Banks in Poland selling fewer mortgages in 2011, down 49%

Could you ask your friend where he 'heard' this - if he did say this, I wouldn't trust much of what his says (unless this is an isolated error).

While I believe market driven property taxes will come one day, it will never be 10%.

In Canada we were paying 2% years ago on my house and it was considered very high.

What is more likely to happend in the near term is increases in perpetual usufruct fees, I've heard of fees being increased substantially recently on re-assessment (as they are based on a 1% of the fair value of the land for residential property and have often never been increased to reflect current market values).

so Harry, answer the question??
What country am I from??

No you are confused, why would I say community charge? Property/wealth tax is really an alternative to income tax. With income tax at least you have an income to pay the tax.

Here is a more detailed explanation of the cut back in credit in Poland

ftalphaville.ft.com/blog/2011/11/04/727401/honey-i-shrunk-emerging-europe


You bought when prices were very low didn't you?


With a property tax you basically don't own the property in 20 or 30 years or a hundred, its will weigh you down for ever with effectively a perpetual mortgage.

But its easy to make cheap snipes at the poor isn't it?

The subject being discussed is a "property tax", how the hell has this got anything to do with income tax?. Community charge/council tax is based on the value of your home, it does not matter whether you own it or rent it. The amount you earn each year is not taken into account unless you are on "benefits" or live on your own when a small reduction will be made. The council tax is used to fund "local" services which is the reason it can vary across the country, depending on whether you have a good council or a socialist one.

And if one rents, there is simply no way at all that the landlord will pass that property tax on to his tenants, is there.


I'm not special. I just worked hard to get where I am now. If other people simply can't be bothered to do the same, I don't want to hear them whining about their lot.

You live in your property, so you pay it. And there is a limit what a tenant or owner can pay, so it reduces the valuation and returns of property.


Its taxation, as I said I prefer income tax over property tax.



No, you were lucky to have bought before prices skyrocked. No matter how hard they work, buying a flat in under ten, twenty or thirty years is impossible for an average couple with todays prices at 10x average earnings.

You are not 'hard working' but a lucky, smug git who was gifted a opportunity by virtue of being born at the right time. Fair enough but poking fun at the younger generation who cannot afford to buy is nasty.

Ah well, the guy is a proud Thatcherite so I don't think he will care much, Harry claims he would welcome a collapse in prices ;this is pure spin, the guy is in love with the thought of being rich due to the inflated price of his dwelling.

This from a man who braggs about owning a farm (with lots of land), a flat in Poland and another flat in London (worth 300,000 GBP and can be rented for 1,000GBP). I suppose you were not born at the right time, you won these things in a lucky bag. The word "hypocrit" springs to mind.

must be a shytehole at that price..;)

I don't own the flat. I've never owned property until two years ago. Even if I did, you missed the point, completely, again.

I could not buy that flat, in in thirty years, never-mind in ten. Nobody who is leaving school in the UK today will be able to buy property in ten years with simply hard work becuase the prices are ridiculous. The house price to average wage ration in Polish cities is ever worse than the UK.

Harry was lucky to buy when prices were affordable over ten years ago and calling 'young people of today' lazy becuase its now impossible indeed makes him a smug, lucky bastard. He constantly slags Milky off for being an unemployed layabout and therefore unable to buy a home.

Well, the best advice I can give to someone leaving school in the UK today would be; get a university degree with a loan and either a) bum about doing low paying jobs, travel the world have fun, or b) emigrate and never return to the UK.

The very worst option is to try and become a wage slave, save for 20 years for a deposit so you can just about own a house when you retire, (which will be worth pretty much what it originally cost in real terms). You have to be mad to commit yourself to a life of paying for my generations (the boomers) comfortable retirement.

This refers to the UK, but people like Harry are the same all over. They have to realise that there are other options, like.. leaving. When governments give you a property tax of 50% (of the rental income/mortgage), its not tenants who end up paying and when you combine this you end up with falling house prices.

School leavers today should memorise the words 'Go F*** yourself' for use against anyone who suggests a career, mortgage and indefinite servitude. Become a bum, loot and rob from the rich bastards with houses, they owe you. When they die you can inherit the house and become unproductive property owner.


Shitholes go for 250K in London, £300k gets you a 40m2 flat in Battersea.

Prices now are about two and a half times more than when I bought but wages are also higher than they were ten years ago. I know plenty of people in Warsaw who have flats and mortgages: they manage to pay their mortgages every month, why can't other people?

If a person wants to work hard and own their flat, they can do that. If they want to whine about how unfair everything is and how prices are stupidly high that they rent a place, they can do that instead (and the more of them who do, the better for me).

it's OK I was just leg pulling..;) but what sounds like shedloads of money buys a cupboard on a council estate......
Anyway I agree with most of your points.
Emigration sounds like a good move.
I really cannot take my kids' teachers seriously .......and only private school teachers take children and their parents seriously.
'Training' them up to be shyte work fodder, to conform and be silent.

Most governments are stupid but they are not suicidal, they are certainly not going to impose a property tax of 50% or anywhere near it.

I own a flat and have a mortgage, and I'm on course to pay the thing off within 7 years.

But then again, we both work and don't pretend to be "internet experts" selling flashcards. Nor do I pretend to be fluent in Polish while actually making horrible mistakes in the language.

If you get 4% property tax and your yield is 8% then the government is basically taxing you at 50%.

You really should learn to read and think for a moment before commenting.


That glosses over that fact that with prices 10 average earnings people need to take a 40 or 50 year mortgage to buy. How many times your wage did your apartment cost and how much deposit did you put down?

If it's mortgaged you don't own it.

Is that a fact? Have you got any sources to support your supposed fact?


I believe it was in the region of three times my annual wage and I put down a 20% deposit.

Mine (bought recently) was 1.5 times our annual wages combined, with a 10% deposit.

When talking about Poland, it's worth pointing out that many flats and houses were/are bought with black market money - money that isn't accounted for and distorts the figures. Also worth pointing out that plenty of older people are dying and leaving flats - when I was buying mine, quite a few of them were obviously "granny-just-died-and-left-me-this-flat-and-i-want-lots-of-money".

Looking at purchase prices compared to declared wages is just silly. I know someone who earns officially 2800zl a month brutto. We don't talk about the nearly 1000zl extra in cash she gets.

and still people here are glossing over this fact.


yes


so shut up and stop demanding that others should pay 7 times more.


Your talking shyte as usual. Every country has a black economy..

Prove it.


In most places in Poland it is still perfectly possible to buy a flat for three times one's annual wage; as Delph points out by telling us that he bought for 1.5 times their combined income.


Are you claiming that all Poles declare all their income? That's nearly as laughable as your constant claims that property prices will go down by 50%.

I'm very interested where I can find a flat for 1.5x or 3x one's annual income in any of the big cities.

Last I remember the national average was 3600 gross, so around 2600 net. But we "work hard", so let's say 3500 net, and the wife pulls in 2000 net. So thats 5500 x 12 so thats 66000. An average flat hovers around 300000, so thats 5x your income. Of course there are so many variables here that it's impossible to even generally summarize what could be considered "affordable" for most people, maybe you make less but the family helps you out, or youre single but work a lot pulling in 6k (for... 30 years), but for most Poles who make 2k net, even with a spouse, and god forbid they have a kid, it's just not financially viable.

When working out how much can be borrowed the gross figure is used not net, so using the average wage of 3600 gross x 2 x 12 = 86,400. 3 x salary = 259,200pln, this is not a unrealistic figure for an apartment just outside of Krakow centre for example. In UK, average salary roughly £25k x 2 = £50k, therefore £150,000 again depending on where you live it is possible to buy a half decent starter property. It is all about expectations, oh and actually having a job of course, earning an average wage and actually being able to afford the 10% deposit!!

Which is six time average earnings. and would buy you 37m2 at krakow's average price of 6.8K/m2. Polish interest rates are quite high arn't they? and 37m2 is just about enough for a couple to survive in but they will probably need a 40 year mortgage.

If they wanted to push the boat out and get what would be considered a starter home, say 70m with two bedrooms you are looking at 476K and 11x average earnings.

Sure, they are ways around all this, but theses are the definitions of affordability based on average numbers, average people with aver gage sized bodies.

There is no way living in Polands cities is affordable unless you are gifted money or property - which is why prices are falling even when wages are rising.

Living outside the cities, at present, is impossible if you want a job in the city due to terrible infrastructure. Once there are motorways that will change.

Banks should not lend based on combined earnings - when I lived in conservative Germany they always lent on the basis of the higher wage earner x 3.

Reasons are obvious, at least 30% of marriages end in divorce and 80% of marriages involve kids at some stage which means one partner taking less hours and increased costs in the household budget. Add in periods of unemployment, early death etc and its not prudent to use combined earnings.

The shadow economy is well documented in Poland and is maybe 29% (World Bank) or 12% (GUS) but probably somewhere between. However these earnings do not have much effect on the housing market - they are concentrated at the bottom end where people are young and floating around (farm work, restaurant work, building work) and at the top end (drug dealers, pimps, bent politicians) where people would probably pay for their McMansions in cash. English teaching

is one of the few middle class professions where a second job paying cash is viable. Even people that used to take cash like doctors and dentists do so far less frequently now.

For comparison its 15% in the UK and about 30% in Italy, although by definition its all an estimate. I'd question whether criminals can buy property for cash, you have to prove where the money came from.

Excellent points, good to hear more objective voices.

Well the idiots managed to get themselves banned again, purely for the sake of it.

Yeah, but Battersea's mostly a very good place to live. When I lived there, I was on £38K a year, had loads of time off, and could afford six holidays a year. And, depending on which part you live in, you can be in central London in 15 minutes. If you think its too expensive (I've been priced out now, leaving was a huge mistake), you can always find a £130K flat in lovely South Norwood :D

Despite its massive problems/crime etc, London's still one of the greatest cities in the world. there are only a few places in the world I would choose to live, but even there, I'd get bored, and it would soon be back to LDN. Who would choose to live in Gocław, for example - even though property is significantly cheaper there?


I imagine the situation is the same over here. I could buy a whole house in Burnley on 1.5x my salary. But finding the same job within 20 miles of that chavvy sh*thole would be impossible. There's at least three times as much as work in my field in London, than there is in even the largest provincial conurbations, which is partly why property is so expensive here. I'd still rather have a 40m2 flat in London than a four-bedroom house in a Northern chav town, though.

Hey, I was just in Goclaw an hour ago. It is not that bad. There are worse places to live.

Seriously? When purchasing the most expensive thing in your life, as well a place where you might end live out the rest of your days, not mentioning something you'll be paying off for decades... and you're gonna tell your kids or family... that... at least there's someplace worse on the planet?

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