Are you getting to the stage where you've had enough ?

[Justin Smith]

I never thought I would ever want to retire, I like going to work even though these days I don't actually make much money. Fortunately I made a few good long term decisions when I set up the business, like buying my own shop with two flats above it to rent out.
But I am starting to think I have had enough, and it's not the money really, it's just getting too much hassle running a business these days and it's even worse as a landlord !
So much regulation and stuff, it's just too much, everything from having to set up a pension scheme every two years (which neither of my two employees want anyway) to spending vast amounts getting my flats up to a "Energy Performance" level where I can even legally rent them out.
What's more I cannot think it's going to get any easier, if anything it'll get even more complicated every year, even more so than life in general because as a business owner you HAVE to do all that crap they keep foisting on you. Much of the stuff we already have (like the pensions farce) was bought in under the supposedly "business friendly" Tories, so what will it be like under Labour ? ! ?
It's not all governmental either, have you noticed you have to be an IT expert to run a business ? And even worse it keeps going out of date so you have to keep relearning it....

 

[IanSuth]

Ever growing regulation is a fact of life

Ask anyone which regs they would scrap and they will list ones that affect their business but never the ones that benefit their life (which affect someone else's business)

That is why people flock to policies about "cutting red tape" or "Slashing EU bureaucracy" but nothing ever happens as any reduction in regulation adversely affects someone and those people shout loudly plus by the nature of democracy politicians are risk adverse and think "oh no, think of the possible bad publicity if I scrap x and someone is hurt (financially or physically)"

As for IT, having started in IT recruitment in 1993 (when it was newspaper ads and faxed CV's plus few had answerphones let alone mobiles", I reckon there is less to know now to run a business and the peak of tech knowledge need was the late 90's - stuff now pretty much does what it is told out the box

 

[Justin Smith]

Ever growing regulation is a fact of life

So it doesn't bother you or affect how long you are motivated to keep working ?

Bearing in mind they almost never scrap any regulations one wonders where it'll all end up !

 

[fisicx]

I’ve been semi retired for years. And now it’s mostly passive income.

Not sure I’d ever want to have a business that relies on keeping up with regulations.

 

[TMark]

I'm currently watching the early 80s comedy series Yes Minister for the first time (I was too young back then!) Watching in 2024, firstly what a treat - they're flipping hilarious with some superb performances! But more to the point, it's fascinating how many of the themes are still relevant today. One such theme being that the cutting of red tape and bureaucracy is a quick and easy way to appeal to the masses. A bit of red meat to lob to the voter to get them on board.

I'm instinctively suspicious whenever I hear or read a politician, newspaper editorial or general populist blowhard calling for red tape to be slashed, a bonfire of regulations, etc etc. While it's important to reassess the relevance of regulations and cull what's not working, regulations are, I believe, generally a good thing and a mark of a civilised society. Of course it can be tiresome for those of us who run a business.

But then we go home and, thanks to regulations, enjoy certain protections, rights and safeguards, whether it's related to a consumer purchase, an outdoor location, some building work, a meal, or whatever.

I wouldn't want to live in the kind of society where our representatives gave in to the understandable but shortsighted hunger to rip up rules.

 

[IanSuth]

So it doesn't bother you or affect how long you are motivated to keep working ?

Bearing in mind they almost never scrap any regulations one wonders where it'll all end up !

I just live with it

If specialists in a field call for a regulation to change I will listen to them - but I have come to realise a lot of regs are "think of the children" regs and you are banging your head against a wall trying to stop them or even harder reverse them.

Let's take an example which is sort of relevant today - cyclists are fighting increasing calls for compulsory helmet use. I was a member of MAG for years so saw all the stats around motorcycle helmet use - the stats basically say that you don't save many useful lives (as in a lot of those you save are vegetables rather than dead) and the increased weight on the head increases neck injuries PLUS you have the risk compensation effects of people feeling safer with a warm insulating helmet on so ride faster/more recklessly. But if you asked 1000 members of the public i reckon 999 would say it is a necessary law because it feels like it must be ( although Australian research over cycle helmets found it decreased usage as it made people feel the activity was dangerous if you were made to wear helmets to do it, which is counter to risk compensation theory)

Can you imagine any politician ever saying "Helmets are actually costing the NHS lets stop the compulsory usage"

Maybe a solution should be all new regulations have a sunset clause and a set of targets in them - if they don't objectively meet their target by a set date the regulation expires.

That is the only solution I can think of which stops politicians being too scared to repeal anything

(PS I don't want a debate on helmets, I was just using as an example of something the majority "feels" must be right so no one will begin a debate even)

 

[Justin Smith]

I'm currently watching the early 80s comedy series Yes Minister for the first time (I was too young back then!) Watching in 2024, firstly what a treat - they're flipping hilarious with some superb performances! But more to the point, it's fascinating how many of the themes are still relevant today. One such theme being that the cutting of red tape and bureaucracy is a quick and easy way to appeal to the masses. A bit of red meat to lob to the voter to get them on board.

I'm instinctively suspicious whenever I hear or read a politician, newspaper editorial or general populist blowhard calling for red tape to be slashed, a bonfire of regulations, etc etc. While it's important to reassess the relevance of regulations and cull what's not working, regulations are, I believe, generally a good thing and a mark of a civilised society. Of course it can be tiresome for those of us who run a business.

But then we go home and, thanks to regulations, enjoy certain protections, rights and safeguards, whether it's related to a consumer purchase, an outdoor location, some building work, a meal, or whatever.

I wouldn't want to live in the kind of society where our representatives gave in to the understandable but shortsighted hunger to rip up rules.

I very much agree about Yes Minister, in fact I got 24 episodes on CD which I often listen to in the car, hilarious.
Not so sure if I agree with you on the regulations thing, it's just going too far now. All the "low hanging fruit" has been covered and they're getting increasingly disproportionate now. Huge cost (in financial term,s or just time) for relatively little benefit. Or, in many cases a nett negative effect. One of the reasons there is a massive shortage of rental properties is there is so much complicated regulation now, and the latest (that all properties must have an EPC over a certain level) has been the straw that broke the camels back for many landlords. They just sell up and get out of it. I wonder how long it'll be before you cannot sell a house without an EPC of a certain level ?

To get back to "have you had enough?", I really am starting to think I have.
When one wakes up in the night remembering yet another thing one has to sort out "or you are breaking the law", it's time to get out. Problem is my lad might want to eventually take over my business and he's only 11 at the moment ! ! !

 

[Justin Smith]

Maybe a solution should be all new regulations have a sunset clause and a set of targets in them - if they don't objectively meet their target by a set date the regulation expires.

I think you'll find that hardly any of the regs they're introducing now (everything from Landlords electrical inspections to banning parents videoing their kids at school events) have any basis in objective statistical research at all.
It's just somebody saying "that could potentially be dangerous, we'll regulate it (or even ban it altogether)".

 

[IanSuth]

I think you'll find that hardly any of the regs they're introducing now (everything from Landlords electrical inspections to banning parents videoing their kids at school events) have any basis in objective statistical research at all.
It's just somebody saying "that could potentially be dangerous, we'll regulate it (or even ban it altogether)".

Which is why I said I think it is the only solution i can see.

As for schools banning parents videoing - only time it has happened to us was because the cash strapped school had sole the reproduction rights to a company for a cut of sales and wanted all vids of the show bought through them - nothing to do with regs purely to do with £

And for every landlord saying "regs go too far" there is a horror story of a rogue landlord (or today's story that housing for asylum seekers will be excempted from the new regs). What went wrong for landlords is that the market is broken - in many places there is no choice and no choice means no efficient market, people have to take what they can get no matter how bad as it still beats the street.

No free market means regulation has to step in.

 

[Justin Smith]

And for every landlord saying "regs go too far" there is a horror story of a rogue landlord (or today's story that housing for asylum seekers will be excempted from the new regs). What went wrong for landlords is that the market is broken - in many places there is no choice and no choice means no efficient market, people have to take what they can get no matter how bad as it still beats the street.

No free market means regulation has to step in.

Pretty much all landlords think there are "regs too far", and on the other hand I think the "rogue landlord" thing is vastly over blown. Think about it, it makes no sense, if you own the property, to let it go to rack and ruin, nor, assuming the tenants treat the place well and pay the rent on time, is there any reason to want to kick them out. On the other hand if they do one or both of those things why should the government make it so difficult for landlords to get tenants out ?

If you are saying the market is broken because there is an insufficiency of rental properties then making life difficult for landlords is going to do the opposite of improve the situation !

 

[IanSuth]

Pretty much all landlords think there are "regs too far", and on the other hand I think the "rogue landlord" thing is vastly over blown. Think about it, it makes no sense, if you own the property, to let it go to rack and ruin, nor, assuming the tenants treat the place well and pay the rent on time, is there any reason to want to kick them out. On the other hand if they do one or both of those things why should the government make it so difficult for landlords to get tenants out ?

If you are saying the market is broken because there is an insufficiency of rental properties then making life difficult for landlords is going to do the opposite of improve the situation !

I think you overestimate some landlords

I have personal experience (all be it many years ago)

I was a student without a bankers reference, my mum had just left my stepdad for emergency housing so there was no way i could get a guarantee. So I took the only housing i could get. A room in large Victorian house where the landlord just wanted a months rent as deposit plus a month up front, it was let out to 9 different tenants although with partners and the fact we sublet the cellar to a student band (who then moved in) we got to 20 living in it.

Environment health were around so often we knew how each took their tea and coffee, it had 13 outstanding rectification notices against it but the landlord (a local taxi driver who only took rent in cash collected on the 1st of the month in person) kept asking for paperwork to be translated or saying his brother owned the property so enforcement was dragged out. Some of the issues were "minor" like wanting a sink in each .om but others like the fact if it was raining you got a shock from one of the indoor light switches were major and 2 weeks before i moved out the boiler was condemned and lockwired off (leaking CO).

We opened some of the many bits of post that kept coming from the Halifax and he was not paying the mortgage and due repossession (despite our monthly payments combined being over double the mortgage payment). We were really worried we would be turfed out just pre exams but that didnt happen. Our final tenancy month would have been the June and most of us graduated mid month so we just refused to pay the last months rent and told him to keep the deposit - 6 mths later the house was on the market being sold as a repossession for £119k (we had been paying over £1500 pcm between us), it is now worth over £900k having been renovated totally.

My son and elder daughter are students (1 in coventry/leamington and 1 in West London) they both have friends with similar horror stories (i have ensured they dont have similar by reading contracts etc) - there are a multitude of landlords and more so dodgy lettings agents preying on young and/or inexperienced and desperate people and ripping them off/ endangering their life's (one of son's friends lived in a house where for 2 months they had to step across joists with no floorboards on the landing)

I think the issue is those landlords / letting agents know it is a 1 year let and they can just gouge people for as long as possible for as much as possible paying out as little as possible

Whilst the rules make your life a pain they (if the councils could be bothered) are meant to give housing departments something to beat iffy landlords with.

 

[IanSuth]

@Justin Smith i should say your experience from inside the housing sector vs my outside observer looking in is likely similar to mine and your different experience of motorcycle helmet laws.

Those looking in always outnumber those with knowledge and shout louder - hence the ever increasing regulation and media paranoid politicians unwilling to to do anything that might possibly lead to any story that paints them in a bad light.

Hence why only mandatory sunset clauses would stop it getting worse (but won't roll back existing laws & regs) and I can't think of any politician who has suggested similar EVER (although Lempit Opik admitted it was very sensible in a conversation i had with him once)

 

[Justin Smith]

Maybe my increase in my retirement thoughts isn't just to do with the ever increasing regulatory burden, but just time catching up with me ! I just haven't got as much desire to put up with hassle and stress any more ! !

 

[IanSuth]

Maybe my increase in my retirement thoughts isn't just to do with the ever increasing regulatory burden, but just time catching up with me ! I just haven't got as much desire to put up with hassle and stress any more ! !

That may be a point - everyone gets to that "sod it - do want you want then, I am going over here into my corner to sulk" moment, and as you get older they get more frequent as I think we all become less likely to be bothered with the fight

 

[Justin Smith]

That may be a point - everyone gets to that "sod it - do want you want then, I am going over here into my corner to sulk" moment, and as you get older they get more frequent as I think we all become less likely to be bothered with the fight

I agree with you other than the bit about going into the corner to sulk. If one doesn't actually need the money and we've all got a limited life span anyway so one wants to enjoy life, one could just as easily say continuing with a business that is giving you more and more hassle, and limiting ones life outside of it, is "unwise" ?

 

[Justin Smith]

I'm currently watching the early 80s comedy series Yes Minister for the first time (I was too young back then!) Watching in 2024, firstly what a treat - they're flipping hilarious with some superb performances!

I am regularly listening to my Yes Minister CD in the car, and the best one is........
Party Games.
An hour long special where Jim Hacker ends up as PM.
Exceptionally funny, even after listening to it a dozen times I still laugh out loud !

 

[fisicx]

What’s a CD?

 

[Justin Smith]

What’s a CD?

It's a bit like an LP, but smaller.

 

[wayzgoose]

It's a bit like an LP, but smaller.

And has pretty colours

 

[Justin Smith]

And has pretty colours

How many birds have been saved from flying into windows by old CDs being stick on them ?
That's the question.

 

[IanSuth]

And has pretty colours

Some of my old LP's have pretty colours - especially the 10" ones

 

[Kerwin]

I am regularly listening to my Yes Minister CD in the car, and the best one is........
Party Games.
An hour long special where Jim Hacker ends up as PM.
Exceptionally funny, even after listening to it a dozen times I still laugh out loud !

I'm not sure if serious but you know there is Yes, Prime Minister as well right?

 

[Justin Smith]

I'm not sure if serious but you know there is Yes, Prime Minister as well right?

This is defn a "Yes Minister" show, probably the last one I would assume as he ends up as PM !