In a recent article (FT 29/7/08), Gideon Rackman, argued that clichés are in effect truisms, based upon the received wisdom of crowds; or to put it another way, you are more likely to get the right answer asking the audience than phoning a friend.

On this basis if I write a blog full of clichés, it is bound to be more accurate than one without them, so here goes:

On the 9^th August we reached the tipping point of the Credit Crunch when BNP Paribas effectively declared that two of their hedge funds were sicker than a dead parrot.

A year on we would appear to be in a perfect storm, but how did we get here? Are we at the beginning of the end of our troubles yet, or merely the end of the beginning?

By Autumn it was clear that the good ship Great Returns From property was holed below the water line and retail investors, always late to the party, rushed for the life rafts of this rapidly sinking ship.

By December brave investors had stepped up to the plate to buy from the funds who were forced to sell, but by January it was clear that they had caught a falling knife and the market in New Year was flatter than a dead cat bounce.

Buying investments based on last years’ values is clearly like driving only using your rear view mirror.

Any hopes of a resurrection following Easter, where dashed when the green shoots of recovery, being nurtured by the agent community, were left withered in the ground by cold blast of Arctic realism blowing into MIPIM with the banking community.

The collapse of Bear Sterns shortly thereafter showed that no one was too big to fail.

Through early summer until now a Mexican Standoff has continued, with sellers either not able or willing to put their heads above the parapet, to be shot at by the big guns of the opportunity funds.

The elephant in the room is of course the question how the banks will react, now there appears to be no relief in sight (not even in September).

Dawnay Day has shown that it’s not always the banks problem if you owe them £2bn.

Come the autumn we’ll be ready and willing to run a few ideas up the flagpole to see who salutes, but for the time being we’re happy to wait for blood on the streets.

They say that good entrepreneurs are always looking ahead and predicting the future.

Guy Naggar and Peter Klimt’s Dawnay, Day has been amongst the smartest and most entrepreneurial property investor of the last cycle, as illustrated by the early listings of Dawnay, Day Carpathian and Dawnay, Day Treveria in 2005 to satisfy the new demand Central, Eastern European and German property investments.

Unfortunately, they are also the first high profile casualty of the downturn with administrators having been appointed to various Dawnay, Day businesses. I am sure many will write Dawnay, Day’s obituary claiming the business grew too big and too fast as they ventured into sectors they did not fully understand.

This may be true but the early acceptance of the situation and the appointment of an administration may also be a sign of Naggar and Klimt’s business nouse? Reports suggest they had taken steps to quickly dispose of assets well before BDO were appointed as the administrator by creditors.

Did management realise that in the face of a Force Nine Property Recession they could stand and fight against a rising tide or simply surrender and allow themselves the breathing space to reinvent themselves ahead of the next market recovery?

Business theory states you should never throw good money after bad and you should take hard decisions as soon as it is obvious a venture will fail. Have Naggar and Klimpt made this tough call before most property investors have even realised the full extent of their problems? 

As the Kenny Rogers’ sang “You got to know when to hold em, know when to fold em, know when to walk away and know when to run.”

What are the chances that despite (or because of) their early exit that Naggar and Klimt will return as  succesfull investors once they spot the dawning of a new cycle?

(PS. I don’t have commas in all the wrong places that is how they write it. )