This was what drove real estate in Spain, though places like Croatia, Turkey and Greece were not as effected...
Are you insane man? It is the most depressive thing you can ever do. Drunks, hooligans and hookers all over the place. The lowest standard of living in the whole of europe.
Greece has a per capita income less than half of GB's (about a 1/3rd of US's). In fact, it's even less than the Bahamas.
clacy, I see you what you mean, I have been to Greece though in 1999, but I have only lived vicariously through British movies to see it..I doubt I missed much. The thing is, Britain made most of its GDP through financial transactions... we are clearly seeing that this is unwinding... look at all the hedge funds leaving London in droves... the pound is what it is, its gonna take a pounding.
When you say "all over the place" you are not kidding. When i was there, all the bars are cram packed with standing room only, that how many drunks are there. The bar doesnt even have to be popular or on a main street. It will be packed at night. Hooligans are all over. England is the only place in the world I have ever been mugged, and the only country I have ever got in a physical fight when i was traveling. I dont know about hookers as I dont look for those types but I will say when i was over there, I met a girl in a bar, made out, gave her my number and the next day a guy calls me telling me he's her fiancee and he takes care of her two children and to stay away from her, so that kind of qualifies as a hooker in my opinion. I would personally rather live with natives in a hut with no electricity than live in england. Thats how bad the people are over there.
There are a lot of posts comparing Greece to UK in infrastructure, etc and in concluding that UK is so far ahead of Greece. I will respond to these comments with a supposed real conversation between a wall street banker and a fisherman. A wall street banker goes to Mexico and sees a commercial fisherman fishing with outdated equipment. The banker tells him to get retrained and buy the state of the line equipment and that then he will be able to catch more fish and make more profits and expand his business. To this the fisherman replies, "But what is the end result of all this effort"? The banker replied that you will be able to retire early, may be by 55. And then what? asked the fisherman. The banker said, "You could retire early, take it easy and just go and fish" I am doing all that already, replied the fisherman... It is the same story with Greece, and lives in these parts of the world like in Greece is in fact very good even though they might lag the west in technology.
You can bet on the long term trend of the foreign exchange of a country's currency by observing the young citizens of that country, and I have been to England and yes, Sterling will take a beating.