That there London...It's a different world

[Drago]

And of 'large proportion".

Depending on the figures you believe, crime accounts for between 1.5 and 4ish percent of World GDP.

London accounts for 22% of the UKs GDP, and a noteworthy amount of that is via the property market. Even using the property market alone as an example, the sector is top heavy with foreign buyers, many of whom are morally questionable at best, downright criminal at worst. The names are easy enough to google.

It would surprise me not if 5p or more of every pound that is generated in London has its origins in crime. That's not small change.

 

[Bollo]

And back on topic ...............

Mrs Dr B is a Stratford girl and, until about 3 years ago, my in laws lived near Maryland station. They sold up to a developer and moved to Barkingside (aka 'cabland') when my FIL's pins couldn't deal with the stairs anymore. My MiL is a local for generations back, while my FIL arrived at the very start of the large-scale immigration from the Indian subcontinent, so their story says a lot about the place.

Because of this I've been visiting Stratford all too regularly for about 25 years and I was trying to think of an outsider's list of good and bad about the place, but it's changing so rapidly that it probably wouldn't be relevant.

For many years Stratford was the arrival point for working-class immigrants looking to make their way in the UK. No one wave of immigration has been able to dominate the area so it's never become 'ghettoised'. Without idealising it, people tend to rub along ok. It's not pretty or nice, but it always felt interesting and alive.

My FIL used to joke that you could tell when the stock market was going to crash because it would coincide with an attempt to gentrify Stratford. Since the Olympics and the arrival of Westfield that has changed. Stratford isn't exactly gentrifying but the developers and speculators have moved in hard and building exactly the type of dormitory high-rise that your son it looking at. Many of the Victorian era townhouses further out are being converted to flats. The children and grandchildren of my FIL's generation of immigrants are starting to move away to the burbs (if you can call Leyton the burbs!). While I think this has made the place feel younger and the centre is changing to meet the needs of the changing demographic, it's losing a lot of its heart. There are signs that Stratford is part of the wider London speculative property bubble, so I'd be very careful about committing to a mortgage.

I could write a whole lot more but it's probably less relevant. Hope that helps.

 

[swee'pea99]

There are signs that Stratford is part of the wider London speculative property bubble, so I'd be very careful about committing to a mortgage.

Amen to that. The entire market has been driven by a succession of governments pimping London to global capital - dirty or otherwise - with massively advantageous tax arrangements. Any significant change of government could bring the whole thing down like a punctured bouncy castle. Add in the uncertainties of Brexit and Big Finance sniffing out Frankfurt, Dublin, Paris and I'd be very wary of tying myself into a 25 year straitjacket.

 

[Tin Pot]

I'm a Londoner but I can't say much on the property ladder. I bought my first/only house, a 4/5 bed semi in suburbia at the peak of the 2008 market. The market crashed two weeks later, but I only lost £5K on the market value when reassessed two years later.

My advice to him would be to examine what he can afford and analyse the asset and finance he is purchasing; price trend for asset type, property values over the last twenty years, resilience to market crashes, mortgage forecasts, etc. Then what his finance costs will be, how he will pay it back, how he will save for furniture/house maintenance, and what his career progress is likely to be.

It's boring, but worth it.

 

[Lee_M]

If he moved out 2 or 3 stops on the central line he could get a load more for his money and still benefit from the ridiculous London market.

I bought and sold in wanstead - bought for 200k sold for 550k

Apparently it's now worth 650-700k !

 

[GrumpyGregry]

In 1984 I considered buying a red brick maisonette in a nice square in E17, it was £75,000 and I decided that was too much for me.

Those same maisonettes are now on the market for £750,000.

1984 I bought a single bedroom flat in the Kemptown area of Brighton for £21.5k Last time I looked on Zoopla it had gone for £325k. London-by-Sea.

 

[GrumpyGregry]

I think the difficulties in the housing market are fuelled by this kind of thinking. The OP's son could find a place that he can afford and he would really like to live in, move in and live happily there. If he makes a profit when he moves on eventually that is his good fortune, and if he doesn't he will have had a happy life. It's a radical idea, I know, but if only it would catch on we would all be better off.

I agree. But admit a certain level of hypocrisy. Regrettably, too many folk, self included, rely on house price inflation as part of their retirement planning. And that's before buy-to-let is used. (Not me guv)

 

[bikingdad90]

Make sure your son considers how he will pay the mortgage and rent if interest rates rise after any fixed rate periods. 1% on £300k is £3kpa. Can he bank on his wages increasing likewise to match inflation and lifestyle.

 

[Markymark]

As I understand it, it's quite difficult to lose money on property if you make sensible decisions. But when huge figures are glibly bandied about people get greedy and make stupid decisions.

It goes up it goes down, but long term (and I mean decades here), it will only go one way.

 

[swee'pea99]

It goes up it goes down, but long term (and I mean decades here), it will only go one way.

"After a long slow climb during the decades of Japan’s economic miracle, prices exploded in the late eighties in the frenzy of the bubble economy. Over the following decade, prices collapsed by over 80%, touching a low in 2002." https://housingjapan.com/buy/history/

 

[Vapin' Joe]

I grew up in nearby Forest Gate, where my brother still lives. Stratford is a crime infested dump.

 

[Markymark]

"After a long slow climb during the decades of Japan’s economic miracle, prices exploded in the late eighties in the frenzy of the bubble economy. Over the following decade, prices collapsed by over 80%, touching a low in 2002." https://housingjapan.com/buy/history/

It is always a risk else everyone would do it but I'll take that risk. We had a house crash in 08, London is now higher than 07. That doesn't necessarily mean it'll always be ok but I'll bet my house it will....

 

[Globalti]

But back to the literal meaning of the thread title, that London really IS different. I'm proud to say that I was born there and I lived there between 1980 and 1985. However when I visit London nowadays I feel as if I'm in a different city, it feels so cosmopolitan, so crowded and so affluent. The only good thing I would say is that it's clean, certainly cleaner than Paris with its stinky drains and graffiti.

Gti Junior likes London as well; last summer his college arranged for him and his classmates to spend three days there while they visited the Inns of Court, the Bank of England and so on. On the third morning he said he decided not to eat the crappy hostel breakfast so he walked out and found a corner cafe where he sat, drinking coffee and watching the city going to work, office folk bustling purposefully past with laptop bags and smart clothes and he said to himself: " I want some of this!" - a laudable expression of ambition for an 18 year old, even though it may hold little allure to anybody older.

 

[subaqua]

You almost manage to make it sound like Mos Eisley Spaceport.

its not far off....

that bit of stratford is about a 10 min walk to the central line . or a 2 min bus ride.

there isn't much in the way of amenities at the moment. but when the development on the old poth hillie candle factory is complete there will be. ( hopefully)

there is the option of commute from Notts into St Pancras . I know somebody who does that as its marginally cheaper than the mortgage on a London Pad. he has a nice big house out in the country. has the advantage of being able to work on the train so might not suit all

 

[Tin Pot]

I think the difficulties in the housing market are fuelled by this kind of thinking. The OP's son could find a place that he can afford and he would really like to live in, move in and live happily there. If he makes a profit when he moves on eventually that is his good fortune, and if he doesn't he will have had a happy life. It's a radical idea, I know, but if only it would catch on we would all be better off.

I understand your point of view, but it is naive regardless of your views on property ownership not to evaluate the things I have described, and may put the OPs son at a significant financial disadvantage should he go ahead without doing so.

Maybe in the future land in Britain will be cheap, that is also something to consider before making a commitment.