The grumpy thread

[wuvvum]

Unfortunately, what's needed is a root and branch rewrite of the rules - and I can categorically say you will never, ever see it.  Ever.  Here's why.  House prices are a British Obsession, and no political party will ever stand up and say "Here is how we're going to lower house prices" because it'd be a suicide mission.  63% of the electorate are owner/occupiers and - having bust their bollocks to get on the ladder - they're not going to vote to be put in negative equity.  No matter WHAT their politics.

I completely agree - there is never going to be any deliberate action taken to actively reduce house prices.  That is something that will eventually happen on its own - although it could be decades down the line yet.

 

What would be good though is action to stop prices continuing to climb - this would avoid the whole "property is an easy way to make money" thing which is contributing massively to the whole sorry situation, whilst avoiding the negative equity issues which followed the last price crash in the '90s and which would affect "normal" homeowners more (in real terms) than it affects anyone else.

[mk2_craig]

Housing seems to be a massive pain in the arse anywhere that employment exists. I'm in Jersey which has all sorts of restrictions on who can work here, how long you have to be here before acquiring the right to buy property etc. You'd think that would keep house prices down a bit right?

 

Wrong. We are in a first time buyers restricted 3 bed semi of frameform construction, built a dozen years ago, no bells or whistles. Bought in 2010 for £415k. I've got just over twenty years on the mortgage, monthly repayments currently the wrong side of a grand and a half.

 

Wife has only worked sporadically since our lad was born Jul 2013 and never full time, currently between assignments. We've just about coped but I'm fed up of having no disposable income. I have tried to keep the place maintained in tidy order just in case we arrived at the point of needing to sell but now all the original appliances need replaced and I just can't find that sort of cash.

 

Might try getting a couple more years on the term next time it comes up for renewal which would help slightly and if I can convince the lender that its now worth half a million then we should see a drop in the interest rate. But it shouldn't be that expensive in the first place. Lower down the ladder and your young couples are losing out to those for whom a 2 bed flat generates better yields than any financial product.

 

Too long didn't read? The more government interferes with the housing market, the more it becomes skewed to the detriment of those who simply aspire to security of tenure, rather than an investment or additional income.

[Tadhg Tiogar]

The housebuilding near me is getting increasingly frustrating. Semi-rural village location but with decent road and rail links, and every available parcel of disposable farmland is being built on. And what are they building? "Executive" homes.

 

As this country already plans to increase the proportion of imported food/foodstuffs, I don't think anyone's really looking at the continuing loss of farmland all that closely.

 

Once farmland is built upon, it's gone forever.

[The Reverend Bluejeans]

As this country already plans to increase the proportion of imported food/foodstuffs, I don't think anyone's really looking at the continuing loss of farmland all that closely.

 

Once farmland is built upon, it's gone forever.

 

 

That's why this country needs a fucking revolution. At the moment - since time immemorial - it's been about individuals empire building, all the time the Great British Public TM spoon fed mind numbing TV and Murdoch bullshit so they can't see what's really going on.

 

"But we told you we were going to fuck you over"

 

But nobody was listening.

[Bobthebeard]

I really don't understand the reason for all the new build housing around here. Other areas may be different of course. Something like 4,000 new homes being built on the Fylde coast. Mainly detached high end housing.

The infrastructure of course won't support it, but that is a separate issue...

My point.

Is there really a shortage of 4/5/6 bedroom detached houses?

I don't get it. Surely the shortage is for stuff that people can actually afford in areas that offer employment or in urban areas. May be missing the point though.

A (once) small coastal town is rapidly turning into a building site. Housing shortage? Of 5* bedroom detached houses?

[Tadhg Tiogar]

That's why this country needs a fucking revolution. At the moment - since time immemorial - it's been about individuals empire building, all the time the Great British Public TM spoon fed mind numbing TV and Murdoch bullshit so they can't see what's really going on.

 

"But we told you we were going to fuck you over"

 

But nobody was listening.

Britain already imports about half of all its annual food consumption. I'd suppose the plan* is to increase that percentage, on the basis that it's cheaper to get other countries to produce it for us, so that we can repurpose agricultural land for development.

 

If a country can't feed itself from its own resources, it may well be squeaky arse time for future generations.

[SiC]

I really don't understand the reason for all the new build housing around here. Other areas may be different of course. Something like 4,000 new homes being built on the Fylde coast. Mainly detached high end housing.

The infrastructure of course won't support it, but that is a separate issue...

My point.

Is there really a shortage of 4/5/6 bedroom detached houses?

I don't get it. Surely the shortage is for stuff that people can actually afford in areas that offer employment or in urban areas. May be missing the point though.

A (once) small coastal town is rapidly turning into a building site. Housing shortage? Of 5* bedroom detached houses?

I remember reading the mostly wanted second home is a minimum of a 4 bed, that is detached and has a garage.

 

I guess the coast is popular as its where a lot of >50yr olds are retiring to, thanks to their comfy pensions, growth from their house sale in cities and high incomes.

[Bobthebeard]

I remember reading the mostly wanted second home is a minimum of a 4 bed, that is detached and has a garage.I guess the coast is popular as its where a lot of >50yr olds are retiring to, thanks to their comfy pensions, growth from their house sale in cities and high incomes.

But hardly a housing shortage though....

I really don't understand the reason for the explosion in building high end new housing. Unless the people that buy them are moving out of cheaper affordable houses, but that seems unlikely.

[TataBobu]

Sky grump: my dad told them to cancel his subscription starting March 22nd. They were really helpful and did the work early. Today. So no internet, no TV. Over the phone they were again really helpful, and stated they could reinstall it in no more than two weeks. Basterds.

[Bobthebeard]

Sky grump: my dad told them to cancel his subscription starting March 22nd. They were really helpful and did the work early. Today. So no internet, no TV. Over the phone they were again really helpful, and stated they could reinstall it in no more than two weeks. Basterds.

SKY....

Good luck with that one. Cancelling your subscription is almost impossible. IME.

[Parky]

SKY....

Good luck with that one. Cancelling your subscription is almost impossible. IME.

Tell me about it. I went to BT TV as it was loads cheaper, and most of the stuff on Sky wasn't of interest to me. I did give them the chance to keep me by offering me a new deal.

 

Basically I have a five year old box from when I started my contract. Over time the amount had crept from £20 up to £37 a month despite not having any Sports channels or specials. So seeing Idris getting excited about a Sky Q box and loads of new stuff for just £20 a month I thought I would ask for a discount. Basically no chance.

 

Eventually after having at least 4 long chats with various members they agreed to cancel (only after I stated I would be delivering my box to their head office with a cancellation letter and stopping the DD).

 

Week later I get a letter - "sorry you are leaving, but if you call us within 14 days you can have a better deal than the one we refused to give you when you originally called to cancel"

 

Fuck them. Only annoyance is a mate is a contestant on Sky Arts "Masters of Photography" and so I really want to watch that when it's out in May.

[Tadhg Tiogar]

Sky: believe in shitter.

[Bobthebeard]

SKY is good IME. Nothing beats it. Expensive and full of adverts though. Am tired of he adverts TBH. SKY needs to up there game and cut down the advertising.

[Cavcraft]

That's why this country needs a fucking revolution. At the moment - since time immemorial - it's been about individuals empire building, all the time the Great British Public TM spoon fed mind numbing TV and Murdoch bullshit so they can't see what's really going on.

 

"But we told you we were going to fuck you over"

 

But nobody was listening.

Absolutely spot on. Trouble is these days nobody could be arsed to have a revolution, most people’s idea of fighting back is to ‘like’ a post on Facebook and perhaps share it. You’re never going to get these half arsed outdoors to do actual protesting.

[Tadhg Tiogar]

Absolutely spot on. Trouble is these days nobody could be arsed to have a revolution, most people’s idea of fighting back is to ‘like’ a post on Facebook and perhaps share it. You’re never going to get these half arsed outdoors to do actual protesting.

It's all about value-free virtue-signalling now.

[Talbot]

Is there really a shortage of 4/5/6 bedroom detached houses?

No, they are just far more profitable to build. Again, from the build next to us. A 2-bed house costs about £150k to build all in, and sold for about £250k. The couple of 5-bedroom houses on the estate cost about £200k each to build but sold for £450k.

 

If there is a market for them AT ALL, then you should clearly build bigger houses, as the profit margin is much larger.

[eddyramrod]

I've just wasted the entire afternoon trying to sleep off my headache.  Now ok, I might not have spent it doing anything constructive or significant, but I'll never know now, will I?  I can still feel it (though not as bad) and my mood hasn't improved.

[The Reverend Bluejeans]

I just (Feb) sold my rented out house in order to raise the ££££ to buy a semi in Sheffield.

 

So, I'm £350 a month worse off, but I can make that up easily with a few hours a week extra and some Ebay action. I don't miss the potential aggro.

 

I rented my house out to two sets of people.

 

1. DHSS good for nothing layabout cunt scum. Not all (or many) DHSSSS'ers are twats like these. I'm sure most are alright. These fuckers were not. Mid twenties couple with two or three kids. Came across as being fine. One CCJ (and that's a warning signal) but as soon as they were in, there were reports of arguments, flying crockery, police and all the usual sub human scum behaviour. Thankfully I insisted that the rent was paid direct to me.

So, in about a year they fucking wrecked the place. Doors ripped off hinges, kitchen to bathroom wall fractured where one of these cunts had been kicking the door hard enough to dislodge the frame. Rat and mouse shit. Carpets and wallpaper destroyed, Tiles smashed from bathroom walls. In all, four grand to put it straight. Insurance (CX Commercial) useless wankers. 700 fucking quid. Thanks.

Kids taken into care. Eventually evicted and I went in with the bailiffs and they'd left - I was speechless. And of course, these cunts knew how the system worked, and how to play it. And they played it well. Rent? Free of course. Child support? Yep.All household and other bills? We don't pay those. No, we'll swap surnames to confuse everyone and run up a £1200 phone bill, £3000 in gas and electric, unpaid council tax, all whilst raking in around £2000 a month in bennies.

 

Getting them out wasn't hard - they knew they'd milked this one - time to repeat the process. In any government I ran, vermin like this would be in the poorhouse. I would build a few, just to put the point across.

 

2. Three Polish lads, plus a bird who was there from time to time. All three work at Sports Direct. Rent paid every month. House kept nice. Any problems reported so I can deal with it. Any mail to me forwarded.  

I offered the place to them cheaper than normal but due to Brexit and uncertainty therein, they declined.

 

 

Anyone who pays £250'000+ for a two bed semi down south needs to re-evaluate their life. Up here, they're half that. Only 150 miles from London and, up here, we have jobs and stuff too. If everyone bloody woke up and thought 'what the fuck am I doing here, being bum raped to live in Hemel Fucking Hempstead/Aylesbury/Luton/Croydon/Wycombe/Portsmouth/insert overcrowded Southern shithole here', looked on Rightmove, thus triggering a   moment..............no - you do not have to live* in Slough. You can live somewhere nice, for half as much. 

 

 

 

 

*Nobody lives in Slough. They merely exist.

[purplebargeken]

I've been trying to get Mrs PBK to consider moving for the last 15 years. No fucking chance as she 'likes London and is too young to go somewhere quieter.

 

Then we have a bit of a problem coming in a years time don't we.

[SierraMikeHotel]

Anyone who pays £250'000+ for a two bed semi down south needs to re-evaluate their life. Up here, they're half that. Only 150 miles from London and, up here, we have jobs and stuff too. If everyone bloody woke up and thought 'what the fuck am I doing here, being bum raped to live in Hemel Fucking Hempstead/Aylesbury/Luton/Croydon/Wycombe/Portsmouth/insert overcrowded Southern shithole here', looked on Rightmove, thus triggering a   moment..............no - you do not have to live* in Slough. You can live somewhere nice, for half as much.

 

Mixed feelings about this, to be honest.  For context, we're in the process of buying a house - a nice but very ordinary, modern 3-bed terrace on an estate, for just under £350,000 - and that's pretty good value for this area.  It does feel like I'm being bent over without any lube, especially when you consider how much prices have gone up relative to salary.

 

A few years ago I had the chance of a move to Yorkshire which is, as you say, just as nice as Sussex but considerably cheaper.  However I was still with my ex then, and she wasn't keen on the idea so it never happened.

 

Now I'm a bit older and I feel settled here, I don't really feel like uprooting yet again and building a new social life somewhere else.  So I guess I just have to put up with the massive mortgage if I want to be within easy visiting distance of my family and friends.

[bramz7]

Portsmouth is actually really cheap for the South funnily enough, I was training with some people from Fratton and they were surprising me with how much the going rate for a house is, even less in Gosport.

 

Yes I'd love to move up North, trust me. When I (well hopefully as is my career aim) get a train driving licence (I am but a measly commercial guard at the moment) I will try and convince my other half it's best for us.

 

I have resigned myself to living down here and renting for the time being, it's futile aiming for anything else really. I'll try and save as best I can even whilst renting of course...

[Frogchod]

Yep. Move north. Best move I ever done was from Reading to Rugeley.

Moved to a bigger house with drive and double garage, reduced mortgage and still

Had dosh left to buy a place in France, Acadianes, GS's,XM V6's and too much beer in the Chtwynd Arms

 

As above though, fuck Slough, that place is Grim

[omegod]

But hardly a housing shortage though....

I really don't understand the reason for the explosion in building high end new housing. Unless the people that buy them are moving out of cheaper affordable houses, but that seems unlikely.

Local councils just want higher council tax band income, happening round here but on greenbelt land sadly

[chaseracer]

...and too much beer in the Chtwynd Arms

 

Upper Longdon?  Nice.

[sierraman]

CCJ, Christ what were you thinking.

[Cavcraft]

Hats off to anyone who rents a place out to people who wreck it and don't pay the rent. Law or no laws, the fuckers wouldn't be staying in my property much longer.

[MarvinsMom]

come to Middlesbrough if you want cheap houses.

 

house values here have fallen something like 45% recently. you can still buy a house for £3k there, though one you can live in will cost you from £5 to £8k, that though will be across the border in St Hilda's, or Haverton Hill, so really you will NOT want to live there...

 

the fact that there is a housebuilding FRENZY going on currently has nothing* to do with the recent falls.

 

they are building everywhere.  they have ruined Stokesly, Yarm anf Guisborough amongst others. and they are pushing for another 5,000 houses between Marske and New Marske.

 

and if the local residents object then there is pretty much nothing that they can do. as each application will get through on appeal to the planning inspector.

 

why?

 

the govenment says that local authorities need to have a strategic long term (like 20 years long term) plan for the future housing needs.

 

but our shit-house labour councils REFUSE to prepare one, so the planning inspector has no choice but to wave these plans though, as there isn't a local plan. 

 

this is true in Middlesbrough, Redcar and Cleveland, Stockton, Darlington and Hartlepool. all places where a dog turd with a red rosett would be elected in an election, and all places that refuse to prepare a local plan, cos the gubbermunt says they should have one.

 

quiet who exactly is buying these crappy little boxes, well i dunno cos there aren't any new jobs on Teesside, and the NHS is still the regions largest employer by a large margin. 

 

many of these towns suffering this increase in population just cannot cope with the increase. take Guisborough for instance, 5 years ago the secondary school got re-built. Lawrence Jackson used to have a role of 2500, the new school can accomodate 1800, this is the case too at Ryehills in Redcar, Huntcliff in Saltburn and Freeborough Accademy in Brotton. all rebuilt in the last 7-10 years, and all much smaller than before.

 

well done Redcar and Cleveland, cuntcil, you shower of utter wankers.

[Captain Furious]

Yeah, but...the Tories are ultimately to blame...Shirley..

[MarvinsMom]

oh right, i forgot.....

 

and surely it all the fault of the Tooories, according to wee Jimmy Krankie....

[Guest Hooli]

Yep. Move north. Best move I ever done was from Reading to Rugeley.

Moved to a bigger house with drive and double garage, reduced mortgage and still

Had dosh left to buy a place in France, Acadianes, GS's,XM V6's and too much beer in the Chtwynd Arms

 

As above though, fuck Slough, that place is Grim

 

I agree with that, except living in france - fuck that it's like slough but worse accents.

 

 

Moving north was the best thing I've done financially. Life is just much better up here as it's cheaper & the place isn't so crowded that even in 'idyllic countryside you can't see for all the other people'.