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Entries in July 2008
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The average home is now worth nearly £15,000 less than it was 12 months ago, which is the biggest annual fall since Nationwide began recording housing data in 1991. There has also been a 41% year-on-year fall in first time buyers. Maybe they're holding out for a bargain, this is already the ninth consecutive month of falls. Or maybe they just can't get a mortgage, no matter how many bankers' shoes they kiss. More here.
By guest blogger, Poppy Dinsey
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Price drops don't get pictures, I'm afraid, those are the rules. But we recommend a visit to the particulars to see a tidy and refurbished five-bedroom detached townhouse in Chiswick's sought after Bedford Park, first listed - according to PropertySnake - at £2.25m in March, yours now for £1.6m.
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Basically, I'm not here. I know it looks as if I am... you're reading this, and everything... but that's the magic of technology. I'm on vacation, and (in what has become an annual tradition at the Rat and Mouse) I'm leaving you with a little festival of property, as recommended over the last couple of weeks by readers and agents. What's different this year is that you might also be reading some additional content courtesy of guest blogger Poppy Dinsey.
If you're an estate agent and you're upset that I've used one of your images... email me here, and I'll remove it the first opportunity I get.
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A classic Victorian warehouse conversion, with all the features you'd expect... exposed ornate brickwork, big windows, barn doors, original radiators, high ceilings. With Urban Spaces; guide price £525,000.
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Yes, believe it or not someone at Jackson Stops & Staff was stupid enough to upload a property to Rightmove with the word 'lesbians' in the spot where the property reference number should have been. The gay couple who owned the £650,000 property were, understandably, horrified when they stumbled upon the advert a few days after it went live.
Although Jackson-Stops & Staff originally said they "fail to see how we have discriminated against you", they have now paid damages of £5,000 in an out-of-court settlement to avoid being sued. A spokesman at the estate agency’s head office has since described the incident as ‘a truly regrettable situation’. Quite. More here.
By guest blogger, Poppy Dinsey
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Oh joy of joys, if you're planning to sell your property in today's climate then you can now expect to pay more for the pleasure. According to The Telegraph, some estate agents are now upping their fees to 2.5% to boost their earnings as house prices fall.
Let's face it, traditional estate agency fees are always a sore point and many would argue that the typical 1-1.5% fee is cheeky anyway. So, should you walk away from an agent that now commands a 2.5% multiple agency fee? David Beakon, senior negotiator at Brighton-based Bonnets Estate agents doesn't care either way...
"If people walk away because the fee is too big then that is fine with us if it is something that we do not want to deal with."
With record low numbers of properties on agents' books, you'd think they'd be more inclined for the business, non?
By guest blogger, Poppy Dinsey
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Just 35x more expensive than yesterday's feature property, this five-bedroom Gloucester Road home - designed by architect Cezary M Bednarski - just south of Kensington Gardens features "a secret entrance". Not ideal if you're coming home late at night and a little worse for wear, but a great talking point. It's with Knight Frank, and the guide price is £7.95m.
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That's according to a new report which you can read up on over at the BBC. Apparently, we should expect to see prices falling 4.4% in 2008, 2.1% lower in 2009, recovering by 2010 and rising at over 9% in 2012 and 2013. Oh, and the report has been written by the National Housing Federation, whose members rely on us having confidence in the housing market. Hmmmm.
By guest blogger, Poppy Dinsey.
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Let's start how we mean to go on, with a little piece of modern architecture history for £225,000. Balfron Tower was designed by Ernö Goldfinger in 1967, and this two-bedroom flat is right on the top floor, with access to a balcony giving views over Canary Wharf. There's a hundred years on the lease, and the £1,300 service charge includes maintenance, hot water, heating and insurance. Which proves you don't need to be a millionaire to live in real style in London.
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 As I mentioned recently, I'm about to head off for a short holiday. So now seems a good time to introduce the Rat and Mouse's new guest blogger, Poppy Dinsey. Not only is she a great blogger, she has an academic background in Eastern European economics and real estate (so she actually knows what she's talking about), she lives in east London, works in product development and blogs for innovative property search engine Zoomf. And - she tells me - she's a massive fan of cheesecake. I'm delighted, excited and grateful that she's agreed to drop by occasionally and add her expertise to London's property blog. Stay tuned.
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More in this Category - Linkage
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That's what they're claiming. It's a "luxury" new-build in Essex, with nine-bedrooms, a swimming pool "complex", no less, and a wine cellar. It's close to the village of Danbury, which, in turn, is close to Chelmsford. Guide price? £5m. Interior square footage? 14,365. Making Marlene happy? Priceless. Grab the particulars here.
Technorati Tags: property, real estate
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As you're probably aware, traffic costs, and right here is where the Rat and Mouse continues paying. Which is why we're encouraging advertisers who feel they might have something to gain from seeing their brand served up to homeowners, renters, landlords, movers, media shakers on around 4,000 pages a day. As part of the deal, you'll get a heartfelt thank you each and every week, which is why, tonight, we're saying thanks to...
... LandlordNanny, an innovative, hi-tech, but simple-to-use, drag-and-drop online organiser for everything a landlord needs to remember, whether managing a single property or a giant portfolio. As well as providing a useful directory of recommended letting-sector professionals (accountants, mortgage providers, HIPs providers etc), they're a registered letting agent, which means that customers get to advertise properties on the large property portals, including Primelocation.com and Propertyfinder.com. Use of the basic service is free. Upgrade to a premium account (£99.95, but £49.95 during the current introductory offer) and you get access to legal documents, automated invoicing, web-based accounting software and more. In other words, the kind of things that would cost a great deal more than £99.95 if you handed them over to a lettings agent.
A toot on our own trumpet [June 9, 2008]
Why advertise with the Rat and Mouse?
Technorati Tags: theRatandMouse
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Instant Access Properties and sister company Inside Track come under the spotlight in BBC Radio 4's Face The Facts, at 12.30pm (UK time). According to this, the BBC will accuse Instant Access - which sells investment properties off-plan, claiming impressive discounts - of being dishonest in its valuations. Undercover reporters have appointed independent surveyors who have claimed even IA's "discounted" values have been "optimistic". Personally, I think we all need to grow up a little about this kind of thing. Valuations of new builds are notoriously difficult at the best of times... the room for disagreement will be even greater when employing surveyors to retrospectively value properties in the middle of the credit crunch. But - more importantly - if all it takes is a phone call to a local estate agent to learn that a discounted price is, in fact, in line with or above market value, doesn't the responsibility for a bad deal have to be faced by the buyer?
Inside Track folds [April 29, 2008]
Technorati Tags: property, real estate
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The man who founded and flogged Foxtons talks property with the Evening Standard. The best bit? This:
"If I knew what the market was going to do I'd be extremely rich."
Otherwise it's something of a low-key interview... a reserved but polite businessman, an enthusiast for Margaret Thatcher, proud of an estate agency empire and either unwilling to engage or unchallenged regarding Foxtons's controversial reputation. He does have a view on the market... a fast fall and a slow rise... give it five years, at least.
Technorati Tags: Foxton's, Foxtons
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More in this Category - Linkage
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According to NOAO NOAH NEAO NAAE the National Association of Estate Agents, first-time buyer sales are up, from 10.6% in May to 11.8% in June. Not much, but considerably more than 9.8% in June 2007. Is this a sign that ftbs are calling the bottom of the market, that there are bargains to be had? Some would like us to think so. But, personally, I doubt it. If you consider how far transactions have dropped off in a year, it seems certain that ftb purchases are way, way down in real terms.
Technorati Tags: property, real estate
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More in this Category - Design
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They sold an average of six properties each in June, which is bad... a 17% fall from May, and down from 13 properties by agent this time last year. More here.
Technorati Tags: estate agents, real estate agents
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More in this Category - About
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Spare a thought for Dalston primary school caretaker Patrick Ryan who's being forced to live among the rubble of the East London line extension. His neighbours have been bulldozed, his house remains, and it's a requirement of his job that he lives in it. The noise is apparently driving him crazy, and it doesn't sound as if he's getting much practical help from the local diocese (he's employed by a church school). Plenty of pastoral care though, which would be comforting if he could hear it.
[via BBC]
Technorati Tags: London, property, real estate
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And I thought I was the only person in the world to have noticed this extraordinarily undignified piece of marketing. In fact - I was so taken aback by its pure shamelessness, I couldn't help a sneaky, astonished admiration for the blush-free PR:
Over at the Guardian, Marina Hyde had no such admiration:
Just occasionally, one receives a press release that contrives to distill everything one hates about a certain stratum of "public life" into a single document.
Marina's goat was so thoroughly got, she dialed the PR agency concerned...
... to congratulate them on perhaps the most witless and inaccurate example of the genre this week. "Thank you," says the woman who answers the phone, and who is clearly unfamiliar with the words witless and inaccurate. "I meant to call anyway," she continues chirpily.
Youch!
Technorati Tags: celebrity, London, property, real estate
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More in this Category - Linkage
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Even in these uncertain times, you can be sure of one thing... somebody, somewhere, will be talking about some kind of boom in the property market:
According to its latest report renting is 30 to 40 per cent cheaper than having a mortgage, but rents are rising by an estimated 20 per cent. Many organistions, including the British Property Federation, now fear that a "new crisis in soaring rents" could cause yet more problems for the have-nots.
The Telegraph goes in search of The Let Set... the let-happy landlords and landladies letting their own homes to rent another. It's the only way to move, apparently. Except in a lot of cases... it really is the only way to move.
Technorati Tags: property, real estate
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Mervyn King's position is unenviable. On the one hand... runaway inflation; on the other... falling house prices. What he could really use is some stability, some confidence returning to the property market, so that he could concentrate properly on inflation (his job, after all) and at least dare think about higher interest rates. Enter fellow MPC-member Blanchflower:
House prices could fall a further 30 per cent, the biggest crash ever witnessed in Britain, a key member of the Bank of England has warned. David Blanchflower, a member of the Bank's interest rate-setting committee, said there is a threat they could fall this far.
Blanchflower is apparently continuing to lobby for rate cuts.
Technorati Tags: property, real estate
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More in this Category - Estate agents
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The news this morning is that Southwold beach huts are booming, with a recent sale exceeding £80,000, and rumours circulating that £100,000 might have changed hands.
Technorati Tags: property, real estate
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More in this Category - Linkage
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Hey, look, the world's stopped turning:
"Middle Britons" will lose more, in percentage terms, from the value of their homes, according to research by AXA and the Centre for Economics and Business Research, quoted in the Middle Britons' bible. Why? It's not exactly clear. The suggestion, though, is that they're less "resilient" to the credit crunch/falling market, because their homes have been gaining in value long after the rot set in elsewhere in the market:
John Ward, managing economist at the CEBR, said: 'Middle Britain will experience a sharper fall in house prices compared to the rest of the country because its resilience to the credit crunch is finally buckling. Whereas the country as a whole has been experiencing a slowdown for some time now, Middle Britain's house prices have remained steady until recently. This means the effects will be felt more starkly as prices decrease more rapidly.'
So, in other words, they won't be hardest hit. They've just been given a little longer to come to terms with what's about to happen. And - according to Ward - their homes will be the first to pick up in value after the bust (should there be a full-scale bust), because most of them live in south of England, which is better placed to weather the economic storm. Business as usual.
Technorati Tags: property, real estate
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In recent weeks I've been described as a “property porn queen” in the New Statesman, sniped at on the pages of The Guardian and lambasted by Panorama for excessively inflating house prices.
And it's true. Kirstie Allsopp does seem to catch more criticism than her TV partner Phil or just about any other property presenter. Why? Apparently she once said that house prices can't go down... although I'm yet to see the context in which she's supposed to have said that. I think it's more to do with the fact that she's posh. Phil... you can imagine a night down the boozer and onto Spearmint Rhino with Phil. With Kirstie... no way. She was born wealthy. And then she had the temerity to go on and be successful. In the Times, she comes out fighting... and even at this late stage she won't be bullied into agreeing that we're seeing a market correction:
It is much easier to fire off flippant articles blaming property TV shows than properly examining why there has been a fall in transactions and - in some places, though not all - a fall in property prices. Some of the recent gloomy headlines make me suspect that all the journalists in the country have sold up and are doing everything in their power to cause a property house price crash so that they can buy at rock bottom.
Technorati Tags: property TV
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According to the Times, it's the new Hoxton... a once-rundown area, chosen by young artists for its rents, trendified, gentrified, Cityfied, a little bit annoying but still a nice place to live. They've even found a genuine artist's studio for sale.
Adam Ball is selling this two-bedroom warehouse apartment, with classic loft-style exposed brickwork, high ceilings and big windows. It's had a price drop (from £695,000) to £655,000. Particulars here.
A call-out to our readers... send us your favourite London properties [July 11, 2008]
Technorati Tags: London, property, real estate
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As you're probably aware, traffic costs, and right here is where the Rat and Mouse continues paying. Which is why we're encouraging advertisers who feel they might have something to gain from seeing their brand served up to homeowners, renters, landlords, movers, media shakers on around 4,000 pages a day. As part of the deal, you'll get a heartfelt thank you each and every week, which is why, tonight, we're saying thanks to...
... LandlordNanny, an innovative, hi-tech, but simple-to-use, drag-and-drop online organiser for everything a landlord needs to remember, whether managing a single property or a giant portfolio. As well as providing a useful directory of recommended letting-sector professionals (accountants, mortgage providers, HIPs providers etc), they're a registered letting agent, which means that customers get to advertise properties on the large property portals, including Primelocation.com and Propertyfinder.com. Use of the basic service is free. Upgrade to a premium account (£99.95, but £49.95 during the current introductory offer) and you get access to legal documents, automated invoicing, web-based accounting software and more. In other words, the kind of things that would cost a great deal more than £99.95 if you handed them over to a lettings agent.
A toot on our own trumpet [June 9, 2008]
Why advertise with the Rat and Mouse?
Technorati Tags: theRatandMouse
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Eleven, tomorrow morning is the final deadline for HBOS shareholders to decide whether they want to exercise the privilege of buying more shares at the price of 275p each. It's a decision surely helped by the fact that as of writing HBOS shares are trading at 267.5p (yesterday, you could pick them up for 225p). In the current climate, these rights issues are a complete joke. RBS shares are currently trading at 180.9p, after a June issue at 200p. And let's not even mention Broken & Busted. I suppose HBOS shareholders can at least comfort themselves that the institution has the dignity to accept the inevitable, and the underwriters to pick up the shortfall, rather than go the B&B route and scurry around re-setting the rights issue price like a street corner trader flogging knock-off perfumes before the rozzers arrive. More here.
Technorati Tags: property, real estate
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More in this Category - Linkage
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Apologies for the continued technical glitches... we're working on it, and normal service should be restored very shortly. Cheers, Ben
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More in this Category - Linkage
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The news, almost exactly a year ago to the day, was of Marcus Cooper's £32m purchase of Witanhurst, Highgate's 65-room West Hill mock-Georgian mansion, and plans to do it up and sell it on for an estimated £150m. By September, the talk was of a flip, for £75m. You see, those were the days... the days of 234% profit in less than two months. How things have changed. In the current market it takes an entire 12 months to make a measly 156% profit on a property. The news, today, is that London's second largest gaff - after Buckingham Palace - has, at last, found a buyer, and has been picked up, for £50m, by Russia's first richest woman, Elena Baturina... who according to the Telegraph is so rich she's actually married to a construction company.
Technorati Tags: London, property, real estate
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Thanks for the emails. I couldn't post a response because... well... of technical difficulties. Normal service resumes now...
Technorati Tags: theRatandMouse
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According to the more bullish estate agents, it will all be over by Christmas. Perhaps. In a brand new Abbey survey 61% of agents believed the property price slowdown would end within a year; only 7% thought it would last more than three years. But if there’s one thing certain about an estate agent’s smile during a downturn it’s that, like Smokey Robinson’s, it’s only there trying to fool the public… It takes a brave property investor to buy British at a time like this. Elsewhere? It’s a mixed and very confusing picture...
Our editor tackles overseas property in his Citywire guest column.
On opportunities for self-build [July 9, 2008]
Technorati Tags: property, real estate, theRatandMouse
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The Rat and Mouse has been passed a remarkable document that's apparently dropping through London front-doors, purportedly courtesy of Knight Frank estate agency. Here's why Knight Frank agents greet you with a smile.
Sheeesh, I feel better now. That was like Prozac. Mixed with a very dry Martini. In fact, I can't even remember, now, why I felt so depressed before. Oh yeah...
Looks like it was my fault. Damn. To make amends, there's no way I'm going to bogart this Prozac-Martini stuff:
Technorati Tags: estate agents, real estate agents
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Did you know that Toyota has a property division? Well, it has. Where it makes very cool-looking prefabs with an eco-slant (including built-in solar technology for charging your Prius). See more images over at the Jetson Green blog.
Technorati Tags: architecture, property, real estate
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Luke Pendlet of Knight Frank, Wandsworth, said: "We had more sales in June 2008 than in June 2007."
It's an actual, factual miracle. After reading Luke's words I turned to the stone effigy of the Rat and Mouse's own personal Madonna and found it crying wet tears of joy. It's a miracle put into perspective, though, by the fact it doesn't reflect on agreed prices, but does reflect a relatively unscathed top end of the market. Nevertheless, read it again and again, and enjoy.
Technorati Tags: estate agents, London, property, real estate, real estate agents
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They can according to a report by Reading University's Professor Michael Ball, for (and here's where we're required to control our skepticism) the Association of Residential Letting Agents.
[via PropertyWeek.com]
Are London rents soaring or diving? [July 14, 2008]
Technorati Tags: property, real estate
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Agents shifted just 15.3 homes per agency April-to-June, the lowest number since RICS records began 30 years ago, and 87% of agents/surveyors reported falling house prices. There's also talk of predatory buyers, as the cash-rich take advantage of desperate vendors.
Technorati Tags: property, real estate
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Depending on who you believe, rents are either being driven up by thousands of would-be buyers putting purchase plans on hold while they sit out the turbulence; or driven down by thousands of would-be vendors, unable or unwilling to sell homes in the current climate, and so flooding the rental market with properties. Hmm. Here's the latest chatter, courtesy of the Gumtree ads database... London rents soaring by 8% a year, the strongest demand in a decade.
Technorati Tags: London, property, real estate
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Joanna Page is apparently something of a keen btl-er, with a new-build in Crystal Palace, another in the Olympic zone, and a terraced house in Lordship Lane. Home is a house in Dulwich. Interviewed here, she sounds happy with her London property investments... although less enamored of some Welsh bricks and mortar.
Technorati Tags: celebrity, London, property
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More in this Category - Linkage
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One of the north east's biggest estate agencies, Sarah Mains, has apparently called in the police, after months on the receiving end of a damaging campaign of mischief and rumour-mongering. According to this, the MoneySavingExpert.com forum has been asked to remove a thread suggesting (falsely) that the agency is going into administration, a story apparently being promoted by unnamed sources, and even spread by rival agents. Asked to comment, Peter Bolton King (National Association of Estate Agents chief) reveals he's being sent hate mail. If any other agents have examples of being kicked while they're down?
Technorati Tags: estate agents, real estate agents
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As you're probably aware, traffic costs, and right here is where the Rat and Mouse continues paying. Which is why we're encouraging advertisers who feel they might have something to gain from seeing their brand served up to homeowners, renters, landlords, movers, media shakers on around 4,000 pages a day. As part of the deal, you'll get a heartfelt thank you each and every week, which is why, tonight, we're saying thanks to...
... LandlordNanny, an innovative, hi-tech, but simple-to-use, drag-and-drop online organiser for everything a landlord needs to remember, whether managing a single property or a giant portfolio. As well as providing a useful directory of recommended letting-sector professionals (accountants, mortgage providers, HIPs providers etc), they're a registered letting agent, which means that customers get to advertise properties on the large property portals, including Primelocation.com and Propertyfinder.com. Use of the basic service is free. Upgrade to a premium account (£99.95, but £49.95 during the current introductory offer) and you get access to legal documents, automated invoicing, web-based accounting software and more. In other words, the kind of things that would cost a great deal more than £99.95 if you handed them over to a lettings agent.
A toot on our own trumpet [June 9, 2008]
Why advertise with the Rat and Mouse?
Technorati Tags: theRatandMouse
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More in this Category - Linkage
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The Estate Agent Event Horizon, in my view, occurred at the moment that Foxtons first drew up plans to move into the nicest building on Parkway.
In the Times, Hugo Rifkind draws comparisons between the shoe business on Frogstar B and estate agency in Camden. At some point, it became uneconomical to be in any business other than estate agency. Now everybody's a struggling estate agent. Nobody can afford anything. It's all over for Camden.
Tuesday afternoon linkage - nothing handles quite like a Foxtons Mini (video) [June 17, 2008]
Foxtons, Camden, will work for free [June 3, 2008]
Foxtons hero [February 28, 2008]
Technorati Tags: estate agents, Foxton's, Foxtons, real estate agents
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The incident occurred in Savernake Road, was photographed, and has resulted in some predictably righteous indignation from the Camden New Journal and a local Labour councillor. The errant agent is said to be from the Hampstead branch. Although he/she hasn't been named, they've reportedly been on the receiving end of a stern ticking off.
Technorati Tags: estate agents, Foxton's, Foxtons, real estate agents
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It's that time of year again. Regular Rat and Mouse readers might remember that, each summer, I like to leave home for a couple of weeks and go somewhere else to enjoy what my family calls a "holiday", or "vacation". Traditionally, I throw the blog open to readers... enthusiasts, estate agents, addicts, weirdos... and publish ten days of London property that's interesting, notable or just plain eye-candy, and that's currently on the market. In the past, it's gone very well, attracting the kind of traffic and emails that suggests it's been popular with readers and tipsters alike. This year we've an extra catagory... the price drop. So... let's see 'em. Whether you're a reader a vendor or an agent, we don't care, we just want your property suggestions... London properties with a good story, a good kitchen, a good location, a good price. Start emailing us links to the particulars now (the deadline: July 22), and look forward to a ten-day festival of extraordinary London property. Thanks, Ben.
Technorati Tags: London, property, real estate, theRatandMouse
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A Guardian reader asks... should she sell up, pay off the mortgage, rent for a while and buy back in when the market's slipped further? Virginia Wallis's answer show just how high interest rates need to climb and property needs to fall before this becomes a sensible tactic. Read it here.
Sell now, pay later [March 19, 2008]
Sell-to-rent... making the headlines [February 18, 2008]
Technorati Tags: property, real estate
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We're hearing from Building Design that Boris Johnson is issuing a thumbs down to plans to pedestrianise Parliament Square in time for the London Olympics, citing congestion issues. The plan would have sealed the road in front of Westminster Abbey off from traffic, creating a public space and new tourist attraction.
Technorati Tags: London
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The Halifax House Price Index - a benchmark in many ways - is posting a 2% fall for June, leaving the annual change at -6.1% and the average house price at August 2006 levels. In the report, Halifax's Martin Ellis tries to paint this as a "moderation in the recent rate of decline", following May's 2.5% drop, but it's still a rate that will cause potential problems should it continue for too much longer. You can download the actual factual report by clicking here, or read some commentary here.
Technorati Tags: property, real estate
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More in this Category - _Other
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Her Camden neighbours have had enough of her "antics", they say, and are campaigning to the council to have her evicted. One of them, quoted here, has apparently been filming her frolics and fisticuffs, and will be handing the evidence over to Camden Council shortly. (What's that? The sound of half a dozen newspapers opening their cheque books?)
Technorati Tags: celebrity, London, property, real estate
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The words of Allsop auctioneer Duncan Moir, describing how it feels encouraging people to bid in its June property auctions. It achieved its lowest success rate since 1995... 60% (its long term average is 80%), and raised just a third of its May total. More here.
Technorati Tags: property, real estate
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More in this Category - Linkage
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While the bottom drops out of the residential property market in what might or might not turn out to be the most ugly and undignified economic prolapse ever suffered by the great middle classes' hearthside economy, the self-builders, the frontiers-people of the housing market, the men and the women with a dream... these people are finding themselves in an uncharacteristically privileged position. After decades of being treated like wacky longhairs, suddenly they're getting the best tables and being offered the specials. Why? They don't need to turn a profit. Their profit's built into the build.
Our publisher, in his weekly guest column, for Citywire.
Technorati Tags: property, real estate, theRatandMouse
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According to 61% of the estate agents surveyed, the slowdown will be over with in a year. Only 28% thought it would take more than a year, 7% more than three years. More here.
Technorati Tags: estate agents, real estate agents
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They've sold 45% less property in 2008's first six months compared to the same period last year, and in London they're reporting 7.5% off house prices (although, if they're selling that much less property their house price data isn't likely to mean so much). Above £5m, property remains "relatively immune". More here.
Technorati Tags: estate agents, real estate agents
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The Department of Communities and Local Government house price data reaches us last, because it's based on completions, but it's accurate, because - er - it's based on completions. April's figures, which arrived in early June, stood out from the crowd by showing a slight rise. May's figures, out now, don't. It seems the DCLG index has finally "caught up with the slowdown". May's index falls 0.3%, leaving the annual inflation figure still in black, but only at 3.7%. Remember, too, that these completion figures reflect exchanges made weeks, sometimes months, before. More here.
Technorati Tags: property, real estate
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That was then:
It would seem that Edeus is focussing on large mortgage loans (up to £10 million) and getting applications through at top speed, enabling a fast completion, or at least the peace of mind of a speedy offer, leaving the other parties to catch up. Edeus has said in the financial press that they will offer buy to let mortgages, first time buyer mortgages and a full range of sub prime mortgages including low loan sizes for heavy adverse cases, through to light sub prime mortgages. Set up by Michael Bolton, Alan Cleary, John Nixon and a team of seasoned mortgage professionals, Edeus... is expected to start business in September 2006.
This is now:
Alan Clearly, managing director, at the group, said: 'If we sold our mortgage book outright, we would most likely make a loss. By going direct to the consumer we can curb this.' Edeus will be encouraging the selected borrowers to contact the brokers that originally introduced the loan to Edeus in order to source a suitable deal with another lender.
Edeus has announced they'll be waiving early repayment charges in a bid to encourage clients to pay up and move on.
Technorati Tags: property, real estate
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The ongoing war with mortgage fraud has claimed a twelfth victim... Sadia Nasir, of House of Finance, banned and fined £129,000. She apparently used her own bank details on four of her clients' mortgage applications; she fabricated payslips and financial statements on her own behalf; and she withheld information from the investigators. Apart from that, she was completely honest.
Technorati Tags: property, real estate
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Said to be on the point of moving into a £20,000-a-month Mayfair rental... a hub for his family while he films a Robin Hood movie with Sienna Miller.
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Grant Bovey runs Imagine Homes, a company that built itself up on the buy-to-let boom, buying properties off-plan, shoving tenants in them and selling them on to landlords. The Rat and Mouse has had a few comments and emails in recent weeks wondering how it's doing. We didn't know. We asked around. We heard a few rumours. But nothing we could absolutely trust. Now, here's PropertyWeek, with news that Bovey and HBOS - a relationship considerably complicated by a £37.5m equity injection in September last year - are "realigning". The piece is pretty vague about the details of what that means, although both parties are quick to reassure that there's been no falling out... they're still very much in love. There is, however, this:
To combat the crunch, Bovey’s arm of the business plans to launch a service whereby it will guarantee to a vendor that it will pay a buyer’s mortgage for five years as long as they stump up 20% equity.
Guarantee to a vendor? Is anyone else having trouble understanding this? While I go away and try to puzzle it out, you have a great weekend. And remember, things really could be worse.
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More in this Category - Linkage
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Nationwide is joined by the Halifax and Abbey. More here.
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Wouldn't normally make a post, but in the current circumstances... from July 9, 2-year fix from 6.58% (£599 fee) or 6.98% (no fee); 2-year tracker from 5.98% (£599 fee) or 5.78% (£1,499 fee). More here.
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If you're unsure whether your MP represented your wishes and best interests by voting to keep an unrealistic and discredited expenses system that would keep them in luxuries at your expense, go here.
Greedy pigs receive slap around the snout, but not hard enough [June 18, 2008]
Standard investigate Blairs' property expenses [June 6, 2008]
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