Tag Archives: residential property market

The Marching Morons* of the Residential Property Market

As Brexit bubbles away, where does that leave the Residential Property Market in the next quarter?

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One doesn’t have to be a carnival fortune-teller or political expert (the former being more accurate) to realise that Boris will be a shoo-in candidate for Prime Minister. Top of the job list will be to trudge through a legislative obstacle course to propel a deal through Europe in three months. This is akin to squaring the proverbial circle and this herculean task will be compounded by the fact that the new – unelected – EU commissioners would hardly have had time to raid the Brussels wine cellar, nor file their bogus expenses claims.

Wisely or not, Boris has committed himself to the deadline of 31st October and there is no going back for the ‘blond bruiser’. After three years of May’s failure, he will confront a restive nation that will delight in nailing him to the masthead. While it’s possible that he’ll just do a cut and paste job of May’s withdrawal deal, kicking some of the more contentious elements down the road (i.e. the backstop), given the past obdurate record of the EU negotiators, this seems like an improbable scenario. We don’t need any more choruses of ‘Mais Non’ from them do we? Continue reading →

Could we be on the cusp of a rising market?

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Despite the political turmoil swirling, there is now an acute shortage of residential property in some sectors. Could we be on the cusp of a rising market?

Here is a man who bites a dog story. With all the political gyrations going on at the moment, could the residential property market be on the cusp of an upward swing? Continue reading →

Ban on Letting Agents’ Fees – boon for the tenant or the clunking fist of needless government interference?

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‘The road to servitude is paved with government intentions’ as economist Friedrich Hayek might have said. His prophetic ideas are pertinent today, where we are on the cusp of a government ‘initiative’ to ban letting fees. As always with bureaucratic interference, a busybody’s desire to help the ‘vulnerable’ ends up as the economic version of playing the piano with boxing gloves, where the cure can often be worse than the ailment.

Any ‘fule kno’ that agents in response will simply raise their fees, which are usually around 10%, to landlords. The inevitable consequence will be higher rent levels for impoverished tenants. Continue reading →