Phil Spencer (television personality)
Phil Spencer (born 11 December 1969) is a British television presenter who appears with Kirstie Allsopp in a variety of home-buying programs on Channel 4 including Location, Location, Location and Relocation, Relocation.[1] Spencer also writes for Lusso Magazine.[2]
Career
Phil is the chief executive of Garrington Home Finders,[3] a property search agency he established in 1996 to help buyers with property search, negotiation and purchase process. It was his promotion of Garrington and the concept of using a buying agent to find a home that led Spencer to become the co-host of Location, Location, Location and Relocation, Relocation.[citation needed]
Criticism
Location, Location, Location has been fiercely criticised by many for ramping property prices, most recently by the BBC's Panorama (June 2nd 2008) which identified it as one of the property programmes that contributed to a property bubble.[citation needed] In an article in the Sunday Telegraph (April 13th 2008) the presenter suggested that the falls in property prices at the beginning of 2008 should not be viewed as the cracking of a bubble and that property was still a good long term investment. In a furious backlash, respondents to the newspaper described him as a "confidence trickster" and a "smarmy snake-oil property-porn merchant". He was accused of "peddling tripe" and told he had "helped to cause harm to thousands of families".[citation needed]
Personal life
He married his long time partner Fiona; they have two sons, Jake and Ben. Phil grew up in Littlebourne, Kent. He currently lives in the exclusive Tonsleys area of Wandsworth, London, SW18.
Spencer is a celebrity sponsor of the 2008 SOS Children's Villages UK's World Orphan Week.[4]