News

12 April 2010

Property Buyers: Make it easy on yourself
 
Generally, I recommend that all the residential properties that a landlord owns are in the same area. All of mine are in the same road in Islington, which makes it very easy for management, and I do not buy anything anywhere else. I have my own team of maintenance men, there is always a waiting list for those who want flats or rooms and management is always kept to a minimum. Buying properties in a single area means that your overheads can be kept to a minimum; and in these difficult times, with profit being squeezed, that could make all the difference.
 
Nicholas Pine
 

Buying unsold lots: strike while the iron is hot
 
When attending an auction you can see what sells and what doesn’t sell and auctioneers are generally prepared to do deals afterwards in order to shift unsold lots. Vendors are also in a very vulnerable mood as they have set their hearts on selling their property / lot that day and, no doubt, need the cash. The most common immediate reaction when a lot hasn't sold is "I wish I'd set that reserve a bit lower" and vendors are generally more amenable to a low offer on the day of the sale than they will be afterwards when they have had time to think about it and - quite often - start to feel resentful: strike while the iron is hot and make your offer while they are still susceptible to the idea of a quick sale. Remember that the bulkier the item is - and the more difficult it is for the vendor to drag home - the lower the price shoud be.   
 
Stuart Maclaren
 

A summer game
 
The advent of spring means that summer is not far away. As our April days get longer and warmer we know in our hearts that some form of outdoor fun beckons, be it drinking oneself insensible in Newquay before falling off a surfboard, or being escorted out of the Ladies Enclosure at Ascot for doing something rather sordid with a petit four.
 
Croquet and its accoutrements do not seem to have attracted the sort of fetish cult about them that we find in the world of golf and a new set can be had for as little as £60, although you are welcome to spring for the Jacques "Sandringham" set at around £3,000, if you are feeling more than usually wealthy.
 
However, older sets wash up quite often in the auction rooms of England and they are well worth investigating. A couple of years ago I spotted a set from 1875 recently, comprising four mallets, five hoops two marker poles and two chipped wooden balls: it went for £200. Better sets go for £400 - £500 depending on whether they are standard models or superior. The superior sets are obviously better made and have the feel of quality, as do the boxes and decoration. Original boxes with intact labels add greatly to the value.  
 
Geoff Havers

Government Auction News Team

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