Britain's Millionaire List Shrinks in Face of Recession
THE GUARDIAN: UK has 242,000 millionaires, down from a peak of 489,000

Britain's millionaires' row has nearly halved in size due to the slump in property and share prices.

The number of millionaires in the UK has fallen from 489,000 at the peak of the economic boom in 2007 to 242,000, reducing the elite club to 2003 levels. Soaring property prices stoked a boom in the British rich list but the collapse in the housing market has suddenly reduced the net worth of thousands of former property millionaires.

The Centre for Economics and Business Research (CEBR) said a very large number of people had entered the lower echelons of the rich list due to the runaway property market and had dropped straight out again once prices faltered, falling 17.7% in the last year.

"Having just crept over the threshold, most of these people have crept back under it again - many, perhaps, without ever knowing that they had become millionaires for a temporary period," said Douglas McWilliams, the chief executive of CEBR.

Owners of buoyant share portfolios have also seen their asset base deteriorate, with a 70% drop in City bonuses also playing a part in the decline. >>> Dan Milmo | Wednesday, May 27, 2009

The Party’s Over in Dubai
TIMESONLINE: Local banks are in trouble and property prices have crashed. Is the bubble about to burst?

Lorna Davidson and her husband Mike gave up Leicester for Dubai this summer looking for a better life. They didn’t find it. The marketing jobs they thought they had in a property firm were withdrawn the day after they arrived and they cannot find alternatives. Nor can they get a mortgage to buy a flat.

“We were told we had jobs at 25,000 dirhams (£5,000) a month and that we could get a property with a 10% deposit,” said Lorna, 24. “There are no jobs and the banks won’t lend without 40% upfront.”

It’s of little comfort to the Davidsons that they are not alone. After a few months when oil-rich Middle Eastern states seemed immune to the effects of the banking crisis and the global economic slow-down, the credit crunch has crashed on to the biscuity shores of the Gulf with the force of an economic tsunami.

With struggling local banks being bailed out, liquidity drying up, the property market transformed from a bazaar of eager buyers into a den of sellers, and the government creating a crisis committee to tackle the slump, observers are asking: is the Dubai bubble bursting?

“Confidence has collapsed,” said Mustafa Alani of the Dubai-based think tank, the Gulf Research Center. Chris Dommett of John Charcol Dubai, a mortgage advisory firm, added: “People have really begun to fear a crash.” >>> John Arlidge | November 30, 2008

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