Aquamarine
Well-Known Member
Employing Camelot or similar does not seem to me to be achieving 'Best Value in Housing". The taxpayer is in effect subsidising Camelot Guardians.
Banks do this all the time.
Brixton Clifton Mansions former squats - background, 2011 evictions and latest news
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Employing Camelot or similar does not seem to me to be achieving 'Best Value in Housing". The taxpayer is in effect subsidising Camelot Guardians.
Banks do this all the time.
Laughing Toad
Turn the volume down please.
Banks can increase the supply of money, not capital.
TruXta
tired
No they can't. Central Banks can, ordinary banks cannot.
ViolentPanda
Hardly getting over it.
I didn't ask for circular logic based on your theory that costs accrue, I asked you to demonstrate that your theory works. Use an example that doesn't exist in your head, something from the real world.
Gramsci
Well-Known Member
Thats interesting.
Im not clear if Lambeth are going to use Camelot or if thats a rumour at moment.
If its not Im really not happy about Lambeth using them after having read the info u and Aquamarine put up.
Also watching that Dutch doc showed how appalling Camelot is.
colacubes
Mr Hot Cookie
They were cleaning them out yesterday morning as well. Just chucking everything left (including some people's art) into bi trucks
ViolentPanda
Hardly getting over it.
I haven't said anything different.
Yes, RBS and Lambeth Housing are publicly-owned, and yes there are rules governing them.
However, the rules that govern them aren't the same, they're rules specific to function and, as I've already stated at least once before, there's no comparison of function. You comparing the two is like someone claiming that a lamb and a piglet are the same because they're both owned by the same farmer.
Stop just snatching arguments out of your arse in an attempt to make yourself look less wrong and less stupid than you do. It doesn't work.
ViolentPanda
Hardly getting over it.
Wrong.
Aquamarine
Well-Known Member
What waw meant was banks decieve by faslifying capital asset accounts, the measure of their solvency.
Anyway, LT's costings principle is not a full scale theory.
ViolentPanda
Hardly getting over it.
They were cleaning them out yesterday morning as well. Just chucking everything left (including some people's art) into bi trucks
Nothing fucking changes, does it?
ViolentPanda
Hardly getting over it.
Not by a long chalk. It's all very well farting on about opportunity costs, but you can only factor in opportunity costs if your alternative use is realisable, and even then you'd have to, in the case of the squats, factor in use-value obtained from squatting (i.e. what would alternative accommodation for the squatters have cost the council), and offset it against the opportunity cost.
Laughing Toad
Turn the volume down please.
No it's got absolutly nothing to do with costs accruing. Remove that from your thinking.
Imagine a person, a trainee nurse perhaps, has £1000. He can spend the money on, lets say, camera equipment, or he could invest it in a one year bond from the bank. If he spends the money on camera equipment, he will not have the opportunity to invest the money at the bank. After one year he will have either about £30 interest from the bank, plus his original £1000, or he will have his camera equipment, and no £30 interest. The camera equipment can be said to have an opportunity cost of £30 for the year. By owning a camera for a year he has forgone the interest he would have gained by putting the money in the bank.
Or what about this set of examples from a GCSE revision site.
Aquamarine
Well-Known Member
Squatters are not necessarily responsible for opportunity costs at the level of feckless landlords.
ETA: landlords are ultimately responsible for their opportunity costs
ETA: landlords are ultimately responsible for their opportunity costs
wemakeyousoundb
hopefully not gimboid
not sure why you keep entertaining here, I doubt the message will get through.
ViolentPanda
Hardly getting over it.
The first line:
"Opportunity cost measures the cost of any economic choice in terms of the next best alternative foregone".
So, what alternative use/function were Lambeth Council foregoing?
None, because the properties weren't fit for occupation as council housing, not even Short Life any longer, and they had no money to remedy that situation, they also had no plans, until very recently, to sell the properties off.
To simply contend that opportunity cost applies even if the foregone alternative in unachievable is bollocks of the highest order.
Laughing Toad
Turn the volume down please.
The buildings could be auctioned tomorrow. Taxpayer debt would be reduced.
Rushy
basically a scrotum
They were forgoing sale. Accounting-wise it is irrelevant whether they intended to sell or not at the time of the squatters occupation. It is an asset on the books and could be liquidated to pay for other services/reduce liabilities - it is just simple economics.There is undoubtedly a cost to holding assets when you have liabilities.
Intention becomes relevant in assessing whether the cost of holding the asset during its occupation is attributable to the squatters or not. If Lambeth wanted to sell but could not because of the squatters then that can be counted as a cost of occupation. If Lambeth intended to leave the property empty then the cost of holding onto that asset is mostly attributable to Lambeth.
Perhaps they should sell them to-morrow rather than waiting for the housing market to recover.
ViolentPanda
Hardly getting over it.
And why can they be auctioned tomorrow? Because the squatters have been evicted, a tactic that Lambeth have had recourse to since the took control of Clifton Mansions, but didn't exercise because....
....that's right, because they'd have had to provide alternative accommodation for the squatters, and because they had no plans for the properties. At all.
As for "taxpayer debt", what are you mumbling about now? Council Tax payers have no debt, and L.A. debt can't be offset by local authorities increasing Council Tax charges.
You're all over the place.
ViolentPanda
Hardly getting over it.
I agree that theoretically it could have been liquidated, but if we follow the balance-sheet logic, Lambeth would have a duty to secure the maximum return on liquidation, something they're unlikely to be able to do even now. In fact I foresee headlines in the SLP along the lines of "Lambeth Council sell off mansion block for silly money" because the economic climate doesn't currently support the development of "luxury properties", even in edgy Briston.
If Lambeth had wanted to sell, then they could easily have done what they did last week. Previous to that they'd settled for an interim solution that kept the flats in use, and people off their emergency housing list. Outwith a cost/benefit analysis by Lambeth balancing the convenience of the properties being squatted against a putative return from sale, we can only guess as to which position may or may not have been most advantageous.
Laughing Toad
Turn the volume down please.
On the contrary. I've been very consistent.
If they had no plans for the properties, then that's even more reason to sell them. If the squatters hadn't been there then it would have been easier.
Taxpayer debt will be reduced. If not, where do you thing the money will go?
Try reading this.
Gramsci
Well-Known Member
Saw this in Guardian on Friday in the editorial section
http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2011/jul/15/unthinkable-encouraging-squatting?INTCMP=SRCH
Faced with rising homelessness and high rents, the government has dreamed up a brain-bending wheeze – criminalising people who put empty buildings to use. Back in the day, squatters enjoyed protections derived from a 1381 act of parliament, as well as an ancient common law right to claim land on which no rent had been claimed for a dozen years. But in recent decades things have got tougher, thanks both to restrictive legislation and the great push to register land, which protects owners against forgetting about property they no longer use. Now, disused buildings are to gain more decisive priority over people seeking shelter. In a speech drafted to delight the Sun, back in the distant days of last month when this was a priority, David Cameron ripped up Ken Clarke's sensible prison plans, re-roasted the old Tory chestnut about blasting at burglars, and then – for good measure – pledged a new squatting offence. This week, a green paper emerged, which dripped with the embarrassment of the officials who'd been ordered to write it. Its "impact assessment" acknowledged the risk of vulnerable people being made destitute. Of course homeowners need to know they won't be powerless if they get back from the shop and find an army of crusties have moved in – but they already have this assurance. No law will stop squatters trying, until the need for affordable housing is met. Until then, instead of waving sticks, ministers should find ways to foster the responsible filling of empty homes
http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2011/jul/15/unthinkable-encouraging-squatting?INTCMP=SRCH
Faced with rising homelessness and high rents, the government has dreamed up a brain-bending wheeze – criminalising people who put empty buildings to use. Back in the day, squatters enjoyed protections derived from a 1381 act of parliament, as well as an ancient common law right to claim land on which no rent had been claimed for a dozen years. But in recent decades things have got tougher, thanks both to restrictive legislation and the great push to register land, which protects owners against forgetting about property they no longer use. Now, disused buildings are to gain more decisive priority over people seeking shelter. In a speech drafted to delight the Sun, back in the distant days of last month when this was a priority, David Cameron ripped up Ken Clarke's sensible prison plans, re-roasted the old Tory chestnut about blasting at burglars, and then – for good measure – pledged a new squatting offence. This week, a green paper emerged, which dripped with the embarrassment of the officials who'd been ordered to write it. Its "impact assessment" acknowledged the risk of vulnerable people being made destitute. Of course homeowners need to know they won't be powerless if they get back from the shop and find an army of crusties have moved in – but they already have this assurance. No law will stop squatters trying, until the need for affordable housing is met. Until then, instead of waving sticks, ministers should find ways to foster the responsible filling of empty homes
Rushy
basically a scrotum
HandinHand
New Member
Please point the the relevant parts of this, most people don't have all the time in the world (like yourself) to read a 400 odd page govenment document.
ViolentPanda
Hardly getting over it.
Consistently leaping from pillar to post, yes.
Lambeth were faced with a very old developer's quandary: Sell when the price you can hope for is minimal, or retain until you can at least realise your original investment?
Not really. Squatters have minimal protection, and as I've repeatedly reiterated, Lambeth could have got rid of the in short order any time in the last ten years if they'd considered it worth their while. They didn't.
Council Tax payers have no debt.
Do you mean "local authority debt will be reduced" (which is what your link basically proposes)?
If so, that's nothing to do with "taxpayers", it's to do with local authority debt.
Why would I read something whose last re-print was 8 years ago, and whose advice is being superceded by legislation currently en route via Jabba the Hutt's ministry?
Like I said, you're all over the place.
And the only person who hasn't noticed is you.
ViolentPanda
Hardly getting over it.
Market circumstances.
In case you haven't noticed, for certain types of property the market is still stagnant, and historically place like Clifton Mansions don't get converted to the type of places that are currently selling (high-end shag palaces and low-end starters), but rather to "luxury (probably on account of existing room sizes being bigger than the average Barrett rabbit hutch) apartments". That means that until the market picks up beyond the very gradual upward slope it's currently on, very few developers, unless they're cash-rich and need to wash their money, are going to want to pay a market price for the property.
Rushy
basically a scrotum
Are you really saying that 'market circumstances' are the reason it will be impossible for sales to achieve a fair open market price? Open market price is the price which can be achieved by an open sale under the prevailing market circumstances.
If what you are saying is that it is not a good time to sell I don't entirely agree with your assessment. Average property price in Lambeth rose 10.8% in 12 months to March 11. At the same point average price was only about 5% below the crazy peaks (about 330 vs 350). Of the past 6 months only one has had negative growth. As for whether refurbished mansion blocks are the kind of thing that are currently selling in Brixton, 2 bed mansion flats in Rosslyn and Hereford (the closest 'historic' comparison that I am aware of) have been exchanging hands for 270-285K (despite hardly any of them meeting the current minimum size standards for new build 2 bed flats).
There is a lot of money out there for property funds at the moment. Boosted by international money because sterling is so cheap and investors want to speculate on a rise in interests rate driving the value of the pound upwards during the term of their investment - potentially adding significant extra return.
Yes, prices could potentially rise but we have another potential economic crisis on our hands which could just as easily cause prices to drop considerably again over the next 2 years. If the council needs the cash now then I don't think holding and speculating is advisable.
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