This year appears to have not bounced back from the Christmas shutdown, job adverts are non existent, what work is about is scrappy and poor pay.
Where abouts are you based ? We were flat out last year, and this year is looking the same. All the trades I speak too are also busy
Building recession? Have you seen the number of cranes in our cities? Not just London, but across the country. There are hundreds and that indicates building, and most people are buzzing with commercial work.
If your doing contract work or new build carpet, lvt, then you can be really busy, but if its domestic then you can be struggling. It's only busy for the contract guys because the banks are lending money out again, same with new build houses banks are lending out again and there's a mad rush on building houses , but if the interest rates go up it will all go to pot. My personal way of thinking is it will keep busy for a few more years until there's enough houses built, then when everyone is mortgaged up to the eyeballs with help from the bank schemes , the interest rate rise will start leading to another housing crash and recession, what's the interest rate again?0.25% What were the interest rates in the 90's
The banks are as cautious as ever. Quite simply they are risk averse. This isn't new, they will happily lend money at lower interest rates (but not the rates you quoted) to those people who don't really need it. Those that do need it are regarded as a higher risk and accordingly pay higher interest rates. The interest rates you quote bear no resemblance to the rates being CHARGED by the banks to any of their customers, they reflect the inter-bank rates and the rates they PAY their customers on deposits. As for house building, I'm not sure we will ever have enough housing and if we do it won't be in the foreseeable future.You are right about interest rates, they are going to rise it's inevitable. They are being held at the moment in an attempt to boost the economy and I don't believe even the most incompetent Governor of the Bank of England will reverse that decision if it is going to hurt the economy. It will happen when the country is ready and able to cope with it. New build houses don't generate much domestic business for about 10 years because the housing is supplied with flooring at a cost that is built into the mortgage. This business will begin to flow into the market in due time. However, there is a lot of "don't move, improve" business out there, but I guess that will be greatest in the more affluent areas. Parts of the media won't agree and if they continue a to preach doom & gloom we may get a self-fulfilling prophecy. Then they can say "I told you so" but I doubt it, and I hope not. We will have to wait and see what happens with our exit from the EU, though I believe we will be fine. With or without a "deal". They need us more than they let on and we can cope with WTO rules. We do it with the rest of the world very successfully. There is a lot of misinformation on both sides of the argument. Apparently, everyone who voted to leave is a racist, not true. Most simply want sovereignty back, and those that are racist won't get what they want because we aren't about to throw everyone out who doesn't hold a British passport. In one of the funniest bits of scaremongering we were being told that our national security will suffer as we won't get Intelligence from the European agencies. Why is this funny? It's funny because we supply them with much more than we get (and I guess we will continue to do so) but most importantly we are world leaders in this field, amongst the best in the world, if not the best. Even in these uncertain times we have a growing economy, unlike many of our EU "partners". This was true before the vote to leave and continues to be the case post Brexit. Our economy will be fine, more than fine we will prosper and grow. Not only IMO but in the opinion of many people a lot smarter than me, in much better positions to know.
The average new mortgage interest rate is around 2% to 2.5% which is seeing a an increase in new mortgages, a lot of people will be in serious trouble when the rate goes up, 2.5% is nothing, when it's cheap to borrow money people get way in over their head and max.
The banks aren't allowing people to get in over their heads with mortgages. In fact , in many cases they aren't allowing people to get in!
I think you will find at the moment it's not that difficult to get a mortgage, ive got a friend who has borrowed twice the amount for the average house in my area and he used the help to buy scheme for the deposit he's on the tools as a subbies labour only. Using the help to buy scheme enables people to buy a house with no actually equity in the property, there for its easier if things go Tits up to just walk away on the house and go rent. The house prices need to go down and the interest rate needs to go up, so savers get a return on the money, banks get there interest and people can afford their homes without worrying. Like I mentioned earlier in another post the interest rate is 0.25% which is extremely low, if they increase that which is very possible that rate rise will be passed onto the mortgage rate. How many of us got conned into fixing our interest rate?because of a fear of a rate rise from all the media from TV to radio to the newspapers for it only to drop.
I'm not saying it didn't happen, but I would really would like to meet the banker stupid enough to lend twice the value of the house, and your mate bought a huge amount of tools and/or very, very expensive ones. An interest rate rise would actually be quite good for the economy as it encourages the inflow of foreign cash and investment which pushes up the value of our currency and makes our markets buoyant. Those people who got "conned" into fixed rates mortgages will at least know what their payments are fixed at and can continue to manage the payments assuming they could afford them in the first place and that their employment status hasn't changed. So no there should problem there. The banks already get their interest, the 0.25% relates mainly to inter-bank rates and isn't applied to banks lending rates when it's to their retail customers. The mortgage rates are testament to this fact. They only begin to look at using the 0.25% when they are paying out interest on customers deposit accounts because it suits their purpose as it reduces cash out keeps cash in (profit). I really am not looking to get into a running debate about it, and we maybe it's best if we agree to disagree, but I really don't believe there is a recession looming and I sincerely hope i'm right. That said, taking your point about the media, I don't think it helps when certain sections of the media, and politicians with personal/political axes to grind go all doom and gloom. It tends to have a negative effect on the demeanor of those taken in by it, and then it gets repeated which kind of re-enforces the doom & gloom argument. We know how accurate these politicians and their serving media are because we have recent evidence of it. Brexit was going to cause the UK economy to crash, unemployment would go through the roof, and the world would melt down. Really? It's thriving and growing at a greater rate than pre-brexit, unemployment is down and as far as I can make out the world has yet to melt down. I hope I'm right and it's all going to be fine, but more over I do hope you don't get the chance to say "I told you so" because that would be bad for all of us. Time will tell.
What I were meaning to say is that the guy is purchasing a house that is double the price of the average house in the area we live in, and he is only a sub contractor worker who is still on the tools, skilled worker, e.g not behind a desk running his own business with people working for him. That would be some expensive tools : ) gold plated
