Real Estate investing

[beachlion]

I'm also not much of a financial expert. I can tell you everything about bolts and nuts and there it stops. And I like to keep it that way.
A colleague once invested his earnings in diamonds. With every diamond was a nice certificate with the appraisal. When he needed money and tried to sell part of his collection, he got about 50% of his investment back. That teached me to stay away from stuff you don't know nothing about.
I'm like Moon, boosting the economy. The only difference is that I boost the American dollar economy with my Dutch Euro pension. It feels like development aid, a sort of Marshall Plan in reverse.

[Sinned]

Actually much as MOH has her down side in not appreciating my skirts she definitely has a nose for a good investment. I have learnt ion the past that if she asks whether to buy something or not then I just tell her to go for it. Typical example. When the first LOTR film came out in the 80's Royal Doulton brought out a series of china figures of Bilbo, Gandalf, Legolas and others costing between £6 and maybe £15. Barliman Butterbur, the landlord of the Prancing Pony sells for several hundred pounds on ebay. We have at least one full set and more than one of some of the characters. That is only one example and we have thousands of pounds worth of collectables in our house as a hedge against poverty. Our 4 bed detached house was bought on New Years Eve 1982 for less than £30000 and now has a valuation of > £350000. MOH fell in love with the house as soon as she saw it and it's now paid off. Financially I guess that we are set up for our retirement [0] but we have worked damn hard for it and in the early years of marriage scrimped and saved but always made sure that our children had the best of everything. I don't mean to brag here as I just accept the situation and I'm sure that many of you out there that are just as financially stable. i consider that we aren't rich just comfortable. Maybe that's one reason to stick with MOH.

[0] We have sufficient liquidity that if a big bill came in we have no worries about paying for it. For anything major that has a substantial labour content we try and pay in cash which gets us a significant discount and hence value for money. When I say that we are Yorkshire folk we mean it!!!!

[Freedomforall]

Sinned we all have our strengths and weaknesses. Sounds like she has a very good talent for spotting deals. How could you go wrong with Lord of the Rings?!?!?!?! And a paid of house is certainly good to have. None of mine are paid off. I wish they were but we do work very hard and hopefully they will be one day. We both grew up dirt poor. My summers were spent working on the farm and harvesting vegetables from the garden. We sold them in large baskets and used the funds to buy our clothes to wear to school. I recall one summer we saved for a bag of cookies as a treat. I made the big mistake of letting the Nabisco grasshopper mint cookies catch my eye. They were so horrible!!! It took me a long time to ever like chocolate and mint together after that.

[moonshadow]

One reason I wanted to purchase a small modest house, was basically for retirement. As I don't expect to strike it particularly rich in my lifetime, and since social security won't be around much longer, I have to figure eventually my health will fail and I'll have to hang it up. I have a little money going into a 401k, that in combination with a paid for house that will hopefully be updated enough to carry us to death, and maybe a little part time job to fill in the financial gaps is my "senior plan"....

That's all I really want to say about "social security", as much as people in my parents age group like to complain about my generation, and the millennials, I can honestly say they really f___ed us with this one... They'll never "cancel" social security, because that would mean they'd have to stop taking the money out of our paychecks. They'll just raise the eligibility age to where few people will live long enough to draw it.

Hope ya'll baby boomers enjoy it... and you're welcome by the way.... Meanwhile, myself, my sister, my daughter, etc get to work until the day we die. #MAGA! WHOOHOO!!!

Anyway, enough of that....

Hopefully, in the coming weeks I'll receive news that will relieve my worry that I might have had another one of my famed financial "epic fails". Hopefully the soil engineer will come up with a septic system that we can afford... or guess what... BACK TO RENTING! Oh and we get to pay a mortgage too! HOORAY!

Sorry... it's been a taxing several weeks, and I've had about all the "thoughts and prayers" I can handle....

[skirtyscot]

Well, Moonshadow, I don't know exactly what you are referring to, but it sounds like it could be a disaster. In case it is any consolation to you, can I just say that while I sincerely hope it all turns out to be OK, I am not praying for you!

[moonshadow]

I don't know exactly what you are referring to, but it sounds like it could be a disaster.

Ahh... it's just a thing. It has nothing to do with skirts this time either. Just an oversight on my part when we purchased the house. I'll write more about it later when I have more details. Right now there is just too much still up in the air.

I am not praying for you!

Thanks. I've got a story to go along with the whole "thoughts and prayers" rant that I will also deliver later.

At any rate, if this limestone slab that sits 12 inches below 95% of my yard would suddenly transform into perfectly percing soil at a depth of 4 feet.... I will retract every critical thing I've ever said about Yahweh...

[Jim]

On Social Security, it depends on whom we elect. A few minor changes will probably stabilize it for your lifetime. Of course, that is if the whole economy doesn't crash, which is no sure thing.

[Sinned]

When we buy a property none of know what is beneath the topsoil ( or isn't in the case of sink holes ) unless and until we have to dig deep for some reason or it's noted on the deeds which should be picked up by the solicitor who acted for you. It is assumed that the solicitor had actually READ the deeds, rather than just skimming them, to pick out any caveats or conditions. After all the assumption is that all is ok as they managed to dig deep enough for the house foundations. Advertise for a contractor to deposit some topsoil from a local building site? No?

[Ray]

The government has really killed the private landlord business in England, unless your property is held in a limited company, with what's called Section 24. Normally in business you can deduct most expenses from income to produce a gross profit. Except in the case of the private landlord where claiming interest on a property mortgage will not be allowed resulting in all the income from rents being classed as profit. This potentially could push landlords into higher tax brackets. Immoral it is since the change doesn't affect limited companies. Of course, at the same time, the chancellor changed the rules about Capital Gains calculations on property transfers into limited companies. So a double whammy. It's still possible to transfer to a company wrapper but it has to be done in a specific way and, naturally, is technical legally. Of course rents will rise and homelessness will occur as landlords evict and sell the properties. Such is government mismanagement. I'm glad that I got out of property rental before all this happened. [0] So development and sale is the only way to go at the moment.

[0] I had 2 properties rented out of which only one had a mortgage. I sold the one with the mortgage.

Another policy that is having unintended consequences. The government put the onus on landlords to check that the prospective tenant has the right to UK residency to stop illegal immigrants being housed, thus forcing them out of the country. One problem is that the landlord will take the path of least resistance and refuse to rent to anyone who doesn't have a UK passport. A landlord doesn't have to give a reason for refusing to rent to someone so cannot be accused of discrimination as nothing can be proved. Of course with Brexit Europeans will come within the scope of this in a couple of years time. There is a pending court case saying that this law discriminates against foreign workers, which it does. But there's more. Forces personnel stationed abroad for a long period often rent out their homes here whilst away and, you guessed it, they are now being brought into paying higher taxes as a result.

As has been said before, you just couldn't make this all up and is the result of rushing legislation through without an in-depth analysis of all the possible ramifications.

6.

Sorry for the big quote above but this is my area of specialism. There are some facts that need to be corrected.

1. The restriction on tax relief for debt costs does not just apply to England; it applies to the whole of the U.K.

2. The Rental market is far from dead. The only impact is on new entrants to the market, and on heavily geared portfolios.

3. Your statement about no tax relief on debt costs is incorrect. It’s restricted to 20% - although that restriction isn’t fully in force yet.

4. There’s no inequality cf companies. In a corporate, your tax relief on debt is at 19% - close to the 20% for individually held debt/portfolios. If you want the income personally you’ll pay tax on a distribution at 32.5% (typically) - on top of the corporation tax on rental income. So the end result is broadly similar.

5. You mention the Chancellor changing the rules on incorporation. I don’t think that’s correct. The CGT rate on resi property remains at 28%. What did change was case law; the Moyne Ramsay case provided HMRC with the ability to challenge CGT free incorporations. You still potentially face SDLT while incorporating unless you get into the FA03 Sch 15 para 18 exemption.

6. Another change that you haven’t mentioned is the SDLT 3% surcharge on second (or third or..) properties.

7. Interesting comments on the immigrant rules. Thanks for sharing that.

[Happy-N-Skirts]

Can we stick with men wearing skirts? This could go on and on and I could tell you how to invest in stocks. They have been good for me, but the topic doesn't belong here. Sorry if I hit a nerve.

[Freedomforall]

I posted this in the section that states non-fashion non-skirt related. Here is the exact title, "Off Topic
Non-fashion, non-skirt, non-gender discussions. If your post is related to fashion, skirts or gender, please choose one of the forums above for it."
You don't have to read this if you don't want to. Posting in it will certainly serve to sustain the thread at the top of the forum as well. We are all here becasue we love skirts, thus it is obvious we have that in common. I believe in order to build friendships and relationshships one must have common interests. Skirts are that one such stepping stone that we all have. It is also healthy for growing realtionships to have other interests in common. I was quite simply trying to post a topic in the "Off Topic" section to ascertain the interests of other members. It was in essence an effort on my part to build other common bonds with members.

[Ray]

I would second that. This is where the more quirky sides to our personalities can come out; where we can share our passions and hobbies. I learn a lot from the comments posted here.

[Freedomforall]

I would second that. This is where the more quirky sides to our personalities can come out; where we can share our passions and hobbies. I learn a lot from the comments posted here.

Thank you Ray.

[Ray]

I can advise people on how to invest in fine wine!

Anybody?

No?

Ah well....

[Sinned]

Ray, I did simplify things for the benefit of the many non-UK and non-technical folks here so you may be right in your corrections and I bow to your greater esperience. Incidentally have you joined Property118.com also known as the Landlord's Union? If not, then please do so as they could use your input. Started by one Mark Alexander and there is a wealth of technical information and support for landlords on this isle of ours. Fortunately I exited from the rental market before all this started and have no wish to get back into it. With all the laws, rules and regulations it's all getting a bit complex for me.

No disrespect H-n-S and others but this thread was started as a genuine discussion topic for those interested in real estate. If that's not your interest then don't open the thread to read it. The title says it all even though where it ends up is anybody's guess. Although a site for support of those enjoying skirt wearing, if we were, as a group, sitting around the potted palm enjoying a coffee or two do you really expect that all our conversations would revolve around the skirts we are wearing? No, there will be those interested in trains who would drift towards one another or any other interest they have in common. This site is actually no different, the only limitation is that we aren't in meat space and thus separated by distance and time. There are threads that I don't really read where where the thread has meandered to, as threads do wander much as conversations do, no longer interests me or I may just open it to see if there are any recent changes in direction.