The U.K. commercial property market is in the middle of its worst slump on record and won’t recover for at least another two years, a report by the Royal Institution of Chartered Surveyors showed. Values for offices, stores and industrial properties may fall 25 percent by the end of 2010 as the economic recession causes rental growth to slow and property vacancies to increase, the London-based firm said. That would bring the decline...

Oligarchs favour trophy homes of white stucco with their own parking in Chelsea, Belgravia and Mayfair, but the price must be right Economic chills, including large stock market falls, have severely diminished the once prodigious spending power of the Russian oligarchs, but some can still afford to treat themselves to such British status-symbols as white-stuccoed houses in Belgravia, newspapers and the rest. The price must be right,...