Good morning,
Rising interest rates are increasing pressure on property investors, with 81 sliding into insolvency in the first quarter of the year. That is the highest figure in more than a decade. Firms already hammered by Covid and the rent moratorium are now facing increasing costs due to inflation and interest rate rises.
The Bank of England has signalled that it will implement more aggressive interest rate rises if inflation shows no signs of falling back.
City bosses are now warning that the UK faces a recession(£) this year.
But rising rates aren’t always a bad thing for business, says The Times (£).
Meanwhile, the highly leveraged £6.8bn takeover of Asda resulted in the supermarket paying £375.1m in interest last year, accounts have shown.
Modular housebuilder TopHat is to build Europe’s biggest “homes factory” in the UK. The Goldman Sachs-backed MMC builder says the plant in Corby will be able to produce 4,000 homes a year.
While The Guardian talks to to Nina Bhatia, John Lewis’s strategy director, who is taking the store on a journey from homewares to housing.
House price growth will almost halve by the end of the year, as affordability tightens and more homes enter the market.
Meanwhile, the latest rate rise has made it cheaper to rent a home than buy one.
That is part due to the rising cost of mortgages. MPs have accused mortgage lenders of “profiteering” as their rate rises outpace the latest increase by the Bank of England.
No wonder Dutch asset manager DMFCO is hoping to sell housing loan investments to UK pension funds.
Profits at housebuilder Wain Group have waxed by 60% to a record high.
While The Times (£) asks: what would happen if Britain just banned all second homes?
And as rail strikes make ditching the commute look increasingly tempting this week, it is revealed that 90% of staff at some local authorities already work from home.
BBC journalists are reported to be furious that the broadcaster has spent more than £10m refurbishing a news studio as it cuts staff and merges channels.
Meanwhile, campaigners in Frankfurt want to spend €426m to rebuild a Weimar-era theatre that was reduced to rubble nearly 80 years ago.
Distressed debt specialist Gramercy Funds scents an “opportunity for experienced credit investors” in the cash-strapped Chinese real estate sector. From zero exposure to the sector before Evergrande, Gramercy has built up to $200m in corporate bonds and expects to buy more.
EG Like Sunday Morning is joined by former editor and market development director Damian Wild for one last show before his move to become ING Media’s managing director. Jess Harrold gets the answers to all the important questions – why do you have a fascination with public toilets, and what is your favourite Kylie classic?
And finally, it seems our quiet campaign for all offices to become dog friendly is starting to get some tails wagging. Lawyers at Slaughter and May(£) will apparently be able to bring their dogs to the office every Friday as part of a wellbeing drive. But, we hear, that will only happen if the dogs taking part in a new trial behave well. Putting the dogs on trial seems a little unfair – let’s hope they have access to a good lawyer.
