Is it just us, or does anyone else find the RICS surveys couched in exceptionally tortuous language?
In its latest, for December, we are told that “30% more chartered surveyors reported a rise than a fall in house prices, down from 35% in November”.
Yes, we have trouble understanding this sentence too. And this: “17% more chartered surveyors reported a rise than a fall in new instructions . . . 20% more surveyors stated that enquiries from potential purchasers are rising rather than falling but enquiries rose at the slowest pace since January 2009.
“Other demand indicators are also losing some momentum, although they remain in positive territory. The newly agreed sales balance slipped to 22 from 24 while the sales expectations net balance dropped to six from 20.”
Is this an adding up or a taking-away sum, as our old teacher used to say? No idea.
The ever-helpful Henry Pryor says it is a percentage of surveyors who are more optimistic than those who are not.
But he points out that while the survey suggests that 30% more surveyors saw prices rise rather than fall, it doesn’t necessarily mean that most of the RICS members saw prices rise.
He figures: “If there were 100 surveyors in their survey and say 26 saw prices rise, and 20 saw prices fall, then it follows that 30% more surveyors saw prices rise than fall. However, the remaining 54 will have seen no change in prices.”
This is all well beyond us.
Of course, it is possible that EAT’s brains are frozen, as this is the eighth consecutive day of the editor being snowed in (even the 4x4s can’t get to us) and food supplies are getting tight.
However, we’d be interested to know what others think. Do you reckon that a campaign to get the RICS to speak in plain English might have the slightest effect?
Comments
AndyW's comment made me chuckle.
Fancy suggesting RICS use the word "down". Don't you people get the reason for RICSspeak? It is to shift through even the worst possible housing data and try find some figure that can be portrayed as an increase.
The public CANNOT be told the truth!!
Realising Reality - if you, or any other, know of an 'agent masquerading as a Chartered Surveyor', I suggest you contact the RICS, TSO and anyone else you care to involve. The rest of your post (apart from the J Leaf bit...) is, frankly, tosh. Houses are worth what a buyer is prepared to pay for them - period. Appraising a property is not a science - it is a skill learned by trial and error. Where you boys get it wrong, is to try to second-guess what others will tell a vendor, and then overegg it in order to get the instruction. Underegging can have a negative effect also, you know. Ever heard the phrase "If it looks too good to be true, then it probably is..."? Some buyers see undervalued houses as having possible problems/poor condition, and won't look further. Therefore, you cut out a section of the market who otherwise could have been the eventual buyer. Keep iat it, though - you will learn your trade eventually...
Yes, the maths offered up seems pointless.
Agents masquerading as Chartered Surveyors seem to have forgotten 'market rules'.
Prices are established in the market.
Quoting above market-value prices slows the market. Quoting below market-value prices stimulates the market. The market is now stagnated because they're not quoting correct market prices.
And as for Jeremy Leaf's recent interview about this on the BBC. well!
The new Homebuyers report is written in "plain English" which surveyors are supposed to use. Try reading one using this dumbed down twaddle and I imagine you will think it was written by Vicky Pollard but unfortunately it isn't. It was drafted by so called practising surveyors. Me I'm sticking to the old way. My clients(not customers as the RICS would have us write) expect to be treated like adults.
I could never do those sums at school about how long it takes to fill a bath etc.
I'm told the answer is 11 minutes.
Mister E seems to have a 100% complex about the RICS. I would point out that he means "Chartered Surveyor" as opposed to Surveyor as any muppet or agent can call themselves a surveyor.....sooo where's my fee for clarifying that?
100% of surevors know 0% about 100% of anything to do with house prices, they just ask for 100% of their work to be done for them by 100% of the agency profession whilst retaining 100% of the fee they recieve from a buyer or a lender.
We should all know that all 'professionals' use jargon, confusing statements and 10 pages when 2 would do - it means they can charge more!
It is confusing though. Why not say "56% of chartered surveyors reported a rise in house prices, down from 57% in November" (assuming none of them said they'd stayed the same of course)?
For the second one, if 117 surveyors reported a rise in instructions, 100 reported a fall, then 17% more reported a rise than a fall...... Shall I go on?
Oh Dear. The first example is as plain as plain can be, isn't it?
Possibley 130 surveyors reported a rise, 100 reported a fall, therefore the number reporting a rise is 30% greater than those reporting a fall. No? In the previous mth it was 100 and 135, giving a 35% difference....
A campaign to stop RICS saying anything at all about house prices would be a public service...