In today’s property surveying blogpost topic we are going to taking a look at the investment value of property versus one of the now most popular new currencies out there – Bitcoin.
To start with, let us take a look a property. We all know what property is, whether it is a flat, garage, house, bungalow, or a plot of land. We are all familiar with what it actually is and what you can actually do with it.
Over the years, property has been one of the most volatile investments available in the market, however, it has also been an incredibly safe investment, especially if you are shrewd enough to know where and how to invest in property.
Bitcoin is a digital currency that actually operates free from any central control of banks or governments. Unlikely the majority of other currencies out there, Bitcoin actually relies on person-to-person, peer-to-peer or company-to-company cryptography.
This means that Bitcoin is very much driven by supply and demand and is free from political change that can come with currencies as we know them.
With all the hype and buzz these days around investment, we thought we would take a look at property versus Bitcoin over the past year, so you can best see if the new school has indeed beaten the old school.
This blogpost is going to make a number of assumptions and generalisations, however, the percentages will indeed be current as of the time they are printed.
To start with, let us look at Property
Over the past year, UK property prices have increased by circa 10.2%.
There are a number of reasons for this and believe it or not covid-19 actually did have an effect on the overall supply and demand of housing.
Effectively, this means if you invested £1 into the property market over the past year, you will have seen a 10.2% increase today.
Now let us take a look at Bitcoin
Bitcoin, despite all the hype and press behind it, has actually gone down by 9.94% over the past year.
This effectively means that, had you invested £1 in Bitcoin a year ago today, you would actually be at a loss of 9.94%.
Another point to bear in mind is that, whilst crypto currency is modern and a lot more popular than conventional bricks and mortar, it is also a lot more volatile.
This effectively means you are going to have to know a great deal more about it than you need to know for a conventional flat or house investment.
One thing we are very mindful of here at Stokemont is that unlikely crypto currency and Bitcoin, property also has the added bonus of being able to work for you.
Yes, you had it right, so long as you know what you are doing, you can actually make money whilst owning the asset through the very nature of renting the property.
By renting a property, you are not only gaining the benefit of a monthly income, you are also going to get the natural price increase likely to occur, assuming the house price index continues to grow as it did over the past year.
As RICS Chartered Surveyors and RICS Registered Valuers, here at Stokemont we do like to keenly watch property prices and ensure our valuers are fully informed of any fluctuations and changes.
Equally, we understand that in order to be a good property valuer, one has to have an overall understanding of what the markets are doing and this can translate into precious metals, crypto currency and conventional stocks and shares investments.
Our biggest and best piece of advice here at Stokemont for any potential investors, whether it is in Bitcoin or property, would be carefully consider how you are going to invest your hard earned money and ensure you have a well-rounded and considered investment portfolio.
This can easily be achieved by diversifying what you are investing in and ensuring that, if there are any individual fluctuations, such as the dip in Bitcoin over the past year, this will easily be balanced out by your investment into the UK property market.
If you would like to discuss your property valuation matter with our team of RICS Chartered Surveyors and RICS Registered Valuers, give us a call today and we will be more than happy to assist you.
