Prof Christine Whitehead spoke at The Residential Funding Conference on Tuesday, 5 July 2016. She provided an economic overview of the political and economic climate after the Referendum. Currently, she says, there is no real or clear-cut assessment that can be made in such a sensitive atmosphere. The story that will dominate for the next few months, perhaps years, she argues, are about expectations and risks–neither of which are handled well by the housing market. There are too many inscrutable or foreseeable variables around questions of negotiation, contagion and other messy political events. All this in the context of a world economy that has not yet fully recovered from the 2008 financial crisis. All these factors directly impact housing. Given all this, Christine recommends going back to basics. She goes on to provide a more robust overview in her PPT presentation, which can be downloaded here.
Here’s an excerpt of her conclusions:
- Forecasting is a mug’s game;
- Fundamentals may not be that changed in long run – regulation will remain much the same; immigration unlikely to slow much if at all; international investors still want to diversify; UK still well placed in the world and no great benefit to EU to making the situation worse?
- But world economy is not strong and EU’s signs of improvement likely to slow; UK’s already have as people take risk averse positions;
- Potential for addressing some of the more fundamental issues in housing while pressure somewhat reduced – but much more likely that supply will fall;
- This time it’s not just the economy but the politics that matter.
Click here to download the PPT presentation.