REAL ESTATE
The British real estate market has experienced a rapid run up of prices in recent years, similar to the US, but even more so. The UK, Ireland and Spain have had particularly rapid increases in house prices. The bubble is bursting here, just like at home. Since the price escalation was faster than in the US, the bust is even worse; the prediction is that prices will fall 30% in the next eight to ten months and will take years to recover. They also have the same sub-prime mortgage problem as the US. Also, a lot of Spain's price increase was fueled by British citizens buying second homes in the vacation areas. Now, with the Spanish market also falling, many of the British buyers are getting the double whammy, falling values of both their second home investment and their primary home. This is a serious problem that the government seems powerless to solve. Housing values vary over the country and are especially high in the areas just outside London (that's where we are).There are three main types of homes in the UK. There is the detached house which is like our single family house. Terraced housing is what they call row houses and is quite common in cities. The most common style of building outside central cities is the semi-detached, which is what we call duplex.
This area has the underground structure of chalk with flint embedded. The chalk is soft so settling of shallow foundation houses is common. The flint is often used in walls and fences; the house walls are usually cinder block with a stone, brick or flint facing, or a combination--many of the combinations are very artistic and interesting. Most of the houses in this area are quite nice, but many of them are also very old and maintenance costs are high.Also, a lot of the houses are located off the main roads on single track lanes, making access a challenge.
1 comment:
And you're looking at UK real estate values WHY?
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