Our esteemed Chancellor was kinder than we had feared. The hikes in Capital Gains tax which certainly would have affected the buy-to-let market, were not present and the Stamp Duty moratorium will continue to the end of June, with a Nil band rate set at £ 250,000. This will give a respite to those buyers who were anxious that completions on their properties would not take place before the previous deadline at the end of March. Continue reading
The Chinese government has much to answer for at the moment, as the world suffers 500,000 Covid-induced deaths and has cost probably ten trillion dollars worth of reparations to underpin the global economies.
Quite apart from the vexed Huawei 5G issues, which the government is trying to unravel as we speak, there’s even more trouble in Beijing’s backyard, as President Xi and his cronies tighten the imperialistic legal controls on Hong Kong citizens, in order to bring them – forcibly – under Communist dictatorship. Continue reading
Former Hampstead home of King Constantine II of Greece, sold by Glentree; venue for luminaries and glitterati, including the Late Princess Diana and her two Princes
Not all is lost with Covid-19. Jonathan Wein at Glentree, has been cracking open the ouzo in celebration of the sale of ex-King Constantine II of Greece’s former London ‘palace’ in Hampstead Garden Suburb which, despite the lockdown, managed to sell for over £6million.
There is a pleasing dramatic flourish to the story, since originally the King bought the property in the early 70s, from the serial entrepreneur, Bob Tanner – joint founder of Glentree International – for the princely sum of £325,000, at the time. Continue reading