freebo

Also, its worth remembering that the precursor to the housing crash in the US and the economic crash in the UK and elsewhere was not high interest rates, it was a sudden drying up of credit.

The world markets have been extremely ugly this week, all the indicies (including the ASX) are way down and the AUD has been falling, especially against the JPY. A large number of Australian morgages are leveraged against the JPY and when it risies its bad news for the banks...

The Greece situation is neither contained nor isolated, CDS's* have been rising against a number of european markets and have recently started growing on Australian corporate debt. Greek debt is owed to mainly European banks (France is the largest amount, then Germany), and Grecce will default, they may delay it by a year or two by pumping cash in, but Greek debt (like that of so many other countries), just cannot be repaid.

We could be headed straight back to 2008, or maybe not but its looks very dicey out there.

And with that, I'm emigrating this weekend! It will be worse in Europe, at least for the time being!

*CDS=Credit Default Swap - the cost of insuring debt against default and a measure of the underlying risk of the thing its insuring.

soulrebel

Thats great, they bought at the right time and were a bit lucky perhaps with the timing. It really is down to luck a lot of the time as no-one can predict what way it will go, if we could we wouldn't be in this mess.
However so many Irish bought 2nd or 3rd houses in 2004/2005/2006/2007 and now all those have lost their values by more than half in a lot of cases. If you bought around 1999/2000/2001 period you should be allright. Actually if you bought in early 90's you probably made a killing.
I suppose the difference is that Oz landlords can still rent out their property so its not too bad, the demand is there. Ireland has no demand anymore all the immigrants have gone back. There are empty rentals everywhere. The government are even considering bulldozing a lot of the "ghost estates" down.

Amazulu

And KRudd and Swan are doing their level best to destroy this industry.

Socialist pricks.

mohogony

Yes their stupid mining tax will drive investors away from OZ to other countries.

Amazulu

Saw a sign outside a pub on Great Eastern Highway this afternoon:
Miners In!
Rudd Out!

Works for me.

pomtastic

It's all good when you are in the mining industry and earning good wedge but when there is a remote chance that you may lose your job the whole picture of living in Perth changes.

You go from 'loving' it here to 'hating' it very quickly unless you have paid off mortgage and have suficient funds.

Amazulu

Ease up there Turbo. Where have I said that I 'hate' Perth? You are making a lot of assumptions about me, what's your problem?

I detest KRudd - like I detest all socialists/losers/liberals and believe that he is ruining our country, what wrong with that?

BTW I have no mortgage and have money in the bank - and I still 'love' Perth.

wilf70

Read all of the posts here with great interest--and found many very enlightening and insightful.Find myself in agreement with Centurion[right on the button]and Soulrebel---clearly a man speaking from experience and the heart[hope you have not lost out in the Irish property crash--my friends lost big time].Those of a more optimistic disposition should remember that contradictory statistics and analyses are a sure sign of a world in transition [and not necessarily for the better];and transition always means pain[usually for the most vulnerable].Remember just before the greatcrash of the thirties everybody and his dog got into the share market.Thats when Joe Kennedy got out and made his real fortune[;when he got out].There is much pain to come--and that will be world wide.I'm just not sure what the trigger will be[Greece;collapse of Chinese boom??]or when it will be.But that grim reaper is sitting in the wings---the ancient Greeks called it hubris.Very interested in peoples reasoned replies

Mr Grumpy

I know an enormous number of people who dont own anything. There are a huge number of renters out there, especially in Sydney. Those people fully support a housing crash then they might actually have a chance in life.

Centurion

I agree with you. The massive disparity between income and house prices is nearly criminal to my mind. I fully support a drop in house prices, not just a small correction. When average people cannot afford to buy homes, something has to give.

NedKelly

You can't extrapolate from a housing crash to getting a chance in life. If there is a housing crash there will be a lot of pain for everyone. It's cheaper to rent anyway so the renters are actually better off.

steve`o

spot on a hell of a lot of people in au use property as "super" a crash would see huge demands on social security

mark wool

They will come down they are unsustainable. Courier mail yesterday reporting that queenslanders not spending as much in shops, and now all the stimulas money is gone. When will we see some shops closing? What about the shortage of houses? I am sure there was a shortage in the UK! Sad fact is that when they do come down some people out there will make a killing through others misery.

Geelong Gent

When I find it easy to park in Chadstone I will worry

bcworld

It is easy to park at Chadstone! The rooftop car park across the road from David Jones always has hundreds of empty spots.

Now Southland...that's a different matter!