Those of you who were kind enough to read my intel "Clever Bankers" of the 29th. April 2008 will recall I said: "The reduction in lending means property prices will find their own level, as they always do; a level which will be more consistent with prudent borrowing and not inflated by high risk lending."
And now we see that property prices in the UK have fallen for the first time in years.
Whilst I feel very sorry for those who are desperate to climb on the property ladder and can't get a mortgage during the current lending squeeze (aka Credit Crunch) I would ask them just to consider whether they really want to borrow more than they can sensibly afford to repay.
Even the banks have decided they can't trust each other to repay loans. It wasn't long ago they happily lent each other OUR money, secured against OUR mortgage debts.
I'm inclined to the view that although the Bank of England may well need to drop interest rates further to aid economic recovery, I fear that what they are doing may be too little and too late.
The USA just announced it is not officially in recession, but it was a darn close run thing, and it seems the main reason was that industry has been stock piling, but they can't do that for long.
They haven't managed to stave off recession yet, and in the UK the same decisions are being made to halt the slide. But if those steps are not working in the USA why should they work here?
Mind you I can't see the Britsh taxpayers being sent a tax rebate to go shopping with, not when the government wants to abolish the 10% tax rate, hitting the poorest the hardest.
And will the Americans go shopping, or will they pay off their debts? I think I might have a fair guess at the answer to that one. I know what I'd do. We all look after number one first, right.
Who was it said charity begins at home?
What do us Brits say? It's something like if they catch a cold in America then we'll be sneezing soon.
Even my old Mum (God rest her soul) always used to say "It's snowing in America, we'll get that soon." It was nonsense, of course, but it's far more likely to apply to the economic situation.
Looks like there's a bit of drizzle falling at the moment; but I just hope you've all got some rainy day money, because I reckon it's going to be pouring soon.
