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Posts Tagged ‘Property’

London Neighborhoods and Owning a Home – Part II

Friday February 17th, 2012

Once one has established the amount of money they have available to purchase a home the work of touring London neighborhoods and finding available properties begins. Learning about neighborhoods and establishing which areas one would like to live is based entirely on the needs of the family. Transportation will probably be an important factor in choosing a property as well as schools, parks and other amenities.

Those moving to London and purchasing a home will have to pay council tax on their home after they have bought it and the amount of property tax can differ tremendously from area to area, so it would be wise to check on the amount of tax due on a property before making a purchase.

Buyers can purchase property through an estate agent who will also explain neighborhoods or directly from the seller.  In both cases the final agreement will be drawn up by a lawyer that specializes in real estate and conveyancing. A conveyancing attorney will handle the transfer of funds from the mortgage lender as well as paying all of the stamp duties and taxes that are owed. They make the buying of property much easier and the purchaser’s attorneys will communicate directly with the seller’s attorneys so that everything is handled smoothly and efficiently.

Buying property is a major investment, but for those who will be living in London for a number of years, or are looking for an investment opportunity, buying a property may make the most sense. It will be a home that will appreciate and when returning to one’s country of origin a great rental property will remain that will hopefully provide an extra income.

With so many neighborhoods to choose from when purchasing a home after moving relocation experts highly recommend utilizing the services of an estate agent who can help not only navigate the city but also with the financial and legal procedures.  While real estate laws are similar to those in the US they are not identical and assuming all is well is a recipe for disaster.  Before deciding on picturesque neighborhoods one wanting to buy a home should get all their legal and financial ducks in a row.

 

 

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Living In London – Renting Property 3

Wednesday February 9th, 2011

In previous articles this week, we have discussed moving to London and the basic types of London rental apartments that you can find on the market. There are a number of details that you need to know about renting property in London, and how to go about it so you can be settled into your new home as soon as possible.

If you are renting privately, or through a letting agent, there will be a certain amount of paperwork and documentation that is required before you can sign the contract. Renting from a private landlord may be easier if you have just moved to London, and do not have an English bank account or a credit rating on England yet. If you are going through a letting agent, then you will have to provide traceable references and proof of income.

In London there may be a number of agents that handle a property, and the one who gets the contract in first will get the London apartment. If you find a property that you like and wish to rent it, then you may have to pay a reservation fee. This will ensure that no one else can rent the apartment while the paperwork is being done. The property market can be cut throat and aggressive so you’ll need to move fast on your new home if it is a place that you especially love. The reservation fee will be deducted from the deposit fee, and it is usually the value of about two or three weeks rent. If you do not pass the credit checks or change your mind then the fee will not be refunded.

One of the biggest checks that a letting agent will do is on your references (which must be contactable) that say you are a trustworthy tenant, and that you are able to pay the rent without any financial struggles. You may have to provide up to three years worth of references, and certainly you will have to give your proof of address for the last three years at least. You will also have to provide proof of employment or funds on a regular basis to be able to pay the rent. If you have just moved to London, then you must ask your new employer to provide you with all of the documentation that you need to satisfy a letting agent. You will have to give them your bank account details, as some agents prefer to set up a debit order that will automatically deduct the rental from your account every month.

The problem is not providing proof of income or getting the paperwork together; it is finding the perfect rental. Property varies considerably in price and quality across London and it might be best to get a professional letting agent find your new home, or even better: Use the services of a relocation agent who can have a property available for you as you arrive. Get settled as soon as possible so you can get out and enjoy London.

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Living In London – Renting Property 1 of 2

Monday February 7th, 2011

Moving to London can be one of the most exciting things you’ll ever do. It is a chance to live in one of the biggest cities in Europe as well as one of the most cosmopolitan, and you’ll have the opportunity to meet interesting people and revel in the sights and sounds of everything that is English. If you are moving to London for work then the chances are that your employer will provide you with accommodation, but if you are looking for that perfect London rental on your own, then you need to know all about how to rent an apartment or house in London.

There are two main types of rental properties available in London:

  • Private Rentals: You can rent a property directly from the landlord or owner of the property, which is a private rental. The advantage is that you will not have to pay an agency fee, but the disadvantage is that there is no intermediary available to help if something should go awry.
  • Letting Agents: You can use the services of a letting agent or rental agent. This does have the advantage of having less of a risk, but if you have recently moved to London you may not have all of the paperwork that is needed to use one of the many letting agents. You should also be careful when using a letting agent to use one of the most reputable agents.

The price of property for rent in London varies considerably depending on the area that you choose to live in. In the most fashionable areas space is at a premium and the prices are extremely high. You will have to weigh up all of your considerations before choosing an area and starting your search. The factors that you will have to consider are the proximity of your home to your work. While you may not be able to afford to stay close to the city and the heart of the business world, you will want to choose a London rental that is close to a major transport route so that you can commute to work easily.

The price of rental apartments drops considerably as you move out of the centre of the city, but make sure that you are close to amenities so you don’t have to walk for miles to get something simple like bread and milk. If you have children, then schooling is another consideration. Schools are zoned by area so you have to live in the area to enable your children to attend a local school. Many areas that have excellent schools have property that is higher in price.

If you are moving to London one of the best things you can do is to find one of the professional relocation services that will be able to take care of the details of your move and will advise you on the areas that you should live in and will be able to have you moved in a couple of days after arriving.

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Living in London – Property and Real Estate

Thursday January 27th, 2011

If you know you are going to be moving to London, and living in London for a few years, you may want to consider buying a property instead of renting a apartment, which will not give you any return on investment. The property market in England and London in particular is complicated, so you might want to get to grips with the way things work before buying a London home. It is true though that property is an excellent investment and if you manage to buy in an area in London that is set for future development, then you could end up making a lot of money.

Living in London – Property Pointers

The first aspect of buying a property here is whether it will need to be financed with a loan. Most people will apply to a bank or financial institution before they start looking at properties, so they have a good idea as to how much they can spend before they start. This is a legal document that will be provided to you by the bank and is known as an ‘in-principle mortgage agreement’. It does give you some sway when making an offer on a home because they seller will be aware that you are able to get financing quickly. There are also extra costs involved in buying a home in London, such as stamp duty tax and conveyancing fees. These can reach thousands of pounds so make sure that you have extra money available to cover all of the taxes and duties that are required by English law.

Living in London – Finding a Property

Once you have established the amount of money that you have available to buy a property, the work of finding available properties begins. You need to establish which area you would like to live in based on the needs of your family. Transportation will probably be an important factor in choosing a property as well as schools, parks and other amenities. Be aware that you will have to pay council tax on your home after you have bought it, and this can differ tremendously from area to area, so check on the amount of tax you’ll have to pay before you buy.

You can buy property through an estate agent or directly from the seller, in both cases you will still have the final agreement drawn up for you by a lawyer that specialise in real estate and conveyancing. A conveyancing attorney will handle the transfer of funds from the mortgage lender, as well as paying all of the stamp duties and taxes that are owed. They make the buying of property much easier, and your attorneys will communicate directly with the seller’s attorneys so that everything is handled smoothly and efficiently.

Buying property is a major investment, but if you are going to be living here for a number of years, or are looking for an investment opportunity, then buying a property may make the most sense. It will be a home that will appreciate and when you return to your country of origin, you will have a great rental property that will provide you with an income.

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Office Space?

Monday September 28th, 2009

No, not as in the film that captured the trials and tribulations of a cubicle existence ever so accurately…

Ironically, the relocation agency needs to relocate itself, and we are literally in the market for OFFICE SPACE!

Business has reached record levels, and we are looking to expand.  This means that we’re outgrowing our current space and would certainly appreciate any recommendations of available office space in the Notting Hill neighbourhood.  Our present office is located in Notting Hill, which we adore, so we want to stay!  Obviously, working in the property industry we have contacts of our own, but we’d like to leave no stone unturned if it means finding the optimal opportunity.  We would require occupancy of up to 10 personnel.

If you yourself work in Notting Hill or know of someone who does that is aware of commercial space for let this fall that could help supplement our search, please do not hesitate to contact us at 020 7229 0757 or [email protected]

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What to Expect in a London Flat — Part VI (a.k.a. Some Like it Hot)

Thursday September 3rd, 2009

Author: Colleen

Thanks for joining us again–we hope you were inspired by our profound last posting.

Now then, breath easy.  Inhale, exhale.  When you discover there may be no air conditioning, central or otherwise, this, like most of the other “issues” I’ve addressed thus far in this series, truly ends up being a non-issue, really.  Piece this circumstance together with all those rumours you always hear about London weather, and voila:  it doesn’t get very hot here, erego, it isn’t that necessary to have air-conditioning (unless you really love to spend your money on, well, air).  You will definitely be equipped with heating, which I was personally delighted to see was centrally operated even with the separate radiators in each room.  In my Chicago apartments, a radiator was a scary coiling mass of iron painted over in decades of chipping paint that literally hissed and spit at me each time the heat ran through–and that water it spat burned my hand each time I manually screwed and unscrewed the knob to regulate it.  Here, the radiators may actually be modern installations that are flatter to the wall (if not covered up with a practical and more aesthetically pleasing cover that provides additional shelving) and may have a centrally located thermostat dial that lets you set them to a specific temperature (rather than just regulate the degree of said hissing and spitting).  You can then use the dials on each radiator to regulate the degree to which they individually heat up, which is energy saving if unused rooms can be shut off completely, or, say, you only want the towel warmer to heat up during spring and summer.  But okay, back to the air-conditioning, as we all know it’s easy to add layers when it’s cold, but there’s only so much you can take off when it’s hot.  Saying that it doesn’t get hot that often is bittersweet news for summer-lovin’ outdoor activities, but it does help for indoor climate-control, yet for those days that it does warm up, it admittedly gets quite stuffy, especially when the sun beams through the windows and heats your rooms to higher temps than what it is outdoors.  The trick is simple:  go to Argos or Homebase and buy a little fan.  This works really well if you situate it in front of your open window to keep fresh ventilation flowing through; all it takes is a little air movement to feel like the uber cool person you are.

London Relocation can also help to chill you out by alleviating the stress of your move!  See you soon in Part VII, our thrilling conclusion to this series on What to Expect in a London Flat.

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What to Expect in a London Flat – Part II (a.k.a. Stairway to Heaven)

Thursday August 27th, 2009

Author: Colleen

Welcome to Vertical London.

Welcome to Vertical London.

Welcome back, folks, for the next post in my series on What To Expect When You’re Expecting…What You Had Back Home.  Yesterday, we addressed Size.  Today, we focus on another ‘S’ word.

Many visitors I’ve hosted have commented that they lost weight after coming to London.  The primary culprits?  Walking and STAIRS.  Ooohh, the stairs, people.  Whether at the Tube station, parks, museums, EVEN THE BUSES (double-decker, remember), you can’t even escape them when you come home.  Especially when you come home.  Once you turn the key and heave the heavy door open to your lovely building, you will most likely be staring down (get it?  Stare?  Stairs?  Ha!  Okay, you got it but chose not to laugh.  Fine.  I won’t pun again) a few flights of steps.  “That’s fine, I’ll just take the elevator,” you might say.  First of all, the term is “lift,” not “elevator.”  Second, um, er, well, yeah, no.  Not likely to be a lift in that building (and the movers hauling all of your stuff will just love that fact).

Initially, the daily ascent and descent may leave you gasping.  The landing before the last flight of steps to my 2nd floor flat (3rd floor by U.S. standards) was officially named after my mother last spring, as it was the point in the climb where she needed to pause to catch her breath each time.  Think of it this way–the money you save by not having to join a gym thanks to all the unsought-but-necessary exercise you get commuting daily can help offset that high rent.  At any rate, you and your bum WILL strengthen as a result and, in no time, think nothing of the stairs anymore.  If anything, it will just make you lament how out of shape you’ll be if you return home and regress to your driving-everywhere/couch-potato ways…

Stay tuned for the next exciting installment from London Relocation Ltd.…

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What to Expect in a London Flat – Part I (a.k.a. Size Matters…or does it?)

Wednesday August 26th, 2009

Author: Colleen

So pretty from the outside...but what lies within???

So pretty from the outside…but what lies within???

Before I go into this series of blog posts, I must preface that this will not be the end-all be-all, fully comprehensive guide to London flats on which to solely rely…there are obviously a lot of factors when it comes to properties, and exceptions to every rule.  I am simply going to write off the top of my head what I consider to be the initial impressions (shocks) most people seem to have once they relocate to London.

At this point, we just have to agree to leave cost concerns at the door.  The property market is what it is, and we at London Relocation Ltd. unfortunately have no more control over rent prices and currency conversion rates than you do.  We just have to accept this as an unfortunate reality and optimistically look to the vast opportunities London does provide us.

Let’s start with the obvious, shall we?  SIZE.  Just before you catch yourself mid-eyeroll upon seeing your first flat (especially in light of what you’re being asked to pay for it), let’s get some perspective here.  You are in London.  Not the sprawling landscape of America that encouraged Manifest Destiny.  You are now living in a city that still has roads based on paths the ancient Romans once wore into the soil.  If they appear too narrow, that is because they were originally established to accommodate horses and carriages, not your SUV.  It’s a city that experienced explosive growth under Queen Victoria’s reign, resulting in the abundant terraced housing that largely characterises London residential architecture–built closely to accommodate the population back then as single family homes before being broken down further into the levels of apartments you see now.

For example, upon doing some research, I learned that the living room of my 2nd floor terrace flat was once used as a master bedroom, our master bedroom once being the 2nd bedroom, and our 2nd bedroom not intended to be a bedroom at all (which is obvious with the way we crammed a bed in there), but, rather, a dressing room of sorts.  In fact, garden flats were the kitchen, ground-floor flats were the dining and morning rooms, 1st-floors were the parlor/reception rooms, and 3rd floors were the servants and/or children’s bedrooms.

Ready for some irony?  The mews homes located off the alleyways behind many of these terrace homes (you may be shown one as part of your flat-hunt with us!) originally housed horses at the ground level and servants’ quarters on the 1st floor–Americans will recognise this as the “coach house” concept.  The 2-story mews houses now accommodate the more affluent that can afford them, whereas the regular likes of us squeeze into the individual flats that the 5-tiered middle-to-upper class Victorian home has been cut up into, so there’s been a reversal of sorts in the social hierarchy where housing is concerned that some might find to be poetic justice.

Thinking in these terms not only justifies the sizing issue, but should also enhance your appreciation of the living history of which you are now a part.

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Warning: High Voltage

Tuesday August 4th, 2009

Author: Colleen

A key consideration for those travelling or moving internationally is voltage.  No one wants to blow out a perfectly good appliance simply because, for instance, UK voltage of 240V is twice that of North America.  Imagine my personal frustration when, within only a couple months of receiving shiny new kitchen appliances as wedding gifts, my spouse and I move to London and can’t bring any of it with us (for the record, we did not foresee our impending London move with 100% clarity at the time we set up our registry).  If your move is permanent, it is worth it to just leave anything with a cord and plug at home and purchase UK equivalents outright.  However, shorter-term placements may leave you feeling that to do so would be a tremendous waste of money that could be put toward other worthwhile things (rent, for instance).

The key for the short-run, then, is understanding what you can use from home or how you can adapt without.  And before I get into that, let’s understand the key terminology:

-         An ADAPTOR converts your 2 or 3-pronged U.S. plugs to the 3-pronged UK standard.  This simply enables you to plug a U.S. appliance into a UK outlet; it does NOT adapt the voltage!

-         A CONVERTER is what you can plug your appliance (or power strip, if needing to convert multiple appliances) into before then plugging the converter itself into the wall.  This will suppress the 240V coming through that outlet to only allow 120V through to your appliance, thus, not blowing it out.

-         A TRANSFORMER is basically a converter, but much more hard core (and expensive).  Whereas a converter is usually a small plastic black box with a cord, a transformer is a heavier, bulkier metal box that is far better adapted to converting electricity for higher wattage items (or total wattage, if grouping appliances together on the same power strip).

Most televisions and computers purchased within the last several years will be 120-240V compatible (just be sure to read the fine print to confirm this before you plug anything in!).  After verifying this, these items can be plugged directly into the outlet using only an adapter.  As far as what to plug into a converter or transformer, it’s generally best to stick to appliances running at a lower wattage, those that are longer running at a slow, steady current like a DVD player or VCR.  Items like coffeemakers, toasters, or blenders that use a lot of energy in short bursts are probably best left at home and replaced, in the interim, by reasonably-priced equivalents in the UK (try Argos or Homebase)—it seriously isn’t worth risking ruining your U.S. stuff and/or blowing a fuse/starting a fire/etc.  Think of what you can live without for a while (probably a blender, huh?) or what you can replace with a non-electric alternative (e.g., a French Press or stovetop espresso maker).

One last recommendation for when you get settled into that lovely home London Relocation Ltd. will find for you:  Though one stubborn, delusional hardware store owner insisted otherwise to me, these older, period-conversion buildings are indeed prone to power surges, so be sure to plug all your appliances into surge-protecting power strips!

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London Relocation was right!!!!!

Wednesday June 10th, 2009

Author: Anthony

Yesterday, I made many calls for an appointment later next week, in Chelsea….
The budget for my client is 300 per week; I managed to find only 10 properties…

2 weeks ago, I found over 30!?!?

Now take into consideration I look for refurbished, location-centric properties in desirable post codes. This means that when I am asked to search in Chelsea, I do not look in Fulham or Earl’s Court. London Relocation’s clients demand perfection; like German engineering, the flat needs to be of a certain standard. Saying that, London Relocation places a lot of German clients… ;)

Anyway, my point is… stock is depleting as more Americans, South Americans, Canadians, Germans and French are moving to London and taking advantage of the weak pound (£). People need housing, and they desire a certain standard. Regardless of the Credit Crunch, supply is low and the demand is high.

Speak tomorrow!

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Good Morning America and Notting Hill!!

Friday June 5th, 2009

Author: Anthony

The Market stalls!!! Wow Notting Hill

The Market stalls!!! Wow Notting Hill

Today is cloudy!!!!!!

Kensington and Chelsea is a popular borough for Americans in London. The neighborhood of Notting Hill has great markets and are great places to get fresh fruit and Veg. Every morning these guys are up at 5am getting set up for the massive market day ahead…YUMEEEEE!!

Also, if you arrive at six in the evening, vendors must sell all the stock or it spoils…So you can achieve mass amounts of fruit and veg for next to nothing (good prices!).

Copious amounts of coffee are being served to onlookers arriving at curious times to watch the millions who flock to see the prestigious, funky market do its thing.

The French, Italians, English, Americans, Canadians, and Germans all come for the weird allure of Notting Hill.

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Americans in Notting Hill

Thursday June 4th, 2009

Author: Anthony

The day is beautiful in Notting Hill, and many Americans and Canadians are out looking for deals and bargains on Portobello Road…Coffee shops are overflowing with people trying to get a seat in the sun. On the corner of Westbourne Grove and Portobello Road, the Negzio Classica coffee and wine bar is a perfect place to eat, drink and catch some rays.

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