Here’s what bothers me about inflation – for what it’s worth

Here’s what bothers me about inflation – for what it’s worth

The latest inflation figures show the growth in consumer prices remaining stubbornly high. The CPI index stuck at 4.5% up on a year ago while the RPI measure remained at 5.2%. These are extraordinary figures given that it wasn’t that long ago that fears were being expressed about deflation. But the figures are not that surprising to some. There have been voices suggesting inflationary pressures were far higher than the assessments made by most expert forecasters and the Bank of…

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Latest housing market weather reports suggest little break in the clouds

Latest housing market weather reports suggest little break in the clouds

The latest batch of house price surveys seem in harmony sat among the barrage of dismal economic news we have been subjected to of late. They are broadly gloomy, but not devastatingly disturbing. Demand once again seems to have slackened, while supply remains moderately perky. That is perky in relation to the low levels supply has reached. The net effect is a further weakening in the prices over a period when one might have expected a higher a bit of…

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City traders still see dismal future for house prices

City traders still see dismal future for house prices

Technically you can buy a house in five years’ time at less than you’d pay today. That’s if you have enough cash to trade in the residential derivatives market. Future HPI, an index of residential derivatives trades put together by Peter Sceats & Associates, puts the average price of a house in May 2016 at £161,498, measured against the Halifax non-seasonally adjusted average price. That average price in May this year was put at £162,344. But between then and now those…

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Spiralling rents pose a tough question for Shapps: Where will the new homes come from?

Spiralling rents pose a tough question for Shapps: Where will the new homes come from?

The latest survey of the residential rental market by the surveyors’ body RICS is likely to wind up the pressure on the housing minister Grant Shapps to promote more house building. The survey suggests that rents are rising ever faster, driven by rising demand in a market where supply is constrained, as the graph taken from the RICS survey shows.

Speeding up public land sales by itself will not boost house building

Speeding up public land sales by itself will not boost house building

The Government today announced its plan to release public land with the aim of building 100,000 new homes. In reality the news, if that is what it is, has been dribbling out for some while. Few were opposing the policy of releasing swathes of redundant public land for housing and other development. The previous administration was keen to release land too. But politicians like a good headline. And a sound bite like “I am today announcing plans that will lead…

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Orders figures support view that there is cause for concern in construction

Orders figures support view that there is cause for concern in construction

The main message in the construction new orders figures released by ONS this morning is that the slope is downward and this is points to further falls in output in the future. And, to put them in context, against peak levels in cash terms orders for new construction work are down about a third. But more worryingly we don’t appear to be seeing the kind of acceleration in the private sector we would need to compensate for the losses faced in public…

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Is the Government Construction Strategy fundamentally flawed? I hope not but…

Is the Government Construction Strategy fundamentally flawed? I hope not but…

The Government Construction Strategy has merit, as did and do the string of not dissimilar publications that have flown from the pens (PCs) of the chosen ones charged with reshaping construction into an industry of which we can be proud. That said, I don’t really think it is my job to dwell on the various detailed points. People far more into the nitty-gritty of procurement and industry management can do that. Though I will say that the move to push…

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Germany’s nuclear option – a cunning plan?

Germany’s nuclear option – a cunning plan?

A few weeks ago I took a train from Hamburg through Schleswig-Holstein and across a causeway to my mother’s childhood home in Westerland, Sylt – a stunning island on the German-Denmark border. As we trundled through the agricultural flatlands I could not blink but to miss 100 wind turbines or a score of solar arrays. Barns in the region were now it seemed routinely clad in solar panels. Neat: farm subsidies linked to producing green energy. It struck me with some shame…

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Why young folk can’t buy homes

Why young folk can’t buy homes

My patience runs thin when listening to the reasons why young folk can’t buy homes. And today I’ve had to listen to and read various interpretations of why they can’t, prompted by the release of the interesting Halifax sponsored research “The Reality of Generation Rent: Perceptions of the first time buyer market”. Call me unnecessarily reductive, but there is one simple over-riding reason why young folk struggle to buy a home, so simple it seems to be the most often…

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