Global real estate - what’s next?

The greatest TV series of all time is The West Wing, don’t even bother disputing this in the comments section. In the fictional White House, President Bartlet famously says “what’s next” whenever he wants to move the conversation on.

This week has seen the property industry trying to do exactly this.

Savills, Knight Frank, CBRE and every property commentator on Twitter have been making predictions.  They want to move the conversation from “WTF” to “We know what’s happening and are in control”.

Of everything I’ve read (which is a lot, as I’m a sucker for punishment) Knight Frank were the most bullish....prices going up in Central London, farmland resilient, 4.5% growth in GDP next year and more. Read yesterday’s daily summary here.

https://www.knightfrank.co.uk/research/article/2020-04-07-your-morning-market-update-from-knight-frank-research-tuesday-7th-april

I get that a) research departments want to show their bosses that they are busy and b) these reports generate column inches, but come on.

We have no idea what the social, political or economic impact of this pandemic will be. People talk about the 1918 flu pandemic (heaven forbid this gets that bad) but it’s well documented that it was the “second wave” that caused the majority of deaths. We’re still on the upward part of the graph in the first wave here.

I’m not trying to be alarmist, just saying that all of these weighty “forecasts” should be taken with the Salar de Uyuni*. I do also understand that markets are about perception and that we should all be staying positive, but let’s just be realistic too. The French economy reduced by 6% in Q1 and will fall by a further 1.5% every 15 days of confinement (source Bank of France, 08/04/20).

Nobody knows what’s next, it’s way too early to tell. Hope for the best, plan for the worst.

On a micro scale, our company is seeing record visits to our website and we’re still getting high levels of enquiries by phone and email. The French property market has been hot these last two years (1.1m sales registered last year) and UK buyers have been rushing to “get in” before  31st December.  The underlying demand is super strong. Our hope is that we’ll be out of lockdown soon and we’re putting plans in place to keep clients and agents safe when viewings recommence.

But, if unemployment soars, if clients can’t get mortgages, if vaccines take longer than thought to develop, if....as a business we need to have contingency plans in place for these scenario’s too.

So, what I’m saying is, use these forecasts as emergency loo roll until the time that we know the peak has passed and that we come out of lockdown. Hopefully we won’t have long to wait.

Then, we can think about moving the conversation along and start making semi-sensible forecasts.

Meanwhile, stay safe, be compassionate and support our front line workers.

*biggest salt flats in the world, as I discovered on Race Across the World last week.

It’s been a while - a little drop of Coronavirus

So, a mate of mine in Australia asked why I didn’t take up the blog again during this exceptional period in our lives.  Challenge accepted Tracy.

A fair bit has changed in the last seven years. I’ve got a proper job, my two little girls have (rather surprisingly) metamorphosed into young ladies and the world is in the grip of a pandemic and in a pretty much global lockdown. Well, apart from Belarus, where they are still playing football in front of capacity crowds. President Lukashenko reckons that vodka and saunas will keep the virus at bay. Let’s hope that Fox News don’t cover the story.

In the last 18 months I’ve had heart problems, a pacemaker fitted, skin cancer and, in December, aggressive prostate cancer, leading to a radical prostatectomy, Despite all this I feel physically fit - I rode 100km’s on the indoor trainer yesterday, which is some going seeing as I was only allowed to start cycling again three weeks ago.

What’s changed (and it’s not easy to say this) is my mental strength.  Even after the pacemaker and the skin cancer I felt indestructible. However, the two nights in intensive care, after the prostate surgery, put paid to that. I suddenly felt mortal and it was sobering. I’m lucky to have Juli-Anne by my side and her shining light lit up the darkest moments. I don’t even want to think about what it would have been like without her.

I didn’t lose my positive attitude to life - I gave myself all kinds of goals and I’ve been smashing them out of the park.

But....and it’s a big “but”....I suddenly find myself feeling nervous. I really don’t want to catch this damn virus. One of the symptoms that led the doc to discovering my heart problem was “breathlessness” and I‘m struggling to come to terms with the fact that I’ve moved from indestructible to vulnerable.

So, current situation - family safe, well and, thankfully, at home. We’ve been in lockdown for two weeks with a minimum of two weeks more, although I suspect it will be longer. No complaints; cupboards are full, we’ve had beautiful weather, books take a second to download and the girls are baking every day. J-A is helping the local nurses collect masks, aprons and other necessities. I’m riding on Zwift every day with pa-in-law and one of my best mates in England and tai-chi every morning has been a revelation.

That’s enough for now, it’s all been a bit personal but will try and make it more interesting over the coming days. There’s certainly plenty to talk about!