After lifting the closure imposed by the Corona pandemic:
The state of the London real estate market has changed after Corona, as there are many houses on offer, but buyers are looking for someone who gives them a discount of up to 25 percent of the original asking price.
Elaf from Dubai: The property market in England has opened its doors after almost two months of closure, but those hoping to actually come back to life will have to wait a bit. This is a report that was reported by the British “Financial Times” by Al-Eqtisadiah. Commenting on the gradual return to life in the British real estate market after the closure imposed by the Corona pandemic.
Last March, real estate review and appraisal tours were banned due to the coronavirus lockdown. According to Zoopla, about 370,000 transactions worth about 82 billion pounds were suspended. The government, looking at the 2.5 billion pounds of stamp duty receipts these sales would have generated, reopened the market in mid-May.
Precautionary Measures:
The report says sellers can market their homes again, and buyers can see them, but many things have changed. Dealing with the market has become more complicated logistically. If they want to inspect the property, agents will ask them to sign a health declaration. And possibly have their temperature checked on the doorstep before entering the house.
Once inside, buyers are required to wear gloves and masks. Not touch anything and keep a safe distance from anyone else, including pets.
Once they leave, the homeowners have to clean the surfaces and doorknobs. There is no need to prepare baked goods to delight buyers anymore, nothing can beat the lingering smell of Dettol.
Before And After:
For a week, real estate agents have been struggling to reopen their offices. While adhering to new health and safety standards on social distancing. A buying agent got summoned to a London office to organize a parade. But the branch manager was surprised to discover that he had taped several items to the floor on his knees.
However, agents say demand is rising. According to Carter Jonas, one of the dealers, phone inquiries on Wednesday the market reopened were 72 percent higher than the last Wednesday before the close, and email inquiries more than doubled. For anyone trying to sell their home, this is welcome news, until they hear offers from buyers.
In affluent areas of London before the shutdown. Knight Frank claims the average price over 12 months was about 98 percent of the asking price. The average offer was just under 93.7 percent.
After the lockdown was lifted. 94 percent of bids were accepted, but the average bid was much lower, at 89 percent of the asking price.
They want a bigger Discount:
Some buyers seek a bigger discount. Last May, the Financial Times hosted a live session on its website with Henry Pryor, its purchasing agent. A reader asked him how much he thought prices would fall in light of the crisis. When he told her the answer was between 5 and 10 percent, she didn’t like it. She was looking for a 25 percent reduction.
According to the report, calculating the present value of any home in the UK is now very difficult, even for professionals. The Royal Institution of Chartered Surveyors in its book “The Red” publishes guidance on how to value homes for mortgage purposes. A big part of the process is finding the price at which similar homes finally sold, and that’s where the problem lies. With so few sales during the closing, appraisers may need to find other clues to make their calculations, such as talking to real estate agents, says John Bagnoli, director of physical asset valuation at RICS.
Wait:
The difficulty in valuing real estate is part of the reason why banks are compelled to withdraw mortgage products, especially when loan-to-value ratios are high.
According to Rightmove, many first-time buyers will now need to increase their down payment from 10 to 15 percent to get the best prices, with an average cost of 12,000 pounds. And buyers in London will need to find an extra 23,873 pounds. And if they can’t, they will try to pursue lower prices.
“There might be as many as 400,000 transactions waiting to happen,” says Peter Williams, chairman of research firm Acadata. “But my guess is that a lot of people won’t knock on dealer doors hard and say ‘let’s get this over with’.” Moving is tough at the best of times, he says: “For anyone who doesn’t have to move, I think they’re not going to do anything now and just wait and see how things turn out.”
Kuwait invests $5 billion in Britain:
The Kuwait Investment Authority (the Sovereign Wealth Fund) is seeking to invest more than five billion dollars over the next three years in the infrastructure sector in Britain, in a step similar to what Qatar has done, in light of the tendency of sovereign wealth funds to increase their returns, taking advantage of low-interest rates.
This development comes weeks after the failure of an acquisition offer worth 5.3 billion pounds (8 billion dollars) made by international investors, including the Kuwait Investment Authority, to buy the British water company, Severrent Trent.
The CEO of the authority, Badr Muhammad Al-Saad, said that the latter is looking for existing projects in the infrastructure that generate returns, and the goal is not to establish new projects, adding that the sovereign fund does not present itself as a project developer, but rather provides capital in the long run.
Al-Saad explained – during his visit to London to celebrate the sixtieth anniversary of the opening of a branch of the authority in the British capital – that the authority is looking for well-established projects in order to diversify its investment portfolio, and considered that there is no way to achieve revenues from fixed income due to low-interest rates.
Regulated Industries
Osama Al-Ayoub, who heads the investment office of the authority in London. Explains that the Kuwaiti sovereign fund aspires to invest in companies operating in industries characterized by a strong regulatory climate. Such as water, electricity distribution, and production.
The Kuwaiti sovereign fund – which has assets worth more than 400 billion dollars – has doubled the value of these assets during the past ten years and achieved a return rate of 9.5% annually, and the fund wants in the current period to engage in investments in it with greater risk instead of investing in funds managed by other parties. As it happened before.
How long does it take to get the visa?
The purpose of this residence is to facilitate transactions for investors from outside the European Union. Therefore, the procedures do not take more than about 10 days. After which you can request the residency for two years directly or wait for the year to pass and then start the residency transactions.
Applications for residency for two years are submitted at the Immigration Office in Madrid and the process takes 20 days.
Other types of residency and visas
In the event that you do not meet the conditions for golden residency for investors. You can resort to other options to visit Spain as tourists or residents. Multiple-entry visas are granted to the majority of non-EU investors. Who invest in Spanish real estate or wish to reside in Spain for non-profit purposes. As for people who want to establish a company, they can request the establishment of self-employment.
You can get more information on our page. And you can also contact us by phone, e-mail, or by commenting below. If you are interested in buying a property presented on our page. We can assist you in all stages, including obtaining a financial loan, legal procedures, decoration, furniture, leasing, and resale.