Ron Hickman dies

[Steve Firth]

Even so three million wouldn't buy you much of a house in rural Hants.

[Bob Eager]

Yebbut Hickman did it 30 years ago..

[Huge]

£9.48M in today's money, according to;

to become reasonable.

[Skipweasel]

Good grief, what a soulless hole.

--=20 Skipweasel - never knowingly understood.

[Huge]

It is, isn't it?

[damduck-egg]

Different people have different needs but in the unlikely event that I would need to move to the place as a tax exile then there is another factor to consider. Getting off the Island to do anything interesting. Would need enough wealth to have a private plane and pilot or the ability to charter an air taxi easily so that Britain or the Continent can be nipped to within an hour. Otherwise I would feel under house arrest in a luxurious Prison.

G.Harman

[Nick Leverton]

Presumably the current vendor had to sell his/her soul to purchase it.

Nick

[Steve Firth]

Likely lifetime earning of even a modest middle manager nowadays, so yes.

[Huge]

That's not what I said, dimwit.

[Dave Plowman (News)]

[Skipweasel]

And whether one of his feet was missing.

[damduck-egg]

There was an advertising campaign back in the 1970's for ISTR a Building Society. ISTR the theme was a young chap collecting his Girlfriend in an old banger with her parents looking on with disdain. The strap line was the comment "Tell them you are going to be worth xx thousand pounds" and went on to suggest an average salary over a career with a few pay rises thrown in . I cannot recollect what the xx amount was but the figure would seem re markedly low now. Many of the targets for that commercial will be on the run down to retirement now,some will already have done so but not if they only became worth the amount in the Advert. Can anybody remember the figure?

G.Harman

[John Williamson]

When I left school in 1972, £5000 per annum was a salary to aspire to. I'm now on four times that, almost, and I'm permanently skint....

[Andy Champ]

Is it really right at the end of the runway?

In Hants

OK to me.

Andy

[nicknoxx]

That's because £5000 in 1972 is worth £52000 in today's money so you've not got anywhere near it.

[Tim Watts]

John Williamson ( [e-mail]) wibbled on Sunday 20 February 2011 19:27:

IIRC my dad was on about 100/week around about 1973-4 (I assume that was net) as an engineer (but that was Civil Service by then).

We weren't rich although he did amass quite a lot of savings (I think he was "careful") - but we had a £6000 3 bed semi with a 120' garden in Surrey (1969 price) and we had a car, tv, plenty of holidays (of the caravanning variety) and decent food.

Now that house *checks*

ah - one of these:

original and identical to the one I grew up in - one conservatory and a tiny extension to the kitchen (many down that way are doing side and loft extensions)

£425,000!!!

That house by the BoE inflation calculator *should* be £77,000 (12.8x increase on 6000). The actual increase is 70.8x !!!

However, on the wages front I reckon I have a similar wage position to my dad, so on that basis I find myself only earning about 5x as much as him net (since 1973-4).

It's highly likely that 100/week may have been misplaced by a few years (he mentioned the figure but it might have been in reference to a few years earlier and probably a highly rounded number). Also, I suspect that being a Civil Servant back then was a pretty cushty number compared to now.

Anyone know what a Civil Service Scientific Officer grade was worth back then?

This:

average wages have gone up 14.6x (1973-2009) and 23.3x (1969-2009)

These days, SWMBO works and that more than doubles our income.

So houses have definately doubled WRT wages if not more, which explains why all married types need to have 2 jobs these days and the days of a stay at home parent are over unless one has a mega financial parasite type job.

OTOH we have 2 cars and loads of electronics we didn't have then but that is skewed by China making cheap stuff - that bubble is going to burst once they do a "japan" and get hugely rich.

[Roger Chapman]

Ten years earlier I left school at 18 with the ambition (then or shortly thereafter) to be earning £1000 pa by the time I was 20, £1500 by 25 and £2000 by 30. (In real terms I failed miserably but inflation eventually made my ambition nonsense). IIRC average income mid 60s was £1500 and £4000 would buy a reasonable house. (£4000 bought me one in 1968).

The Civil Service doesn't actually pay very well so I would have thought that in 1973-74 your father would be unlikely to be on more than £2500 gross, not £5000 net and it could have been less judging by the house price. A 75% mortgage on a £6000 house would have been achievable on a mere £1800. (Max. 2.5 time annual salary).

[Tim Watts]

Roger Chapman ( [e-mail]) wibbled on Sunday 20 February 2011

22:57:

I wonder if it was 100/month net?...

[<me9]

That's because (until recently) banks/building societies would lend out up to

5x salary, compared to 2.5x (+1 possibly for spouse) and demanded a 15% deposit (which could be reduced with an insurance policy taken out).

Houses cost more or less what the lenders will lend.

[Steve Firth]

It's in bloody Ringworm. Which is almost Dorset and would require you to marry your sister-mother.

In central HANTS a local vicarage - not really a grand house - sold for £3m. Houses like that one sell for £12-23m.