Barratt boss warns of labour shortage September 10, 2014 The boss of Britain’s largest housebuilder Barratt Developments warned yesterday that a shortage of skilled workers could prevent the country from delivering the homes needed to tackle housing crisis as the company reported a doubling of full-year profits. Mark Clare said the lack of skilled workers – from bricklayers to architects and plasterers – is [...]
Men with wide faces secure bigger bonuses but are worse at collaborating, study finds July 24, 2014 It pays to have a wide face, but only when you're going it alone, according to research by scientists at the University of California, Riverside. Called “Negotiating face-to-face: Men's facial structure predicts negotiating performance”, the study used a series of negotiation simulations to compare the success of wide-faced and narrow-faced men at securing deals when [...]
Buying overseas? Speak to the currency experts first July 21, 2014 Spanish property continues to be popular for Brits looking to buy abroad, with nearly half of all property enquiries for Spain sitting in the £50,000 to £150,000 bracket according to figures from Kyero.com. The Costa Blanca remains the favoured region, accounting for more than a third of Spanish property enquiries on the portal, and with [...]
Lloyds pledges £6.5bn for first time buyers through this year January 21, 2013 LLOYDS is increasing its mortgages to first time buyers to its highest level since the group was dragged down in the financial crisis and had to be bailed out, indicating it is edging closer back to health. The banking group has promised to lend £6.5bn to 60,000 first time buyers in 2013. That is an [...]
Thinking bigger: My Voucher Codes founder Mark Pearson talks Fern Britton and young tech entrepreneurs November 16, 2014 While we’re talking, it suddenly dawns on Mark Pearson that it’s his company’s eighth birthday. “It’s definitely around now,” he laughs, raising his empty plastic water cup in the air. In June of this year, Pearson sold My Voucher Codes, as part of his parent company Markco Media, to global mobile money technology provider [...]
La Senza goes into administration, putting jobs at risk July 1, 2014 UK lingerie retailer La Senza has gone into administration for the second time in two years, putting 752 jobs at risk. The event comes after Middle Eastern retail investor Alshaya was unable to revive the business, having acquired it in 2012 as it was going through a pre-pack administration deal. Over 1,300 employees lost their [...]
City workers fuel Midtown housing boom May 12, 2014 HOUSE prices in the area dubbed Midtown have outpaced the greater London market in the first three months of the year due to a surge in demand from buyers working in the capital’s financial sector, new research out yesterday shows. According to property consultants CBRE, the price of a property in Midtown – between the [...]
How rich are Help to Buy users? May 29, 2014 Today the Treasury released their figures on the use of the controversial Help to Buy scheme – specifically for the second (mortgage guarantee) part of the policy. It has been used 7,313 times so far – but Berenberg’s Rob Wood notes that the figures lean heavily towards more recent months. Only 818 mortgages were [...]
In graphs: London house prices no longer the fastest growing in the UK July 28, 2014 The Land Registry has released new data on house prices in England and Wales and the figures show the market is cooling. The average across England and Wales shows that prices are stagnant – showing no change at all. The average selling price for a house in England and Wales during June was £172,011: a zero per [...]
In graphs: Mortgage approvals rise in June even as London house prices drop July 29, 2014 The discussion around the UK property market was given an added element of confusion today as mortgage lending statistics for June beat expectations. In its Money and Credit report, the Bank of England shows that the number of mortgages approved for house purchases was up to 67,196 in June, above the 62,007 seen in May [...]