Barratt predicts “significant improvement” as help to buy boosts housebuilding May 11, 2016 Barratt is showing no signs of suffering from the slowdown in property sales, with the housebuilder today confidently forecasting "a significant improvement in performance for the full year" thanks to help to buy. The figures The 19 weeks to 8 May have been "strong", with total forward sales, including joint ventures, up by 9.7 per cent to £2,8bn. Net [...]
“A plague on both your houses”: The Shakespeare property index April 23, 2016 "Money buys lands, and wives are sold by fate," wrote William Shakespeare in The Merry Wives of Windsor. But exactly how much land a wad of cash will get you is, as we know, different around the world. In the spirit of the 400th anniversary of the Bard of Avon's death, estate agents Knight Frank [...]
UK house prices: Institute of Economic Affairs (IEA) says government failure to confront Nimbys is fuelling the housing crisis March 2, 2016 A leading free-market think tank has accused the government of yielding to self-interested local residents at the expense of pressing ahead with major housebuilding projects. In a new report out today, the Institute of Economic Affairs (IEA) argues that the government’s “failure to tackle the housing crisis is due to its unwillingness to confront the [...]
Jobs saved at Powa as buyers swoop for PowaTag and PowaWeb businesses March 3, 2016 Jobs have been saved at UK fintech giant Powa, after its PowaTag and PowaWeb businesses were sold. The company, one of the UK's only $1bn tech "unicorns", filed for administration last month. But today administrators Deloitte said 69 jobs were saved after PowaTag was sold to a consortium led by Ben White, while the the PowaWeb business has [...]
Sajid Javid assures he’s fighting for British steel “every hour” April 12, 2016 Business secretary Sajid Javid said today that he's fighting for the UK's embattled steel industry "every hour of the day". Speaking during a three-hour emergency debate regarding Britain's deepening steel crisis in the House of Commons, he said: "The challenges we face are great, the crisis the steel industry faces is global, but I am fighting for Britain's steel [...]
Duke Street Capital’s perfume seller celebrates bumper sales of knock-off Chanel fragrance March 15, 2016 Hats off to the well-heeled asset managers at Duke Street Capital. The firm's discount retailer Original Factory Shop is shunning originality and raking it in on knock-off designer goods. Original Factory achieves an annual turnover of around £200m for the private equity firm, and no wonder – a £5 bottle of perfume the firm says smells just [...]
London house prices: This nine-bedroom Chelsea mansion just sold for £51m – 300 times the average house price April 10, 2015 A house just outside Chelsea's super-upmarket square The Boltons has sold for just over £51m – that's 300 times the average house price for England and Wales. The Daily Mail reported the nine-bedroom property in Boltons Place had been sold to an offshore company – although the buyer got a deal: it was originally on [...]
Watches as investments: How the Rolex Oyster Perpetual Cosmograph Daytona might be the most collectible watch ever, if only you could get your hands on one July 21, 2016 Last year two anonymous phone bidders made history when their feverish nine minutes of bidding ended with a Patek Philippe 5016A selling for $7.3m – 10 times its estimate. The crowd at the La Reserve Hotel in Geneva burst into spontaneous applause, delighted to have witnessed the sale of the most expensive wrist-watch ever. Stories [...]
London house prices: Sub-£1m homes in central London “becoming extinct like the Dodo”, according to Wetherell and Dataloft report February 29, 2016 Remember the Dodo? That's the way affordable homes in central London are heading, a new report has claimed. Within the next 12 to 24 months, apartments costing less than £1m and houses valued at less than £2m "will become extinct across Mayfair and the West End", according to the latest research by Wetherell, with data analysis [...]
Hometrack figures show slide in property sales across top 20 UK cities in 2015 February 26, 2016 The number of number of homes sold across the UK's top 20 cities fell by two per cent over the last year, according to data released today by Hometrack. London has seen a seven per cent dip in transactions in the year to January while Cambridge experienced the biggest drop in sales, down 20 per cent [...]