House Prices

[Mrs McCarthy]

To be fair, the scenarios you are describing are not necessarily common. Most elderly people sell their homes to pay for care, for example. The vast majority of landlords are in it by choice, not because it was their only option.

Personally I have a problem with the way our entire property and renting infrastructure is set up. I find it gross that so many people think of BTL as an investment for themselves only, when in reality, your property will be someone’s home. People forget this and the way some tenants are treated is beyond belief.

Let’s be honest, the amount of awful landlords out there far exceeds the number of good ones. Around half of private landlords refuse those on benefits for example, and 44% refuse to rent to non-British passport holders. Private landlords are far less likely to return full deposits to tenants than agencies. The general makeup of private landlords in the UK is 50+ white men who don’t believe in climate change! BTL perpetuates the existing unfair social hierarchy under the guise of personal investment.

In general it’s a very selfish way to make a bit of extra cash. It’s also not the cash cow people seem to think it is. I can see how if you’re desperate and you need that extra bit of money monthly, then it probably suits you. For most people however, investing in stocks, shares, financial products and your own home (if possible to add value) is probably more suitable and more lucrative in the long run.

I am a non-British passport holder, and I am not even from EU, so I am aware of the difficulties. However it’s not the landlords fault, it’s the way the whole of the English society is geared in treatment of migrants, whether from EU or non-EU. They are not inventing the problem, they are just following a pattern.
The stories I shared are not singular. My husband’s grandmother is in a care home, and the majority of the residents there are renting their homes. His other set of grandparents are planning to do the same, as do all of their friends.
I feel like people assume that the private landlord is a property mogul with 100s of awful bedsits. Whilst they do exist, the average landlord is not a mogul. The majority of them may be male, white and British, but again it’s because of the way the society is geared.
It’s the same with tenants, the same with people who live in leaseholds, rather than freeholds. We used to live in a leasehold flat that we owned, and the only difference between owning a flat and renting one was that we were allowed to paint our walls whatever colour we wanted.
There is a reason why BTL is popular as an investment. It may be more lucrative to do other things like invest in stocks and shares but you need to understand what you are doing otherwise you will lose money. With BTL you can get an instant return within the first months. If the government wants to tackle this problem, they should change the terms of BTL mortgages; not turn landlords into evil people.

 

[Italy2]

That's what we did when we bought our house, it really was the worst house in our street, no central heating, the fire had been boarded up and the previous owners used calor gas heaters, there was only one window in the house that wasn't broken so we slept in that room, double bed and bunk beds for our children and I was pregnant with another, haha we liked making work for ourselves! My husband built an extension to the back and side of the house, but to keep costs low we bought a lot of materials second hand or in the sale, we also didn't go on holiday, have take outs, basically put our life on hold for 5 years to afford it all without borrowing an money. Now everyone that goes past our house compliments the had work we have done, this makes it all worthwhile. I don't regret doing it this way because at the time we couldn't afford to move into something already done.

I completely understand and appreciate that you have worked hard and deserve to have your dream home but if everyone keeps making extortionate profits off house prices then younger generations will not be able to get their dream home.

 

[Yel]

Prices around here don’t seem to have changed and new properties have gone up and sold by the look of Right Move. Any estate agents or brokers on here who can give an impartial view, or is it too early still?

Prices won't fall yet, everything is frozen while furlough and mortgage holidays at on. Maybe come the autumn they will. Sellers aren't quick to drop the asking prices, especially not in the UK where people have a real issues selling a house for anything less than it was worth at the height of a market.

If I was buying now I'd gazunder by at least 10%.

There might be a few sales that actually complete at the moment, put any pent-up demand will soon be exhausted.

 

[Yel]

Would the upcoming budget 2021 take into consideration the mortgages being offered and have an impact on the housing market?

Well they will do all they can to keep prices high, so that'll be extending the stamp duty holiday and giving more tax payers money to people to buy. It's pretty disgusting really, proping up prices rather than trying to fix the broken market. But the average person will see the return of 95% mortgages and tax payers subsiding it as good .

The only people that win are those selling financial products. The average person being saddled up with evermore debt to buy an inflated essential is terrible. But that's the world we live in.

I do wonder how much affect the latest intervention in the market will have. Of course they would never let it come to a cliff edge. But I expect most that wanted to move have by now and once furlough ends jobs will be lost (even those thought to be safe as things filter down).

More house price inflation because people feel richer when their asset goes up in value and the economy is based on selling ever higher house prices to each other like a ponzi scheme.

 

[Caffeine Fiend]

Totally depends where you live. Rental properties here if you need more than 2 bedrooms are in really high demand so landlords can charge a premium. My mortgage is less than half what my rent was. V similar properties too. Same builders built both houses back in the day. Leaves us more than enough money per month to maintain it.

There needs to be more social housing, more security in renting, more freedom to decorate and have pets. Living in someones investment doesnt feel like a home when in many cases people cant decorate and cant settle as they know they can be evicted with not much notice.

 

[Yel]

The sooner the stamp duty changes end the better.

Richi gets so much support, but it was madness to start Stoke the housing market as it reopened and before anyone knew if it needed some petrol poured all over it.

 

[TheWitchIsBack]

That's not the case here with today's prices. Even with the ultra low interest rates it's cheaper to rent than a standard rayment mortgage once you factor in basic maintenance.

Plus there's the fact that a mortgage is a long term repayment so God knows what the future holds so no one really knows.

I think the difficulty with the whole rent/buy debate lies on future income, specifically in retirement. Many people won’t have a sufficient pension income, and state pension could cease to exist if the politicians continue to bleed the country dry, so home ownership potentially reduces outgoings in retirement to give you some relative security.

State pension is around £8k per year and not enough to rent property and maintain it, especially at the rate rents and cost of living will continue to rise.

There are definitely pros and cons to both, but I’d rather own a home outright by the time I retire so that my private and (hopefully) state pensions can afford me a decent enough standard of living that means I don’t need to rely on credit. I’d also like to leave that financial asset to my kids as I think by the time mine are grown home ownership will be a huge expense. I save every month for my own future but I also save separately for theirs because of the way things are going.

The housing market can’t be sustained at this sort of level much longer, houses are exponentially increasing in price and salaries aren’t increasing at the same rate so something will have to give. We need a government shake up.

 

[Begborrowsteal]

I don't mind the pre announced visits announced well in advance as I know they do them every year. I would actually try to be out when they came over to check as it made me more anxious. I hate the random checks (door frame inspection the last time ) and created a fuss over those even if they had the tradesman right there with them too.

They have no right to enter without your permission and without 24hrs notice.

 

[Kim Mild]

It's not like many other businesses. It relys on pricing people out of something essential and is exploitative by nature.

Very parasitic and provides next to no value to society. It's causing untold havoc for the whole of society with people feeling unable to put down roots and being seen as a failure for renting.

It's mainly people that were born at the right time to buy when house prices were affordable and they've now remortgaged to speculate on. They slap themselves on the back at what a great business person they are because they've benefited from the loose lending and printing that keeps causing asset bubbles.

"Most landlords are fantastic" evidence please? Your posts on this thread are interesting . Most landlords are like most businesses and want to make the most money.

Some landlords are money grabby wannabe entrepreneurs, some are people who have invested in property with little expertise and no clue what they are doing despite their best intentions.

However, there are some landlords that have been landlords like forever, these tend to have a fairly decent reputation and have a waiting list . ( I'm basing this on the landlords of my old workplace who had commercial and residential properties)

 

[Italy2]

Most 90% mortgages are back now and it seems business as normal

 

[Yel]

Ha ha I’m definitely not an estate agent....that’s not a job I’d ever aspire to....just saying the market may not be as badly affected depending where you live....we’ve recently bought and sold so am not moving anywhere for a very long time, we bought a home, not something to make money from!

Oh no don't think you're an estate agents, but that's classic estate agent speach - it gets repeated alot as it's popularist.

Sold means nothing untill it's exchanged, estate agents around here are putting on houses and changing to sstc a few hours later. Presumably it's a trick to make it look like they're busy?

Nationwide have withdrawn all 95% LTV and their minimum is now 85%, factoring in the falling prices I assume. Also just because a product exists doesn't mean someone will get it, they will possibly be much more strict on who qualifies.

https://www.archive.is/oldest/https...ples-minimum-deposit-for-uk-first-time-buyers

 

[Homebird44]

A lot of people are in the same situation.

My friends and I had a challenge in which we would stick to the bare minimum (rent, groceries, electricity, Internet, petrol) for a year. Some of us were able to save up to 10k in a year. During the same time houses that were sold for 80-100k are now 175-250k. Even in remote places with no public transportation, no jobs and no distraction (cinema, bars) houses are sold for 150k in Ireland. Mind you our salaries didn't went up.

House prices are stupidly high. I feel so sorry for anybody wanting to buy. I know stopping the stamp duty has helped people out but the prices are ridiculous. Id be waiting for a while if I was looking now, they'll hopefully start to level out a bit.

 

[Boutros-Boutros Ghali]

Going back to the economy, I think the redundancies are really going to start happening now sadly. With large companies having to have I think 45 days consultation and smaller ones 30 days now's just the time to start the process so come August when furlough changes they won't have the liabilities. Not seen this in real life, but a few posts here. This might only be the begining of challenging times.

Sadly I agree with you
My partner works in hospitality, he’s the events manager for a large convention centre. Furloughed until the end of July but we can’t see how they will keep him on, there just isn’t going to be a market for large scale conferences/events for a long time, so they won’t keep staff on. His industry is going to be saturated with people looking for jobs, without the jobs being there.....testing times ahead for many. We are lucky that we made the move north and have a small mortgage, plus I was able to negotiate to keep my London salary, so we’ll be ok until he finds something else, but many others wi t be so lucky. Plus he’s worked in the industry his whole life, he’s very good at what he does and has worked his way up, so it’s sad that his whole career could be gone just like that

 

[littlepup]

I’ve mentioned before property only tends to become available here when someone dies tbh and the quality is therefore really poor. Their house had been modernised so is a rarity so not really surprised it went so quickly, shocked it wasn’t so much as listed online though! And frustrating as any similar property won’t have details on zoopla for us to create a range with? :/

There’s another one for sale on our road now but it’ll require a good double digit percentage of its price’s worth of work doing to it as it’s a probate sale.

Do you mean you want to see other properties so you can value your own? Online details can be very, very misleading. The pics won’t show up damp or subsidence etc nor tell you if the seller wants a quick sale or is in a big chain so unless you’ve been in the property and spoken to the agent it’s hard to narrow it down. Obviously there’s a rough ceiling price you can work to but what something is advertised for and what it sells for can be really different and if you wait for the sold price to come onto zoopla the price market have changed - certainly at the moment.
Just get a few agents round to value. It’s no obligation and even if you do put your house on the market you always want a few agents to value so they’re more than used to valuing without it becoming a listing.

 

[Tublet83]

Out of curiosity does anyone here has a new build house and what do you guys think of it? I know so many people have bought new houses in our social circle and they love it. Some of them have bought them on help to buy and some have as their forever home because they are nice and clean. I know they are more expensive than an old house but they are clean and no one has ever lived there before. What do you guys think of them?

Depending on where you buy in the UK, when buyer a new building you can go immediately into negative equity, ok if you plan on being there longer term but not if you want sell especially on a large estate.

I hate the ridiculous number of bathrooms in new builds would rather have bigger rooms!

 

[Yel]

I cringe hearing people saying how fab it is their employer has got rid of the office - I think especially for very big companies who will have a lot of “wastage” (eg employees doing very little, roles that no longer need to exist really, overpaid for their actual technical skill set management) they’ll have used the furlough scheme as a proof of concept for how much headcount they could cull.

Yep this exactly, even if only 1% or 2% of jobs are lost it will be monumental with how quickly the changes are being brought in.

It will all be affected if people are sent back to the office or not.

The ramifications are absolutely huge, a lot more than 90% of prets disappearing!

Algorithms were already replacing white collar tasks at a rapid rate from everything from accountancy, diagnosing medical conditions and legal work. Not every job will be replaced but the headcount will be reduced with machines doing more grunt work. That with a small increase in offshored jobs will be absolutely monumental.

 

[Yel]

Thing is people now expect their houses to be worth that money now. I think people will just end up staying put if they can’t get the high prices of this year (unless they really have to move)

Things keep moving with divorce debt and death, I imagine there's been a huge rise in all three.

Some people with a choice may not sell for a penny less than it was worth at the top of the market but lots of others will. Hense the falls of 2008 and end of 90s even though lots said people just won't sell.

If you're moving then the next place falling by a similar amount makes it a zero sum game, or maybe a bit of a benefit if you're moving somewhere more expensive.

 

[Babysnark]

I've spent the last 6 months trying to help my mum sell her house and move closer to me (she's on her own in a 3 bed house now me and my sister have left and she wanted to downsize, she still has a fairly large mortgage). Honestly been utter hell, had to ring up within the first couple of hours of the listing posted to even get a viewing, been to 50+ viewings, lots of horrible properties heavily overpriced. Had about 5 she wanted to buy and tried but was outbid by 10k over the asking price consistently.. She's now given up and staying put for a couple of years and I'm moving back in from renting to save up for my own deposit. Glad I can stop refreshing rightmove ngl...

Do we think the market will be easier then? I've tried researching myself but it's not clear - there might be a slight dip in price inflation in 2022?

 

[hnoz]

First-time buyers to get 95% mortgages in new 'Generation Buy' scheme

The PM told the virtual Tory party conference today that he hoped the mortgage plan would create two million new home owners.

metro.co.uk

Has anyone seen the announcement from Boris today? What do you guys think and when do you think he is aiming to bring these plans in place?

"We will help turn generation rent into generation buy."

"fix our broken housing market"

"[labour] They may have million-pound homes in north London, but they deeply dislike home ownership for anyone else."

lol why does Boris love to pretend the conservatives haven't already been in government for a decade?

 

[actuallyeducated]

I don’t understand the hate on here for landlords. It’s supply and demand. People need/want to rent, therefore landlords provide this service. With investing people can make money investing in morally questionable companies. Yes people have taken advantage of a situation if they’ve been lucky enough to make money from their house. Don’t be bitter about it. I’m sure you’d be glad if it had happened to you, just, it didn’t.