Dear Gerry,
I, am listening to your show here at home
Why? Because I have being unemployed now for one year, for the first time in my life
I have being working for the last 32years and I have never being unemployed in my life before now
In the last year I have lost practically all my pension (625,000 Euros) pension now worth 21,000 k
That after 32 years
At 54 years living at home with two children and no prospect of work anytime soon, things don’t look to good
Having saved up and paid into this pension arranged for me by my bank at the time.
I am discussed with the Bank’s Advisers and management companies that were supposed to be managing my pension at a fee of 3.75% each year, what a rip off!
I recently got a letter in the door telling me that my pension provision was not sufficient to pay me the expected pension in 12 years time and I was advised by the same bank to immediately stump up 1200 Euros each month to top up my pension
There was an 1890 number that I could call if I had any enquires
I decided to call this number just to off lode my anger at the gall of this shower of crooks
I got through to a 26 year old gent who was on a 6 month contract and he was just sitting out his time to get his pay and then off to Australia
The bottom line was he could only tell me what I might be able to receive in a pension payment if the Markets were to re-cover
There was sense that the Bank was responsible for any wrong doing
I had my own business and I employed 6 people for 10 years, paying all my taxes and theirs
When last January I had no choice but to bit into my pride and go to the dole office I got the shock of my life
Sorry I was not entitled to any payments (Dole) because I was self employed
I am not looking for anything from you or your show Gerry
I am just taking the time to inform you of the absolute carnage that is out there at the moment and anything remotely to do with Banks, Financial advice, Politicians, Insurance, Health Insurance and best of all Wealth management
Is likely to be met with a double barrel shotgun from this house!
I would do the same to any politician
Yesterday the EGM of Bank of Ireland again just showed that the same Crooks are still in their fat seats, their fine offices and holding on to their outrageous salaries
Despite calls from the floor for the 13 or so Directors to resign, there was no response from the stone faces of the Board
And now with the motion passed giving the 50% majority amendment I fear the rest of my life investments will be stolen from me by the incompetent government and handed over to faceless foreign investors who have no commitment to Ireland .Just like they did with Eircom!
Anyway back to my Dole entitlements
I occurred to me that the latest unemployment figures were just another example of fiddling the numbers
As I am not entitled to any Dole payments I do not have to go down to the dole office and register every week or month
It occurred to me that I must not show up on the statistics that come out with the published unemployment numbers
Sure enough! Only those, that are in receipt of the Jobseekers benefit are in the figures
So this means that the approximately 65 thousand “X Self-employed persons do not show up as part of the unemployed figures and there are the 65 thousand people that left the country last year
And we must not forget the 125 thousand people that are on useless courses on how to polish your nails in FAS to consider (That’s another days work Gerry)
So the real unemployment figure is about 600 thousand and rising!
I still consider myself one of the fortunate ones and we will muddle our way through this latest depression (having gone through the 70′s and the 80′s)
I have a small mortgage and thank god enough savings to keep me going for now!
This is a letter of caution to anybody listening to the vested interests now coming on to the air ways in the last week or so claiming it’s now a good time to buy property, don’t you believe it!
I count myself lucky because I always followed a few simple rules when buying property.
And so I never lost money on property bought over the years
Here are the 4 rules
- Pay no heed to what the seller says he wants for the property (as in his value)
- Find out what the property will realistically get on rent (Let’s say you can get 800 Euro every month for the property) that gives a total annual rent of 9600 euro then!
- Multiply this figure by 10 (this is the worst case for interest charged by the Bank for the mortgage) so you get a figure of 96,000 thousand euro
-
Walla this is the true maximum value of the property and this is the amount you should pay and no more.
Follow these simple rules and you will never have trouble with your repayments.
The bad news is that current property values are still way out of line with true values and this is why the Banks will now only lend at 2.5 times annual salaries.
This, by the way is now dictated by Brussels.
Since the average wage is heading down, even at the current 30,000 euro this suggests that the maximum average worker can afford is now a 70,000 mortgage
So prices will have to reflect this new reality I’m afraid!
for what it’s worth ,I believe that apartment s in Dublin will drop down to around 60 to 80 Thousand Euros ,again keeping the rule in mind “what rent can I get ” with rents falling I believe the most you will get soon in Dublin will be 6 to 700 Euros depending where in the city you go!
This is what you would expect in the rest of Europe, we are just getting back to the normal levels that would be sustainable for this economy.
I am dispensing these pearls of wisdom in the firm hope that they will help somebody in these times of distress.
Thank you for your time Sir,
