Following on from rather gloomy news last week about Leeds and Holbeck and the continuing pressures on the Spanish mortgage and property market and the international market in general John Howell Associates one of the leading international but UK based legal firms has announced it is to close from the 10th July. Whilst covering other countries John Howell’s biggest, market was Spain
John Howell states that to cash flow business; given a 75% drop in incomes expected; he put in £ 100k of his own money last year and clearly cannot commercially sustain this until the market recovers.
There are signs of recovery in the purchase market with higher levels of property in Spain being sold in the last few weeks but recovery is slow and will take time; for some firms the recovery will come too late.
Although recovery of the overseas market would be greatly enhanced if lending was more readily available for the right clients and those willing to use larger sums of their own money a mortgage should still be possible and bargains are widely available.