It was all above board

[johnofgwent]

I recall reading about a prize pair of arse holes who had no idea about certain company taxation rules in the late 80's in the freelance IT mags.

Then I worked with one of them.

This was a right laugh.

During a stint in Saudi half a dozen of my mates from earlier employers and contracts opened accounts in the channel islands and set about salting away money there knowing if they brought it into the UK the Tax Man would royally F@@@ Them Over. Two chose later to bite the bulet and use the funds tax paid to buy near-mansions in the UK. Fair enough. The others chose a lifestyle akin to my uncle's using their offshore wealth to enjoy life offshore (!) Look, it was six months of hell, and gave them a kings ransom. Who am I to point the finger and whinge.

But the chaps I refer to ....

Well, one of them they learned to fly, got a PPL, and bought a secondhand cessna or some such and parked it out on a private plane airfield by the A3.

They boasted to us mere mortals on the hughes aircraft job of how they had flown to the isle of man, gone t a bank there, transferred their gains from offshore accounts to the branch and thence to a couple of metal suitcase, boarded the plane and flown over their aunt's farm or whatever at zero feet and chucked the suitcases out.....

They got done for some quite unrelated tax fraud while working at TfL (sorry, LuL as it was then, on the project I joined about six months later)

I remember a project manager there over a beer saying "John, I read on your CV you worked at XXX did you ever come across two guys by the names of " ...

"No, I donlt think I did" i lied as best I could. "There were three teams there and if they were on the network systems team they never spoke to us"

[johnofgwent]

Blimey John, I wish there were valuers like that in London.

We have a small flat in a pleasant area, but it is still just a small flat. And valuations in the last six months have varied between  550,000 and a 1,000,000 pounds. And unless I want to sell up and live in a cardboard box on Hampstead Heath, it is all bollocks.

I don't like to say it, but I sometimes wonder if estate agents are entirely reliable.

That was 1988

In fact I made a bloody huge mistake about that time.

Our "two bed and a you must be bloody joking boxroom" mid terrace priced in 1983 at £24,840 on which we got a 100% mortgage of £8450 and Moira's £3600 had become too small with Emma on the way (we didn't know then all she would need was a pickle jar) and I got headhunted by a bunch of right jokers in Camberley and Hastings and other Home counties so of course I had months of interviews and house hunts at home counties prices.

The interviews were largely a con and i set about looking for something bigger in my current area. And made the classic mistake when popping into the Wimpey / Barrtatt / whatever development up the road.

When asked what my price budget was i said "oh i guess up to £100K" which was then the price of a cheap three bed semi in Newbury (for work at the airbase at Greenham for a software house) or similar in the very edge of Farnham etc for the varius defence contractors round there I'd been headhunted by

The site agent went a strange colour and said "well, you can certainly afford everything on this development, what brings you to this part of the country ?"

It was a fun hour or so looking at mansions I'd never be able to afford but I had t remember to cross them off my filofax !

[Borchester]

As I also pointed out in other threads, dual (actually multiple) income mortgage interest relief at source, which granted my unmarried mate and his mistress £60,000 of tax free interest relief on his house when Moira and I were only allowed £30,000 as a married couple, was exterminated not the moment Nigel the Nutter sat down, but six months after the budget in question.


Overnight my £39,950 home purchased and completed the week before was valued at £45,000 and by the September we were under attack from estate agents offering us valuations in excess of £89,000. That weekend a white Escort XR3 with recaro rally seats roared up the road, and when they spotted the SOLD sign on the fence I hadn't bothered chopping up, a bloke every inch the red braces DINkY hammered at my door waved a briefcase with £75 grand under my nose imploring me to sell.

He got very short shrift.

I wish now I'd taken the offer and gone To a hotel for the night.

The instant the MIRAS dual relief scheme ended my home which was then valued at 98 grand tanked along with all the others to 63 grand. Five buyers of houses up the road were instantly in 30% negative equity and were still in queer street overpaying for their homes by tens of thousands when we moved out of ours to our current abode six years later

Blimey John, I wish there were valuers like that in London.

We have a small flat in a pleasant area, but it is still just a small flat. And valuations in the last six months have varied between  550,000 and a 1,000,000 pounds. And unless I want to sell up and live in a cardboard box on Hampstead Heath, it is all bollocks.

I don't like to say it, but I sometimes wonder if estate agents are entirely reliable.

[Barry]

It was in the late 1980's, before the euro existed.

Oh, right.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-61941113

3 suitcases, one million EU beer tokens in each.

[johnofgwent]

Non-controversial anecdote:

Some years ago someone I knew was selling their house. A potential buyer turned up, literally with a briefcase full of cash, explaining that he'd buy the house "cash", but only if the sale was completed immediately. My acquaintance didn't sell to this person!

As I also pointed out in other threads, dual (actually multiple) income mortgage interest relief at source, which granted my unmarried mate and his mistress £60,000 of tax free interest relief on his house when Moira and I were only allowed £30,000 as a married couple, was exterminated not the moment Nigel the Nutter sat down, but six months after the budget in question.


Overnight my £39,950 home purchased and completed the week before was valued at £45,000 and by the September we were under attack from estate agents offering us valuations in excess of £89,000. That weekend a white Escort XR3 with recaro rally seats roared up the road, and when they spotted the SOLD sign on the fence I hadn't bothered chopping up, a bloke every inch the red braces DINkY hammered at my door waved a briefcase with £75 grand under my nose imploring me to sell.

He got very short shrift.

I wish now I'd taken the offer and gone To a hotel for the night.

The instant the MIRAS dual relief scheme ended my home which was then valued at 98 grand tanked along with all the others to 63 grand. Five buyers of houses up the road were instantly in 30% negative equity and were still in queer street overpaying for their homes by tens of thousands when we moved out of ours to our current abode six years later

[HDQQ]

Why not , did they only have euro's ?

It was in the late 1980's, before the euro existed.

[Borchester]

Why not , did they only have euro's ?

[Streetwalker]

Non-controversial anecdote:

Some years ago someone I knew was selling their house. A potential buyer turned up, literally with a briefcase full of cash, explaining that he'd buy the house "cash", but only if the sale was completed immediately. My acquaintance didn't sell to this person!

Why not , did they only have euro's ?

[HDQQ]

Non-controversial anecdote:

Some years ago someone I knew was selling their house. A potential buyer turned up, literally with a briefcase full of cash, explaining that he'd buy the house "cash", but only if the sale was completed immediately. My acquaintance didn't sell to this person!

[T00ts]

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[Barry]

i acknowledge what i am about to write is unsubstaniated barry , but i read yesterday this story about charles is a number of years old , ( from 2015) and the media sat on it , and surprisingly just as charlie criticised the rwanda debacle , decided to release it?

Keep up the good work. 5 consecutive posts in this thread in 40 minutes. Soon be ahead of the gnome. 

Never let the age of the story get in the way of a possible resource. The Queen is mortal and you anti royalists will be looking for every leverage to create a republic or 3.

[Streetwalker]

I wouldnt be so presumptuous streetwalker about the monarchy surviving. We are now approachng the natural end of lizzies reign , and entering uncharted waters for the first time since the middle of last century.

The duke of Rothesay , as the tanaiste charlie boy is known in my country , isnt popular. The media are doing their best to sell his son .

I dont know the strength of feeling in your country , but certainly the monarchy isnt popular in scotland . If we get our independence , rest assured that family are gone.

I dont think the scottish historically have had the same subservient hero worship of the monarchy as your country has had. We regularly took the crown of scots off incumbents who werent to our liking , murdered three of the stewarts , and saw them as first among equals rather than the gods above men that england thought they were.

Nothing lasts forever not even the monarchy.

It would be your countries choice if it wanted to become a republic on independence but you cant just say that family are gone . The Royals own property , The Crown estates own vast areas of land including the coast and the 12 mile limit  not to mention mining and fishing rights 

Are you planning on just taking it back , will you sieze all lands and business owned by the English, is my land in Scotland to be stolen   ?  

Yes there are few who are Royalist hero worshippers but I think most of us just think  they are part of what is in our  national DNA , they dont cost us anything and give us an excuse to have a party every now and again .

[Thomas]

Scottish support for monarchy falls to 45%, poll reveals

Widening rift on retaining the royals is revealed ahead of Queen's platinum jubilee

Fewer than half of people in Scotland say they support retaining the monarchy, according to a major new poll that reveals the cultural divides emerging within the union.


https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2022/may/15/scottish-support-for-monarchy-falls-to-45-poll-reveals

[Thomas]

Exactly. You'd expect him to insist on Great British Pounds, Shillings and Pence.
The whole story either needs substantiating or withdrawing.

i acknowledge what i am about to write is unsubstaniated barry , but i read yesterday this story about charles is a number of years old , ( from 2015) and the media sat on it , and surprisingly just as charlie criticised the rwanda debacle , decided to release it?

[Thomas]

The Monarchy will survive long after we have gone Thomas ,it may be scaled down a bit but I can't see much support for a republic bar from  the  wavers of the red flag .

I wouldnt be so presumptuous streetwalker about the monarchy surviving. We are now approachng the natural end of lizzies reign , and entering uncharted waters for the first time since the middle of last century.

The duke of Rothesay , as the tanaiste charlie boy is known in my country , isnt popular. The media are doing their best to sell his son .

I dont know the strength of feeling in your country , but certainly the monarchy isnt popular in scotland . If we get our independence , rest assured that family are gone.

I dont think the scottish historically have had the same subservient hero worship of the monarchy as your country has had. We regularly took the crown of scots off incumbents who werent to our liking , murdered three of the stewarts , and saw them as first among equals rather than the gods above men that england thought they were.

Nothing lasts forever not even the monarchy.