There are many problems with real estate in the developed world, most of which lead to the eventual conclusion that investment in those markets is a very bad idea. The markets are in decline and if the United States enters a big recession as it seems to be doing, one can expect the real estate markets to decline by a much larger amount.
However, when analysts discuss the shape of the property markets in any part of the world, what they are looking at is a general trend. In other words, they are looking at aggregate data of what is happening in a particular geographical region during a particular stretch of time and while that is a very powerful method of analysis, there are usually exceptions.
To illustrate the point, here are two examples of exceptions – one of general property market health and another of the private sector.
As far as property market health goes, the Welsh property market is still going strong despite the falling apart of the nearby English property market. According to most of the analysts who regularly look at data from the Welsh markets, the general wisdom is that Wales tends to be a half-decade or so behind England in terms of economic development and five years ago England’s property market was booming. Wales is certainly one place that has bucked the trend of Western property market downturn.
As far as the private sector is concerned, one need look no further than the Land Securities Corporation. They are a very large property developer based in London that has posted gains in all four quarters of 2007 when other companies simply aren’t showing high returns on their investments. With higher investor interest and continual activity in property development, Land Securities looks to be in a very good position to ride out the storm and come out the other side in the black.
