London has had a heck of a ride when it comes to real estate. The additional governmental intervention in New York has made London the center of finance for the world.

As such, real estate prices have tripled over the past decade. New statistics have show that the market has declined in the past year. But the word on the street is that the  market has just stopped as the world financial markets are all over the place.

For those of us in the United States we have become accustomed to a declining housing market. Now the important question is have the British learned from our mistakes?

My guess is a big nope.

The London property market blazed a trail for Britain’s decade long housing boom, which saw average prices more than triple between 1997 and 2007, according to Nationwide Building Society, one of the U.K.’s biggest lenders. But prices have fallen 9.4% in London in the past year, as layoffs and the specter of evaporating bonuses rein in spending among those still employed.
“I’ve never seen such low volumes, and I’ve been in the business 25 years,” said Peter Rollings, managing director of Marsh & Parsons, a London real-estate agency. “The first five months of the year were OK, but since then, volumes have fallen off a cliff.”
Across Marsh & Parsons’s 14 outlets in the western part of the city, agents typically receive some 200 inquiries a week. In early September, the agency recorded only around 140 weekly inquiries, and by late in the month, that number had shrunk to just 25. via WSJ.com

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