Almost a class warrior...
May. 3rd, 2008 09:59 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
almostwittyThere is nothing like a bunch of screaming financial headlines to bring out the class warrior in me. Even though I own (half) my own home.
The headline in The Metro (a London freebie newspaper that accounts for a lot of the readership in London) screamed that house prices might drop by 30%. A small headline on page two talked about food riots caused by rising food prices. Another article in the anti-Ken Evening Standard (the only London newspaper you actually have to pay for) interviewed a couple who had to cut the selling price of their house by £100k to £400k. Even though the house only cost them £250k to begin with.
If the recent election results and screaming headlines are anything to go by, people are far more concerned about falling house prices denting the value of their investment portfolio - ie the money they could be making by doing nothing - and the inability to borrow more money than, say, rising food and fuel prices and job instability. Which says volumes about the insanely warped priorities in Britain today.
For heavens sake, a house is there to keep a roof over your head first. Sure its nice to know that its worth something but falling house prices are a good thing for all but selfish investors and those people who HAVE to move house having just bought a flat...
Then again I am (in lieu of getting broadband) trying to redecorate my slightly run down flat and can now mostly be seen in DIY centres or studying home decoration magazines and Ikea catalogues. Oh dear...
The headline in The Metro (a London freebie newspaper that accounts for a lot of the readership in London) screamed that house prices might drop by 30%. A small headline on page two talked about food riots caused by rising food prices. Another article in the anti-Ken Evening Standard (the only London newspaper you actually have to pay for) interviewed a couple who had to cut the selling price of their house by £100k to £400k. Even though the house only cost them £250k to begin with.
If the recent election results and screaming headlines are anything to go by, people are far more concerned about falling house prices denting the value of their investment portfolio - ie the money they could be making by doing nothing - and the inability to borrow more money than, say, rising food and fuel prices and job instability. Which says volumes about the insanely warped priorities in Britain today.
For heavens sake, a house is there to keep a roof over your head first. Sure its nice to know that its worth something but falling house prices are a good thing for all but selfish investors and those people who HAVE to move house having just bought a flat...
Then again I am (in lieu of getting broadband) trying to redecorate my slightly run down flat and can now mostly be seen in DIY centres or studying home decoration magazines and Ikea catalogues. Oh dear...
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no subject
Date: 2008-05-03 09:50 pm (UTC)Oh! I missed your point! Apologies abound!
For my part, I was ready to sign the Plaid Cymru petition supporting a tax on any non-Welsh-resident buying a holiday home in Wales equal to 100% of the value of the house but, go figure, you had to be a Welsh resident to sign it.
My husband gets a little alarmed by these fits of mine. I think he's worried that, if we ever return to the UK, all of my repressed socialism is going to come boiling out... ;)
no subject
Date: 2008-05-03 10:11 pm (UTC)as for the Plaid Cymru petition... it's pretty much a racist thing to only allow local people to buy houses in the local area. It'd allow those parts of Wales to remain *very* much monocentric...
(and I can say that in LJ. If I said that in my other blog, most of my Welsh readers would disown me. Go figure.)
no subject
Date: 2008-05-03 11:23 pm (UTC)