MoneyWeek map: the world's dearest houses

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  1. Boris MacDonut

  (20 February 2012, 05:44PM)  Complain about this comment

  Bizarre map. It is titled world's dearest areas and half is devoted to the cheapest, all of which are in the USA. I cannot believe there are not cheaper places in say Russia or Hungary but maybe the UISA is even poorer than we already knew. Also gives the lie to Australia as a land of milk and honey with 5 of the dearest there.

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  2. drotar

  (20 February 2012, 08:23PM)  Complain about this comment

  The reds are from most affordable areas and the greens from most expensive?
  :)
  Come on! Who did the colors?
  I also I didn't know world has 20 cities :D
  Good idea, lazy map.
  

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  3. drotar

  (20 February 2012, 08:30PM)  Complain about this comment

  Definition of average annual.
  Is it gross, net, pretax salary of one person (or family), also with or without health care/social insurance?
  

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  4. David Atherton

  (21 February 2012, 12:49PM)  Complain about this comment

  Is this map to make some political point? Plymouth and Bournemouth are very odd choices for the British map, especially as they are not the cheapest (North East) or dearest (London) in Britain. And is salary taken as the country, or the actual location. Clearly the US 'Rust Belt' is hardly indicative of the US as a whole.
  
  Well done however for pointing out the Australian housing bubble, still going five years after all the others burst.
  
  Hong Kong is of course a special case, being totally influenced by the Chinese economy, but with no space left. Prices in the NT and SAR would be an interesting comparison.

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  5. Percy Matthams

  (21 February 2012, 07:58PM)  Complain about this comment

  Plymouth?! You havin a larf ain't ya?

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  6. pdoffsaver

  (21 February 2012, 09:19PM)  Complain about this comment

  If everyone reads the article, it is not trying to locate the most expensive places which in the UK would obviously be in London. It is highlighting the most places to buy against the average salary in the those areas, according to the survey. London house prices are high, yes, but with that there are high wages. Bournemouth has high house prices but low wages due to it being a very service and seasonal orientated economy, i.e. lots of hotels / b&b's paying low wages. Plymouth, I guess, is the same. Both areas (like a lot of towns in the south of England) suffer from second-home-itis, much to the detriment of those born in the areas and the towns themselves.
  
  The government need to do something about the multiple home disease that is destroying English communities. But like the previous government did nothing and this lot seem to be cut from the same cloth, I will not hold my breath.

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  7. valencia expat

  (22 February 2012, 07:38AM)  Complain about this comment

  You've definately got plymouth, devon wrong! Yes the ratio of salary to house prices is high, but its a run down naval town with high unemployment, a lazy, feckless population, a bad drug problem and crap transport links.
  
  Locations included should have included Gibraltar, and also london.
  
  Plymouth should not be on this map, what a poorly researched article.

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  8. harrydiver

  (22 February 2012, 09:58AM)  Complain about this comment

  @ valencia expat...obviously you need to research the article better yourself regarding its content...and should you really be making comments about area within a country you have runaway from..assuming you are an expat...

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  9. Lin

  (22 February 2012, 12:36PM)  Complain about this comment

  I live in Plymouth and this is nonsense. The house prices are expensive but I have seen worse in other places in the country.
  Plymouth is not run down and the Plymouth people are not lazy.
  Plymouth is a wonderful city with new and old buildings, it has a huge tourist industry and I am proud to live here.
  Valencia expat - it must be a while since you have visited Plymouth your statement is totally untrue!

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  10. pete

  (22 February 2012, 05:54PM)  Complain about this comment

  I just bought in Plymouth, very cheap I thought. Really nice City too, Dont know whats so bad about it? Loads of sailing, surfing, huge maritime working sector. Yeah its got some bad areas but coming from Manchester they are nothing like as bad... IE no guns no gangs etc

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  11. chris

  (23 February 2012, 10:18AM)  Complain about this comment

  No London on the map yet you show Plymouth? What a joke...

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  12. Boris MacDonut

  (24 February 2012, 10:21PM)  Complain about this comment

  Are we to assume that London requires a salary multiple of less than 7.3 times to buy a house ? As the Landregistry has the typical London house at near £440 k that puts average salary there at over £60,000 compared to a national average of around £30k

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  13. pdoffsaver

  (10 March 2012, 06:46PM)  Complain about this comment

  Boris ... I think this is the source report: http://www.demographia.com/dhi.pdf ... the report looks at affordability for the local population. No-one is suggesting that London property is cheap but it comes in at a multiple of x6.9 for Greater London with a median household income of 41.8k and median house price of 290k.
  
  Bournemouth at x8.7 with income 24.7k price 215.8k
  Plymouth at x7.4 with income 24.2k price 179.5k
  
  I believe the key word is "median", whereas the figures you highlight may be average? From purplemath.com: "The "mean" is the "average" you're used to, where you add up all the numbers and then divide by the number of numbers. The "median" is the "middle" value in the list of numbers."
  
  Anyway back on the original topic, the Government needs to do something about multiple property ownership which is very damaging for the communities affected.

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