Killer Arguments Against LVT, Not (487)

As we come up to the big part 500 anniversary episode, here is an article which TBH spotted in The Daily Mail.

It is an absolute classic of the Home-Owner-Ist genre and highly recommended reading. See how many lies, contradictions, self-delusions and diagonal comparisons you can spot.

It would take me days to debunk them all, but this diagonal comparison is worth a mention:

Older people who bought houses years ago, and who are living on a small income, could struggle to pay their tax bill and be forced to sell a cherished family home.

And not every owner-occupier in the South has benefited from huge windfall gains. Young people with huge mortgages on recently purchased tiny flats in the capital would be hammered too, with a chilling effect on their aspirations.

Poor Widows in Mansions (low income, massive unearned gain, no mortgage) and recent purchasers (high income, no unearned gain yet, large mortgage) are at absolute opposite ends of the spectrum! If one deserves sympathy, then the other doesn't. Even if you ignore the extremes, how does that translate to sympathy for the vast majority in the middle (medium income, modest unearned gain, small/cheap mortgage)??

As it happens, these problems melt away on closer inspection:

1. Fairer Share said that clearly there would be a 'defer and pay on death' option for the former.

2. For the latter in a "tiny flat in the capital" which cost them (say) £500,000, this tax would be like a small % increase in mortgage interest rates. Instead of paying 0.2% Council Tax each year (£1,000), they'd be paying 0.48% Proportional Property Tax each year (£2,400), which is only £117 a month more (hardly 'hammered') and no worse than a 0.28% increase in mortgage rates, which purchasers should have budgeted for. The government can ease the strain by just dropping interest rates, although the chances are that interest rates have fallen by 0.28% since they took on a mortgage, so they are no worse off than they originally expected.

If they are in a "tiny flat" then no doubt they 'aspire' to 'move up the property ladder' some time in the next ten years, at which stage they will save at least £15,000 SDLT (we don't need to worry about whether SDLT is borne by buyer or seller - when you trade up you are both). So when they achieve their 'aspiration', they will get all their money back and it will make 'moving up the property ladder' a lot cheaper and easier.

Daily Mail firing on all cylinders

The Daily Mail sticks the house price straight into the headline to save its readers the bother of reading the article:

Grandfather’s five pet pugs who nipped at postman as he delivered a parcel to his £800,000 home are spared being put down after court hears he had Beware of the Dog sign up

Daily Mail on top form

From The Daily Mail:

Two grandparents known as the 'heart of the community' were killed in a fire at their farmhouse alongside their dog just hours after wishing their family happy Christmas.

Frank, 90 and Madeleine Dougharty, 86, were found alongside their dog Flash on Boxing Day morning at their farmhouse in the Sussex village of West Chiltington.

Emergency services were called to their £760,000 home at 9.10am after reports of a significant fire which has gutted their remote farmhouse.

Daily Mail on top form

From The Daily Mail:

When police arrived they found [Hancock] covered in blood as he told them 'I'm hardly going to deny it; look at me'.

Hancock, of Etwall, Derbys, had already pleaded guilty at Derby Crown Court in July to two counts of murder via video link.

PE teacher Ms Almey and [her new partner], a company director of a marketing firm, were discovered in a pool of blood at the £400,000 property on New Zealand Lane just after 4am.

Daily Mail on Top Form, Nearly

From The Daily Mail:

A dog trainer who once worked for Princess Anne is suspected of murdering his wife at the cottage where Boris Johnson grew up.

John Zurick, 67, allegedly shot his estranged wife Debbie, 56, after he discovered she had a new boyfriend. He then turned the shotgun on himself, friends said yesterday.

Paramedics were called to the cottage, on the Prime Minister's family estate in Somerset, on Saturday afternoon but were unable to save Mrs Zurick...

The Zuricks bought the property, where the Prime Minister spent some of his childhood, from Mr Johnson's father Stanley for £440,000 in 2013.

Stanley Johnson owns the neighbouring 14th century farmhouse on the Nethercote estate with his wife Jennifer. A third house on the estate is owned by the Prime Minister's sister Rachel.

Yes, yes, but what would the cottage be worth now (ignoring the murder-suicide stuff)?

Daily Mail on top form

From The Dail Mail:

Helen Hancock, 39, was found dead alongside 48-year-old company director Martin Griffiths at a property in the upmarket village of Duffield just months after she walked out on her husband...

Detective Inspector Steve Shaw of Derbyshire Police told the court the couple were discovered at the £400,000 detached property in Duffield, Derbyshire, the early hours of New Years' Day.

Daily Mail On Top Form

Man, 24, is found dead in a swimming pool at £3million mansion after 'drowning at house party'

Daily Mail On Top Form

From The Daily Mail:

The son of a murdered civil servant branded her sex-obsessed killer an 'evil being' as he faced him down in court today.

Kasim Lewis, 32, bound and gagged Catherine Burke, 55, in her £700,000 home in Muswell Hill, north London, before stabbing her to death in November 2017.

He was given a minimum 40-year life sentence this afternoon.

Daily Mail On Top Form

No mucking about here, they included the value in the headline to save us the bother of scrolling through the article:

Tenant fights for life after being hit in the throat by hail of bullets in 'targeted attack' at £780,000 house owned by comedian Russell Kane

UPDATE: Thomas (in the comments) noticed that one of the neighbours complained that the valuation was too low, and it's been relisted at £1.2 million

Daily Mail On Top Form

From The Daily Mail:

Romanian national Cristian Sabou was detained on a European Arrest Warrant this morning at his address in the northern town of Dej over the death of grandmother Valerie Graves.

The 55-year-old artist was murdered with a claw hammer in a ground floor bedroom at a £1.6million house in Bosham, West Sussex - a village featured in ITV drama Midsomer Murders.

Daily Mail on top form

It's the first bullet point in yesterday's article on the death of a stowaway:

First picture of Oxford graduate sunbather who had miracle escape when frozen stowaway plunged 3,500ft from Kenya Airways jet and landed just THREE FEET from him in London garden

* John Baldock was in garden of £2.3m home where he lives in Clapham, London
* Man's body fell 3,500ft from landing gear of Nairobi to London Heathrow flight
* Neighbours say the body landed just feet from Mr Baldock on Sunday afternoon
* Mr Baldock is a software engineer from Exeter who has a master's from Oxford

Daily Mail on top form

From The Daily Mail:

The BBC confirmed [Danny Baker's] tweet, and said in a statement: 'This was a serious error of judgment and goes against the values we as a station aim to embody. Danny's a brilliant broadcaster but will no longer be presenting a weekly show with us.'

Earlier, standing on the doorstep of his £2 million house in a dressing gown, Baker denied he was racist, saying he was 'shocked at my own foolishness.'

Daily Mail on top form

Headline in The Daily Mail:

Concorde captain who flew the Queen and Princess Diana is found dead with dementia-suffering wife in 'murder-suicide' at their £800,000 farmhouse in Kate Middleton's home village

House prices and tenuous Royal Family connections, doubleplusgood!

Daily Mail on top form

From The Daily Mail:

Yousef Makki, 17, was stabbed to death on Saturday night in Greater Manchester... Yousef is thought to have received a scholarship to attend the school, where fees are in excess of £12,000 a year.

Two 17-year-old boys have been arrested on suspicion of murder. They are both also pupils at prestigious schools in the North West and are believed to live in multi-million pound homes in the area.

That really is a journalistic low, even by the Mail's (lack of) standards.

Daily Mail on top form

Scroll right to the end of the article for the money shot, i.e. the original headline:

Police probe mystery deaths of two men after their bodies were found inside £270,000 home

Evening Standard channels its inner Daily Mail

From The Evening Standard:

Mrs Muhammad was shot shortly after 7.35 am as she did the washing-up, her husband told the Evening Standard.

Scotland Yard said the woman suffered a wound to the abdomen during the attack in the £500,000 house in Newbury Park.

Daily Mail on top form

Detectives find body of man in his 40s in the grounds of £1.5million home after using metal detectors to search garden

Daily Mail on top form

From The Daily Mail:

A British woman faces death by hanging after being charged with murdering her allegedly abusive husband with a kitchen knife in their idyllic Malaysian retirement home.

Petite Samantha Jones, barefoot and wearing an orange prison suit with the words 'Police Lockup' emblazoned across it, appeared sombre and nervous as she was formally charged with murdering husband John, 63, in Langkawi on Tuesday.

Samantha was charged with murdering her husband between 1am and 3am on October 18 at their £200,000 home overlooking paddy fields in a quiet village on the island.

Daily Mail on top form

Arthur Collins's father, 55, ADMITS allowing his £1million home to be used as a cannabis factory after he was caught by police during raid to find his acid attacker son

Daily Mail on top form!

From The Daily Mail:

A retired company director who covertly filmed a young woman getting changed at his luxury home has been jailed for eight months.

Allan Austin, 66, installed a hidden spy camera at his home in Cheshire because he 'liked the figure' of the victim...

When officers searched Austin's £500,000 detached house in the village of High Legh, near Knutsford, Cheshire they found the hidden camera which was linked to his computer and iPad.