The tragedy of The Presidents Club and Oxfam: Who are the real victims here?

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I have to say that the present febrile hysteria about moral rectitude may have gone quite mad.

The shameful, rush to judgment by the PM, MPs, charities and the Press in the Presidents Club debacle was staggering.

By the scribings of one lowly journalist, posing as a hostess at the Presidents Club function, on a mission to find a story, without any apparent substantiation, has turned into the modern version of a ‘kangaroo court’ and a subsequent ‘lynching’.

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The House Whisperer

You would think that the process of selecting a buyer for a particular property is important. You would also think that an appointment for them to inspect the property, is crucial. But, how many estate agents know how to get a deal across the line? This is a vital science, which is so important to the success of the process, yet many of them are clueless as to how to master it.

Over 41 years in the residential property business, I have been brought into ‘problem deals’ as a ‘Mr. Fix-It’ and we have the highest success rate of any agent in business. More often than not, it is at a crucial time where intransigence and obstinacy of buyer and seller, is at its peak and where the closing of the last 10% of the price gap, between offer and acceptance, is most difficult.
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Are the Stamp Duty hikes doing more harm to the UK Economy than just strangling the Residential Property Market?

We all know the reasons why the former Chancellor imposed those draconian hikes on Stamp Duty charges in the autumn Budget of 2014 and we can now see the full devastating and distorting effect it is having on the Residential Property Market, particularly in London.

Prices are down by 25% and activity is down by 70% and since transaction expenses are now playing such an important part in the mind-set of prospective buyers, in certain price ranges, there is absolute gridlock in sales, where sellers outnumber buyers by 10-1. Continue reading