The April edition of the FindaProperty.com Rental Index has hit the virtual shelves, with the headline:

“Two-Tier Rental Market Emerges: Houses Begin Recovery Whilst Flats Continue To Suffer”

Click here to read more headlines from the April Rental Index or click here to download the full Rental Index pdf. ( 1.7MB approx)

Alternatively if you prefer a more soundbite-friendly experience, see (and hear!) Andrew Smith - our head of Research - emerge from the jungle and talk about the latest index and what it means for YOU the renter and YOU the lettings agent:

Here’s a handy visual representation of figures recently published by Moneyextra.com about mortgage availability.

It shows that in the first quarter of 2009 people with a 25 per cent deposit had access to the largest number of mortgage products: 797.

In Q1 2008 there were still plenty of deals at 90 per cent LTV (401) but this had plummeted to a mere 67 by Q1 2009.

It will be interesting to see if the Budget announcement on mortgage backed securitisation produces a shift in loan-to-value ratios – high deposits are currently a big obstacle for many buyers.

However, not everyone believes this is the key to a market recovery – David Lawrenson over at Letting Focus recently argued that many people overestimate the impact of mortgage access on the future direction of house prices.

Why? Because, in his own words:

“Over 40 per cent of people have no mortgage so don’t give a stuff about mortgage rates; and if they are not buying for themselves they will be giving their lucky offspring at least some of the money for a deposit and for the hefty mortgage fees which are now the norm.”

That’s a fair point, and well made. But let’s hope LTV levels do improve so that all those people who can’t make a withdrawal from the Bank of Mum & Dad get a chance to buy a place of their own.

Great story on Sky News about a motel manager in New Zealand who’s banned an entire town from staying in his holiday complex of studio apartments and villas.

The town in question is Wainuiomata, population circa 17,000 - none of whom are now welcome at the Supreme Motor Lodge in Palmerston North, NZ.

The reason for this all-out ban?  Well, it seems the town’s sports teams – regular visitors until recently - are somewhat lacking in manners, leave rubbish strewn around and have scant regard for fellow residents.

When their last stay resulted in all night music and rudeness towards staff, manager Malcolm Glen, who goes by the nickname Basil Fawlty, deemed it the final straw and issued his blanket ban.

Even the MP for Wainuiomata is barred: when he phoned to test the ruling, using the old “don’t you know who I am” trick, he was promptly informed by Mr Glen that it mattered not a jot, particularly as he was a Scotsman and therefore didn’t have a vote anyway.

Fair play to the man, I say. And could this be a canny wee marketing campaign, too?  It certainly enticed me to sneak a peek at the motel’s website, and sure enough, it states on the homepage:

“Just to add some extra character to our offering, we have Malcolm (better known as Basil Fawlty) at the helm.”

Sadly, there’s no mention of a Sybil.  Boo.

“The fully outfitted, meticulously detailed, two bedroom, Boeing 727 fuselage suite” at Hotel Costa Verde, Costa Rica.

Just… wow.

(via Inhabitat)

Sometimes you’re drawn into a world you know little about and come back both amazed and enlightened.

It’s happened to me twice today already. The first came about by following the @talkirish Twitter feed.

To explain: I have an Irish girlfriend I’d like to impress with my knowledge of her native tongue. But thus far my Irish vocab only includes such useful words as ‘poc’ (goat) and ‘ceapaire’ (sandwich). So if I’m ever starving in Sligo I can at least ask for a goat sandwich.

Today’s Irish word came through on the Twitter wire.

“Hey Mike,” I say to Winging It’s Hibernian Editor, “today’s Irish word is ‘Bó′.”

“That’ll be ‘Cow’,” he says.

Next thing I know I’m knee deep in Irish myths on th’internets reading about the Cattle Raid Of Cooley, which as far I can tell is all about mass slaughter through bull envy.

The second voyage of discovery happened just now as I was researching chickens (bear with me) …

As the credit crunch bites even harder more people are starting to grow their own veg, make their own stuff (Kirstie Allsop throws a pot and uptake in pottery classes quadruples*) and even keep their own chickens.

To this end, via notcot.org I came across the rather lovely and enthusiastic www.backyardchickens.com, which proudly presents itself as the: “#1 destination for the information you need to raise, keep, and appreciate chickens”.

It’s fairly USA-centric, but does indeed contain pretty much everything you (n)ever wanted to know about chicken keeping.

There’s a guide to breeds, which takes chicken appreciation to a new, intimate level. The ‘Blue Laced Red Wyandotte’ is apparently “a bird of curves”.  Hmmm. Not sure I needed to know that.

A bunch of Chicken sayings: “Regard it as just as desirable to build a chicken house as to build a cathedral.” (Frank Lloyd Wright.)

And (relating to the previous quotation) there’s a great gallery of chicken coops, some of which would indeed shame Notre Dame. Ok, maybe that’s a slight eggsageration (ahem) but some of these chickens have seriously nice cribs…

The Kreitz Family’s “Poulet Chalet”

"ChickenHaus"

The (slightly odd) GopherBoy's Coop

And finally … the one I saw on notcot.org that dragged me into this odd - but strangely comforting - world of chicken keeping, the wonderfully absurd:

Maurice, The Car Chicken Coop

The last one is from England, naturally. No-one does eggcentricity (ouch) like the English.

For a more modern take on the chicken coop, see ‘Chicken Coop For The Soul‘.

*Note: I just made up this statistic, but it’s probably true.

Interesting Q&A with MPC member Kate Barker over at the Spectator on why the housing market and the economy hit the skids.

Barker, who did a review of housing supply for the government, makes some pretty strong statements, among them that the target for housebuilding may now be defunct due to demographic changes and that the MPC shouldn’t have been set up to focus so narrowly on inflation.

She also predicts that house prices will pick up as lenders become more liberal about how much they will lend:

“The big slide down to 75-80 per cent [loan to value requirement] may be overdone. So I would expect the mortgage market to move. I expect house prices to move up again.”

The full text is at The Spectator.

 Loading ...

Glitzy City, Curious Town

The Easter weekend is always a bit of a treat and this year certainly didn’t disappoint.

Far from being frowned upon, the pursuits of stuffing one’s face with gigantic roast dinners, ovular chocolate and day-beer are positively encouraged, which never fails to fill my clogged heart with gladness.

On Tuesday I experienced a brief bout of commuter chaos when, on arriving Finsbury Park, I learnt that there’d been a jumper on the line and so trains on the Hertford Loop were indefinitely suspended.

Naïvely, I asked why it wasn’t possible to simply pounce down onto the track and snatch it off when there was a reasonable gap between trains, or even try hooking it up with a broom. Did it have a hood, I wondered, because that would surely be a doddle to snag.

After a wearisome roll of the eyes from the First Capital Connect platform manager, the term “jumper” was explained to me and I realised my suggestions had perhaps been a little less helpful than I’d hoped.

Rather than wait around twiddling my thumbs and spending eye-watering sums of money at the organic snack shack betwixt platforms 5 and 6, I quickly scanned the departure board and got set for a four minute wait for the Welwyn Garden City service.

I was in Hatfield about twenty minutes later, and quarter of an hour after that the taxi was pulling up chez moi.

It’s the first time there’s been any real travel chaos in nine months (even during the snow earlier in the year) and, whilst I wouldn’t fancy the prospect of doing it every day, it’s good to know that by crossing a mini-cab driver’s palm with gold (well, fifteen quid), I’m not stranded just because I’m not on the Tube.

I’d have comfortably spent more than that on a couple of cups of boredom tea and floor-biscuits had I waited for the ‘Loop to re-open.

Maundy Thursday arrived and, as I enjoyed quaffing a handful of post-work Soho holiday-beers outside one of the area’s fine hostelries, I was delighted to be approached by a heart-stoppingly pretty young lady dressed as a rabbit and dishing out flyers for some modern discotheque or other.

After a brief, flirtatious chat that was in no danger of going anywhere given the clear disconnect in our relative prettiness, I was able to enjoy a good old fashioned rock back on my heels with my eyes on stalks as she sashayed off into the night never to be seen again.

Feeble, I know, to count this voyeuristic non-event amongst the highlights of my city week, but she had whiskers and everything, that wascally wabbit, so I really was powerless to resist.

I am a bit of an organised control freak (a typical Virgo apparently) so this house buying lark is freaking me out! I feel like all these different people - estate agent, solicitor, valuation surveyor and lender are all talking and leaving me out!

To be honest though, I am just letting them get on with it as not entirely sure what I am supposed to be doing …

Anyway, good news! I got the official mortgage offer which I stared at for a few days, got a bit scared about (I’ll be paying how much?!) and then got my confidence back (this IS a good investment and it IS a good time to buy).

So I signed my social, shoe buying, holidaying life away …

That organised Virgo side of me is coming in handy though as I have put together a spreadsheet of how much I need for first mortgage payments, money transfer fees, mortgage fees etc. Means there hopefully won’t be a shock later on down the line.

I had to do a few more admin tasks as well e.g. getting proof of my identity. My high street bank refused to certify my identification, so did the solicitors down the road (apparently there is a new law and they have to know you personally?) but finally realised that the agent could do it so that is one thing off the list.

And so now I wait …

Spoke to the agent the other day and the vendor is currently negotiating on the cost of the lease extension (it is quite a scary amount of money they have to stump up) but it is a condition of sale so has to be done.

She apparently doesn’t want to lose me, but my heart jumps every time the agent’s number flashes up on my phone. I shouldn’t be so negative but I am scared she could pull out and try and get a higher price for the flat to help with the lease extension cost.

What can you do but keep everything crossed? If it is meant to be, it will be. Actually surprised at how relatively calm I am. I suppose I have heard so many people talk about losing places along the way so am being realistic and not getting my hopes up too much.

I keep saying that if it doesn’t go through I will only lose the £400 that I have paid out for the valuation survey and admin fee to the lender. It is still £400 but not the end of the world although every penny counts at the moment.

I really need to stop ‘treating’ myself in Topshop …

Europe’s biggest all-singing, all-dancing consumer poll, the Readers’ Digest Trusted Brands survey, has released its results for 2009.

Research is conducted in 16 countries to find the top 20 “Brand Specifics” that are common to all countries.  There’s also a “Local Categories” list where each country includes 20 top brands of their own choice.

And so to the results….drum roll, please…

Here in the UK, Nationwide has overtaken Halifax as the most trusted mortgage lender while British Gas topped the list as best utility provider.

Our favourite household cleaning product is Flash, which we probably buy from our top retailer, Tesco, along with our Colgate, Flora and Sure deodorant.

And, since it’s almost Easter, we can’t forget chocolate: Cadbury’s came out as the UK’s favourite choice of confectionary.

Across all 16 countries, Nivea and Nokia hit the number one spots for skin care and mobile phone handset; both brands have been voted in first place by all countries since the survey began in 2001.

Visa is the credit card of choice in 14 countries; Canon the top brand of camera in 13; and Kellogg’s serve up the best cereals in 10.

The survey also threw up some weird little peculiarities according to country.

Russia’s local categories, for example, included seed oil, shoe care - and diarrhoea remedy.

Portugal, on the other hand, voted for favourite laxative and throat analgesic.

In Finland, they had a category for best ‘functional food’. Eh, hello? Isn’t that the ultimate point of food?

Meanwhile, over in the Netherlands, they were busy rating bicycles, dating sites…and beds.  You gotta love the Dutch.

I ask because I recently had two blog posts sent my way, one urging investors to buy flats, the other saying, nah, don’t be daft, it has to be houses.

In the flat corner is Robin Bowman of Property Secrets, who argues:

“There is almost always rental demand for good flats in good locations, which are generally what renters will be looking for rather than houses. Larger, family suited apartments also. Provided there’s no oversupply.”

But  David Lawrenson, over at Letting Focus, reckons the typical leasehold flat can sometimes be a bit of a headache:

“If the management of the block is good, the lease is well drafted and there are not too may other flats in the local area then flats are OK. But often this is not these case.

“If you are thinking of buying a flat, think about noise and inconsiderate neighbours. In converted flats, noise is always a real problem because the properties were never built to be soundproofed in the first place. In the long run, properties that are freehold and have gardens will always keep their price – just as long as they are in decent areas.”

 Loading ...

Feel free to send your reasons using the Comments link below.