Advise - Selling house - Offer made....

[Rave]

Sorry but Rave, doing what has been the opposite of your advice for the last 5+ years has worked out well for me. True that isn't to say it will in the future. But I fear in your analysis you feel the result should be what is best for society, not what will happen. My parents are prime examples, they spawned two, yet get angry two and nail about "new developments" happening near them, because it will spoil their view, or lower their property price. Whilst we argue about it, they sometimes admit their hypocritical nature, they are typical in that.For me its not about due diligence. Its about their been a trend in the market that is stupid.

I genuinely didn't bank on the government being so monumentally stupid. Lesson learned. Meanwhile, the can has been kicked down the road for 4 years, so the collaps when it does come will be all the more catastrophic IMO. Or, if they do somehow manage to avoid a crisis and simply grind the debt away through inflation over a lost decade or two, that will go on a lot longer than it otherwise would have .

I haven't won, but then I was never really in a position to play the game anyway, so I've hardly lost either.

[Saracen]

Saracen, if you want to discuss risk then please use some figures that are relevant to the context here. Otherwise the discussion is meaningless.

There have been a couple of sets of announcements in the news, even one set in the last couple of days, of what is expected to happen, and the broad picture was London leading, with the south east not far behind, and an expected 6% pa. I'm sure if youcwant the details, you're as capable of finding them as I am of finding them again.

And it's not meaningless. All anyone can do is look at what best opinion is, and then bear in mind that best opinion can be wrong. You pay your money, or not, and take your chance. Nobody, but nobody, knows what will happen in the next 6 months.

[Saracen]

Good to see a decision has been made, Andehh. At the very least, it's a load off your mind if you aren't worrying about it. I don't want to sound negative, but ..... don't count your chickens 'til they hatch, though. Even getting an offer is quite a way short of completing a sale.

[Saracen]

....

The best time to bite a proceedable buyer's hand off is when there aren't very many of them about.

Agreed, if it's the only buyer. But you only need one more. That's one reason why turning it down is a bit of a risk. As I said earlier, a sale now is a guaranteed position, and you lock in the current financial position. If you don't, you could do a lot better, if things fall right, or a lot worse if they go wrong.

....

Care to link to some then?

Nope, because I don't have them to hand, and the PC I was using before Christmas, with the links on, died. Until I get it rebuilt, or get the drives in another machine, I don't have the browser history. However, yet another story has been in the news in the last 48, maybe 72 hours. I saw it on a news aggregator on a tablet, so it'll either be BBC
News, or one of the major broadsheets, or something like the Economist. But I don't remember which. If I see it, I'll let you know.

[TheAnimus]

I genuinely didn't bank on the government being so monumentally stupid. Lesson learned. Meanwhile, the can has been kicked down the road for 4 years, so the collaps when it does come will be all the more catastrophic IMO. Or, if they do somehow manage to avoid a crisis and simply grind the debt away through inflation over a lost decade or two, that will go on a lot longer than it otherwise would have .

I haven't won, but then I was never really in a position to play the game anyway, so I've hardly lost either.

Oh buddy, this isn't a pissing competition, 2011-2012 has been interesting for some of my investments. By that I mean a lot of whiskey has helped make it merely interesting, rather than emotional roller-coaster.

However, it hasn't been government propping up house prices, only the stamp duty threshold thingie could be argued to be directed entirely at that.

We've seen depressed base rates, but that is due to many things more important than housing. In many parts of London we've seen increase in population, but no new buildings able to be made.

In fact, we've finally seen crossrail go ahead, which should in fact help bring in more commuters and allow for lower prices in certain areas. If we aren't going to mercilessly develop on the greenbelt or build eyesaws then its the natural consiquence.

Inflation is a way of adjusting our current scenario, sadly its welcomed by both sides. Our spendie spend spend, tax and borrow types love it, because it allows them to spend more (as they don't acknowledge the devaluation spending has). Our no spendie, no taxie types like it, because we can deflate the debt away, and inflation is considered 'fair' as it targets everyone (ie hurts the poor most).

[Saracen]

I genuinely didn't bank on the government being so monumentally stupid. Lesson learned. Meanwhile, the can has been kicked down the road for 4 years, so the collaps when it does come will be all the more catastrophic IMO. Or, if they do somehow manage to avoid a crisis and simply grind the debt away through inflation over a lost decade or two, that will go on a lot longer than it otherwise would have .

I haven't won, but then I was never really in a position to play the game anyway, so I've hardly lost either.

The thing is, you've been predicting that crash for years, and we've xebated it numerous times. My position, for clarity, is that while I felt it was self-evident that property couldn't go on appreciating at the rate it was indefinitely, it was not clear if we'd get a crash, or just a relatively modest negative adjustment.

And as I said in past threads, I suspected the latter unless some catastrophic external event triggered the crash, which while certainly possible, was by no means certain.

Well, we got a monumental event, and it didn't trigger a crash. It certainly put paid to any price growth in most of the country, and some places have, for sure, been hit harder than others. But we haven't seen anything like the property crash we saw in the late 80's /early 90's. That one left me with a mortgage I could only just, by the skin of my teeth, cope with, and a house worth just barely more than I paid, five years after I bought it. And I was one of the lucky ones.

So for all the hype over the severity of the credit crisis, it hasn't devasted the property market. Why not? For a start, because a lot of mortgage holders, especially anyone on a tracker, did and is still doing well from interest rate cuts. Though, to be sure, those on low'start mortgages got caught in a trap when the low rate deals expired and they couldn't remortgage in a competitive market.

Also, of course, while some have lost jobs, by and large, the "recession", even the doubke-dip, has not seen the drastic, persistent and extensive rise in unemployment we might have expected.

The economy is not in good shape, for sure, but it could have been oh so much worse.

So the housing market has dipped a bit for sure, in most places, and is barely above the price levels of several years ago even in the good spots, but it hasn'f crashed, despite "the most severe econkmic crisis since tge great depression".

I don't think that bodes well for a massive collapse any time soon, because it's survived a huge credit squeeze, the US economy in trouble, a massive eurozone crisis (still ongoing), and a generic worldwide slowdown, even for the likes of China.

Every economic crisis tends to be different from the one before. IMHO, we will not see a property collapse provided we don't see a further massive deterioration in the state of things, and moreover, one that causes massive unemployment.

As long as the substantial majority can continue to pay their mortgages, or at least avoid sufficiently serious default so as to end up with repossession, then property owners will, if need be, simply sit on their existing property.

We will not see a collapse when demand and supply are equal-ish, or when demand exceeds supply. And right now, demand does exceed supply. We have a substantial housing shortage. And with recent steps to free up finance starting to hsve an impact (hence those market rise predictions I mentioned), we won't see see a supply surplus any time soon. So, as long as finance is there, and confidence remains, a property crash is unlikely, IMHO.

Therefore, it comex down to whether any cataclysmic event, bad enough to devastate either available finance or buyer confidence, occurs. And yes, it could. But it's a very long way from clear that it will.

But nobody, of course, knows. You don't, I don't, Osborne abd Balls don't, Souros doesn't. Nobody does. So, it's a risk.

And if it were to happen inthe next few months, Andehh will be laughing once his sale completes. If what happened in the last crash happened again, that £200k in the bank would buy him a place that currently would cost him about £400k. It'd be a good time to be cash-rich and property poor. If it happens.

[Smudger]

Also take into account 6 or so months of mortgage payments you won't be making if you take the offer now...

[RoganJosh]

Meanwhile I'll sit here with my pile of cash and gold in the bank and see what happens. I'm hedged, and I'm pretty liquid, so I'm happy.

Dave - are you a capitalist?