The Clapham Property Blog

A few months ago, I wrote an article on the Clapham Property Blog about the length of time it took to sell a property in Clapham and the saleability of the different price bands ( i.e. whether the lower/middle or upper local property markets were moving slower or quicker than the others ). For reference, a few months ago it was taking on average 76 days from the property coming on the market for it to be sold subject to contract (and that was based on every Estate Agent in Clapham) … and today … 126 days .. does that surprise you with what is happening in the UK economy? Well, a number of Clapham landlords and homeowners, who are looking to sell in the coming months, contacted me following that article to enquire what difference the type of property (i.e. Detached/Semi/Terraced/Apartment) made to saleability and also the saleability of property by the number of bedrooms. As I have said before, whether you are a Clapham landlord looking to liquidate your buy to let investment

“I just love looking over and keeping up to date the 108 pieces of legislation that govern the rental of residential property in the UK” ...No Clapham Landlord, ever If you are one of the 2,159 Clapham (or SW4 to be precise) landlord’s that manages your own property, would it surprise you to know that there are 108 separate pieces of legislation that govern the rental of private houses to tenants. Oh, and on top of the 108 pieces of law, there are further 300+ regulations in the mix. Whilst Clapham landlords may once have preferred to manage their Clapham buy-to-let properties themselves to boost their profits, many Clapham landlords are starting to see this as a false economy. In the last four years, an additional 830 landlords in Clapham have converted from self-managed to having their property managed by a letting agent in Clapham, taking the total number of properties under management in Clapham to 3,377 (out of a total of 5,536 private rental properties in

What is it to be British? Our stubbornness, long-suffering stoicism, our vexation at injustice, our obsession with football and rugby, we are weather obsessed external awkward noncommittal modest people whilst underneath seething like a volcano because someone jumped the queue….. and our No.1 obsession is with the property ladder. This ‘love affair’ with owning our own home has been both good and bad for the UK as a whole; giving people financial freedom in their later years whilst also reducing the quantity (and quality) of housing provision whilst adding the extra pressure of a ‘them and us’ society. Strong words I know .. but let me explain more. I honestly believe that most Governments since the end of the 1970’s, Conservative and Labour, have attempted to nourish our addiction to home ownership (to keep the housing market on track) with the Council House Right to Buy sell off in the 1980’s, tax relief of mortgages, relaxation of the mortgage rules in the late 1990’s/e

I have been asked a number of times recently what a hard Brexit would mean to the Clapham property market. To be frank, I have been holding off giving my thoughts, as I did not want to add fuel to the stories being banded around in the national press. However, it’s obviously a topic that you as Clapham buy to let landlords and Clapham homeowners are interested in ... so I am going to try and give you what I consider a fair and unbiased piece on what would happen if a hard Brexit takes place in March 2019. After the weather and football, the British obsession on the UK property market is without comparison to any other country in the world. I swear The Daily Mail has the state of the country’s property market on its standard weekly rotation of front-page stories! Like I have said before on my blog, there are better economic indexes and statistics to judge the economy (and more importantly) the property market. If you recall, I said the number of transactions was just as importa

It doesn’t seem two minutes ago that it was 90 degrees Fahrenheit in the shade (32 degrees Celsius for my younger readers), hosepipe bans looked likely and it was simply too hot to sleep at night, yet early indications were, that as the temperatures soared, the Clapham property market appeared to be doing the reverse and was already starting to cool down. 33.90% less people moved home in the Lambeth Borough in the first part of 2018, when compared to the average number of people moving home (in the same time frame) between 2014 and 2017 The average number of households who sold and moved locally between 2014 and 2017 in the winter and spring months was 353 homes a month.. yet in the same time frame in 2018, only 234 (on average) sold and moved. So, what is the issue? Many have cited Brexit as the issue – but I think its deeper than that. Brexit seems to be the “go to excuse” for everything at the moment – my neighbour even blamed it for the potholes! Anyway a