I really shouldn't of spent the afternoon on Rightmove & Houseladder - Page 2

Del Lardo · 28-12-2009, 20:30

Quote:

Originally Posted by Lozza

If your doing that your throwing your money away... the agreement isn't even worth using to wipe your bum it's so ****e

They are nothing nothing but monkeys and con men!

Spoiler Alert! - Highlight below to read!

might have had a situation recently where a fully functional boiler in a tenanted property was being checked by BG for a landlords safety cert.. they managed to break it and couldn't fix it.. said it couldn't be fixed and we needed a new boiler at a cost of £3K PLUS 3 weeks of pissing about with incompetent first line engineers to finally get elevated to a senior engineer who says it can be fixed but the parts are obsolete.... One call to Valiant tells me they have the part and it's £25 but they can't sell it to me direct. Another week of trying to get it sorted and get the parts department at BG to order it!

4 Weeks on tenants have no hot water no heating.. so the bullet is bit and £3200 is spent with a private firm to install a new boiler on the following Saturday.

Thursday at about 4.30pm BG call after several irate calls to them and we go through the whole farce of what has happened, I get told again the parts are obsolete, I explain that I know for a fact they are not and Valiant have them and that it's a £25 part. called back at 5.05 and told the part has been sourced and it will be installed the next day... too bloody late have arranged for a new boiler to be fitted!

anyway it did get fitted and the boiler was fine only to be ripped out the next day for a new one and £3200 light.

So please excuse me if I think your wasting your money and that they are w@nkers!

End Spoiler Alert!

Guess it's down to who you deal with. Parents boiler blew up on Christmas Eve a couple of years ago and BG fitted a new one on Boxing Day free of charge as part of their cover. This was a couple of months after a mates boiler blew up and he had a highly recommended local engineer mess him around for 3 weeks before finally admitting that he couldn't fix it and recommended a replacement at £3k. He decided to get the new boiler fitted by BG and instead the engineer fixed his old one.

Del Lardo · 28-12-2009, 20:31

Quote:

Originally Posted by Dymetrie

They probably only fixed it because they didn't have a clue what you were on about, then

Either that or my grammar was so bad they felt sorry for me

Del Lardo · 28-12-2009, 20:49

Quote:

Originally Posted by Lozza

That's true it is. But having had plumbing and electrics on the plan.. full home care thingy... I wasn't impressed or confident in them after they had previously messed up a job where a central heating pipe had a leak.. the plumber they sent around bodged the job up and my dad had to talk him through fitting a stopcock to prevent the continued flooding he'd caused, while we waited for someone more experienced to come out the next day to fix it!

Edit... so as you can imagine i'm not letting them strike 3rd time lol and definitely not recommending them!

I guess we can agree to disagree unless you fancy pistols at dawn?

Out of interest was the plumber employed by BG or just a local contractor?

Dymetrie · 28-12-2009, 21:06

Quote:

Originally Posted by Del Lardo

I guess we can agree to disagree unless you fancy pistols at dawn?

Out of interest was the plumber employed by BG or just a local contractor?

I'm going to have to agree with Lozza here.

Iirc, then BG engineers are generally local companies who are subcontracted though, so prolly luck of the draw...

Jonny69 · 28-12-2009, 21:34

I know how you feel mate. It gets me down sometimes. I see people just 2-3 years older who got their property just before the big boom and they are made for life. 2-bed terrace places round here that would have been starter homes are now way out of reach at £330K+ and the people in them bought them at less than half that. Nowhere to buy anyway because it's not worth them selling. They just rent them out at some 2-3 times what their mortgage costs them and stick the money into their main home.

Sucks bigtime. Been stuck renting for years now and it holds life up.

A Place of Light · 29-12-2009, 13:28

The UK is moving towards the point where the majority of people rent, rather than buy, their property. This should worry the financial sector.

Del Lardo · 29-12-2009, 16:10

Quote:

Originally Posted by Jonny69

I know how you feel mate. It gets me down sometimes. I see people just 2-3 years older who got their property just before the big boom and they are made for life. 2-bed terrace places round here that would have been starter homes are now way out of reach at £330K+ and the people in them bought them at less than half that. Nowhere to buy anyway because it's not worth them selling. They just rent them out at some 2-3 times what their mortgage costs them and stick the money into their main home.

Sucks bigtime. Been stuck renting for years now and it holds life up.

I wonder how long it is before sections of the UK barely has anyone under the current age of 30ish owning property there, as the population ages people who bought years ago will carry on living there not releasing stock and those who do want to move up the ladder will just rent out their existing property as the mortgage is 1/2 what they can get in rent. There are already areas in the SW where people buying holiday homes etc are forcing out the local populace who have been there for generations as there is little affordable housing and if I look at the prices in the area of Cambridge where I live (Mill Road area for anyone who knows Cambridge) you really need two people who are in the 40% tax bracket to even consider buying. I consider myself to be very fortunate in my earnings and if you had told me 6 years ago what I would be earning today I would have laughed in your face, I guess the fact that I am earning more at 28 than I thought I would be at 38 and still finding it nigh on impossible to get on that first step of the property ladder is what is really getting to me at the moment.

Having said all this if I was in the position to move to one of the other big towns/cities in the UK, e.g. Birmingham, Manchester, Cardiff, Newcastle (i.e. not the SE) then I could afford to buy somewhere pretty easily. I know that I don't help myself by staying in Cambridge but having spent 6 years making a life for myself here I really don't want to leave

Now one of the things which is really getting to me at the moment (and I would appreciate peoples thoughts on this as I freely admit I have very middle class views occasionally bordering on Daily Mail

) is how social housing is handled in Cambridge. I grew up with the classic council house estate system but now in Cambridge due to the sell off in the 80s? there is not enough social housing so the council forces the developers to give them a %age of new build property often up to 40% in order to get planning permission. Now in theory this is great but let me provide an example and let me know what you think......

Just down the road from me is a new build of approximately 500 1-2 bed apartments, prime first time buyer property but only 275 were available for private buyers when they were built (and a lot were picked up by Buy To Let but that's another discussion) and 225 were given to the council for social housing. Now personally I have an issue with anyone being given what is basically prime city centre property by the state as I think it takes away any incentive to better yourself and often any incentive to work. I've had the pleasure of listening to a couple of young ladies discuss how their life plan was to get pregnant at 16 to 'get one of them nice flats' and it worked for them, they now have a couple of kids and a £250k 2 bed apartment while I carry on renting and have what is rapidly approaching a four figure monthly income tax bill

I'm not claiming that these are the norm but surely having the system set up this way is going to encourage abuse?

No doubt my views will have some people reaching for their keyboards to bash my head in and if that's the case please tell me why. One of the things I like about this forum is that we have a wide social spectrum and I am always happy to have my views challenged and occasionally my opinions may be changed

Del Lardo · 29-12-2009, 16:11

Quote:

Originally Posted by Lozza

TBH some bum off the street would have done a better job in both cases.. but in seriousness have no idea they all turn up in a BG van though!

I think if they are in a BG van then they work for BG directly. Still you know where to go looking for a plumber next time

A Place of Light · 29-12-2009, 16:28

In the larger Japanese cities, it's impossible for the younger generation to buy property.....even with 50 year mortgages. So, they resign themselves to the fact that they'll be renting for the rest of their lives and instead many of them plow their money into their cars. That's why you almost never see a Japanese import that's standard ie the way it left the factory. IMHO the only way to prevent this coming to the UK is to slash the mortgage interest rate. The banks play the long game, so even at a low rate they are making a lot of money on a mortgage.

Rich_L · 29-12-2009, 19:01

It's a strange one, the desire of home ownership is very much a British phenomenon, something like 70% of homes are owner-occupied whereas in most comparable Western countries it is more like 40-50%, where things like long leases and buy-to-le is far more common than it is in the UK.

Obviously there's more to it than just the financial picture, but you can do just as well if not better by renting and investing the difference in other products (such as a investment vehicle linked to the property market), as you would by 'investing' in buying a home.

I guess the best thing is just to try and let go of the preoccupation that not owning a house is a 'failure' and enjoy the fact that the lively rental market means with a bit of luck and wheeling and dealing you can inhabit a property at a decent rate which would be far in excess of anything you could afford to buy, and still have money left on top.

28-12-2009, 21:34	#15
Jonny69 Noob Join Date: Oct 2006 Location: Socialist Republik of Kent Posts: 5,032	I know how you feel mate. It gets me down sometimes. I see people just 2-3 years older who got their property just before the big boom and they are made for life. 2-bed terrace places round here that would have been starter homes are now way out of reach at £330K+ and the people in them bought them at less than half that. Nowhere to buy anyway because it's not worth them selling. They just rent them out at some 2-3 times what their mortgage costs them and stick the money into their main home. Sucks bigtime. Been stuck renting for years now and it holds life up. __________________

29-12-2009, 19:01	#20
Rich_L Dr Cocktapuss Join Date: Jul 2006 Location: Seven Sizzles Posts: 1,044	It's a strange one, the desire of home ownership is very much a British phenomenon, something like 70% of homes are owner-occupied whereas in most comparable Western countries it is more like 40-50%, where things like long leases and buy-to-le is far more common than it is in the UK. Obviously there's more to it than just the financial picture, but you can do just as well if not better by renting and investing the difference in other products (such as a investment vehicle linked to the property market), as you would by 'investing' in buying a home. I guess the best thing is just to try and let go of the preoccupation that not owning a house is a 'failure' and enjoy the fact that the lively rental market means with a bit of luck and wheeling and dealing you can inhabit a property at a decent rate which would be far in excess of anything you could afford to buy, and still have money left on top. __________________

29-12-2009, 13:28	#16
A Place of Light Absinthe Join Date: Dec 2007 Posts: 1,247	The UK is moving towards the point where the majority of people rent, rather than buy, their property. This should worry the financial sector.

29-12-2009, 16:28	#19
A Place of Light Absinthe Join Date: Dec 2007 Posts: 1,247	In the larger Japanese cities, it's impossible for the younger generation to buy property.....even with 50 year mortgages. So, they resign themselves to the fact that they'll be renting for the rest of their lives and instead many of them plow their money into their cars. That's why you almost never see a Japanese import that's standard ie the way it left the factory. IMHO the only way to prevent this coming to the UK is to slash the mortgage interest rate. The banks play the long game, so even at a low rate they are making a lot of money on a mortgage.