Focus on… Hammersmith: It’s Hammersmith time in London September 26, 2013 HOMES in Hammersmith are increasing in value as young professionals and families compete for properties in the area. Bordered by Shepherd’s Bush in the north and Fulham in the south, the west London area has found its housing stock in short supply in recent years, leading to an average of six applicants per property and [...]
Online dating tips from the world of economics January 20, 2014 HAVE you ever turned to the neoclassical synthesis or the efficient markets hypothesis to help you to find love? We’d wager not, but having spent some time on Match.com, Stanford professor Paul Oyer has written a book: Everything I Ever Needed To Know About Economics I Learned From Online Dating. Whether you believe Keynesianism can [...]
Housebuilders pledge to end advance sales of homes overseas December 18, 2013 A TOTAL of 11 housing developers have signed a pledge to market their properties to UK buyers first, or at the same time, as marketing abroad. Concerns about properties being sold to foreign investors who then choose not to live in them have led to claims that many London streets are unoccupied while demand in [...]
Government gloats of Help to Buy success as bubble expands August 13, 2013 Since the launch of the Help to Buy equity loan scheme in April, there have been 10,000 reservations for new build homes: evidence, the government has said, that the scheme is working (release). Earlier today, communities and local government secretary Eric Pickles said: This government’s package of measures to boost the housing market is working, [...]
The main winners from Help to Buy? Rich men in London January 23, 2014 Nearly 40 per cent of would-be homeowners under the age of 40 are planning to apply for the government's controversial Help To Buy scheme in 2014, according to research from Experian Consumer Services. In November, Halifax and RBS reported strong interest in the first phase of Help to Buy receiving more than 2,000 applications in [...]
The New York Times is totally wrong in its attack on London March 10, 2014 AN op-ed in the New York Times slamming the UK’s response to the Ukrainian crisis is making waves. Its author, Ben Judah, makes some decent if unoriginal points about how London depends on Russian cash, but his piece is so full of holes a fisking is in order. Here goes. 1 “On the [Shard’s] top [...]
The New York Times is totally wrong in its attack on London March 10, 2014 AN op-ed in the New York Times slamming the UK’s response to the Ukrainian crisis is making waves. Its author, Ben Judah, makes some decent if unoriginal points about how London depends on Russian cash, but his piece is so full of holes a fisking is in order. Here goes. 1 “On the [Shard’s] top [...]
What the other papers say this morning – 04 March 2014 March 3, 2014 FINANCIAL TIMES Nine private equity heads share $2.5bn The nine founders of the four big listed US private equity companies took home more than $2.5bn between them last year, with Apollo Global Management’s Leon Black alone receiving $546m. The dividend income, investment profits and other compensation shared by the founders of Apollo, Blackstone, Carlyle and [...]
Living a sporting life in the heart of new business hub February 27, 2014 New homes in Glasshouse Gardens hope to entice buyers eastwards to live in the Olympic Park NEW BUILD developments are sprouting up all over east London these days, but Stratford seems to be quite a hotspot for them. The former site of the Olympic Games is now carving its way into the capital, developing its [...]
Spell of hot weather jumpstarts B&Q owner’s ailing sales July 24, 2013 Kingfisher, Europe’s biggest home improvements retailer and owner of B&Q and Screwfix, has reported like-for-like sales at its UK and Ireland stores open more than a year were up 2.5 per cent in the ten weeks to 13 July, thanks to the spell of hot weather (release). Total group like-for-like sales were also up 2.5 [...]