UK House prices (Nationwide; February 2010 down 1%)

When I look at the data from the nationwide the figure for February is actually a drop of 1.3%. The 1% drop is seasonally adjusted.


Also, they say that the 3 month movement is +1.6% but this is also seasonally adjusted. The actual 3 month movement is -0.9%.

Prices are perhaps going down (slightly), and have been since September. Since September 2009 prices have shown very low rises and falls, overall house prices for this period have fallen 0.3%.

http://www.nationwide.co.uk/hpi/historical.htm

UK Growth for 4th quarter 2009

It's a big argument about an estimate that clearly shows there is no growth (plus or minus an error). The most annoying thing about this recession is that reckless businesses and reckless individuals are being bailed out by those who were not reckless. Not a good policy for the long term strength of a country.

Growth or no growth, we should be investing in quality.

RBS and LLOYDS performances

One of the main problems here is the belief that a government can run a business, let alone make a ?profit?. RBS and Lloyds will probably never fully pay back the amounts they relied on during the bail out. More likely they will be sold off by a conservative government for a ?loss? and the market will deal with it. I imagine that in 10 years time the biggest UK banks will be Barclays and HSBC. They should be as they have been run well and should be rewarded for that.


In answer to the question 'who is to blame and who is really being bailed out?'

Low interest rates are largely bailing out those who overspent and those who did not are paying for it.

UK Savers Revolt

Most people seem to assume that savers are only bailing out the banks. It is true that the banks have been bailed out, however at the moment savers are generally bailing out the people who borrowed heavily in the last few years and cannot afford to pay it back. There should be more political angst against those who remortgaged on the increase in the value of their house (which is unearned income) and are now being protected by low interest rates. Do you want to live in a country that helps those who were foolish and punishes those who were not? With inflation above 4% (when you account for costs associated with homes, with or without a mortgage) then the money you have is going down in value even with interest. The low interest rates are protecting those who made a mistake and the reduced value of your money is paying for it.


You do not have to pay for others mistakes. It would be better to take you money out of its current savings account and move it to the highest possible rate you can find, which probably won’t be in the accounts run by the banks who are servicing these cheap mortgages. Better still would be to Just REVOLT. Take you money out. Move it abroad if you can. If you can’t, then make a run on one bank and move the money to another. Do whatever it takes to put pressure on the banks and government to give a reasonable savings rate and to stop supporting those who caused the financial problems.

Make no mistake; the banks and reckless spenders need your money. Don’t let them have it without a fight.