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Showing posts from 2010

Christmas Opening 2010 & New Year 2011

Best wishes for Christmas 2010 and New Year 2011! This year we are closing our doors at lunchtime (12:00) on 23rd December and re-opening at 9:00 am on January 4th. For the benefit of our tenants and landlords you can still reach us during this period by dialing 01353 645809 . Please leave a message with your name, brief description of the situation and full contact details. Our system will e-mail the voice mail to the mobile of the duty person who will be back to you as soon as possible.

Date that Property

Ever wondered what 'period' your home belongs to? Or if the selling agent got the date right! Here's the (not exhaustive) guide: How to age a home Tudor (1485 - 1603): half-timbering, steep roof, tall and narrow windows, large chimneys Jacobean (1603 - 1660): flat roof, columns and pilasters, decadent detail Georgian (1714 - 1837): two chimneys, matching housefronts, large sash windows, brick walls, contrasting window frames, porticos Victorian (1837 - 1901): slate roof, three stories, bay windows, ornate finish, Gothic and Renaissance revival, ordered room layout Edwardian (1901 - 1919): red brick, gables, semi-detached, mansion blocks, functional design, less decoration 1920s and 1930s: functional, smaller, mock-Tudor and Georgian revival, plain doorways and lintels, Art Deco, geometric 1940s: angular and shiny surfaces, wooden panelling, tiled fireplaces 1950s: open plan design, streamlining, picture windows, minamalist, high-rise, prefabs 1960s: Lar

Sage Advice From Mike Woodfine

When everyone is diving in then it's probably best not to be buying. The reverse is often true but Mike Woodfine from The Money Centre advises would be investors on the correct attitude to borrowing mortgage money. Read the Yorkshireman's advice here  http://bit.ly/arQLwu  !

Tory Minister Vows to End Era of House Price Booms

Tory Minister Vows to End Era of House Price Booms The latest nonsense to issue from the mouth of a Con-Dem minister has left me agitated, not to say irritated! The Daily Mail of 13th October reported Grant Shapps’, the Housing Minister, speech to the Housing Market Intelligence conference. Read in full here http://bit.ly/dpGL4K if you are suffering from low blood pressure. He stated: “...middle class families ... should not rely on their homes to fund retirement”. We have had a Labour Government mount a several billion pound raid on pension funds, a stock market lose our pension funds a fortune and now we have a Tory telling us that property as a pension is a mortal sin! I suppose if you are an MP or a senior civil servant then you won’t need to worry about the investment in your property as you have a gold plated, brass constructed pension that the middle-classes have, and are still being asked, to fund from their heavily taxed income, whilst paying into their poorly performin

How Resilient Are We to the 'Cuts'?

It feels to me like the UK property market is holding it's breath waiting for the public spending cuts to finally be announced. In a late August blogpost I stated my irritation that the cuts were announced but not going to be implemented or details given until October. Well, in advance of the actual announcements, the BBC have created a page on their website where you can check out how resilient your area may be. This is based on a number of factors to create to a figure between 1 and 324. 1 being most resilient and 324 least. East Cambridgeshire scores 45 whilst nearby Fenland 235 and South Cambridgeshire 10! Check out the site here: http://bbc.in/aY28rC

Sash Windows On Older Homes

At the last minute we are getting our sash windows painted this week. The windows are hardwood replicas of the original Victorian ones, complete with sash cords and brass pulley wheels and were made by R S Button Joinery in 2003. This is the second time they have been painted since then so I feel they were a good investment. Luckily we were able to use the old-style narrow gap double glazed units to keep the style correct and not have over-large glazing bars. English Heritage have advice on sash windows  here  http://bit.ly/aQVYOH

Home Selling Tips & Suggestions

This article was published in the Telegraph and is headlined  Tips for selling your house this summer I  think the comments and tips hold good for the Autumn while we wait for the 'Cuts'  and really any other season of the year there is something to glean from this collection of agent's suggestions. http://bit.ly/cu9f4i

Autumn is Just Around the Corner

As I write this it is nearly the end of August and the rain, which hasn't stopped all night, is still pouring down on a bedraggled Market Place. Stallholders are regularly pushing up their canvas roofs to send a cascade of water over the ground. Depressing? Just a bit, maybe, but look on the bright side. We will soon be in September with the throngs of bored children heading back into the arms of their welcoming teachers to continue their studies towards the next crop of A* GCSE's and A levels. What of the property market, which is now looking towards early Autumn? The coalition government announced mid Summer that they would be making their main 'Cuts' in the Autumn and I feel that the usual holiday season lull has been intensified by the prospect of this happening. If you tell a population that there is pain to come then they batten down the hatches and wait and see. The recent retail figures and mortgage approval figures may bear this out to a degree. Once people

Definitely a Work of Fiction!

John Phelps, a former property correspondent for the Cambridge Evening News and a property journalist for more than 30 years, has just published his first novel: Agent From Hell. He reassures me when he aserts " I have never met an estate agent like Theo Salter and, in any case, the book is not an agent's manual... it is meant to entertain!" Priced at £8.99 it can be ordered from bookshops or from Matador Publishing. Follow this link for review and details http://www.troubador.co.uk/book_info.asp?bookid=1142

Why do we do it?

Oh my God, we’re at it again! Todays Times headline has sent shivers through the property owning classes as they think that the economy is ‘stuttering’ and house prices are stalling/falling again. It’s August - this country’s main school holiday month - and whilst large numbers of us are not jumping on airplanes to Spain or sunny places as (not being heavily bonused bankers)our budget won’t stretch to it, we are in the majority ‘on holiday’. Since I became an estate agent in 1979 the late summer has always been slow in terms of sales and new instructions. I have never had a best ever sales month in August. Now, add into this the Cameron/Osborne/Clegg effect and you have the perfect recipe for a seriously depressed property market. Forgive me but I have to say politicians never learn from past mistakes. Whilst waiting in a queue outside a Pork butchers the other Saturday morning I made the mistake of passing the time of day with the gentleman in front of me. He asked what I di

Market Update from Hometrack

Monthly National Housing Survey Results at a glance: http://www.hometrack.co.uk/ Prices fell 0.1% in July - the last month on month price fall was in April 2009 when prices fell by -0.3% The decline in demand is in part seasonal but the underlying trend for the last 5 months has been downwards Concerns over the economy and talk of impending spending cuts have taken their toll on market confidence and levels of demand The change in market conditions has seen the average time on the market rise to 8.7 weeks - up from 8.4 weeks in June. The average time on the market has returned to August 2009 levels The proportion of the asking price being achieved has dropped to 94% from 94.3% in June and looks set to decline further as pricing comes under pressure The one positive from the survey is that the volume of sales agreed increased by 3.7%. Despite this agents are marking prices lower as they see rising supply and faltering demand putting prices under downward pressure over the rem

All 27m UK homes listed on the new Zoopla.co.uk property app

Interesting app if you have an iPhone... David Clark and Company The Property Sales People 01353 665020 DD 01353 645809 david@clarkhomes.co.uk http://www.clarkhomes.co.uk http://www.lettingsearch.co.uk   David Clark & Co Ltd is a limited company registered in  England  and  Wales . Registered number: 053826604 Registered office:   Richmond House Broad Street  Ely Cambs CB7 4AH Begin forwarded message: From: " Zoopla.co.uk Blog" < no-reply@wordpress.com > Date: 20 July 2010 10:00:25 GMT+01:00 To: < david@clarkhomes.co.uk > Subject: [New post] All 27m UK homes listed on the new Zoopla.co.uk property app All 27m UK homes listed on the new Zoopla.co.uk property app zooplauk   | July 20, 2010 at 8:44 am | Tags:   app ,   iphone app ,   property app ,   Search   | Categories:   House Prices ,   Search ,   Site Features ,   Social media   | URL:   http://wp.me/pslLG-zR Ever walked past the home of your dreams and wondered if it's for sale or what it last sol

Top 15 Movies About Moving

It's a 'Summer thing', but have a read then if you have the moving bug why not view? Top 15 Movies About Moving There are an amazing number of movies that begin with a person or family moving into new surroundings whether they are going to school and moving away from home, taking a new job, or experiencing another  life changing event.  These movies can be really timely for people that are going through something similar in real life.  It’s great to be able to laugh, cry, and yell along with the characters at some of the events surrounding a normal move.  Accordingly, we put together the following list of the top 15 Movies About Moving (of All-Time). Karate Kid (1984) – This starred Ralph Macchio as Daniel Larusso a teenager forced to move from New Jersey to California.  He has a difficult time at best making friends and in fact finds himself making enemies much more easily.  He ends up getting beat up by some karate students and finds himself saved by the handy man

June House Prices & Affordability Index from FindaProperty.com

Interesting for buyers and sellers but worth reading in depth... David Clark and Company The Property Sales People 01353 665020 DD 01353 645809 david@clarkhomes.co.uk http://www.clarkhomes.co.uk http://www.lettingsearch.co.uk   David Clark & Co Ltd is a limited company registered in  England  and  Wales . Registered number: 053826604 Registered office:   Richmond House Broad Street  Ely Cambs CB7 4AH Begin forwarded message: From: "TDPG Research" < sam@mail2.tdpg.com > Date: 16 June 2010 15:00:50 GMT+01:00 To: "Sam Reynolds" < gary@clarkhomes.co.uk > Subject: June House Prices & Affordability Index from FindaProperty.com To display this email in a browser,   please click here   June 2010 Increased Seller Confidence Leads To Highest Stock Levels Since January 2008 "We've seen a flood of sales properties come onto the market this month. And that is in no small part due to the scrapping of HIPs, according to our findings, in addition to