Thursday 19 July 2012

"Predicting property booms from station to station"

Richard Allan left a link to the summary of an excellent bit of research by the LSE.

Whether they really have developed a model which predict the increase in location values around new stations as accurately as they claim, I do not know, but the relationship is easily observable and easily explained, and it's reassuring to know that it's not just estate agents and land value taxers who are aware of it.

8 comments:

mombers said...

I feel so proud that my taxes are going to help poor, struggling landowners get a break. Definitely a better way to spend money than say, increasing spending in education or getting rid of VAT!

DBC Reed said...

Frank Pick of the Underground, who commissioned the map and typography,said in evidence to the pretty important Barlow Commission in 1938 :"THe moment an Underground extension is projected,the value of the land is at least doubled.When the railway is built and stations are opened,land adjacent to the station is at least quadrupled in value"

Bayard said...

The Metropolitan Railway Company was quite aware of this effect and, as land devlopment by railway companies was prohibited in their acts of parliament, they set up a separate company, Metropolitan Railway Country Estates Ltd, which bought up land alongside the railway along and sold it to builders once the railway had been built. Live in Metro-land!

A K Haart said...

No wonder homeowners hated Beeching.

Mark Wadsworth said...

M, to be fair, some of those landowners may be Poor Widows In Mansion who have scrimped and saved all their lives and never claimed benefits and whose heirs would love to inherit the cherished family home (continued page 94), I hope you don't want to piss on their chips or anything?

DBC, only quadrupled?

B, that's a true story which we LVTers like to tell each other round the campfire.

AKH, looking back, I think Beeching went way too far.

DBC Reed said...

@MW
Yeah I wondered the figure was so low but I am just relaying what he said.N.B The country was still in Depression and land prices were relatively low generally, hence all those Thirties semis: 3 million houses built between 1933 and 1939 i.e.half a million a year.(Also we'd come off the Gold Standard which reduced Bank Rate>> interest rates from 5% FEB 1931 to 2% in April 1932.)

Mark Wadsworth said...

DBC, ah yes, the good old days when increasing housing standards (be it privately owned semis or council housing) was seen as A Good Thing...

Shiney said...

@DBC

'Frank Pick of the Underground' - change the 'of' to 'and' and that is a great name for a band, you know.

Shiney