Supply isn't driving house prices – it's demand

It's not supply that lies behind Britain's housing problem, but demand, says Merryn Somerset Webb. And it's best not to count on it lasting forever.

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Buy-to-let is seemingly alive and well

When I'm in London I've started using Uber. It's having an interesting result. You won't, I know, have guessed this, but I am intensely competitive at heart and Uber drivers rate you out of five as a passenger the instant you get out of their cab. I've taken four rides now. I'm a perfect five. And I really want to stay that way.

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Merryn Somerset Webb

Merryn Somerset Webb started her career in Tokyo at public broadcaster NHK before becoming a Japanese equity broker at what was then Warburgs. She went on to work at SBC and UBS without moving from her desk in Kamiyacho (it was the age of mergers).

After five years in Japan she returned to work in the UK at Paribas. This soon became BNP Paribas. Again, no desk move was required. On leaving the City, Merryn helped The Week magazine with its City pages before becoming the launch editor of MoneyWeek in 2000 and taking on columns first in the Sunday Times and then in 2009 in the Financial Times

Twenty years on, MoneyWeek is the best-selling financial magazine in the UK. Merryn was its Editor in Chief until 2022. She is now a senior columnist at Bloomberg and host of the Merryn Talks Money podcast -  but still writes for Moneyweek monthly. 

Merryn is also is a non executive director of two investment trusts – BlackRock Throgmorton, and the Murray Income Investment Trust.