Senor Chevalier

I reckon that whilst there is some correlation between people's general level of 'sense' and their ability to earn money it is loose at best. Plenty of bright people don't earn a lot depending on circumstances and choices they make and there are certainly plenty of fairly dim people in well paid jobs. Could it be that people's level of sense is more or less constant (eroding slightly with age and booze of course) and that the ones that (deservedly or randomly) accumulate wealth remain just as sensible (or stupid) as they always were (rather than becoming stupid) but that their level of dosh over time just increases above their level of sense? There's also a reasonable argument that when short on time and not short of loot it makes no sense to worry too much about what occasional purchases such as a yoga vest cost. Don't get me wrong, I think the cost of the yoga vest is madness but then I also think that yoga is madness.

Martyn Long 07830195682 Chartered engineer, runs a small practice lives locally.

You said it! People used to slot in the new tax disc over the old one or remove the old and replace with the new. Now they renew online and many leave the old where it was. Doesn't mean they are not taxed. They wouldn't get too far without being picked up by ANPR cameras.

Indeed. The whole thing was a very difficult experience but we were sufficiently fortunate to be in the position to get ourselves into the predicament in the first place and eventually did emerge from the other side.

We bent over backwards to consult with neighbours for our planning and build. We got a mixed response. Some friendly and supportive (we were removing an eyesore). Some needlessly and pointlessly forced us to incur cost by insisting on extra party wall surveyors when we had offered to let them choose the surveyor to act for both parties - this meant that the money we were going to spend tidying up a shared wall / butting bottles of wine etc which would have benefitted them did not get spent. One neighbour was friendly and made 'useful' planning suggestions which we accommodated and then objected to these specific elements in their response to the planners - I kid you not. She moved out of the are a month after we completed and her parting words were that she was surprised to say that it turns out she rather likes what we've done. Others did the tactical planning point scoring thing - study the planning rules and complain about things they don't give a stuff about like the neighbours opposite complaining about a rear facade and window, concern that one bedroom is 0.5m2 below the Southwark guideline etc - chip away at our plans and cause death by 1000 cuts. One neighbour only provided partial access for our PW surveyor to assess and document the pre-existing condition of their property and then asserted that the cracks that had 'appeared' in all the rooms we had not been allowed to survey had been caused by us - I think he thought we were spending a bit of cash and he could get a full refurb of his property out of us. Overall it is a mixed bag. I would still consult neighbours, try to stay on good terms and consider requests but frankly trust myself to decide what's reasonable and not compromise on things that are important to me. If on the receiving end then try to put yourself in the shoes of the person trudging through the awful planning system and then often getting ripped off by builders, utility companies etc...

DVLA will help you. After I'd navigated their automated call system (take a deep breath) I got through to a very sensible chap who figured that the lesser evil was taking my money and taxing the car without the ref number. A rare display of pragmatism.

Wrestling this back to topic for a moment, living in London in terraced houses you do have to come to terms with the fact that neighbours will get building work done from time to time despite it being inconvenient. It is a fact of life and a pain in the @*** but a 'live and let live' attitude is far better than winding yourself up about something that at best you can frustrate but ultimately you cannot stop or control. Clearly there are rules which limit what people can do but provided they stick within them then it is better to accept the situation earlier and let them get on with it as after the work is finished they will be your neighbours. By chipping away, nit-picking and insisting on additional surveyors etc you can add to the unnecessary costs incurred by your new neighbours and deplete any goodwill before you've even become acquainted. Having the wall built on the boundary line rather than their side would give you option value if your circumstances change and you do wish to get your own extension done and / or future owners if and when you come to sell. The way planning rules work you can't stop development but you can nit-pick over things that you don't really care about thus adding to cost and worsening the scheme for your neighbours but making no particular difference to you which is pointless and just leads to bad will.

Are you suggesting it was you then Louisa?

Thanks DF / L

That's what I thought.

I've just been told off by an objectionable woman for disposing of an old paint can in my green general waste bin. I asked her if I wasn't supposed to do that and what I was supposed to do with it. Apparently I should know better but evidently I don't. I pointed out that she obviously knew what to do and it would be more constructive if she pointed me in the right direction but she just sloped off. A short burst on the Southwark website hasn't helped. Could anyone spare a moment to tell me where it goes? Failing that does anyone want a collection of miscellaneous paint?

I used James Lewis for my party wall advice on a build in Herne Hill http://www.jlewissurveyors.co.uk/ At the end of a long and complicated building project there's not that many of the people I used for the various elements that I would use again or recommend. James is one of them.

Bear in mind you will end up carrying both your son and his new wheels (whatever they are) for a good proportion of the time. Toddlers walk slowly and can't go very far - balance bikes are good but they reduce speed and range whereas a scooter does the opposite. Has to be scooter...

Yeah if you are going for stone tiles then it's got to be honed rather than polished... I'd draw the line at riven - you don't want to collect grime.

We had originally specified dalsouple but we were told that they had stopped supplying small quantities for residential and were focusing on larger commercial contracts so that's when we switched to Nora which is a very similar product. I'm sure either would be great and if you can get hold of the dalsouple in a sensible quantity then go for it!

Hi There I have just laid a rubber floor in my bathrooms and it looks great. I went for Noraplan Uni: http://www.nora.com/uk/products-systems/floor-coverings/noraplan-sheet/showproduct/noraplan-uni/art-1461/6176/ If you are going for underfloor heating in a new build then the water system is best, but it is quite involved in terms of plumbing and manifolds etc and you need a bit of floor depth to accommodate it. The electrical matting systems are much thinner and easier to install in an existing house. Whilst not as efficient for a small room it is almost certainly not worth the effort of the water system unless you are doing other rooms as well. For the rubber floor to look good you need the floor to be very flat so you would normally lay a latex screed underneath. The rubber floor finish is only 2mm thick and so if you are replacing a tiled floor then you ought to be able to fit a membrane, screed the electrical kit and the rubber tiles all within the depth of what you are replacing so you avoid an annoying step up at the threhold to the bathroom. I have some of the rubber floor tiles left (you have to buy in whole boxes) so depending on size of your bathroom it may be enough. If you are interested then drop me a PM.

I would not hesitate in recommending Dry Waterproofing. I had bad experiences with the big waterproofing companies who just want to sell their products whether you need them or not. I've seen Dry Waterproofing twice recommended less intervention or alternate works (improved ventilation) as it is the right solution even if though they make less or no money on it. [email protected] 07972 896188 good luck.

Note as you are altering the number of units you should qualify for a reduced VAT rate on the conversion works. 5% rather than 20% last time I looked so this is a big saving. Make sure you do go get planning or certificate of lawfulness or whatever as otherwise you may struggle to claim this VAT relief (as well as the reduced council tax as mentioned above). Whilst Southwark have a general drive to increase the number of residential units (Shortage of homes) they are generally supportive (in my experience) in the case of restoring a house to a single dwelling - particularly if it has been cut up badly or is in a residential area. Whilst there is a shortage of dwellings generally, the acute shortage is family homes / houses (as I understand it).

It was lurking there as channel 372 all along. A bit of jiggling and now it is back where it belongs.

We appear to have lost Film4 on retuning. Anyone else had this issue? Presumably there is a way to manually restore it but TVs these days are all a bit to auto tune clever for that.... Thoughts?

I would second the Gloucester Old Spot at WR. Last time I was in there, they had been renamed with their ingredients and were called chilli and lime sausages or something. Pretty sure it is the same Old Spot in there, but there was a moment of panic when I thought they were out...

Seemed to make a reasonable fist of balancing priorities to me. Haven't seen the detail. Hopefully they'll have taken the opportunity to clean up the stupid cock up in the transitional arrangements where the personal allowance is phased out so that those with income in the threshold area pay a marginal rate of income tax that is higher than those earning far more.

H - I was simply responding to the utter nonsense in your previous post. I have not sifted through all your previous posts to determine whether they too are or are not nonsense. The post I responded to was wrong for the reasons I outlined. It may just not have been put very well in which case say so. Otherwise it may be your actual point in which case, now drop it or explain it. I am trying to stick to the logic of the argument in exploring this topic, but you resort time and again to personalising it and making such statements as I am jealous of the wealth of a 30 year old couple trading out of a studio flat. Yeah, that's it, you've got me nailed. History tells me that your posts are nauseating bunkum.

If you insist (incorrectly as it happens*) that the principal private residence is the driver of house prices He said PPR was one of the drivers not the principal driver. Nobody (well probably someone) would dispute the impact of BTL on house prices as another driver. I'm not necessarily saying the PPR exemption should or shouldn't be removed, but are you honestly saying that it has no impact on prices? Come on? then you must also accept that no money has been made at all - people simply live there. I'm not sure how this follows? The PPR does not just apply to houses people sit in as there is no MT that operates in this way. It applies to capital gains on sales and means that people can buy and sell houses without any CGT. This means that when someone who has a perfectly nice and adequate place to live has some spare funds available they are incentivised to buy bigger / better houses as a nest egg exempt from taxation rather than considering any of a diversified portfolio of alternate possible investments. So getting rid of the PPR would precisely allow people to simply live there and then there would be no money made by people or HMRC, but for now there is an exemption allowing people to seek ever more expensive house prices as most alternate investments are ignored. You are very absolute in your statements Huguenot. You use words like incorrect as if this has been objectively determined. I do the same myself sometimes. It adds emphasis and it is good to be robust and assertive when you are very confident you are right. Rolling out the same "statement of fact" tone all the time including when you actually haven't fully read the previous point or thought about it does mean it starts to lose emphasis though. Have another go...

Agree it is an awful word and on reflection anglicising it rather than leaving it exposed in its American form is probably the wrong call. Interesting thoughts and an angle in this debate that is new and has not been explored on the previous pages. Systems are complicated. Unintended consequences often result. But, that general logic would argue against any change, so I guess policy makers have to consider the specific likely consequences in as structured and rigorous a way as is possible and then make rational decisions based on balance of probability (ideally ignoring popularity but in reality having regard to the politics). Q1) What if the price drop puts them below the threshold. Well as a starter for 10 I would suggest that this must be structured so that the tax is applied on an incremental basis, i.e. to the value of the property that exceeds the threshold (income tax style rather than stamp). This means an on / off witch is avoided. Properties above but close to the threshold pay little tax anyway for this reason. Prices will shift due to the tax but also due to other reasons so would need to be as a point in time. The tax would be announced before it came into effect so any price adjustment should be effective prior to the tax being levied. Q2) The consequent increased demand at lower levels. I don't know on this one. It's an interesting point. It is similar to what we see around stamp duty thresholds with price compression at the boundaries. Ultimately it gets priced in, but transitional effects could cause issues I agree. Personally I think all discontinuities in tax banding are stupid and we should have a more continuous formula to avoid such perverse kinks. Marginal Income tax rates in this country are a farcical case in point but that's another argument. I guess introducing the tax at a lower property value level at a very low rate and having it increase more smoothly could help smooth things out, but I am aware this is likely to be unpalatable. Overall the tax would raise money which may or may not be used to reduce income tax. But the question you raise is around the net effect of the balance of forces on property prices: MT causes a reduction in value of high end property Downsizers possibly increasing demand for cheaper property Increase in such demand pushes could push threshold value properties back above the tax level and / or price others out This only happens if the volume of properties that are devalued to below the threshold is fewer than the number of people that sell and rebuy below this level In addition increased net income due to possibly lower income tax gives higher buying power to earners across the whole property market providing an upwards force How does this complicated web of factors play out - Gawd knows frankly. My feeling is that paper property prices could come down overall and people sat in big empty houses with no income would be taxed a bit more whilst those earning a lot but living in small houses because they didn't have rich parents would do a bit better.