A cut in Interest rates to 0.25% a disaster for savings and pensions. You'd be better keeping your money under the mattress ! :boo hoo:
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A cut in Interest rates to 0.25% a disaster for savings and pensions. You'd be better keeping your money under the mattress ! :boo hoo:
For me, this is the only tangible effect of the Brexit vote so far and I have to say it's brilliant. I'll be paying less for my mortgage as will millions of others.
It's odd because we were told that a brexit vote would mean higher interest rates and higher mortgage payments. It just shows you how much waffle was put out there by both sides when the reality was that nobody had a clue what would happen.
It is for final salary schemes though and for the value of cash in general.
If anyone thinks interest rates at 0.25% is actually a good thing in the long term then they need their head examined...all it is doing is encouraging more debt and more spending while driving a huge mis allocation of capital into riskier and risker investments for people who want any sort of return on their cash. And that's before you look at the impact of QE has on gilt yields and the concept of central banks holding corporate debt...all obtained with magic money!
Only the latest in a long line of central bank interventions that are doing more harm than good.
The old cliche "safe as houses" comes to mind.
That said, there's a bit of a moral dilemma involved. Edinburgh is the place to buy, if you can afford it, to get a decent income. However, that pushes prices up and squeezes out the next generation of potential buyers. With a couple of offspring trying to buy, I see that side of things, and it's not pretty.
Cash rates are so low anyway will it make much difference? Skipton Building Society have in the last hour reduced their rates by 0.20% on a number of products. If you lucky enough to have £50,000 in Savings your now a whole £1.93 a week worse off.
Indeed...but that's part of the problem. Super low interest rates (be that 0.5% or 0.25%) simply penalises savers. So the more prudent you are the more you get hammered by these policies. Politicians bemoan lack of retirement saving and the closing of final salary schemes yet are fully complicit in setting the rules that are crushing he ability for people to get a return on any savings!
As some have alluded to the next step is negative rates where you are actually charged for not having spent all you have. Central banks are simply trying to force people to spend spend spend in a desperate and futile attempt to encourage 'growth'. A number of countries have now banned cash transactions over a certain amount (France being one)...just another step in authorities slowly taking over people's ability to hold cash and therefore forcing them to spend by 'encouraging' them not to hold savings as the value of them can only fall unless you take risk. A risk that gets bigger all the time as more and more people chase yields and thus drive up the price (and yields down) of any yielding asset.
The BoJ have taken this policy to new levels...they are now top 10 holders in a huge amount of Japanese listed companies. If they keep going the way they are eventually the state (through the central bank) will own the lot, all with newly printed cash. It truly is bonkers.
The only solution I can see for the man in the street is to hold gold and gold miners...they have had a great run already but are just about the only hedge against the central bank war on the fundamental principles of sound money.
It's not just not pretty, it's nigh on impossible.
Unless you are in a position of being able/willing to live with your parents until an advanced age and have no life, have parents able to provide a substantial loan/gift or have an inheritance from an elserly relative (which is a grim way to think) then getting in the Edinburgh ladder is soul destroying.
I'm at a stage where I really regret going to uni at 18 as it meant moving away from home and spending a small fortune in rent in Aberdeen and Edinburgh. In many cases a degree has become so devalued due to the ridiculous criteria for getting some jobs that my earnings are substantially lower than guys I know who jacked school at 16 and learned a trade or a vocational qualification. I wish I had done the same.
No no no, you're wrong... we have all these countries lining up to set up trade deals and we've taken back control. The stock market has rebounded because all of those cheap shares after it tumbling and actually, the decimation of the pound is a good thing...for some reason... that no-one can really explain.
We've also sold off one of our biggest and most successful companies to Japanese ownership - think of all the cash that we've now taken back control of...
Brexit is a clusterf*** of a disaster and this is tip of the iceberg stuff.
A fall in sterling is a positive step in remedying the rather large balance of payments deficit. It reduces the price of exports while at the same time discouraging the purchase of imports by encouraging domestic consumption. Thus it reduces the need for Britain to continue to rely on foreign money to finance our lifestyles.
I'm not saying it's all good but it is certainly not all bad and anyway look at the long term picture and you will see the devaluation of the pound is not a Brexit thing it's just the continuation of a very very long term trend. The pound used to be worth almost $10!
I can't agree with the nigh on impossible part of this. Having been involved in banking in Edinburgh there are plenty of people who manage to put money away for a deposit and still have a life. Yes the size of your deposit will mean you are at the higher end of the LTV and having to pay more in interest but mortgages are achievable for first time buyers in full time employment. People just have to be realistic with where they are looking to buy.
Yep. Me and my missus rented for 6 years, saved over £12k, bought our first house in Edinburgh, lived in it for 5 years, sold it and moved up the property ladder.
It's absolutely doable. Your first home will likely not be your dream home, and it's obviously more fun spending your money than saving it, but that's just the way it is.
It's doable but it's a slog. We've been saving for 4 years now and we're getting there but that's accepting Edinburgh has been replaced by out the city. I'm under absolutely no illusions about what we are looking at, my expectations aren't at all high.
The % increase in private rental prices in the last few years has been difficult as well. Of my mates around my age I would say it's somewhere between a 2 and 3 to 1 ratio of people who don't own a home to those that do. A few have, unwisely imo, just given up.
It's hard I know, I guess I was lucky in I bought my first flat for £55K in 2001 when property was still relatively speaking affordable. Got my foot on the ladder as I then sold it for £115K 3 years later.
At least you are making use of the schemes available to you as met many first time buyers who have no idea about Help to Buy Isa etc.
The private landlords in the B2L market certainly do not help matters. Whether the proposed changes by the government on stamp duty on B2L homes makes a difference is still to be seen. It may be a positive and stop people purchasing second homes but by doing that has the potential to reduce the amount of rental properties and increase the rental prices even further.
Edinburgh is a disgrace as well for the numbers of new student accommodation being built. The home builders can't compete with these companies in price and as a city we are losing out on new homes, which a % of would need to be affordable housing.
I'm in town for the next few days and have to say that in my view house prices feel to be a lot cheaper now than when I was actually considering buying here about 3 years ago.
There's similar properties on the market for the same price as the one I bought on the outskirts of Berlin and that certainly wasn't the case back then. Even the drop in value of the pound doesn't explain the difference. Also it feels like there are many more properties on the market than 3 years ago which would be a better explanation of the drop in price.