When a mortgage publication used Twitter to quiz housing minister Grant Shapps on whether he had any regrets about the NewBuy scheme, it got back a reply which may have had it fooled for all of two seconds.
Our cheery housing minister replied (apparently): “Apart from mass default, nothing can go wrong. Save [sic] as houses dear!!!”
Shapps looks genuine enough on Twitter, with his smiling face above his tweets. He dubs himself: “Minister of State for Housing and Local Government. Housing Minister by name, Home Boy by nature.”
In one tweet, he says: “I’m an honest-to-goodness housing minister with no strings or trap doors.”
He also has a nice line in insulting his constituents, saying: “Half my constituents probably didn’t even vote, too busy lounging around on the social.”
So, could he possibly be for real? In answer to one doubter, he says: “I may be a parody of myself but at least I have a self to be parody of.”
https://twitter.com/#!/Grantmeshelter
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Comments
It's funny how, when guilty people are faced with their own misdemeanours, things often go eerily quiet!
Yesterday, the BBC published the latest findings about the stagnation in the UK housing market which show there were 74,000 completed sales during the month of March 2012 (up from 63,000 in the previous month but partly as a result of the stamp duty concession, which expired on the 24th March). http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-17823606
Essentially, the volume of sales has remained very subdued compared with the number of transactions in March 2007. It is now about half that level, HMRC figures show. My research, along with that of Rightmove's, suggests that there is a lot of pent-up demand for house purchases currently but that buyers simply cannot afford the prices being asked. See: Rightmove clocks up 1m views for FirstBuy - EstateAgentToday, Friday 20th April 2012
Unless something is done to address 'this issue', we will only have half the housing market functioning for several years to come.
Who wants to come up with a policy to remedy this? "Well I do, for one".
Mine is described in essence in the current Property Match Press Release at: http://t.co/65EXJlC
While it's quiet, now is the ideal time to mention this and to invite considered discussion about my ideas, or, for others to post their own proposals for getting the housing market, which is unquestionably one of the main-stay sectors in our national economy, back into trading health; quickly.
I think this may be the best place to post such ideas, especially if Grant Shapps himself may end up reading about them
:-))
To No-one... etc.,
To correct what I meant by what I just said and for the record, I feel I do have a valid reason to comment on such important matters as these, until fairness, integrity and dignity are demonstrated in the work ethic of estate agents because all too many of them currently want to monopolise the house-marketing business in order to carry on being unscrupulous, devious and rude without being challenged.
There is plenty of public condemnation about this and I am not alone in holding such views, even though others may be reluctant to voice their views in forums such as these.
By voicing such views, I am hoping some people in authority will take notice and start helping to bring about 'needed changes' in the way the UK housing market currently functions, or rather malfunctions - to be more precise.
To No-one... etc.,
When Fairness, integrity and dignity become the new work ethic for estate agents, all of whom currently seem to want to monopolize the house-marketing business so that they can simply carry on being unscrupulous, devious and rude, as now.
Please stop embarrassing yourself Mr Hendry, you obviously didn't achieve any progress during the active part of your career so why on earth are you bothering to fill your retirement years with posts on an internet forum.
The industry thinks you are talking rubbish, Government won't listen to you and you can not afford to get the public ear. Please ask yourself at what point should you give up and shut up.
I believe I have a great concept for changing the way the housing market operates, for the better.
Having qualified in residential property valuation (as well as in all other forms of property valuation) in 1974, I've researched the failings within the UK housing market. I've found 'mammoth imperfections' and developed workable solutions to resolve them. Please see my papers on http://bit.ly/cJTAwe for further details.
I'm also a pioneer in retaining the right of house owners to sell or let their properties privately. The government has been lobbied to remove this right, by those having a business interest in estate agency, for years now. It's more important than ever for people to keep using their right to sell or let privately, or they may eventually loose them forever, if legislation should ever be enacted to make it mandatory to use an agent. I'm against that; not against estate agents themselves.
I hold the view that if estate agents as a group were to change the way they address doing business in the housing sector, they could increase the values of their businesses as well as be of better service to all those buying, selling, renting, or simply moving house in the housing or private residential sector. That sector is a absolutely huge market in this country. It is a fundamental plank of the future fortunes of our whole economy. If our Government cannot see that, they are truly blind, in my opinion.
So really, the title should be "Is this a tw*t or a twit".
Shapps has been a complete and utter waste of space ...
Bankrolled in opposition by construction firms, his policies have done everything to prop up new build prices (significantly UP according to the latest figures - all heading for the pockets of building companies) and nothing at all to unblock the wider market (which, as we all know, is most of it ...!)
The astonishing thing is, in the current talent free zone that is the Tory party, he's tipped for promotion rather than the sack.
Have a look at the new Findaproperty Valuation Section.
I reckon they must be using your cackhanded system of valuation to come up with figures that would be at home on Jackanory.
I can not see how anyone can come up with such figures.
Go check out your own area and see what you think!
Morning Peter!
And if someone comes along to them and says "Please hear me out? Here is a serious attempt to find the 'mammoth imperfections' in the UK housing market and finally resolve them: http://bit.ly/cJTAwe." They say "Sob off. Can't be bothered with doing any of that." or words to that effect.
So much for democracy, I say.
The real @GrantShapps is almost as amusing with his penchant for self publicity and complete lack of "joined up" thinking or coherent housing policies.
Boy Wonder to Mr Pickles' Fatman, they are more Del and Rodney than Caped Crusaders!