 
Quick Move Blog
Monday, 30 June 2008
According to Hometrack, house prices have fallen by 3.2% compared to a year ago. This is the 9th month in a row that prices have fallen, with the average house now priced at £170,500, down from £176,100 this time last year.
At the weekend Professor Stephen Nickell, a leading housing advisor to Gordon Brown, warned that it would take until 2015 for the property market to start booming again. He also warned that the “severe rationing” of mortgages was preventing first time buyers from taking advantage of falling house prices, preventing affordability from improving.
The figures also show that sellers are taking a record length of time to sell their properties - on average it takes 10.3 weeks to receive an offer, up from 6 weeks last year.
The number of new mortgages approved for house purchase has fallen again, to a new low.
According to the Bank of England, there were 42,000 mortgages approved in May, 28% lower than April, and 64% lower than a year ago.
This is the lowest since the Bank began reporting the figures in 1993 and the number of approvals has now fallen for 13 consecutive months.
Philip Shaw, chief economist at analysts Investec, described the figures as "terrible". The Council of Mortgage Lenders and the Royal Institution of Chartered Surveyors have warned that property sales this year would fall by between 35% and 40%. The Land Registry revealed last week that the number of house sales slumped by 50% in March compared with the same month in 2007.
"They are clear evidence in the change in attitude among mortgage lenders and home buyers," said Ed Stansfield, of Capital Economics. "People no longer want to borrow and those that do want to borrow are not being allowed to by the lenders.
"The implications of this is that the market is going to remain pretty weak for some time with a significant downward movement in house prices. We are off the scale. We have never been anywhere near as low as this in activity levels and mortgage approvals."
Monday, 23 June 2008
Latest figures from HMRC shows that house sales have fallen by 32% in 2008.
There were 504,000 sales in the first five months of 2008 compares with 743,000 (these are house sales above the notification limit for Stamp Duty).
The figures show that in May alone sales were down by 37% on last year at just 98,000.
According to the property website Rightmove, sellers now outweigh buyers by a ratio of 15 to 1.
"It's a sign that properties are taking longer to sell so there are more on the market," said Miles Shipside of Rightmove.
Thursday, 19 June 2008
HBOS, the UK's largest mortgage lender, today predicted that house prices in the UK will fall by 9% this year.
In a trading update, HBOS said the housing market remained "subdued" and the number of transactions this year would be down by 45% on 2007's level.
Today's forecast is a change to their statements earlier in the year: In February, HBOS said house prices would be "flat" in 2008. Then, in April, the Halifax house price survey predicted "a mid single digit percentage decline".
The bank is also seeing a rise in arrers: The proportion of its mortgages which are in arrears has risen from 1.3% at the end of December 2007 to 1.43% at the end of May.
Tuesday, 10 June 2008
The number of houses being sold has collapsed to its lowest level in 30 years, according to latest figures from RICS.
The average number of houses sold by estate agents in the past 3 months was 17.4% lower than a year ago - almost a third lower.
Tim Edmonds, an estate agent and RICS member, said: "Transactions have virtually halted. Where sales have been agreed, it is very difficult to get them through to exchange."
This trend is reflected in our own FTI survey, showing that a sale has a 50% chace of falling through.
The report also highlights the return of 'gazundering' - the practice of buyers dropping their offer price after thay have agreed to purchase. In many cases, buyers are refusing, or unable, to hand over any money to purchase a house.
Monday, 9 June 2008
The article, which can be seen here, was part of an article about the troubled state of the housing market. The article examines some of the issues facing buyer and sellers, and suggest ways to ride out the credit crunch. The article comments: "Property chains are fragile – according to property website www.quickmovenow.com, today’s sellers face a 50 per cent chance of deals falling through, thanks to the current uncertainty in the market."
quickmovenow.com's unique FTI index, whose latest monthly report can be seen here, is in a good position to become a commonly referenced signifier of the state of the housing market. The monthly figures it produces gives a remarkable insight into the state of the housing market, unavailable almost anywhere else.
Thursday, 5 June 2008
House prices has suffered their sharpest fall in 15 years, accordng to latest figures released from Halifax.
According to the Halifax's figures, prices fell 2.4% in May, with prices down 3.8% on this time last year.
Howard Archer, chief economist at Global Insight, said: "The latest data on the housing market are undeniably alarming. Clearly, the downward pressure on house prices coming from stretched buyer affordability and tight lending conditions is now biting hard."
Despite this fall and the pressures on the house market, the Bank of England has left interest rates unchanged tod ay, due to increasing inflationary pressures.
Tuesday, 3 June 2008
The latest data from the Land Registry confirms recent reports of house prices falling.
Their most recent data shows prices falling by 0.2% in April, reducing annual house price inflation to 2.7% from 3.6%.
April was the 8th month in a row in which annual house price inflation has fallen.
There are big variations between regions.
Property prices have fallen during the last year in the East Midlands, Wales and the West Midlands. In London, they are still nearly 7% higher than a year ago.
The mortgage drought, which has been brought on by the credit crunch, has led to a 30% slump in the number of sales going through.
The Land Registry's figures show that in the three months to February, there were, on average, 72,479 sales per month.
That was down from the monthly average of 103,141 seen in the previous three months.
|
| |
Quick House Sale Calculator
Fall Through Index
Refer a Friend
T: 0800 068 3366 
Email Us 