Kentish Express Ashford & District
Upmarket supermarkets boost market
New research (oh how Nuts and Bolts loves a good survey) has found that living close to a well-known supermarket chain can add an average of £22,000 to the value of your home.
And if that supermarket happens to be an upmarket one then the benefit can be even bigger.
The so-called ‘Waitrose Effect’ can boost the price of a property even further, by an average of almost £40,000.
So that could definitely be excellent news for residents of Ashford’s Repton Park estate, which has a Waitrose at the entrance to the estate, off Templer Way.
The report says properties close to a Waitrose store can be worth an average of £38,666 (or 10%) higher than elsewhere in the same town – the highest among the national supermarkets.
But as well as Waitrose, properties near other supermarkets can also be worth more... Sainsbury’s (£27,939), Marks and Spencer (£27,182), Tesco (£22,072) and Iceland (£20,034).
Sadly for some, the lowest house price premiums are in areas with an Asda (£5,026), Lidl (£3,926) or Aldi store (£1,333).
Mike Songer, Lloyds Bank mortgage director, said: “Our findings back-up the so-called Waitrose Effect. There is definitely a correlation between the price of your home and whether it’s close to a major supermarket or not.
“Our figures show that the amount added to the value of your home can be even greater if located next to a brand which is perceived as upmarket.
“Of course, there are many other drivers of house prices beyond having a supermarket on your doorstep, but our research suggests that it is a strong factor.”
So expect to see estate agents promoting houses as close to excellent schools, the railway station, parks – and a Waitrose!
Remember the days when people went on holiday and one of the first things they did after returning home was to take their camera film to somewhere like Boots to get their snaps of Benidorm processed into prints as quickly as possible?
Then a day or two later you’d go pick up the film and rush home to see the results and eagerly stick the photos into the family album.
But times change and now photographs are very much a thing of the past as people use digital cameras or their mobile phones to take pictures that they then store on a CD, memory stick, PC or laptop.
Yet we must still be a nation of nostalgics because new research by safe.co.uk (oh how Nuts and Bolts loves a good survey) shows that people in the South East still hold sentimental items dear, with old family photos (44%) topping the list of most prized possessions, followed by family heirlooms (30%) and jewellery (20%).
A very unheralded anniversary took place last Sunday, with the Speaking Clock celebrating its 80th birthday.
A national institution and part of Britain’s heritage, the Speaking Clock was the first of the pre-recorded information services in the UK, provided through telephones.
Created for people who wanted to know the time and did not have a watch or clock to hand, it was initially only available in the London directory area, with the first British Speaking Clock introduced on July 24, 1936.
The time announcements were automatically co-ordinated on the hour with Greenwich meantime signals.
To access the service, subscribers would dial the first three letters of the word ‘time’ as dials at the time included letters as well as numbers to aid automatic calls. Dialling T. I. M. led to its common name ‘TIM’. The service went national six years later.
David Hay, head of BT Heritage, said: “The BT Speaking Clock is a national treasure. Even though we live in the digital age, more than 12 million calls are made each year to the BT Speaking Clock to get an accurate time check.”
Jane Cain was the first voice, after winning a Post Office ‘Golden Voice’ competition, and was used from 1936 until 1963. Pat Simmons, a London telephone exchange supervisor, was the second voice (19631985). The third voice – and first male one – was Brian Cobby (1985-2007). Sara Mendes da Costa took over from him and is still doing it.
With the holiday season in full swing now that the schools have broken up, new research (oh how Nuts and Bolts loves a good survey) reveals that almost a third of UK families on holiday pinch snacks from the breakfast buffet to save money on buying food later on.
That’s because 36% of parents worry about the cost of feeding the family when away, resulting in 31% of holidaymakers taking extra food from the breakfast buffet for their lunch.
The study by Kenwood Travel (www.kenwoodtravel. co.uk) also found that, of the 1,000 people surveyed, 42.1% admitted they’d brought food with them from home so they wouldn’t have to spend money on it while they were away.