Often, Hollywood is a great friend to Greece, and films shot in the Greek Islands give the country a lot of free publicity. Zorba the Greek made Crete into the most desirable location in Greece, Shirley Valentine promoted Mykonos, and Captain Corelli’s Mandolin boosted tourism in Kefalonia for many years afterwards. Recently, the film Mamma Mia, based upon the works of ABBA, filmed on the island of Skopelos, promises to have the same effect. This small island, lying near its better known neighbour, Skiathos, is set to become a major tourist destination, despite the one hour ferry journey.
FALLING OFF THE HORSE
The Cyprus property boom is over. Whatever the internet investment websites and realtors claim, the Cypriot property market has irreversibly collapsed. The worldwide economic crisis has completely deflated the speculative bubble, and many property owners are desperately trying to sell properties on an already flooded market. Sadly, they face a long wait or must sell at an obscenely low cost, losing around 30%.
Norwich Union, who recently changed their name to “Aviva,” have put a freeze on investor withdrawals from their “Norwich Union Unit-Linked property fund.” The excuse they have given is that they do not have any money and want to liquidate some of their assets by selling some of the property into what has to be the worst commercial property market in the last twenty years. Good luck getting your money back if you “invested.” any money in this one.
More on British Property Prices continue to decline and Aviva Freezes withdrawals from Fund
I don’t mean the exocet missile sort of boom, I mean housing bubble boom. According to a well respected news source in the Middle East, 7days.ae, Iraq is on the verge of a property boom thanks to “short supply,” so it seems that if you want to start a housing boom, you need to bomb a few buildings. This is their report:
Honesty and trust are two major issues plaguing the Dubai property market at the moment. Dubai is crashing hard and fast, with The Trump International Hotel and Tower in Dubai canceled, and numerous developers in Dubai firing staff, yet still the developers and government insist on putting out dis-honest press releases aimed at presenting a false picture of the market. And so-called “news,” sources in the Gulf continue to publish them. Even when they directly contradict the facts.
Bulgaria’s property bubble has burst in a big way. Prices have fallen by as much as 60% in the last few months, with many recent sales back on the market at substantial price reductions
The local papers in Australia are running supplements explaining to the locals what is happening to the sharemarket – you see its done something that a generation either hasn’t experienced or has forgotten about: its gone down and by a lot. The fall out from Lehrmann Brothers was the last straw and the local market dived like it hasn’t for years. I suspect some of those who have had their retirement savings in the share market feel a bit like this guy:
Another British property consultant, Jones Lang LaSalle, announced the fact that it would be making redundancies this year. A spokesman stated:
In light of the current challenging financial and economic climate, the company has taken the difficult but necessary decision to make 60 to 80 redundancies affecting employees based in England.
No surprise really, and according to homemove back in April, a third of British estate agents could be forced to close.
Options are not new but they are not often available for residential property in Australia.
Options are a concept from share investment where the buyer buys the right but not the obligation to buy a share a certain price at a particular time in the future.
