Comments for Brickonomics

Comment on Housepricecrash.co.uk by John Wallter

John Wallter — Sat, 10 May 2008 07:32:19 +0000

The table have turned out 12 months ago, and clearly the UK housing market is heading for a BIG crash… Whatever you ant to do, do not buy now !! Wait very very patiently. Let the prices go down 20%, then 30%, then 40% and only then consider making an offer. Don’t listen to these manipulated cheat TV programmes like “Property Ladder”, because there is no more property ladder. Miss Sarah Beeny have you found another job?!?

Comment on Housepricecrash.co.uk by john graham

john graham — Sun, 11 Mar 2007 16:58:41 +0000

One friend of mine is a builder selling about 20 houses / appartments p.a and says within the past six months sales have become much more difficult in the 130k – 160k bracket in Leeds area (appts) Rodley & Morley area although built to a very high standard. Other builders offering large incentives such as free smart cars or big discounts of up to 25% off, this doesn’t sound like a booming house market. Sooner or later with higher debts on cards and interest rates rising people will be squeezed and the cycle of negative equity will commence again unfortunatly but probobly sooner

Comment on Housepricecrash.co.uk by pali

pali — Fri, 08 Dec 2006 19:23:44 +0000

quite afew are just sad that they missed out on the boom and are hoping for a crash. sad really.

Pali from london

Comment on Sensible comment on demolitions shocker by Simon Fairlie

Simon Fairlie — Sat, 18 Nov 2006 22:44:15 +0000

If you want 5,000 words of local testimony about what people in Salford think of the Pathfinder and Urban Splash schemes, go to http://salfordstar.blogspot.com/

Comment on The buy-to-let bubble? by Shay Conway

Shay Conway — Tue, 14 Nov 2006 16:06:53 +0000

You forget about the overseas investor, those of us in the Eurozone(dare I use the E word) pay 4.5% while the Great British pay 6.4%.
Typically an apartment in Manchester worth £100,000 will yield £500 per month or £6,000 pa, ground rent £100 pa , maintenance £780 pa , estate agent fee £600, interest payment £4,500 giving a profit of £120pa or a loss of £520 for a local.

Comment on Housepricecrash.co.uk by Ash

Ash — Mon, 16 Oct 2006 10:33:26 +0000

You’re either very young and naive or Miss Kirsty la la land Allsop herself!, how can ask whether any sort of crash would be bad? You obviously did not personally witness the housing crash of the late eighties and how it destroyed families. That particular crash started off very small and it’s boom wasn’t under-pinned by so many unstable factors we have today.
This website and others balance out all the spin that we are constantly bombarded with in the media, Ash

Comment on Megamalls, walkable cities and ‘la Londonisation’ by Rob

Rob — Tue, 08 Aug 2006 08:33:35 +0000

Agreed. That’s fairly nutty. Especially as the bit that counts for continued economic/cultural success is the robustness of the volume/building rather than the continuity of the use.

Here in Birmingham we have just re-built a huge chunk of the city into a form that can only ever work as one particular type of use. Walk down a street in Paris and you’ll see spaces that could be (or have been) anything from a glass blower’s foundry to a mobile phone shop.

Comment on Sensible comment on demolitions shocker by Brickonomist

Brickonomist — Sun, 25 Jun 2006 17:42:19 +0000

Thanks for the comments Roger, though I have to say I'm not convinced. The 400,000 figure turned up once in a speculative early scoping document and, as John Perry points out and as you should know, does not bear any relation to the actual plans of the pathfinders. The story from Stoke doesn't suggest any particulary strong opposition to the pathfinder, and the performance of the Birmingham one, while worrying, shouldn't be used to denigrate pathfinders which don't have the same problems. And finally, you do yourself no favours by calling John Perry "obviously a political propagandist hack". He's one of the most respected and authoritative housing experts out there (co-author of the housing finance bible, for example) and a former policy director of the Chartered Institute of Housing.

Comment on Sensible comment on demolitions shocker by Roger Dodger

Roger Dodger — Sun, 25 Jun 2006 07:58:32 +0000

From Inside Housing, 23rd Jun 06…

“Birmingham Sandwell’s housing market renewal pathfinder has performed so badly that the Audit Commission warned that it could put the reputation of the entire national programme at risk.

In a draft report published in error by the Audit Commission on its website this week, the inspectorate said there was a risk that Urban Living’s work could actually make neighbourhoods more fragile and further polarise existing communities.

There was also no evidence to show how the pathfinder had determined whether to refurbish or demolish houses, it said.”

And this is the very Pathfinder area which Brendan Nevin, whose report triggered the schemes, said is a shining example of the policy’s success.

Comment on Sensible comment on demolitions shocker by Roger Dodger

Roger Dodger — Sun, 25 Jun 2006 05:56:35 +0000

“By putting unprecedented effort into involving residents, Renew is emerging with plans that have high proportions of local support – even from people whose houses might be demolished.”

Complete bollocks.

From the local newspaper in Stoke, Renew’s patch…

“the council said most residents were in favour of the scheme [for mass demolition of an area of 250 terrace homes]. A questionnaire returned by 93 tenants, landlords and homeowners found 64 per cent wanted clearance instead of refurbishment. … Where a property was rented, the council sent one questionnaire to the tenant and another to the landlord.”

So they double-counted, based on a pitiful response rate – and then used that in the press and flyers as a ‘valid reason’ to declare a mass clearance area.