the Rat and Mouse, headed "List of Top 100 Property Owners in London". Turns out it's not a list, it's a question:
I was just wondering whether there's such a list available. My guess is that the top 100 owners in London own nearly than 1000000 beds. My research has been vain until now and there appears to be no data available in the public domain. Thanks for your help guys in helping me crack the code.
That's a great question, and I'm damned if I know the answer. Surely that data exists somewhere. If you know... please drop me a line and I'll pass on all information to my correspondent.
Technorati Tags: London, property, real estate, the rat and mouse
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Nationwide's reporting a fall of 0.5% for December, leaving the annual inflation figure at 4.8%. The three-month figure is down to 0.9% (from 1.4% in November). In the accompanying comment, Fionnuala Earley makes the interesting point that house prices are finishing the year roughly where many analysts expected, however the route has been a little odd. That won't reassure chartists, however, who'll be focussing on the last few months' downward and seemingly sustained downward movement.
Meanwhile, lending's still down... 40% down November-to-November. More on that, here.
Technorati Tags: property, real estate
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More in this Category - Linkage
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Welcome back, Rat and Mousers... hope you're looking back fondly on a peaceful and satisfying holiday, in which you bonded afresh with your loved ones and received touching and surprising gifts. (Thanks - by the way - for all the comment spam. It was just what I always wanted.)
I know what you've all been wondering over the holiday... how much do you exactly need to be earning to feel rich in London? Luckily, a Financial Times survey can answer that question: £432,000. That's 18 times the average national wage, and more than twice the average salary of a director of a large company. What's really interesting is how that number compares to other UK cities. In Manchester - a truly happening city - the figure was "just" £91,000; in Glasgow, £115,900. Interestingly, the closest was Birmingham, with £318,600, which is clearly nonsense because nobody earning £318,600 would contemplate living in Birmingham. The reasons for the Londoner's sense of impoverishment? It's all comparative. It's about London's super-rich and non-doms changing perceptions of "wealthy"... More here.
Technorati Tags: London
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The Rat and Mouse will be taking a break now until December 27, when we'll be back with the lead-up to the traditional and very exciting New Year's property price predictions. Until then, wishing you all a very Merry Christmas... Ben
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Over at the Wimbledon Guardian, Balham residents are getting into a lather about the Foxtons fleet parking on their residential side streets and forcing them to park their own cars on neighbouring roads. What?! says the local Foxtons chief. We're paying at the bays just like anybody else driving into the area to work... And yet the residents just pick on the Foxtons estate agents, apparently even shouting at them from their doorways (read the comments below the piece). What's going on? Obviously, it's partly because they're the easiest to recognise, what with the cars and the aftershave and everything. But the Rat and Mouse believes it's also to do with the delight people take in identifying an "untouchable". Telemarketers... Jehovah's Witnesses... Foxtons estate agents... they're all treated as outside the circle of deserving basic manners... so in some ways it's a bit of a treat when the ordinary Joe - fresh from a day of having his nose hair tugged by any of his many bosses - can find an opportunity to vent. Get over it, says the Rat and Mouse. How about a "hug an estate agent" day in 2008?
Technorati Tags: estate agents, Foxton's, Foxtons, London, real estate agents
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More in this Category - Celebrity homes
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When the bank cut interest rates earlier this month, the Rat and Mouse expressed some doubts as to whether the cut would work its way down to the high street. My inbox quickly filled with emails pointing out that the lenders were already promising to play ball... and the following morning's Times ran a front page demonstrating the big mortgage giveaway with a few figures. The Rat and Mouse took its licking, and remained quiet.
A fortnight later:
More than half of mortgage lenders have failed to pass on this month’s interest rate cut in full to homeowners or to guarantee that they will.
The credit crunch has caused the banks so many problems, they're further from the charity business than they've ever been. Expect them to do everything they can - higher rates, higher fees - to claw back as much money as possible. For the time being... Bank of England base rates won't be as relevant to high street borrowers as many like to think.
Technorati Tags: property, real estate
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Remember Malcolm Green - the fanciful Hampstead estate agent in trouble for conning a schizophrenic old man out of more than half a million pounds? Last Friday, he and a colleague were found guilty on a number of charges. They're both going to spend Christmas and New Year behind bars, before returning for sentencing. But solicitors representing Green and his partner Shevket intend to introduce psychiatric evidence to prove that both estate agents are depressives and would be high suicide risks in prison. More here.
Technorati Tags: estate agents, real estate agents
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Director Patrick French of Lloyds Residential Property Services has been banned by the OFT for failing to pass on details of offers to clients and failing to disclose a personal interest in properties to potential buyers. Looking at the report, it appears the entire firm is to get the chop... which is big(ish) news, because if it's the same Lloyds I'm thinking of they're not a trivial player in east London.
Technorati Tags: estate agents, London, real estate agents
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More in this Category - Linkage
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The BBC's on-off-on again relocation of large departments from London to Manchester is in the news, with the Daily Mail taking a characteristically outraged tone over details of the home relocation process. They're being forced by the current climate to dig deep into the organisation's coffers to find a way to shift employees north. The Mail makes a big deal over the decision to award hefty one-off "decoration" payments, and help with solicitors' fees, HIPs and other moving expenses. More interesting, though, is the home-sale process. Employees' homes will be valued by at least two surveyors. 95% of the average valuation will be guaranteed, and a company called "Cactus" (new to the Rat and Mouse) will purchase the homes on the BBC's behalf, freeing up quick cash for the London expat. The homes will then appear in estate agents' windows (no details, as yet, as to which agents), and the BBC will swallow any negative price differential between that 95% figure and the actual real market sale price. Hmm... a license for estate agents to create a bit of quick turnover? More here.
Technorati Tags: London, property, real estate
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Charmed. Oh, there's more:
Poverty of weather, poverty of emotional expression (save for humor and violence) and, now it seems, poverty amongst first-time buyers of real estate.
Thanks, Chris Matyszczyk... perhaps growing up in the UK with that surname gave you more exposure to humour and violence than is representative. But that's neither here nor there. He's writing for ZDNet about cohabitation and Facebook, and in particular sharetobuy.com, a kind of speed-dating service for would-be home-sharers looking to get onto the ladder. His tone is, er, skeptical and, interestingly, he equates a willingness to use this service with greed. Has any Rat and Mouse reader tried sharetobuy.com? Any experiences to report?
Technorati Tags: property, real estate, Web, Web2, web2.0
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Then head for Europe, according to financial advisers Blevins Franks. The report is really aimed at UK buyers of overseas properties, recommending Euro-currency mortgages for tax advantages, stability offered by the European Central Banks and far more attractive interest rates. I wonder - though - whether it's possible to take out a Euro-loan for a UK property? Anyone know?
Technorati Tags: property, real estate
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According to Lucian Cook, director of Savills Research:
"The desirability of suburban life and the post war encroachment of suburbia, has resulted in the emergence of the super suburb.”
How do you spot a super suburb? Well, 50% of buyers in a super suburb are "high-ranking executives", 46% employed in City-related jobs. In the top 25 London suburbs, the average property value is £540,000. Space, quality-of-life, better schools... Savills gives a number of reasons for suburbia's popularity in the UK.
Technorati Tags: London, property, real estate
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A couple of June's ago the Rat and Mouse got uncharacterstically upset about a man selling off lunar land. We got over it. But, the subject's back in the news with this report by Reuters, quoting some top wealth management strategists who hope think they might have found a link between property prices here on Earth, and, er, space land, with space land leading property values by around a year. The good news? Moon real estate has rocketed in value during 2007. They do, however, warn against interpreting this as a forecast. Although, obviously, if you do interpret it as a forecast, you deserve all you get.
Technorati Tags: property, real estate
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Rightmove are blaming HIPs for a 3.2% house price fall nationally and - wait for it - a 6.8% fall in London in December, after a surge in one and two-bedroom homes hitting the market in the run up to HIPs day. A bit of mathematical voodoo reveals that the HIPs effect could have accounted for 1.1% of the national price fall and 2.3% in London. Rightmove's December figures leave their annual inflation rate at 4.8%, down from 7.9%. They aren't, however, being particularly bearish about the numbers, insisting that a monthly fall brought on by season and HIPs-related factors doesn't mean more falls in the New Year. More here.
Technorati Tags: London, property, real estate
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It strikes the Rat and Mouse that now is a particularly good time to be paying close attention to PropertySnake, the place to watch real-life asking price collapses as they happen. Today, we're particularly taken with this rather charming five-bedroom Victorian house in Clapham, down from an original guide price of £1.399m (according to this) to the current £995,000... that's a bargaintastic fall of 28%. Stay tuned for more. And have a great weekend.
Technorati Tags: London, property, real estate
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According to a survey by Hyder Consulting Environment and Home Survey, quoted here in the Times, almost half of buyers said they plan to use the HIPs EPC to demand a discount. HIPs, they say, will force prices down. Meanwhile (and thanks to a keen-eyed Rat and Mouse reader for this) the Royal Institute of Chartered Surveyors argues that HIPs will force prices up - especially for the first-time buyer, who will suffer an even worse tightening of supply when fewer people are prepared to pay to speculatively market a smaller property. Say "hi" to the HIP... the only red tape to push prices up and down simultaneously.
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According to a Royal Institution of Chartered Surveyors survey, only 1% of potential buyers are asking to see HIPs:
James Scott-Lee, a spokesman for RICS, said: "The survey results clearly show the complete apathy potential buyers have for Hips. They are seen as an unnecessary added tax on the selling process that you can't even give away."
[via Telegraph]
Technorati Tags: property, real estate
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From today, every property - if it's being marketed - needs a HIP. Expect critics to be watching closely for any correlation between HIPs and low supply at the smaller - first-time buyer - end of the market.
Technorati Tags: property, real estate
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More in this Category - Comments
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According to a survey of estate agents, it's a troubled one. The HotProperty survey - quoted by Nubricks - reveals that less half of respondents believed they'd be relevant after a decade, and only 28% thought they had any practical future in twenty years.
Technorati Tags: estate agents, real estate agents
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I've received a number of emails asking me whether I'm Ben Burnside, as well as Ben Brandt. Why? It started when, in an idle moment of web browsing, a HousePriceCrash blogger plugged in HousePriceRise.co.uk... and was rewarded with this:
Why would the Bank of England buy or use that domain name? They wouldn't, of course. Commenters on the thread have traced the address to a Ben Burnside. The plot thickens. His motivations are pretty hard to fathom, but I can assure anybody who's emailed me... not guilty.
Technorati Tags: theRatandMouse, Web
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It's making BBC News headlines this morning... the latest Royal Institution of Chartered Surveyors is reporting a fourth monthly fall. Remember - this is the strange one, in which the RICS hold the hands of a representative number of agents/surveyors and ask them how they're feeling. The results? In November, 41% sensed a drop in prices over the previous three months, 23% sensed a rise.
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More in this Category - Linkage
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So much of the frenzied debate about house prices in the U.K. is conducted in such a way to make one think falling house prices in a region are a bit like spotting the plague.
That's Morgan Stanley's David Miles, quoted in Bloomberg today, pointing out the lack of swelling associated with falling house prices. The moaning and the headaches, however, still stand. Miles's point is that a 10% fall next year only brings us back to where we were a year ago, and will have a positive redistributive effect for first time buyers and/or the young and "people about to trade up" (the last group, presumably due to a combination of a narrow gap between price bands and less Stamp Duty). He also berates anybody doubting the wisdom of the City, when it comes to the likelihood of such a fall:
For people who say that's absurd, I turn it back on them. Why do you think people who are smart and know about financial things and trade derivatives are pricing things in such a way that that's what they imply?
Hmm, dunno.
Technorati Tags: property, real estate
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It looks, from this, in the Independent, that it means long-distance commuting. Jonathan Christie meets a single father of six kids who commutes from Nottinghamshire to London every day of the week. The story's about a new and apparently growing breed of train jockeys, happy to travel two or more hours each way in exchange for the bigger real estate they can afford outside of traditional commuter land. Anyway, that's what it looks like. But what about this?
Or, more alarmingly, this?
Or maybe it was just a typo:
Technorati Tags: London, property, real estate
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Mail on Sunday columnist Liz Jones is in Sub-prime Land and heading for Repo City. She tells her story here, and - a Rat and Mouse warning - it's not for the queasy:
To build myself some sort of secure future, I then did what I was told by my financial adviser, and invested a huge sum each month in a portfolio of ethical businesses. An investment that has so far meant I have lost 75% of what I paid in. Argh!
Argh!, indeed. I don't want to tell you your business or anything, Liz, but I'd be having a serious conversation with that IFA. Anyway, just to add insult to injury, Liz (and I sincerely hope Associated Newspapers are throwing some cash her way in return) is the subject of a This Is Money poll. Is this another fine mess she got herself into? Or is the system to blame? The Government? The Grinch? So far, Liz is coming off rather badly, but the Rat and Mouse suspects a significant portion of the voters are HousePriceCrash militia, who called the woman "less than a monkey" on their own blog earlier, and have a habit of descending on these polls as if they actually mean anything.
Technorati Tags: property, real estate
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Professor Daniel Bernhofen of the Globalisation and Economic Policy Centre has warned that if the Government press ahead with plans to build three million new homes by 2020 they'll risk toppling the UK market into a full-blown catastrophe. Bernhofen's take is that a lot of the recent so-called demand has been quite different to need, it's been investment-motivated. When interest from buy-to-let investors wains, our impression of the need - supply relationship might seem quite different. A colossal building programme before the market has had a chance to ease down prices gradually (in relation to general inflation) would, he believes, be extremely misguided. More, here.
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October data from the Council of Mortgage Lenders, increasing numbers of borrowers are gambling on rate cuts and moving over to variable rates. Whether they win will depend as much on lenders' priorities... short-term income to offset exposure to loses, or increased business to offset a slowdown in the market. The figures also reveal the extent of the mortgage squeeze. The proportion of income spent on mortgage payments is up to an average of 20.6% (ftbs) and 17.6% (movers), the highest levels since 1991 and 1992.
Technorati Tags: property, real estate
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According to the FT, Tesco - still, officially, in limbo between its suspended private sales service and a possible "new and exciting on-line estate agency service - has complained to the OFT about Rightmove's refusal to list Tesco's properties. Rightmove's response?
"The analogy is, if we opened a grocery store next to Tesco and found people were still going to Tesco, would our next move be to insist that Tesco let us open up on their premises?"
Actually, it's pretty difficult to find an accurate analogy right now, since it's not at all clear what Tesco's intentions are. However Tesco's concern appears to be that Rightmove is much more than simply a shop front... they are a standard online entry into the property market. But do they dominate any more than Tesco dominate the grocery business?
Tesco sounds retreat [October 4, 2007]
Estate agents grab whatever's to hand, prepare to fight Tesco [July 30, 2007]
Technorati Tags: estate agents, property, real estate, real estate agents, Web, Web2, web2.0
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It's always late (the new figures are for October), but at least it means something, based, as it is, on completions. The Government data gives us a 0.1% rise in October, down from 0.3% in September. Annual inflation rose to 11.3% from 10.8%, reminding us that most of us can afford a slight weakening in prices without suffering an actual stroke.
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Thanks to the Rat and Mouse reader who sent me the results of an interesting Facebook survey of a thousand London tenants by the Deposit Protection Service.... an independent service which aims to make the negotiation over and return of deposits quicker and easier. Apparently, 36% claimed to have never had their deposits returned, and another 37% had to wait more than a month to see their money. Which is a problem when they need upwards of £750 in order to secure their new place. So where are they getting the cash? According to the survey, 33% turn to their parents. It looks as if the Deposit Protection Scheme - on its own - isn't enough.
Technorati Tags: London, property, real estate
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Flamboyant property entrepreneur Nick Leslau has just bet £234m on the mid-term health of UK residential property. The deal is a derivative-style deal with Swiss Re, who are reducing their exposure to property by offering Leslau exposure to 3,400 homes acquired through equity-release policies last year. The average age of tenants is said to be 82, so - and don't read this is you're feeling squeamish this morning - the majority of the property is expected to be sold in the next ten years. The Rat and Mouse wonders whether - by this time next year - Leslau will also be investing in meals-on-wheels and free door-to-door medical services.
[via Property Week]
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More in this Category - Linkage
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He's over here promoting BEE MOVIE, and - according to this - he's thinking about staying:
"Since I've been here I've been talking of a lot of people about it. I think it's a great idea. I'm going to definitely look into it. The audiences here are great and I haven't been here for a long time. I think it might be fun."
Serious, or just polite? The Rat and Mouse remains skeptical.
That's it from me until Monday. Do something different this weekend.
Technorati Tags: celebrity, London, property, real estate
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It's the FT's property index, and it has England and Wales homes rising in value by 0.5% in November, leaving annual inflation at 9.1%. Yes, it's surprising. So how'd it happen? Firstly, it's based on transactions agreed before the panic really set in. Secondly, it's been skewed by some hot London action... with London discounted the index fell a little, and the annual rate was just 6.7%.
Technorati Tags: London, property, real estate
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Vogue reports on Clare Wright Keller's move from cardigans to Cadogan Square (ouch), the Pringle creative director's first foray into interior design. She's apparently given a Brahm apartment the Pringle touch, and it's now being rented out for £4,500 a week. No photos, I'm afraid... although is anyone else can point us in the right direction...
Technorati Tags: interiors, London, property, real estate
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Zoomf, and new snowy logo, here.
[via Renthusiast]
Technorati Tags: Web, Web2, web2.0
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It was pretty inevitable. Kirstie Allsopp was always very vocal about the shortcomings of HIPs, and now she's an adviser to the Shadow Housing Minister Grant Shapps (whose name I love saying). But - wait for this - they intend to keep the Energy Performance Certificate. Now, the Rat and Mouse is as green as (probably greener than) the next property blogger, but aren't EPCs a) a significant part of what we call a HIP? b) an utterly pointless waste of time benefitting nobody except the clipboard monkeys? So what are the Tory plans? Proposals being considered include offers being made legally binding (to put an end to gasumping/gazundering)... and, as far as I can see, that's it. Although there is the remote prospect of nudity. This, from the BBC:
"If everyone says they like HIPs I will walk naked across College Green," [Kirstie Allsopp] added.
Technorati Tags: property, property TV, real estate
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That's London's most expensive tube line in terms of property prices. FindAProperty apparently have the answer - although I can't find it anywhere on their site. Luckily (and oddly), I found it via Country Life. Place your bets now. Answer after the jump.
Technorati Tags: London, property, real estate
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A quarter of a point, lopped off the base rate, bringing it back 5.5%. More here. But the big question is whether this will have any effect on mortgages.
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It should be pointed out that the management insist bonuses and pay increases stop before senior staff, but benefiting employees are said to be "surprised" by news they'll receive bonuses amounting to £200, plus a one-off sum of 2% of their salary, plus a 4% pay increase. For once, we discover where are taxes are going. Feeling generous this Christmas?
[via the Guardian]
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What's all the fuss about? asks CE Stuart Law. Demand will be boosted in 2008 by immigration, interest rates will drop back to 5%, buy-to-let will experience a second wind, with mortgage terms beating homebuyer mortgages and rents continuing to soar. Assetz are pinning a 5% growth tag on the 2008 UK property market. Courageous conviction or an attempt to talk up the market?
[via Mortgage Introducer]
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The third consecutive monthly fall reported by the Halifax means a 1.1% drop in November, leaving the annual rate of house price inflation at 6.3% (down from 8.9%). As Tom points out in the comment after today's linkage, this is the first time the Halifax as recorded three falls in a row since 1995. More here.
Market report - Nationwide and a dramatic tumble [November 29, 2007]
Market report - London hit by October fall says Land Registry [November 28, 2007]
Technorati Tags: property, real estate
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It was the venue for a high-profile drug overdose and police raid, but it's recently been empty while Winehouse stays in Bow and her husband stays in jail. Now - according to this - she's bought in the East and the Camden pad will hit the market.
Technorati Tags: celebrity, London, property, real estate
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Take a photograph of one of your grotty rooms, then go here to find out how to send it to the suspiciously immaculate Naomi for close scrutiny. Five photographs will be selected (randomly, so don't trash your house in order to get attention), and the lucky winners will be shown the secrets of good taste.
Technorati Tags: design, interiors, property TV
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It was the first prosecution by Hackney Council of its kind, and the lucky estate agency making local history, last Friday, at Thames Magistrates Court, was Sovereign, of 223 Victoria Park Road. So what did they do? Or - in local parlance - wot they done? Apparently, they've been caught sticking "sold" and "to let" boards outside properties despite the fact they hadn't been instructed, thus breaching section 13 of the Trade Descriptions Act 1968. From Sovereign's website:
The staff at Sovereign House are proud of the reputation we have gained over the years backed by a strong brand image, easily recognised all over the areas we cover on our black 'SOLD BY' boards.
No pithy closing comment necessary.
Technorati Tags: estate agents, London, property, real estate, real estate agents
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Rightmove have gone from green to blue in a revamp that's more about look than functionality.
Fair enough, looks better, but weren't you kind of expecting a little Googlemaps fancy shmancy-ness, too? No, still stuck with those clunky, non-draggable AboutMyPlace maps, and a little primary and secondary school action to give the impression of usefulness. Or do they know something the young upstarts don't? Do users just want the barest of information... agent and guide price? Personally I appreciate the thought that goes into the Nestoria and Zoomf experience... what do you think?
Technorati Tags: Web, Web2, web2.0
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City bonuses are set, according to CEBR research, to drop by 20% this year, and 6,500 City jobs could go the way of cheap credit. The Sunday Times have spoken to estate agents who have already noticed a drop in enquiries in the property sectors most associated with bonus cash. Who'll get hit? Central London, the Cotswolds, the southwest, parts of Norfolk, Suffolk and Kent. Obviously, it's not all about a lack of City money. It's also about a lack of confidence in the property market. Caused by a lack of City money. Caused by a lack of confidence in the property market. Caused by a lack of ... you get the picture.
Technorati Tags: London, property, real estate
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Operating profits rose 67% and staff will share a bonus pool of £51.4m.
[via Renthusiast]
Technorati Tags: estate agents, real estate agents
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Against an oncoming torrent of negative data, and a growing awareness that twitchy landlords may well have the house price crash button under their fingertips, beleaguered buy-to-let mortgage specialist Paragon digs in its heels and, undaunted by my mixed metaphor, tells the world the buy-to-let sector has never had it so good. Apparently, returns (the data includes house sales) are up 15.5% on the year, rents are up 10.2% and one in four landlords are looking to buy. Fighting talk.
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