With Storm Doris now making her way onto UK shores, the Met Office has issued weather warnings across the country, declaring that the ‘weather bomb’ is likely to cause significant damage to buildings and houses.
In fact, the storm may be far more damaging than first predicted, with experts saying it has since gone through a phase known as ‘explosive cyclogenesis’. There’s no doubt that reported winds of up to 80m/ph will cause havoc among residences in affected areas of the country.
And as your beloved roof panels try to withstand a very tough test, now seems like as good a time as any for those homeowners without home insurance to consider the range of options out there.
Finding a home insurance plan that works for you
For most of us, our home is the single most valuable asset in our possession, which makes a robust home insurance policy essential to protect a property against all manner of eventualities.
Recent national research led by Consumer Intelligence shows that the average cost of home insurance coverage has increased by an average of 1.8% in the past year. This means that a standard policy is likely to cost around £124, and even more for over-50s for whom the increase is as much as 3%.
However, it’s not enough to just go for the cheapest price you manage to find; it always pays to check what is actually covered in each package. From weather damage to theft, there are a wide range of factors to consider – so make sure you double-check the lot before signing on the dotted line!
In what is now an annual tradition, leading comparison website Which? have announced their definitive UK supermarket rankings.
The results follow a nationwide survey in which over 7,000 shoppers from across the country were quizzed on a broad range of customer satisfaction measures, both in store and online.
The best
Renowned upmarket grocer Waitrose topped the overall in-store experience for the third year running, coming in with a customer score of 74% overall. That said, Waitrose were only marginally ahead of both Marks & Spencer and, perhaps surprisingly, Aldi.
But while both Waitrose and Marks & Spencer gained plaudits for their spacious store layouts and helpful staff, Aldi was highly commended for its fantastic value for money and quality own-brand products. Aldi’s prominence also indicates that the average price of goods was a major factor this year.
Meanwhile, Iceland ran away with top spot in the online supermarket rankings with 77% customer satisfaction, another surprise.
The Worst
On the other end of the scale, Tesco, Sainsbury’s and particularly Asda suffered poor in-store scores in comparison. This was largely down to the unavailability of popular items and average food quality compared with other supermarkets.
Asda also ranked joint bottom of the online rankings, along with Sainsbury’s and Waitrose. All things considered, it doesn’t look like it’s been the best year for the bigger supermarket names, with many people seeming to seek an alternative option for their weekly shop.
The results in full
Waitrose – 74% in-store/71% online
Iceland – 69% in-store/ 77% online
Marks & Spencer – 73% in-store only
Aldi – 72% in-store only
Lidl – 72% in-store only
Morrisons – 70% in-store/74% online
Sainsbury’s – 67% in-store/ 71% online
Tesco – 66% in-store/74% online
Asda – 62% in-store/71% online
Ocado – 76% online only
This week, Communities Secretary Sajid Javid announced the UK Government’s plans to revitalise the UK housing market, stating that the current system is ‘broken’.
But what makes Javid’s plans any different to that of his predecessors? It’s a fair question given that housing has been somewhat of a perennial problem facing the Government for the past thirty years. In fact, the challenge of home ownership has never seemed more daunting, particularly for first-time buyers.
In an interview with Sky News, Javid unveiled plans to support small construction firms in their goal to build more houses. A £3bn loan fund is now in place to help these firms build more than 25,000 new houses by 2020, and up to 225,000 in the long term.
Fixing our broken housing market
Today the average house costs almost eight times the average person’s annual earnings – an all-time record in the UK. Such a high housing cost is a significant barrier to social progress, savings and disposable income, especially for the ordinary worker living in Britain.
The government plans for housing are laid out in full in a long-awaited white paper entitled Fixing Our Broken Housing Market. The report is available to download here.
However, Labour have already begun to question these plans in Parliament, with housing spokesman John Healey MP questioning whether this statement of intent is enough to solve the housing crisis faced by millions of people.
It does seem to be a step in the right direction, at least, but is it enough?
This week, the Bank of England made its annual growth forecast for the year ahead, stating that we can expect 2% economic growth over the course of 2017 – a figure that’s bang in line with the government’s inflation target.
While that’s all well and good, what does it actually mean for our standard cost of living, and what has been happening with market prices over the past 12 months?
The key thing to weigh this rise inflation against is the change in average living wage over the same time period. Now, the average wage is just over £28,000, up from £27,600 in 2015, which indicates an increase of approximately 1.5%.
source:https://www.ons.gov.uk/employmentandlabourmarket/peopleinwork/earningsandworkinghours/bulletins/annualsurveyofhoursandearnings/2016provisionalresults
This would lead us to believe that people are 0.5% worse off now than they were one year ago, however it really depends what household factors affect each individual household. Let’s take a look at some key areas of the consumer market to see how specific prices are faring in general.
Housing
According to the Land Registry, the average UK house price at the end of November 2016 was £217,928 – which shows an increase of approximately 7% in just under a year. The average monthly rent is up too, from £819 to £839 over the same period of time.
Experts say that the housing market has already started to indicate signs of recovery after an initial period of uncertainty and weakness following the vote for Brexit.
Energy
The cheapest gas and electricity price rate in January 2016 was £765, according to MoneySavingExpert.com. However, the cheapest price in January 2017 was up by around £70, jumping to £834 overall.
This rise has largely come over the past three months, although it was on the horizon for some months prior to this. Raw energy is generally priced in US currency, which makes the pound’s collapse against the dollar particularly significant for large energy providers, and which explains why we’re seeing such a hike in price over a rather brief period of time.
Food
Perhaps a little surprisingly, food prices were in fact down by 1.7% over the previous year, which means the average family is saving about £2.50 on their weekly shop. It may not seem like much, but for a product applicable to us… every little helps, right?
source: http://www.retailtimes.co.uk/brexit-not-impacted-shop-prices-yet-latest-brc-nielsen-index-shows/
When mobile banking was first introduced as an SMS service in the early 2000s, few could’ve predicted the rapid development that would follow over the course of the next 15 years.
These days, every major high street bank offers a responsive mobile banking app that allows their customers to access account information, statements, make payments and transactions within just a few shorts clicks. Providing you can connect to the internet this makes mobile banking extremely convenient, especially if you’re in a hurry to check your balance or transfer funds.
But what other good reasons are there for you to download a mobile banking app to your mobile? Let’s run through them now…
Keep track of your finances
The ability for customers to check their balance at a moment’s notice is great for those who wish to get a tight handle on their daily, weekly and monthly expenditure. And although there may be certain aspects – such as viewing a list of all direct debits – that you may only be able to do with conventional online PC banking, soon we expect the functionality of both services to be more or less identical.
Many banking apps also offer a well-designed analytics function that allows users to see their main outgoings and how much money they have been spending in comparison to previous months.
It’s just as secure as online PC banking
The fact is that mobile banking is just as secure as traditional PC banking, and follows more or less the same login and password structure. And even if you log in to your banking app and immediately lose your phone afterwards, most apps will log you out after a very short period of inactivity.
This is the future
The growth of the mobile industry is astounding when you look at the figures. A recent national forecast from Statista suggests that the number of smartphone users in the UK will reach just under 45 million this year, which is 70% of the British population.
And that figure is only going one way right now. As a natural development of this rise in usage, mobile banking will become more and more prevalent, and so banks will invest more and more into creating increasingly responsive mobile apps to seek out an edge over the competition.
Despite the relatively mild months of November and December, January’s air has brought with it a discernible nip. As the temperature falls we’re all more likely to give into temptation and hit the heating on; at the expense of a low heating bill at the end of the month, of course.
Electricity-wise, the darker mornings and evenings are also far more likely to see us switch on the lights for an additional few hours every day. Plus, as people generally wear more layers of clothes in winter it’s easy for the washing machine and tumble dryer to be constantly whirring away, particularly in a family household.
So, what exactly can the average UK household do to keep their back pockets in check? Rest a little easier and let Evolution Money run you through some of the best tips out there…
Optimise your timings
The price of gas is the same whatever time of day you choose to put the heating on. This means that, to save as much money as possible, you should be considering two simple factors: outside temperature and occupancy of the house.
Once you’ve worked this out, you’ll be in a good position to work out your most cost effective routine. Bear in mind that most modern boilers now have a timer function, so you can set the heating to turn on for half an hour or so just before you wake up or return home from work.
Change those light bulbs
Although this is a relatively common tip that you’ve probably heard before, we can’t recommend switching to compact fluorescent light bulbs (CFLs) enough.
These bulbs use an average of 75% less energy than your standard light bulb, which could actually save you up to £100 per year on your electricity bill, particularly if you have a lot of bulbs in your house.
Switch to a lower washing temperature
Heating water can prove to be one of the biggest drains on your energy usage. So instead of automatically going for a high temperature on your washing machine, consider flicking the dial a few degrees downwards.
This can save you a surprising amount of money per load, particularly if you are washing clothes for the whole family on a regular basis.
When George Osborne announced in July last year that he was planning to impose a much higher tax rate on the properties of wealthy non-doms living and working in the UK, many people said it was about time that the strange loophole was sewn shut.
Now an almost identical tax is being rolled out to international parents who plan on sending their UK-based children a loan to buy their first house. These loans will now effectively be subject to inheritance tax, just as a direct investment in the property would be.
The new legislation is likely to affect thousands of international parents, and is expected to discourage them from funding purchases of property on British soil. And it’s not only parents who are subject to the new rules – the imposition has no limit of guarantors and will also cover other family members, trusts and companies.
The difference between ‘loans’ and ‘gifts’
The reason a parent may choose to send a high-value loan rather than a gift is simple: security and culpability. With a gift, the child has unlimited access to the funds and may spend them however they like, with no expectation that they will ever have to return the money.
Sure, a parent is able to pass their son or daughter a cheque for £20,000 towards their new house, but without legally documenting the payment as a loan, the child is technically free to do with the money what they wish – which is an understandingly worrying prospect for parents.
During the past 12 months, house prices in the UK have risen by an average of +4.5% nationwide, a similar rate of inflation to that of 2015. All UK regions experienced house price growth to varying degrees, most notably East Anglia which saw its biggest increase since 2010 (+10%). (source: The Telegraph)
Surprisingly, house price growth in London fell sharply compared with the previous year, going from +12% in 2015 to +3.7% this year. This meant that, for the first year since 2008, house price growth in London actually fell below the UK average.
On the whole, the rise in house prices is being attributed to a national supply squeeze. Fewer homes on the market mean that the cost is still rising steadily, despite other pressures on affordability. This made 2016 a particularly challenging year for first-time buyers.
With the new year now upon us, housing experts are looking ahead to 2017 in an attempt to forecast what’s on the horizon for the property market over the next 12 months.
What’s likely to happen?
Even though the general feeling of uncertainty is definitely still there, the prevailing thought among many housing experts is that house price growth will slow down compared to 2016.
As the knock-on effect of Brexit continues to unravel, it’s difficult to predict a precise rate of growth with any real conviction. However, it’s more than likely that house prices will continue to rise, though at a slower rate than what we’ve seen in 2016.
Anyway, we feel it won’t be long before we see the impact of low mortgage rates, low supply and low foreign investment in the housing market post-Brexit – but the nature of that impact remains to be seen. Perhaps a slightly easier prediction is that there will likely be no silver bullet for first-time buyers looking to get their first foot on the property ladder.
It’s no secret that our gas and electricity bills tend to grow a tad larger during the festive period. Now is the time when friends and family get together, share a mince pie or two and stick on a Christmas film. With the heating on, of course.
But while energy usage inevitably increases, millions of UK residents are now expecting a far more expensive utility bill than usual. Rising wholesale gas and electricity costs, coupled with further green taxes, now mean that the average cost of gas and electric may go up by as much as £100 over the next 12 months.
Why exactly? Well, many large energy suppliers are putting the price hike down to a knock-on effect from Brexit. Raw energy is generally priced in US currency, which makes the pound’s collapse against the dollar particularly significant for large energy providers.
How can you cut down your energy bill over the festive period?
There are quite a few obvious steps you can take to cut down your energy bill over Christmas, most of which are probably common sense and best practice all year round.
If you or your family are walking around the house in a T-shirt with the heating on, it’s time to heed your father’s advice and invest in a woolly jumper. Of course, if you do decide to turn the heating on when you get home from work, make sure you turn it off once your ideal temperature has been reached. Keep doors and windows closed to keep the warmth in. A draft excluder always helps.
The same goes for lights – switch them off when you leave a room! Energy saving bulbs are well worth the investment and can cut down on cost over the course of months and years.
As for Christmas lights, perhaps it’s best to set a limit for when you turn them on each evening. A few hours here and there is certainly better for your budget than leaving them running all night long, which can also be a major safety hazard.
Evolution Money wishes you a very Merry Christmas, and a Happy New Year!
Credit cards have been the norm in the UK for a while now – since 1966 in fact, when Barclays first introduced their inaugural Barclaycard to the masses. It quickly proved popular with the public and the credit card network has been expanding ever since.
Fifty years on, over half of British adults own a credit card, but now our concept of credit, and indeed money, seems to be evolving yet again. And we’re not just talking about contactless payment.
Several consumer spending experts, including current chief executive of Barclaycard, Amer Sajed, have recently been talking about the gradual demise of the traditional plastic card in favour of seamless payments and wearable technology.
No doubt that future generations will have little practical use for coins, cash or cards; so, what will payment methods look like in 50 years?
Wearable technology
One very interesting prospect is the advances in wearable technology and how this might feed into our daily routines.
Barclaycard themselves have already developed prototype rings, bracelets and keychains which all contain a microchip that allow the wearer to make a payment with a simple swipe. It’s a novel idea for a few reasons, especially when you consider that it’s a lot harder to lose a ring or a sturdy bracelet compared with a wallet or purse.
Even though these items are currently little more than display models, it’s exciting to think that such technology is already well on the way to being introduced.
The immediate future
For the time being, it’s unlikely that credit cards will go out of fashion anytime soon; but the question of whether they will eventually become obsolete is certainly more when than if.
In fact, at the rate which digital technology is currently developing, it wouldn’t be a surprise to find the shift happens a lot sooner than we think.
Representative 22.93% APRC variable.
For a typical loan of £26,600 over 180 months with a variable interest rate of 19.56% per annum, your monthly repayments would be £484.00. This includes a Product Fee of £2,660.00 (10% of the loan amount) and a Lending Fee* of £763.00, bringing the total repayable amount to £87,030.00. Annual Interest Rates range between 11.7% to 46.5% (variable). Maximum 50.00% APRC. *Lending Fee varies by country: England & Wales £763, Scotland £1,051, Northern Ireland: £1,736.
Think carefully before securing debts against your home may be repossessed if you do not keep up repayments on your mortgage or any other loan secured against it. If you are thinking of consolidating existing borrowing, you should be aware that you may be extending the terms of the debt and increasing the total amount you repay.
