The ‘Buying Your First Home During Covid-19’ webinar will look at how the first-time buyer market in Northern Ireland is currently performing and the types of properties and associated price ranges that this particular customer are most interested in. The panel will look at the trends and insights into how the market will perform throughout 2021 and some of the important economic indicators that first-time buyers will need to be aware of. There will be information on the current mortgage market for first time buyers and the types of finance available to them.

SPEAKERS

Samuel Dickey

In 2016 Samuel joined one of the largest independent estate agents practices in Northern Ireland as a Partner. Simon Brien Residential cover the entire province and are involved in sales, rental and valuation of property of all types and sizes.  In 2004 Samuel qualified as a Chartered Surveyor and is the Residential Spokesperson for the profession in Northern Ireland.  Samuel is also a Board Member of Co-Ownership Housing.

Jordan Buchanan

Jordan Buchanan is the Chief Economist at PropertyPal, acting as the spokesperson for the company and a trusted subject matter expert on all UK and Northern Ireland economic and housing matters. He currently sits on the Board of Co-Ownership, Northern Ireland’s shared ownership provider.

Jordan is an experienced economist and research professional and has published extensive analytical research on key issues affecting the UK and NI economies. His recent work includes research on Brexit and other macroeconomic risks, the labour market and the housing sector. Jordan is skilled in economic modelling and alongside colleagues in the University of Cambridge, has developed a macroeconomic forecasting model of the UK economy and a gravity trade model to estimate the economic impact of Brexit. Jordan has also developed economic forecasting models to understand future growth patterns in Northern Ireland. Jordan lectured in Economics in the Ulster Business School and is a regular commentator across a range of media outlets.

Neil Conlon

NI Property Finance LTD MD Neil Conlon is a Chartered accountant and Financial Adviser. Neil has over 15 years’ experience in Finance and Property.

Neil was previously a Finance Director of a leading Northern Ireland estate agent for 8 years, joining the company in the aftermath of the Property Crash, and help guide it to Estate Agent of the year in 2016 and 2017.

During the downturn Neil acted as Fix Charger receiver on the largest administration in Northern Ireland, furthermore he took property strategy and disposal instructions from the PWC, EY and BDO during the recovery phase of the property market.

NI Property Finance and Wealth offers a full range of financial services and also provides a bespoke personal service for assisting clients to purchase buy to let properties and build property portfolios.

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The post Tanya McGeehan, Managing Directory, Featured in Belfast Telegraph appeared first on MCG Property Group.

Tanya McGeehan, managing director, MCG Investments

“In the property industry in Northern Ireland for the short term the two key areas of focus for MCG Investments were action that might be taken by Government to support first time buyers and confirmation of the expected decision to extend the freeze on stamp duty.

“We are delighted that the Budget has announced positive news on both fronts. The government ‘help to buy’ scheme which we must see operational in Northern Ireland will assist new buyers to the market with a minimum 5% deposit. Those buyers will also have the additional comfort that the treasury will underwrite a chunk of their loan as part of a guarantee agreement with lenders. We also welcome the extension of the freeze on stamp duty until the end of June which will in the first instance ensure that deals on the brink of completion do not collapse, and more importantly continue to stimulate the local market which remains buoyant as we move into the spring.”  […]

Source: https://www.belfasttelegraph.co.uk/business/ulsterbusiness/analysis/the-budget-reaction-from-across-northern-ireland-business-and-industry-40156010.html

The post The Budget: Reaction from MCG Investments appeared first on MCG Property Group.

The ‘Commercial Investment in 2021’ webinar will examine the impact the pandemic has had on Belfast and look at the regeneration plans for the next five years. There has been an increased number of retail brands permanently closing their doors in recent months, leaving behind numerous derelict commercial buildings in Belfast city centre, and the panel will provide an insight into the current demand and supply for commercial property in Northern Ireland, discuss the barriers to UK and international investors investing in Belfast and what areas need improved on, to increase the demand from investors.

SPEAKERS

Robert Mulligan

Robert Mulligan is a property developer with projects in Northern Ireland, London & the South West of England, active across various sectors including student, commercial & residential.

He founded Farleigh Property, based in Wimbledon before forming the Bristol based Farleigh Rengen which is a leading developer focussing predominantly on Bristol and Bath including having completed over 100 new student units in 2020 alone.

Robert’s group of companies currently has 11 developments under construction employing approximately 300 construction workers across the UK.

David McNellis

David McNellis is a graduate of the University of Ulster and a Member of the Royal Institution of Chartered Surveyors. He joined Lisney in 1986 and was appointed a Director in 1994.

David heads up the Commercial Agency Department and has approximately 26 years experience in the property industry. He specialises in the acquisition, sale and letting of commercial property across Northern Ireland acting for landowners, property companies, institutions and private Individuals.

Simon Hamilton

Simon is Chief Executive of Belfast Chamber of Trade and Commerce. After graduating with degrees in history/politics and law from The Queen’s University of Belfast, Simon began his career as an auditor at PriceWaterhouseCoopers. Prior to taking on his current role with Belfast Chamber, Simon served as Minister of Finance, Minister of Health and Minister for the Economy in the Northern Ireland Executive.

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Our webinars were also featured in some other news media, you can find copies of those in the gallery below.

Belfast Telegraph 19.02.21 Webinars press release

Newsletter Webinars Coverage 16.02.21

The post MCG Investments Webinar Series Featured in News Media appeared first on MCG Property Group.

The second fact, is that I am writing this between the joys of home-schooling three hyper children and trying, like many of you, to keep my business going at the same time.

That said, no excuses, as I intend to give you my own thoughts on where I see things in the residential property market, here in Northern Ireland, in the time ahead.

Better still, I intend to go further than that, and bring some other industry leaders in to this conversation in the weeks ahead to pick up on the insights I am offering in this piece.

The Why – Covid-19 outbreak

As I write this, the fundamentals are sadly that over 1m people in the world have been diagnosed as positive for this virus. In UK and Ireland terms we have lost in the region of 8,000 of our neighbours, family and friends to this disease. That is a shocking loss of life and obviously the most important thing right now!

After we have recovered from being ill, the world economic outlook would suggest that financially we may also become sick.

These really are unprecedented times. In response, to a greater or lesser extent, the entire private sector is technically being nationalised by the Governments. There is a myriad of problems with this both short and long term but those issues are not for now.

In these very uncertain times for us all there is a lot of noise out there. It is important, in this new normal, to use our new found ‘head space’ to assess how we are going to position ourselves in the weeks and months ahead. Put simply we need to focus on what our plans are to position for success on the other side of this tsunami.

Recently I have read publications from some property experts offering their views in the current challenging climate. One earlier this week, from Jordan Buchannon, Economist at Property Pal was particularly noteworthy and I found it, in the main, merging with my own recent assessment of where things stand. Thanks to my business mentor Gavan Wall for encouraging me to share my own thoughts in this blog. I am doing my best to become more comfortable being uncomfortable!

The Fundamentals – Why Property

“As safe as houses” is not an accidental term. Property has proven to be an obsession in Ireland and the UK and here in Northern Ireland citizens continue to be driven to “get on the property ladder”. It has proven reliable in the long-term for growing our assets and wealth or simply in having the security of owning our own homes.

When my late father retired from the Bank in 1993 and started his property journey interest rates were at 12 %, hardly an incentive to borrow money to start investing in bricks and mortar. Despite that reality, he did just that and built up a very sizeable portfolio that is still performing solidly to this day, long after we lost him to illness sadly in 2012.

The attraction to property, apart from the emotion of owning something, is that it provides safety, security, capital growth, cash-flow and when done properly, can enable us to reap rewards in the short and long term.

Covid-19 has not, and will not change that basic pillar. Property remains, for me, the place to invest funds now and in the future.

At the beginning of this year, despite the first two months of stormy weather, do you remember that? (we all complained!) yet the property market in Northern Ireland was having its best start in several years with lots of activity and signs of a prosperous year ahead.

Our current prices remain well below the pre -financial crash (2008) and it looked as though 2020 would be the year to see those differences with other regions of the UK market close. Put simply, we had in the region of 35% to grow in to compared with others.

Why is this different to the financial crash in 2008?

Let’s be honest…

This feels different, this is different!

If you were in property back then, we all made mistakes. We did too! Anyone who was dealing at a reasonable level had at least one bad deal. We had one really bad deal and a couple of smaller ones! They hurt, but they weren’t fatal thankfully.

The truth is we all royally messed things up! Banks, developers, agents, everyone! We all got carried away in a haze of easy credit and inflated values! We all deserved some pain and boy did we get it! It was, in large part, of our own making and now 12 years on, we are at least able to admit that!

This time, we aren’t to blame. Unless we were working in the World Health Organisation (WHO) or leading governments (Get well soon Boris, if you are reading this in St Thomas’ Hospital) we didn’t see this coming and now we are all, as the hashtag suggests “in this together!”. I have other views on that!

As I have been writing this blog the seriousness of the potential economic situation is emerging. The ‘R’ word recession is everywhere. There is talk of the EU project failing. There is talk of output falling by 10% in NI alone. My take on this, is that this is all about the uncertainty of things! Remember Brexit… When we have a clear exit strategy from the measures in place currently, a certain level of confidence will return in my opinion to enable us to switch the lights back on!

MCG Investments – Six Success Steps

I do not claim to be an economic expert and there may be readers who disagree with my assessment, and that is absolutely fine. They may be better qualified and better placed in their fields. For me, what I am absolutely clear on, is that we all need to have a plan to emerge from this! Our plan is forming in my own mind, based on the following:

1. There can and will be no enforced punishment on banks or developers like there was before, for being irresponsible. We will return to normal business in that regard.

2. This is a pause in the market, not a stop, and we are positioning ourselves to press play as soon as social distancing measures are relaxed.

3. The property market is not like the financial markets, it takes time to correct and is not instantly volatile to external shocks. We are planning for a modest dip in the market in the region of 5% initially.

4. We are then planning for a bounce back in values, later in the year when the supressed demand from Quarter 2 (2020) assuming we return to normal life no later than July/August 2020.

5. Interest rates are at 0.10 % and will remain there for a long time until we all assess the damage across our respective industries from essentially switching off the economy.

6. At MCG Investments we see this as a massive opportunity for us and our investors for “sticking to the knitting” in terms of being aggressive in the market investing in property in the short and long term. Post 2008 we were aggressive, but not aggressive enough- lesson learned!

Now you know what we are going to be doing for the rest of this year! What will you be doing?

What next

I hope that you enjoyed my first blog on property. Between the home-schooling, the never-ending kitchen routine and the one daily exercise outing I have really enjoyed writing it. Thanks for reading!

As a follow up, I am delighted to announce that I am hosting a NI Property expert panel Q&A (via zoom) next Thursday 16th April when you can hear first hand their perspectives on the current climate and what the future holds.

Details of this event, including the panel members, time and the link, will be announced on my LinkedIn page @Tanya Mcgeehan over the coming days.

I will finish with this, long before we had an economy, we had a society and always will, so in the here and now, look after yourselves and your families.

Stay safe and well.

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