Plymouth Property Lift

Plymouth is one of the successful bidders and has made it onto the 2018 World Cup list of host football stadiums.  Home Park, the home of Plymouth Argyle will be further modernised and upgraded and improve the immediate area.  For property appraisals near the Home Park area contact the local Independent Chartered Surveyor, Graham Cocking at http://www.plymouthbuildingsurveyors.co.uk/ .

To discuss how this may affect the market in the wider Devon and Cornwall area, contact your local Independent Property Expert by calling your local propertysurveying.co.uk Independent Chartered Surveyor or go to the Devon or Cornwall Network pages.

Market Comment December 2009

The latest press announcements by the Bank of England and the RICS suggest that House prices in England and Wales are generally continuing to rise in certain areas often fuelled by a lack of supply.  The local Independent Chartered Surveyors with www.propertysurveying.co.uk report a varied market with London bolstored by both big bonuses from the city as well as foreign net investment.  Our surveyors indicate a difference in demand in locations around the provinces whereas in London , the network surveyors demand is still strong with some agents very busy.  A consistent demand has been reported by the westcountry contingent, and along the south coast.  Enquiries are coming in for along the south coast in Hampshire and in Sussex . 

In the deep west, Cornwall and Devon are benefitting from consistent demand with Dorset and Somerset also reporting a healthy number of transactions taking place helped by the net migration to the area. 

In the Gloucestershire and Welsh Border Country, enquiries are in less depth but a number of transactions are taking place with demand good in places like Ross on Wye, Stratford upon Avon, and parts of the Birmingham and West Midlands connurbation such as Wolverhampton and Telford . 

Soundings from other surveyors of our network of Independent Chartered Surveyors will be placed here over the next few days.

Insulation of Timber Floors

Very often, when people are insulating a house, they insulate the roof space, double glaze the windows but forget to insulate the floors.  If the rest of the room is insulated, the floor becomes a thermal weak point.

A solid ground floor is difficult to insulate retrospectively.  However, if there is enough room to increase the height of a floor slab or if it is a suspended concrete slab construction, one can sometimes get access under the floor making it possible to improve insulation.

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HIPs to be scrapped?

The housing spokesman for the Conservative Party, Grant Shapps, has said that they would scrap the Home Information Packs (HIPs) “in a matter of weeks” after coming to power.   He has said that it would be his first job should the Conservative party win the next general election.

This follows claims by some estate agents that the packs are impeding the housing market recovery, as the cost of a HIPs report commits the vendor to expenditure of, typically, some £400, even if they do not sell.

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Can’t Sell – Won’t Sell?

When your home refuses to attract a buyer there are usually good reasons and some of them are within your power to influence. Frustrated sellers are now beginning to question the need to engage an estate agent and save between 1% -2% of the sale price in fees.

Taking this route in turn demands a fresh look at how you are presenting your home to the potential purchaser.

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Chartered Surveyor Help ?

An interesting article explaining some of the ways an Independent Chartered Surveyor may be able to help you has been written by a member of the propertysurveying.co.uk team.  This lists the work undertaken from building surveys to valuation work as well as the less common party wall, expert witness, retrospective valuations and other related work undertaken by multi discipline professional independent chartered surveyors. Read more here