A property developer has won a High Court case against property investors forcing one to pay £133,000 after they backed out of an agreement to purchase flats "off plan".
The High Court, in Bristol, has ordered the person to pay a whopping £133,282 in damages, costs and interest to Plymouth's Prestige Homes South West Ltd, after pulling out of a deal to buy two Zero 4 flats in Plymouth.
Probably does not come as much of a surprise to anyone involved in UK property sales, but worth pointing out:
More than two thirds of UK property disposals last year were sold at prices below their valuations, according to the IPD/RICS Valuation and Sale Price Study 2009.
Through the day we get updates and press releases from property finance publications and various trade bodies.
On Tuesday (18th September) The Building Societies Association (BSA) reported "unwavering consumer confidence" within the housing market.
They went on to explain that their report is the first look at the public's view on residential property purchases. Unsurprisingly the report found that most people (88%) were buying a property because they wanted to own their own home (duh!). The headline from the report was that the housing market is in good shape.
It is a fact of life that one person's misfortune can be another persons opportunity, so any discussion about property finance has to include a quick consideration for what happens when things go wrong.
unregulated been a lot of talk in the press about homeowners applying for mortgages with "[tags[adverse credit[/tags]". The popular press tends to concentrate on the problems this causes for for the applicant, but the issue of adverse credit applications creates problems for brokers and lenders too.
During a recent speech the outgoing chief executive of the Financial Services Authority (FSA) publicly stated that he would like to see secured loans come within the regulatory umbrella of the FSA's control.
The succession of recent interest rate rises is starting to have an impact on the [tag]buy to let[/tag] market. The inevitable consequence of this is that some lenders are tightening their criteria for new borrowers. This means that unless a new entrant to the buy to let market can come up with a large deposit they are going to find problems balancing their rental incomes against higher loan to value mortgages.
Bridging loans can be used for almost any purpose so long as there is enough equity in the property. The UK Bridging Loan market is estimated to be worth £2.5 billion and the demand for bridging loans is believed to be growing by 25% year on year. Bridging finance can be made available for many purposes, the obvious one being to bridge the gap between the purchase of a new property and the sale of an existing property.
[tag]Home Information Packs[/tag] are now not going to be mandatory until 1st August 2007, although only properties with four or more bedrooms are going to need them. Cynics of the way that the whole matter has been handled have even suggested that the final decision about the future of HIP's and [tag]Energy Performance Certificates[/tag] (EPC's) will be delayed until Gordon Brown takes over.
