FEW economists, and even fewer comics, can claim they prophesied the 2008 crash.

Of course Simon Evans is no palm reader, dilettante psychic or seer but a messy run-in with a shifty landlord back in 2007 left him with the unnerving feeling something fishy was brewing. His hunch proved all too true.

“I turned into this Old Testament prophet, saying ‘Don’t you see? It’s coming, it’s coming,” he laughs heartily. “It was a random sequence of events. My wife and I had decided to move from London down to Brighton & Hove. The person we were supposed to buy a house from in Brighton changed their mind at the last minute so we ended renting there, just at the time when the property market seized up and went to freefall.

“It turned out not to belong to the person who was renting it to us; they had failed to pay the mortgage and it was being repossessed. We were unable to get legal redress against them. I became convinced this catastrophe was going to befall the entire country; everybody was saying, ‘No, the economy is in great shape’. But of course I was right.”

The cogs started spinning and armed with the internet, heaps of research and reference books, he set out to tame and conquer the elusive beast that is ‘the Economy.’ Stand-up became the obvious conduit to share his newfound expertise and beat some pecuniary sense into his fellow man.

“I thought, I do seem to know more about it than most comedians, because most comedians don’t want to read about heavy stuff like this and see if they can tease the comedy out of it.

“Traditional comedy is about the gap between what we like to think we’re like and what we’re actually like if you take a step back and look at it. And often money tells you that. What are the British actually spending their money on? Is it booze or gym memberships? If you take that approach to it, it’s all just about what people are really like.”

Ten years on, the master and (sole proponent of) economedy continues to impart his hard-won insights and unpick our visceral terror of straight money talk both live and on his Radio 4 show Simon Evans Goes To Market.

While his breezy yet no nonsense approach has won him legions of dosh-shy and flush fans alike, the self-confessed “money-worrier” who flies into full-blown panic at the mere whisper of investment and stocks admits he made an unlikely candidate for this economedy business.

“I’m so risk averse,” he confides. “I learnt how to invest and buy stock, but the fear which grips you and the realisation of anything that could go wrong… and then the relief when you don’t buy something and it goes down in value. It’s greater than any pleasure I’ve ever felt from buying anything and watching it go up. It’s counter-productive really but it tells you the kind of person I am,” he deadpans. “I love talking about the economy but when it comes down to it I get anxious even when I have £5 on a horse in the Grand National.”

Brits’ peculiar approach to financial matters, not least his own irrational (some may call it wise) aversion to gambling, will be duly questioned and thoroughly mocked in his new show In The Money.

“At the core of my show is our revulsion and embarrassment at the idea of engaging with the realities of money and the importance of being financially literate and making good decisions," says the 50-year-old. "One of the great topics in comedy for centuries has been sex and vulgarity. It was all about the embarrassment of sex; that’s where all the Carry On films came from. We’re equally embarrassed about money, though oddly it doesn’t come up so much. Perhaps it’s because we are so embarrassed about it that we can’t even do it in comedy.”

Like the economy, his foray into comedy was the handy work of circumstance. After studying law at university (“a mistake”, he hastens to add), he dabbled in journalism. When he was assigned to write an article on comedy workshops, he packed in the day job and gave stand-up a crack.

In light of the downturn and its crushing blow to the newspaper industry, this was a smart move.

“It’s not like you can lose your job as a stand-up and if you can hold on to your job then recessions are generally speaking not that bad. There’s always some work out there for comedians and in the last recession I did quite well because I got a lot of corporate work from people who the previous year might have been able to afford Jimmy Carr and suddenly couldn’t. So, they were asking ‘who can we get for this amount?’ But there are always winners and losers.”

Simon Evans will appear at the Arts Centre on May 25 at 8pm. To book call 01793 524481 or visit swindontheatres.co.uk.