All articles by Brian Green – Page 38
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House sales drop a third as credit crunch bites
The latest transaction figures from HM Revenue & Customs underline the industry fears of a collapse in home sales.They show that sales of property worth more than £40,000 have fallen by more than a third since the credit crunch hit. This May's figure of 98,000 transactions compares with 155,000 last ...
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Housing market gets tougher says Rightmove
The housing market is getting tougher with 15 homes on sale to every buyer, according to the latest research by the website Rightmove. And although asking prices dipped this month they remain at about the same level as last year.Set this against the usually conservative predictions from the HBOS, which ...
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The wealth effect and the death of builders' tea
Each morning I walk past a large Sir Robert McAlpine site. I'm impressed by the speed of build, the cleanliness, the apparent high safety standards and a general feel of efficiency.This morning I missed breakfast so I stopped at a cafe to buy a snack to eat on the hoof.A ...
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When even the good news is bad news you know it's time to take cover
A massive leap in retail sales. Excellent news surely. But no. Even if you are in the shopfitting business, this is does not make comfortable reading.On figures like these the markets are pricing in interest rate rises. This reaction encouraged, do doubt, in part by the tough words by the ...
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It's simple: act now or the house building industry collapses
When asked to do this blog I had hoped to steer clear of indulging in raw comment. But, even as cynical as I have become as a journalist over twenty odd years, I had not expected to encounter such fundamental ignorance and dithering as I see within Government ahead of ...
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Prepare for massive jobs cuts, recession is upon us
Construction is heading for two years of recession says the Construction Products Association in its latest forecast.It puts output down 1.3% this year and 1.6% next year, before a sluggish recovery starts in 2010.The net result is that activity will fall by more than 5% from the where it was ...
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Consensus grows on 20% house price fall
The new parlour game for economists seems to be guessing where the bottom is for house prices. The latest consensus position seems to be coming in at about 20% judging by reports in the Guardian and the FT.But that will be an average, so get ready for stories of houses ...
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Carnage if 70,000 fewer homes built - an £8 billion hit for construction
The Observer this Sunday claimed 70,000 fewer homes would be built this year.We face the biggest post-War slump in house building it said after interviewing Barratt chief Mark Clare.Frankly that would be carnage and, if the figure proves anywhere near accurate, it would mean a cut of about £8 billion ...
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More gloom for US housing market
Confidence in the US housing market has been further dented by a sharp rise in foreclosure (repossessions) in May according to RealtyTrac figures.
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House prices are still up on a year ago, says FT survey
It flies in the face of other house price measures, but the FT house price survey puts prices in England and Wales up by 2.7% on a year ago, despite a 0.6% fall in May.
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Unemployment jumps but no sign yet of slump in construction jobs
Employment in the wider economy continued to grow but there was a jump of 38,000 in the number of unemployed in the three months to April, official figures show.Rising unemployment is seen as a key factor in determining the shape of the economic slowdown and if it rises sharply may ...
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Mervyn King warns banks on binge drinking
I have a lot of time for Mervyn King's comments. Here's one from today that I think is worth a look. It is from his speech to the British Bankers' Association on "Banking and the Bank of England"."It is often said that the role of a central bank is to ...
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Thousands of homebuyers in negative equity
Figures provided to the BBC by the Council of Mortgage Lenders show that 23,000 homebuyers took out 100% mortgages in the 12 months to March this year.With house prices as measured by HBOS (Halifax) back to the level of January last year, this means that many if not most of ...
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House price falls - but not 'alf
The Guardian yesterday reported that traders were pricing in a 50% drop in house prices over the next four years. Firstly and personally, I think prices may fall quite deeply. But I don't think they will drop by 50% in "real" terms, unless the economy takes a pretty freaky turn ...
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Big freeze in the housing market threatens the wider economy
The May survey from the property body RICS once again points to house price falls - not deep, but widely spread. But the real threat claim its economists is from a freezing up of the market.Official figures point to a drop of about a quarter in the level of transactions ...
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Construction recession looks likely this year
On the face of it things look fairly steady in construction land. Thanks to a strong showing from publicly-funded work and a timely rise in private non-housing repair and maintenance, construction output remained steady in the first quarter of 2008, despite falls in private housing and commercial work.It is no ...
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Halifax figures confirm house prices are plunging
The average house prices has been falling by £4,000 monthly over the past three months as the pace of decline in the market has accelerated, according to HBOS figures. In May house prices were down 2.4%.So, if you had your house valued at £199,600 last August (the peak reached by ...
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Wave of job cuts spells more gloom for construction
The Government's confidence booster of "we'll be okay look at our strong labour market" is now starting to look rather shaky.The last pillar of hope for those keen to stop a collapse in house prices was strong employment. That prop appears to be wobbling.They say that the last thing companies ...
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Batten down the hatches here is a construction recession warning
The buyers body CIPS registered the fastest monthly fall in construction activity since it began surveying the industry in 1997. The figure for activity in the housing market was pitifully low.The survey of purchasers sets "no change" at 50, below that is decline, above increase. Well at 43.9 in May ...
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20% hike in two years in cost of home improvement work
Figures from the cost information service BCIS point to an inflation-led threat to the housing repair and maintenance market, as prices rise 20% over two years.Energy inflation, skills shortage and rocketing global materials prices are combining to pump up inflation just at a time when may households are considering staying ...