The coming worldwide credit crunch

People should be sensible enough to see past the doom & gloom though & just take notice of all the advice, others thoughts & GOOD NEWS etc, Georgia. (With apologies to those who are experiencing the immense difficulties of purchasing in their case because of corruption etc. I am speaking about propective purchasers looking for sound advice).

Thanks more,

I think i misunderstood a lot of TJ posts,i think we are actually"singing from the same hymnsheet" in a strange sort of way.

This is such a good forum i just dont want people to stay away as they feel there can be too much doom and gloom at times.

I think the word "priorities" sums it up......

I think we have crossed purposes TJ,

The whole idea of Spain is to do exactly what you state..............

I couldn't agree with you more,people come here for the life and to escape the rat race,they try to enjoy every second and look for a pleasant enviroment for both their families and in retirement.

We shouldnt have to worry about how much a €1.20 cafe con leche is worth,can you measure worth on a level of enjoyment.

I was the same as you in the UK work work work,2 cars,3 cars,big house,bigger house.......................

Does it make you smile?maybe for a split second.

I take your point with investors but nowadays the core of people moving here are looking for something they have lost.

A walk on the beach a longer life expectancy and happy smiley children will always have the same value,priceless.

Your posts are very informative and i wouldn't doubt for one minute that you know your stuff.

I just think we measure and value things at the moment in a different way.

What I'm trying to get across, obviously rather unsucessfully is that people are obsessed with the amount of euros or dollars or pounds that they have, or how much their property is worth. But in an inflationary environment, its not what matters.

If the government are insistant on turning our money to confetti, then in a few years time we could all be earning a million pounds a year, but if a sandwich cost 1000pounds, its not going to help alot.

When i was a kid, a millionaire was someone really rich, now they are two a penny. You have to have hundreds of millions before you get on any list now.

I am jsut trying to help people get off the hamster wheel of life, where people work harder and harder but just don't seem to get ahead. But as you say it does not seem to be working. Time to sit in the sun and have a cup of tea, if I can afford it.

sorry wasn't meant to be cynical.

I was just asking for an educated decision and your thoughts on what to put your money into..........

After all,we have worthless money,live in our worthless houses,our stocks are collapsing,we drive around in our devaluing cars drinking through magic straws!!!

just wondered if you had the answer......................

thats cheating,its easy to say what not to after the fact...........

Tell us o wise one what is the answer,what do we buy............

By saying this i do take it that you are a multi millionaire and are going to let us in on your tried and tested get rich sheme.........

By the way as you "work in the city"  how do you get so much time off and get back to Spain so quickly............

Wow - thats a bit cynical. I'm not trying to sell anything, unlike most people on here.

If you have to know I put work in the City in quotes because my work used to be in the investment circle, traded options, equity derivatives.

I can spend my time now in Spain cos I'm retired. Too busy bringing up little girls lol. 

thats cheating,its easy to say what not to after the fact...........

Tell us o wise one what is the answer,what do we buy............

By saying this i do take it that you are a multi millionaire and are going to let us in on your tried and tested get rich sheme.........

By the way as you "work in the city"  how do you get so much time off and get back to Spain so quickly............

So a pound sterling was worth one pound of silver in honest money days.

So lets do some quick simple calcs:

Silver is currently around 8.5pounds an ounce. There are I think 16 ounces in a pound.

So Silver is now 8.5 times 16 per pound sterling

About 128 pounds sterling a pound.of Silver.

So the Great British Pound has lost so much value its not even worth 1p compared to its original value.

What does this mean - well it that if you want to get wealthy and stay wealthy you have to invest in something of value that cannot be meaningfully increased in supply.

This rules out Spainish property, Euros, Pounds, dollars and Wide screen TVs. All of which can be manufactured at will.

we are seeing the affects here but the percentage drops are not as high.

What we are seeing here is that some "walk to the beach apartments" are coming back to within the 100k mark which i think is about right.

Brings it into perspective again with UK property prices,after all thats what fuelled the market in the first place......

In this area i honestly do not think prices will fall dramatically on the "comfortable owners" property.

What i will agree with is that as the banks claw back more and more due to personal financial problems due to the credit crunchie there will be more and more bargains avaliable,again good news for buyers.......... 

Yes am about to reply to your email Georgia - dont worry!!!!

I totally agree as all their figures are based on thin air and I would love to know how they can use valuations when they are reducing their valuarions by an average of 15% so far based on the actual ones I have, I had a case 2 weeks ago, valuation of the property was 238,000 18 months ago on purchase. We had buyer, val came in at 203,000!!! When challened and shown  the bank val of 238k which was stated on the nota simple, the new bank said they rang up a nearby developer near the complex and asked them what their cheapest property was. Then using their price per square metre, valued out property! And this is happening constanlty, down valuing from a year ago.

Hence negative equity is rife. Totally ridiculous! Either use one method or the other. Banks used to routinely increase their valuations by 10% at the beginning of every year. Now they are using comparables, but not of actual prices as they cant until new purchases become registered as in the past black money masked the true purchase price.

Prices are coming down, and judging by the amount of people I have already spoken to this week, there are going to be some huge losses around.

By the end of this year, banks will have to divulge the arrears they are carrying and there will be too many propertied repossessed and up for sale that wont go and clear the debts attached.

Big mess - but great news for buyers if you know what you are doing.

Thanks TJ, most people know of me as a pro!!!  Youde be suprised what you can get for 10 euros if you know where to go........!

• BBVA (major Spanish bank): prices +1.4% in 2008, -1.9% in 2009, housing investment down 3.5% in 2008, planning approvals down 175,000 to 500,000, and 250,000 jobs lost
• Morgan Stanley: prices -5% in 2008
• Deutsche Bank: prices -2% to -8% in 2008
• Natixis (French bank): prices +2% to +3% in 2008
• Crédit Agricole (French bank): prices -10% over period 2008-2009
• Aguirre y Newman (Spanish real estate consultancy): prices - 10% on average, but down 15% on the Costa del Sol, sales down 50%