Richard, I do not hope what you are saying is wrong. Hope doesn't come into it, it's irrelevant to me whether you are right or wrong about 'Property Bubbles and Crashes' but you have a fundamental lack of understanding of this business and are misleading people who could be influenced by you.

I have been in Property for over 30 years and seen all sorts of different scenarios and predictions, most of them are short lived and when it comes to Property you can't make knee jerk decisions based on short term movements. It is impossible to time a sale at the top of a market or know when you are buying at the bottom (no such thing) reading your conflicting posts it seems that you didn't so don't keep pretending you did, luck comes in to that game and I'm not into gambling.

I have no intention of selling my UK portfolio, it is not what this is about, it is about refinancing when the opportunity comes along. You take the finance at the good times which I did last year and now I'm set up for the next 6 years, by then you will be no doubt be wondering which Estate Agent or Tax Man you will be giving your money to next.

The only sale I will make is my PS Deal because I can't refinance in Cyprus and it won't pay for itself, a silly mistake to make when it goes against all the principals that PS taught me in their excellent literature - we all make mistakes and that was mine.

In two years time I doubt if we will see you on this forum as I don't believe you have what it takes to make a living out of Property.

I don't own property in the UK (other than my own home which DOESN'T count as I'm not looking to make money out of it, just stay warm) so I have no need to clutch at straws, Richard.

Nevertheless, Savvy's points ring truer, more accurate and better reasoned than your broad brush, pessimistic and poorly researched commentary. What I do like is your passion for what you are saying and it is all logical. Almost makes sense, in fact.

But you're completely ignoring some basics of property investment. Which is hardly surprising, given your propensity sweeping statements. Just as an example, how you can dismiss rising rents for UK BTL landlords as "NO WAY" making up for capital losses over the next few years is surprising to say the least.

First of all, you'll need some pretty dramatic falls (which have yet to occur despite all your doom mongering) AND it will depend on the individual investor's circumstances - what their mortgage situation is, how many properties, what areas, what levels of rent they are ACTUALLY experiencing...that sort or thing.

Now it might NO WAY make up for a fall in capital value for YOU (not that you have or had any UK investment property anyway I think) but you can't assume on everyone else's behalf. Nor, I would suggest, can you arrogantly claim you're right about a crash and everyone else is wrong.

Time will tell, of course, and I know you are banking on (quite a bit) of it!

Savvy

I am interested in your comment about selling in Cyprus. I have a Palace Heights unit and after looking at the cyprus Market concluded that at present it seems a strong hold -

- solid if unspectacular growth over the last 2 years that is currently picking up with 15% forecast for 2008 and 2009.

- potential upside from joining the Euro and in the longer term reunification.

I had thought hold for 2 years and then re-evaluate in light of equity level, finance availability etc. Can you explain a bit more why you think an early sale is the way to go.

Regards

Alan

You're absolutely right Ben, everyone is in different situations and entering markets at different times and of course it's easy for me to sit here saying I've been in it for years blah blah blah but for anyone entering the market recently they might not necessarily have the benefit of comfortable returns and reserves so of course it could be difficult for SOME to enter certain parts of the UK market now but not everyone.

During the last 30 years the only time I have found it easy to buy property was during the 2004-2006 years, it was never an easy business before and many got into it thinking it was, so there is going to be some serious fall out. Hopefully people will keep their bottle and not over react.

I must admit, buying my first house in 2004 was a walk in the park compared to purchasing my current one last year. In terms of finance, even then, pre-"Credit Crunch" (I love a media term), it was much, much tougher.

What you say about bottle is right too I think - if people have it, everything will be ok, if not, yeah, there might be trouble!

Alan - I agree with much of what you say, if I had the will to hang on I would -especially if I had invested in Nicosia like you.

The growth that you talk about refers to 'offplan' values and not resales. It appears that Resales are not growing at the same rate unless you get the Deeds. The things that you refer to have been promised by so many Developers and Agents in Cyprus for years now - I have already waited 3 years, however, as we don't have any answers on Completion certificate or Deeds I will probably still be here ranting on for another 2 years. I really do hope that Cyprus works out well in the end for all that invested there, it does have alot of potential but it is not easy.

My investment totalled 130,000 euros including all fees, fixtures, fittings and furnishings. I signed up to the deal exactly 3 years ago and I am currently marketing it at 140,000 euros. I will have to pay approx 12000 euros fees to sell, so I will suffer a loss even if I get the asking price - most people are offering 10% below at the moment. I have had one viewing in 6 months but I think more innovative marketing is needed.


I hope that PS are going to sort this out soon, they keep promising but nothing happens.

Jo

It would be good to get more analysis on resale value versus off plan values. I note that the surveyors that PS commission generally use off plan values as comparators so the concept of "below market value" is somewhat tainted. For example I can attest to the fact that offplan -v- resale value in Liverpool was around 15- 20% higher in 2005 - because peopel buying offplan were only putting 10% down, did not get a survey to assess value and saw everybody else doing the same thing.

This also seems to be the case for Cyprus - to be clear the "market value" is the resale value and this is the only one PS should us.

I now know of a development in Liverpool where 35% of buyers forfeited their 10% deposit on exchange rather than complete in January 2008. Interesting times....

If you do a Search on the BuySell website for Resales - 2 Bed apartments in the Famagusta area you will only get a couple of pages come back and the first page (lowest values) are mostly Avlida apartments priced from around 110,000 to 150,000 euros.

They should be selling, they are nice apartments in a good location but the truth is we don't have the Deeds and we don't have the right Professionals working on our behalf and accessing the right markets. There have been 45000 viewings of the thread about Cyprus on this forum - so Property Investors are very interested in this market. If I was as good at marketing as I am at Ranting I would have solved this one by now and got the whole Avlida development let out and self financing but I am not a marketing person which is why I believe it is the very least the PS can do under the circumstances.

People don't want more and more deals right now, they want their existing ones to work and need professional marketing to get Tenants in and sell when appropriate.

end of yet another Rant.

When speaking of economics you do speak in general terms. You have no choice. Obviously there are individual exceptions due to differing circumstances. Of course it is possible to buck the trend on occasion.

But why bother if you dont need to and if there are better opportunities elsewhere, where there is far less risk involved.

I thought I have finally got a remortgage on my BTL after various attempts. But no, at the last moment I also got a ridiculous valuation from surveyor.

My (nearly) newbuild I bought in August 06, which incidentally is twenty minutes walk from the City of London in N1 area, is apparently in a state of negative equity. Local estate agents value it at least 50k higher at possible sale price - more at initial market price. In fact there is a 100k discrepancy just taking the most optimistic estate agent!

It appears from the report that the surveyor took a very limited view of the market and like for like sales in the area. My tenant said that he never went onto the reasonably sized balcony and saw the private residents only garden and the water side (end of wenlock basin) at its edge. He moaned on more than one occasion about why I didn't buy underground parking (it was never available to one beds) even though it was pointed out that I have residents parking.

Consequently my BTL remortgage has almost fallen through. I am in the process of getting valuation from local estate agents in hope that my broker can appeal.