Graham

As Working Lunch pointed out in today's programme, the "Doomsayers" in the Sunday papers took one comment from the Council of Mortgage Lenders and (typically) blew it out of all proportion.

The CML said that (as part of a much longer statement), to stop the housing market dead in its tracks would require at least a doubling of the current interest rate. They did *not* however, at any time say that this was either desirable or intended!

The Sunday Telegraph, however, grabbed that line, took it out of context and blew it up into a massive article, then the other papers saw that and decided to run with it.

Frankly I'm not worried about a housing price crash like the '80s. The situation is completely different, we don't have the problems with staying in the ERM at a ridiculously high exchange rate and having to jack up interest rates to keep the value of Sterling up, nor do we have the millions of unemployed from that time, so it's simply not going to happen like that.

Put it this way, I'm a very "risk averse" investor, but I'm planning on re-mortgaging my flat on a "buy to let" and getting myself a 3 bed house in the not too distant future and there's *NO WAY* I'd be doing that if I thought there was a sizable risk of a housing market collapse!