HSBC axes £300m data centre plans for Monks Cross, York (From York Press)

Hands up if you saw this coming!?

What a ringing endorsement of Waller, Galloway, Reid and all they stand for. They will truly bring this city to its knees.

I’d be keen to know how much money was spent by the council wooing HSBC to York? We can add it to Galloway & Waller’s bill.

Yup Sunseeker, this was hardly a bolt from the blue was it!?

They are not the only ones who are disappointed.
It didn't take long for the bank to change it's mind about York though, did it? It was old a few months ago that the Lib-Dim apologists where cheering about the brilliant investment the Council has made in wooing them here.

People must be living in cloud cuckoo land if they think that 'propped up banks' are going to start splashing out money on brand-new facilities and infrastructure. This was always a publicity seeking fantasy for individuals seeking kudos with voters and business.

Numpty. HOw can collapsing banks choosing international outsourcing over basing business in the UK be in anyway attributable to a local council.

I didn't believe it possible but the poor standard of this blog is actually deteriorating

voiceoreason wrote:
Numpty. HOw can collapsing banks choosing international outsourcing over basing business in the UK be in anyway attributable to a local council.

I didn't believe it possible but the poor standard of this blog is actually deteriorating

Well, isn't it curious that then they announced that they were coming here the council were quick on the mark to get their bit of the glory. Now that there is a problem you expect them to be excused. Double Standard, What double standard?

Ermm it isn't actually a Blog, but that aside, the poor standard of your comments continues ...

Millions of hands in India are waving right back at you! Another bunch of dreaming developers hit the building blocks of reality. No large business is coming to York while it is run so ineptly. There are more honest cities to business with who have clerically skilled workforces, not ex factory workers.

Glen_Quagmire wrote:
People must be living in cloud cuckoo land if they think that 'propped up banks' are going to start splashing out money on brand-new facilities and infrastructure. This was always a publicity seeking fantasy for individuals seeking kudos with voters and business.

Actually HSBC were one of the few banks who didn't need any "propping up and were not in any danger of collapsing. Perhaps that's because they make good business decisions. And for the amount of money it will have cost them to do the due diligence just to get through planning, I don't think they were never serious.

However I'm sure the poor standard of governance in York will not have contributed in any way positively!

The withdrawal of the data centre proposal is just a sign of the deepening recession - and it hasn't even got going yet.


12 years of borrowing money and pumping it into an economy to keep it going is going to have consequences. The government is also wanting to further borrow over 12% on GDP next year. Unbelievable insanity. Greece is knackered and they are borrowing less. It's hard to see how the UK will be able to hang on to its Triple A rating. Public services will be slashed, teachers/policemen/f
iremen/NHS staff/Council workers will be made redundant. You cannot pay people with money you do not have. If you don't believe me, look round Europe at Ireland, Latvia and such the like. Thing is, that's small scale because they are much smaller countries.


Things like artificially inflating house prices, does not create real wealth. (BTW - There is going to be a humoungus property crash). Real wealth is country-wide assets. Most of ours are either gone or are now foreign owned. Sold for a fraction of what they were worth.

Wait and see. I'd love to be wrong.

sciencefan wrote:

Glen_Quagmire wrote: People must be living in cloud cuckoo land if they think that 'propped up banks' are going to start splashing out money on brand-new facilities and infrastructure. This was always a publicity seeking fantasy for individuals seeking kudos with voters and business.

Actually HSBC were one of the few banks who didn't need any "propping up and were not in any danger of collapsing. Perhaps that's because they make good business decisions. And for the amount of money it will have cost them to do the due diligence just to get through planning, I don't think they were never serious. However I'm sure the poor standard of governance in York will not have contributed in any way positively!

http://www.tradingma
rkets.com/.site/news
/Stock%20News/265767
7/

Beg to differ sciencefan. HSBC is selling its Canary Wharf building for 772.5 million. If you fancy a nice pad with views of London that is.

Quibling about banks and blogs aside, I hope you voters remember the catalogue of self congratulation and failed projects come poling day and vote for anyone other than Lib-Dem, Labour, Conservative or Green. A vote for any simion would be an improvement.

santa claus wrote:
What a ringing endorsement of Waller, Galloway, Reid and all they stand for. They will truly bring this city to its knees.

.....No, No, No. and I'm not a supporter of theirs either.

This is caused by the recession and the ridiculous mess our banks are in caused by Brown and Darlings in ability to regulate the banks

voiceoreason wrote:
Numpty. HOw can collapsing banks choosing international outsourcing over basing business in the UK be in anyway attributable to a local council. I didn't believe it possible but the poor standard of this blog is actually deteriorating

Right. I'm sure that correspondance across the UK will refelct similar points of view. This is absolutely nothing to do with York per se. Everything to do with recessionary times.

Kiff wrote:

voiceoreason wrote: Numpty. HOw can collapsing banks choosing international outsourcing over basing business in the UK be in anyway attributable to a local council. I didn't believe it possible but the poor standard of this blog is actually deteriorating

Well, isn't it curious that then they announced that they were coming here the council were quick on the mark to get their bit of the glory. Now that there is a problem you expect them to be excused. Double Standard, What double standard?

Well wouldn't you want to take some pride in what at the time was a coup ? You can't blame the city council for a global downturn. This sort of thing is happening all over the UK and Europe at the present time.

My, my, what a lot of people with simplistic axes to grind. Poor sad angry deluded fools.
.
You know what, that bloke who was going to buy my car last month decided he didn't want it unless I knocked 600 quid off the price. Who to blame? Waller and Galloway!
My internet is slow lately. Guess whose fault? Waller and Galloway!
I didn't get many spuds this year's harvest. Yep, you guessed it - Waller and Galloway.
Idiots.
.
By the way, in the spirit of Brangelina and SuBo, should Waller and Galloway be Walloway?

Good to see a good few people with a sane view of the HSBC decision rather than the tired cyclops approach of the usual hacks with their skewed views most of which don't lift a finger to help bring business to the city.

HSBC made a clinical business decision based on the current global banking environment and to be honest I don't think the words "Lib Dem", "Waller", or "Galloway" formed even 0.000001% of their considerations.

You want someone to blame - you need to look far further than the Constituencies of Outer and Inner York.

Try the sub-prime lending market in the US for starters...

GailForSwins wrote:
Good to see a good few people with a sane view of the HSBC decision rather than the tired cyclops approach of the usual hacks with their skewed views most of which don't lift a finger to help bring business to the city.

HSBC made a clinical business decision based on the current global banking environment and to be honest I don't think the words "Lib Dem", "Waller", or "Galloway" formed even 0.000001% of their considerations.

You want someone to blame - you need to look far further than the Constituencies of Outer and Inner York.

Try the sub-prime lending market in the US for starters...

“Skewed hacks?” That would be funny if it didn’t make me want to puke.
.
Just remember many on here recall you using a Claudia Lawrence story to put the boot into the Labour Party.
.
Do keep posting but never forget – you have no credit with many on here. Hypocrite.

And not one constructive comment.
As for "A Taxpayers" snide remark about ex factory workers. you are obviously a chinless idiot who has the belief that because the unskilled/ semi skilled residents of the City which until 15 years ago had tens of thousands of people employed have no right to decent jobs.
People like you see no relation between lack of opportunity and the rise of the social underclass. I would suggest that the leaders of the City look to attracting some businesses who require slightly less skilled employees than for the University and science park.

leninwasright wrote:

Kiff wrote:

voiceoreason wrote: Numpty. HOw can collapsing banks choosing international outsourcing over basing business in the UK be in anyway attributable to a local council. I didn't believe it possible but the poor standard of this blog is actually deteriorating

Well, isn't it curious that then they announced that they were coming here the council were quick on the mark to get their bit of the glory. Now that there is a problem you expect them to be excused. Double Standard, What double standard?

Well wouldn't you want to take some pride in what at the time was a coup ? You can't blame the city council for a global downturn. This sort of thing is happening all over the UK and Europe at the present time.

I'm not saying we shouldn't take pride in the City. When it was first announced I was pleased (and said so). My point was very simple the so-called voiceoreason thinks that council can take credit when good new is announced but not be associated when things go wrong. I call that hypocrisy.

Oh dear yet again stupidity reigns on the site.NOTHING TO DO WITH GALLOWAY OR WALLER and I am in no way a Lib Dem supporter, the total opposite. But I do like the truth and the lack of understanding of truth on this site is breathtaking.

Glen_Quagmire wrote:
The withdrawal of the data centre proposal is just a sign of the deepening recession - and it hasn't even got going yet. 12 years of borrowing money and pumping it into an economy to keep it going is going to have consequences. The government is also wanting to further borrow over 12% on GDP next year. Unbelievable insanity. Greece is knackered and they are borrowing less. It's hard to see how the UK will be able to hang on to its Triple A rating. Public services will be slashed, teachers/policemen/f iremen/NHS staff/Council workers will be made redundant. You cannot pay people with money you do not have. If you don't believe me, look round Europe at Ireland, Latvia and such the like. Thing is, that's small scale because they are much smaller countries. Things like artificially inflating house prices, does not create real wealth. (BTW - There is going to be a humoungus property crash). Real wealth is country-wide assets. Most of ours are either gone or are now foreign owned. Sold for a fraction of what they were worth. Wait and see. I'd love to be wrong.

What deepening recession? All latest figures are showing that yes, whilst technically in recession, we are on the upward trend in terms of negative growth. I don't understand how that is attributable to a deepening recession.

House prices are not artifically high. This is proven by the fact that yes, they blipped, but are once again rising. The fact of the matter is a simple case of supply and demand - nice houses in nice places tend to come at a nice price - as a result of that, everything in that area is more expensive. In much the same way that rubbish houses in rubbish area come at a rubbish price.

There will not be a property crash. They will level off, slowly, and follow a standard inflatory curve. There is simply insufficient houses in the UK that people want to buy. Also, we live in a global world, and with a good exchange rate (for foreigners buying UK goods), if house prices do start to fall, foreign investors will fly in with their millions, create the demand and push prices up again.

Artificial wealth IS created. All wealth, by definition, is artificial, with the obvious exception of cash-in-hand. If everyone owns a £300,000 house, it is completely worthless unless someone else buys it. Same applies to any good. if everyone owned a £300,000 house, and tried to sell them all simultaneously, THEN the wealth would vanish. But they don't, so it doesn't. This same reason is why shares in companies plummet - there is no wealth. There is no cash. UNTIL someone else wants to buy it. In the stock market, shares plummet when everyone tries to sell at once, i.e. when the rats leave a sinking ship. But the housing market is different. With notable exceptions, if you sell a house, most people tend to buy another one...they have to else they have nowhere to live. It's self-fulfilling.

I agree with some of your thoughts though. You can not pay people with money you don't have. But the government are not doing that. They have ample money to pay people with. What they don't have, is ample money to spend on new helicopters, new NHS IT systems, ID cards or new railway projects. It is these things that will get put on the back-burner, and these things which will impact the economy - which political party in their right mind is going to make 2million doctors, teachers and nurses redundant?! Professional suicide!!

Scaremongering does not help the country. I'm interested in your point of view though, and would be interesting to try and prove you wrong over a pint sometime :-). Sorry for the long post!!!

mystic_genius wrote:

Glen_Quagmire wrote: The withdrawal of the data centre proposal is just a sign of the deepening recession - and it hasn't even got going yet. 12 years of borrowing money and pumping it into an economy to keep it going is going to have consequences. The government is also wanting to further borrow over 12% on GDP next year. Unbelievable insanity. Greece is knackered and they are borrowing less. It's hard to see how the UK will be able to hang on to its Triple A rating. Public services will be slashed, teachers/policemen/f iremen/NHS staff/Council workers will be made redundant. You cannot pay people with money you do not have. If you don't believe me, look round Europe at Ireland, Latvia and such the like. Thing is, that's small scale because they are much smaller countries. Things like artificially inflating house prices, does not create real wealth. (BTW - There is going to be a humoungus property crash). Real wealth is country-wide assets. Most of ours are either gone or are now foreign owned. Sold for a fraction of what they were worth. Wait and see. I'd love to be wrong.

What deepening recession? All latest figures are showing that yes, whilst technically in recession, we are on the upward trend in terms of negative growth. I don't understand how that is attributable to a deepening recession. House prices are not artifically high. This is proven by the fact that yes, they blipped, but are once again rising. The fact of the matter is a simple case of supply and demand - nice houses in nice places tend to come at a nice price - as a result of that, everything in that area is more expensive. In much the same way that rubbish houses in rubbish area come at a rubbish price. There will not be a property crash. They will level off, slowly, and follow a standard inflatory curve. There is simply insufficient houses in the UK that people want to buy. Also, we live in a global world, and with a good exchange rate (for foreigners buying UK goods), if house prices do start to fall, foreign investors will fly in with their millions, create the demand and push prices up again. Artificial wealth IS created. All wealth, by definition, is artificial, with the obvious exception of cash-in-hand. If everyone owns a £300,000 house, it is completely worthless unless someone else buys it. Same applies to any good. if everyone owned a £300,000 house, and tried to sell them all simultaneously, THEN the wealth would vanish. But they don't, so it doesn't. This same reason is why shares in companies plummet - there is no wealth. There is no cash. UNTIL someone else wants to buy it. In the stock market, shares plummet when everyone tries to sell at once, i.e. when the rats leave a sinking ship. But the housing market is different. With notable exceptions, if you sell a house, most people tend to buy another one...they have to else they have nowhere to live. It's self-fulfilling. I agree with some of your thoughts though. You can not pay people with money you don't have. But the government are not doing that. They have ample money to pay people with. What they don't have, is ample money to spend on new helicopters, new NHS IT systems, ID cards or new railway projects. It is these things that will get put on the back-burner, and these things which will impact the economy - which political party in their right mind is going to make 2million doctors, teachers and nurses redundant?! Professional suicide!! Scaremongering does not help the country. I'm interested in your point of view though, and would be interesting to try and prove you wrong over a pint sometime :-). Sorry for the long post!!!

..and sorry for quoting the long post, but it's one of the best I've ever seen.

mystic_genius - your self-selected name says all I need to know about you.

Your argument is flawed. A house remains an asset at all times. A bank may offer you money against the house - the debt to be paid back after your death through your estate. A so-called equity release. Your argument would be better explained by art. You could paint a picture and price it at a million pounds. Whether it sold (at your price) would be up to one art buyer.

Terry Wogan's last day tomorrow. He used to be a banker...

ak7274 wrote:
And not one constructive comment.
As for "A Taxpayers" snide remark about ex factory workers. you are obviously a chinless idiot who has the belief that because the unskilled/ semi skilled residents of the City which until 15 years ago had tens of thousands of people employed have no right to decent jobs.
People like you see no relation between lack of opportunity and the rise of the social underclass. I would suggest that the leaders of the City look to attracting some businesses who require slightly less skilled employees than for the University and science park.

No one has a right to a job. Period.

If someone doesn't want to get some skills either when you were at school or by putting the effort in now then no one is to blame but them.

Jobs requiring unskilled labour are disappearing fast, why, because those unskilled rolls can be done more cheaply by machine or in other parts of the world / Country where living costs and wages are lower. It's basic market economics.

You have to face up to the reality. The market economics in a city like this do not often support industries such as manufacturing which use more unskilled labour. So "Taxpayer" may have been condescending and patronising but he was, ultimately, spot on.

And I am not a chinless wonder, I am just someone who worked **** hard to learn what I needed to to get a good job, that I enjoy and earns me a decent wage and proud of it.

What i am also not is a socialist idiot living in a world twenty years out of date when unions actually had some power!

And Glen_Quagmire, Quahog, before you start spouting random news stories at me I'm not an idiot. You were talking about "propping up banks". Have HSBC taken a hit in the so called "credit crunch" I'm quite sure they have taken a good kicking like all financial institutions. Have they been propped up by loans from the British Government......No.

Pedro wrote:
mystic_genius - your self-selected name says all I need to know about you. Your argument is flawed. A house remains an asset at all times. A bank may offer you money against the house - the debt to be paid back after your death through your estate. A so-called equity release. Your argument would be better explained by art. You could paint a picture and price it at a million pounds. Whether it sold (at your price) would be up to one art buyer.

If you must know my name on here is a random selection from Ebay. My real name has too many connotations in ebay-land to remember, so I was given something completely at random. But anyway. You're obviously one of those people who formulates an opinion based on absolutely no information, so who am I to try and defend myself.

The debt wouldn't necessarily be paid when I die...I pay an amount monthly for my mortgage, on the assumption that if I pay said amount for my mortgage, in 35 years I will own my own home. the same would apply for any home-secured loan. If I die first, it will be paid, but even with average life expectancy, I still expect to live for a further 54 years, which is 19 more than my mortgage lasts for.

Here is the point.

If I pay £700 a month for 35 years to rent my house, after 35 years I have nothing, house-wealth wise. If I pay £700 a month for 35 years into a mortgage, in 35 years I will own a house. How much I paid for that house is irrelevant. How much the house is worth is irrelevant. And that is what people are realising...in 35 years time it will be worth something. Be that the same, less or more than today, but it will be worth something. therefore you might as well buy a house, because in the future you won't be any worse off than renting, and could be a lot better off. And in the present it's no different.

People realised this a long time ago, probably in the 80's, and there has been steady house price growth since. The supply of good quality houses in places people want to live is lacking. Severely. But in decent areas, land is expensive, so therefore houses are expensive - compare the George Wimpey developments at Tadcaster Road and Selby - identical houses, but the ones in York are £100k more expesnive.

A small blip in house prices this year (and yes, in the grand old scheme of things, if house prices go up 400% in 25 years, then drop 10% in one year, it is just a blip) and people are panicking. There is no need. Think about the long term, and if in the next 20 years house prices remain the same (which they won't, they WILL go up, but not by the amount they have done previously) you're in no worse a position than you are today, but have the notible exception of house-wealth.

Roclank 2000. Thank you. I wrote a 100,000 word thesis on this at uni a couple of years back. Good times!

mystic_genius wrote:

Pedro wrote:
mystic_genius - your self-selected name says all I need to know about you. Your argument is flawed. A house remains an asset at all times. A bank may offer you money against the house - the debt to be paid back after your death through your estate. A so-called equity release. Your argument would be better explained by art. You could paint a picture and price it at a million pounds. Whether it sold (at your price) would be up to one art buyer.

If you must know my name on here is a random selection from Ebay. My real name has too many connotations in ebay-land to remember, so I was given something completely at random. But anyway. You're obviously one of those people who formulates an opinion based on absolutely no information, so who am I to try and defend myself.

The debt wouldn't necessarily be paid when I die...I pay an amount monthly for my mortgage, on the assumption that if I pay said amount for my mortgage, in 35 years I will own my own home. the same would apply for any home-secured loan. If I die first, it will be paid, but even with average life expectancy, I still expect to live for a further 54 years, which is 19 more than my mortgage lasts for.

Here is the point.

If I pay £700 a month for 35 years to rent my house, after 35 years I have nothing, house-wealth wise. If I pay £700 a month for 35 years into a mortgage, in 35 years I will own a house. How much I paid for that house is irrelevant. How much the house is worth is irrelevant. And that is what people are realising...in 35 years time it will be worth something. Be that the same, less or more than today, but it will be worth something. therefore you might as well buy a house, because in the future you won't be any worse off than renting, and could be a lot better off. And in the present it's no different.

People realised this a long time ago, probably in the 80's, and there has been steady house price growth since. The supply of good quality houses in places people want to live is lacking. Severely. But in decent areas, land is expensive, so therefore houses are expensive - compare the George Wimpey developments at Tadcaster Road and Selby - identical houses, but the ones in York are £100k more expesnive.

A small blip in house prices this year (and yes, in the grand old scheme of things, if house prices go up 400% in 25 years, then drop 10% in one year, it is just a blip) and people are panicking. There is no need. Think about the long term, and if in the next 20 years house prices remain the same (which they won't, they WILL go up, but not by the amount they have done previously) you're in no worse a position than you are today, but have the notible exception of house-wealth.

Roclank 2000. Thank you. I wrote a 100,000 word thesis on this at uni a couple of years back. Good times!

You chose your name, not e-bay! If it had randomly said "excessive masturbation" would you have used that name instead?

You talk a lot - but don't talk a lot of sense. But that is the modern student for you.

I proved that the argument (re - a house is worthless until you sell it) by practical example.

Your answer is more long-winded nonsense and waffle. With no contradiction of what I said!

Pedro wrote:
mystic_genius - your self-selected name says all I need to know about you.

Your argument is flawed. A house remains an asset at all times. A bank may offer you money against the house - the debt to be paid back after your death through your estate. A so-called equity release. Your argument would be better explained by art. You could paint a picture and price it at a million pounds. Whether it sold (at your price) would be up to one art buyer.

I didn't contradict you as I agree with you. A house is an asset at all times. But it has no value, until someone wants to buy it, and until you agree a price to sell it at with the proposed buyer. I think we agree on that...I have no intention of contradicting myself or you on this point.
But the discussion isn;t about that. It is about the proposed "humungous property crash" mentioned earlier, which I do not agree with.

Incidentally, what have you got against the modern student? I dare suggest that you will be able to "prove" that anyone who graduated post 19xx is technically inferior to those who graduated pre-19xx. I assume you are aware that a well rounded university thesis normally included a detailed discussion of both sides of the argument, with a conclusion of opinion at the end? So yes, the 100,000 words I wrote contradicted themselves (as I had to, to get across all sides of the discussion), with an informed conclusion at the end.

But in your semi-aggressive, stubborn attitude towards both me and my opinion (which yes, may be wrong, but I am still allowed to hold it and indeed express it), you seem unwilling to listen to anyone who differs from your viewpoint, and as a result deems the whole process of commenting on articles somewhat pointless, especially as this post now bears no relevance to the actual story.

Oh, and while I'm at it, surely this site would be a prime location for some of the hndreds of family homes which are urgently required in the York area?

just a thought, if anyone at the council is listening...?

mystic_genius... your main argument against a further crash in house prices seems to be that the supply and demand imbalance (the mantra of the mainstream media) will keep prices high, thus prices are not artificially high but 'normal' as the market dictates prices. And yet, if there's one single, surely undeniable, thing anybody with a brain to call their own should now be aware of, it was the availability of easy credit, or the insatiable demand for it, that was almost singularly responsible for the house price bubble (as I, an unashamed 'doom merchant' will call the current situation).

The current apparent upwards blip in prices we are told exists (a return to 'normality' the erstwhile wise-after-the-event mainstream media would call it, as if to inform a population with the attention span of a goldfish that normality was the preposterous financial environment created by the banks that led to the crash) can surely be attributed to a number of unsustainable factors. A government insulating, amongst others, those who made poor financial choices or lied on their mortage applications, by paying their mortgage interest for extended periods. Those properties that are reposessed and sold at auction excluded from land registry figures lest they provide a downwards bias. A trend towards 'gifted deposits'; parents lending money to their offspring, perhaps by remortgaging their own homes, to pay for the deposit that the banks (sensibly) now require - a ludicrous situation of a market pulling itself up by its own bootlaces.

These, and other machinations at present are not the characteristics of a functioning market but the features in a market distorted by numerous unsustainable factors, underpinned by a discredited government for whom no amount of taxpayers cash is too high a price to pay in order to limit damage to their own sorry party at the next general election. That is why prices remain very much in an 'artificially' high state.

Take a look at a graph of income multiples to house prices, easy to find on a Google search. The frankly happy-clappy notion of prices 'flatlining' from here is laughable when visualised against what has preceded it. That's the 'soft-landing' scenario; people learn nothing from history and will always be doomed to make the same mistakes over and over again.

The counrty is in a real mess, far worse than any politician will admit. Our cloud cuckooland house prices will not stand up when reality bites again. And when it does, once again the mainstream media will tell us "we always said this was bound to happen". And once again the great unwashed will stare at their TVs and read their tabloids and think that they really did.

I couldn't disagree more.

The fact that parents are helping will forever happen - those families who bought in the early boom years, or indeed while house prices were stable, will find they have a huge amount of equity. Said people must die (we all do!), therefore the money must go somewhere, traditionally this is the kids. Unless you are saying that death is not a sustainable venture, you're quite mistaken!

The availablility of credit does pose a problem, but does not get rid of demand. I was 22 when I bought my first house (in late 2008, mid-credit crunch, I might add). I have since bought another one. I did not have a deposit, other than what I could balance transfer and apply for in loans. Even in mid-credit crunch, banks were throwing money at me - they still are. That is not fool-hardy, that is the fact that I know how to manage money, and have proved this all my adult life. Just because people can't get a 100% mortgage anymore does not mean they can't get a 95% with a 5% personal loan!!

Also, in relation to the above, you are making the broad assumption that everyone buys a home with a mortgage. This would not be the case. If a house cost, for the sake of stupidity, £50, then I would be the first one in the queue at the estate agents. This would drive prices up.

Anyone can see the imbalance between supply and demand - the government has pledged several million new homes in the next however many years...they know it. The problem is with the NIMBYs - which will always exist. No one wants the extra houses in their area. Again, an ever-lasting problem, meaning there will never (repeat, NEVER) be adequate supply of homes to meet the demand. Note, these homes need to be in the right area - there is no point in them building, for example millions of homes in Chapelfields, when people simply don't desire this area as a place to live (as much as other places).

Just two simple questions for those non-believers in what I think:

Why do you think house prices rocketted during the 1990s? Why do you think those same circumstances don't exist?

I'll give you a clue - cheap mortgages weren't the reason!! (who remembers the 15% interest rates of the early 90s?) - the largest boom in this industries history came off the back of the a very deep recession, who is to say the same won't happen again?

mystic_genius... you say "the availablility of credit does pose a problem, but does not get rid of demand". Of course it doesn't, but without the credit, the demand is irrelevant. There's be almost unlimited demand for Ferraris if the money to buy them was being handed out willy nilly. Your personal circumstances as you describe them relate yourself and are hardly an accurate portrayal of the entire system. It is a fact that banks are demanding higher loan-to-valuations (generallly considerably higher that 95%, certainly for a first-time-buyer as you were), and that can only have a negative impact on prices. Self-cert loans (liar loans in reality) are virtually extinct, and were a key driver in recent years (was it about a third of all mortgages were self-cert? why was that do you think?). The market is being propped up in various ways by the government as they stagger to the general election. It is not a 'real' functioning market as can bee seen if you scratch the surface.

The mid 1990s? Prices after the last recession were - in REAL terms - less than half they are now. There was also MIRAS, plus higer wage inflation helps with debt repayment. Don't make the mistake of looking at today's interest rates with what they spiked to then and imagining that's the change in real affordability. It isn't. To imagine we're at the end of a recession - or thereabouts, the hard times are almost behind us and there's another boom on the way is sadly laughable.

To refer back to the point about supply and demand, as you seem to make a correlation between that imbalance and the absolute level of prices, several papers by Andrew Farlow at Oxford University, with the greatest repect perhaps a more learned academic than yourself, suggest the population growth in this country relative to the housing stock would produce 'natural' house price inflation no more that 1% above wage inflation. Any growth on top of that can be put down to easy credit in the mortgage market. That market is nothing like it was two years ago. If you're a good risk you'll get a loan, but you need more than the ability to fog a mirror to prove that these days.

There's a dead cat bounce in progress, a sucker's rally. It'll most likely last a few more months yet, there's billions still waiting to be thrown on the fire. The last thing the reality facing this country in conducive to though is this absurd level of prices. A large swathe of the general public have been quite literally brainwashed into some sort of house-priced obsessed drones over the past decade. Reality was suspended, but many people are soon in for a proper shock.