House prices down/up??

[muffins78]

http://www.propertysnake.co.uk/

Hello, I have just found this site - perhaps you've seen it before - but 25% reduction on some properties. To be fair, some of them are on the market for a while!! Perhaps house prices are falling!!

I did see some silly prices for one bed flats coming on the market thought!!! ?235 for a weenie one bed!!!

[snoozequeen1]

Actually they don't seem to be falling that much round here (Nunhead).

Roomy 3 bed Victorian houses in Nunhead were selling for ?385,000, top, in Oct 2006. By June 2007 they were being marketed at up to ?480,000 and were selling at that price.

It looked crazy to me and I don't see why, even if some of that extreme bubble rise disappears, anyone should be crying about a "crash". It has been suggested that much of the 2007 rise was fuelled by estate agents arranging fraudulent mortgages - setting up buy to let mortgages, through which you can buy a property based just on its potential rental income, without reference to your salary, for people who could not possibly claim to be earning the 50k per annum each they would otherwise need.

I declare an interest - I am going to be selling - but was also going to be buying again, and am trying to work out what to do now.

.

The current problem is that few owners are putting their houses on the market. There are fewer houses for sale here than I have seen since the housing crash of the late 80s/early 90s, when I was actually gazumped, despite it being supposedly the bottom of the market. There were only two houses for sale across several streets of Victorian terraces and both needed extensive work.

I suppose the problem is that when the credit dries up the merry go round stops and while there will be repossessions, other people can't move or have a fixed idea that their house is worth the peak price and don't want to sell for less.

So those who do really have to buy, because of a breaking up or expanding family, still can't find a lot to choose from. Looking at the South London Press, the housing ad supplement actually seems a bit thinner than it usually is at this time of year.

There isn't a single 3 bed family house advertised to let around here either.

[tommy]

3 bed houses still being sold around the Bellenden area for 550k (have no interest in buying of selling myself)

[muffins78]

The house prices are really odd. The houses at either side of me are for sale, having been previously rented.

House A went on the market for just under ?700K. It is a four bed house. Two of the bedrooms are tiny and this would be same layout as my house - where I cant even put a single bed in the rooms, I've used one as a boxroom and the other for clothes. So the layout isn't fantastic. It has subsequently been reduced to ?640K and now back on the rental market.

House B went on the market for ?595K. It has been slightly renovated, and has three great sized doubles. Its a far better buy then House A in my opinion, even the layout downstairs works a lot better. This house hasnt been sold either.

I reckon it is the estate agents manipulating the prices. (I know there are other factors which affect price e.g. length of lease remaining etc). The prices sometimes just don't add up, comparing what other properties are for sale, and even on the same road. And at what point if you are to make an offer, are you going to look like its a joke, by going way under the asking price.

I didnt realise about that Buy to Let mortgage thing you mentioned above. Its that true?? I pay extortionate rent on my own, and I know a mortgage would be much cheaper. Its very frustrating that I don't have the salary multiplier (I am working on this :-) ) but can afford to pay rent way above a potential mortgage cost.

I agree that if prices are to come down, many people will sit tight, and wait for the market to pick up again. On the other hand, it's really rubbish that people have worked really hard to have what they have now, and with all interest rate changes, costs of living increasing, they could lose something that they have worked so hard for!!

[????]

I wish people would remeber it's their home not a bleeding 'share',it's for shelter and enjoyment! I'm glad I've no Buy to let stuff left now just a mortgage, nice house and my family...I don't care too much about the 'value' of my house.....I can't 'do' much with that value unless I'm moving to lse of Skye anyway

[Dr De Soto]

The answer to this question is going to vary street by street and home by home, but based on all the evidence I've seen so far, yes, prices are going down. It's just that sellers don't want to believe it and estate agents don't want to lose customers by being pessimistic. There's no conspiracy (it's a free market!) but there's a lot of psychology at work.

This is what's happened in a road near me:

There are more houses/flats on the market than has been the case for years.

5 houses and 2 flats have been on the market over the last six months

One of them went on at ?725kin October, and after two months was reduced to ?699. It didn't sell and was taken off the market.Another went on at outrageously optimistic ?650k, didn't sell and is now rented.

Three more are for sale in the range ?550-?650, two of them since the start of January. As I understand people aren't viewing let alone making offers. Despite all these 'prices', no house has ever sold on this road for more than ?500.

One flat went on for ?275 in October. It has finally sold for ?240-odd. Another hasn't sold.

So that's 7 properties I know about, only one sold and that was at over 10% off the original asking price (set at the very peak of the market). It doesn't mean prices have dropped by 10% (yet), because buyers almost always knock a bit off the listed price, but all the evidence is that the trend is downwards. It may take months or years to settle down. It was exactly like this in the early 1990s across London.

However, this is only a BAD thing if:

(a) you have minimal equity in your property and you need to move, or...

(b) you are planning to trade down to somewhere smaller to use the equity as a pension, or....

© you are a buy-to-let investor (though even a 10% drop in property prices isn't as bad as what's already happened to the stock market).

For everyone else (I suspect the majority of people in East Dulwich) IT DOESN'T MATTER! For those wanting to buy for the first time IT IS GOOD NEWS.

[Cassius]

However, this is only a BAD thing if:

(a) you have minimal equity in your property and you need to move, or...

(b) you are planning to trade down to somewhere smaller to use the equity as a pension, or....

© you are a buy-to-let investor (though even a 10% drop in property prices isn't as bad as what's already happened to the stock market).

Sadly for me I fall into 2 of those criteria..................:(

[MrBen]

It's pretty stagnant/falling gently at the moment but no real drivers for a bad crash other than loss of confidence. I think its not a bad time at all for a first time buyer to buy a flat if they have a deposit as sellers are offering some decent 2006 level prices. Despite all the mortgage hype you can still get a 3 year fix for 5.5% from most of the big lenders. Thats historically still very cheap!

More people seem to be renting in ED though as a result. I number of my mates have just rented their flats out within a few days. And rents are up about 10% on last year. So not all bad news.

But property is so 2007. It's all about cooking now. And cars. So lets talk about cooking and cars instead.

[snoozequeen1]

Cars? Cars are now? Cars, now (or to be precise from April 15 2008), mean biofuel.

Biofuel comes from grain and soy that's being grown on land in the poorest parts of the world, bought up by the super rich and hedge funds in the US and the UK, foodstuffs shipped out of countries where people are going hungry. Anyone heard a whisper of food riots in Mexico, people going without meals in El Salvador?

Let them eat cake? Is that now? Because it seems to me that although we were born in the 20th century, we are very willingly rerunning the 18th and the 19th. And if the hungry react as the hungry always have, we will certainly deserve it.

[snorky]

Biofuel = BioFool in most cases

Another display of how selfish and shortsighted American Policy is screwing up the rest of the world

Good work Americans !

[SeanMacGabhann]

???? said:

"I wish people would remeber it's their home not a bleeding 'share',it's for shelter and enjoyment! I'm glad I've no Buy to let stuff left now just a mortgage, nice house and my family...I don't care too much about the 'value' of my house.....I can't 'do' much with that value unless I'm moving to lse of Skye anyway"

I'm worried about how much quids and I are agreeing lately...

[mockney piers]

Well, he is a hammer you know. Can't be too far wrong now.

I wouldn't be too happy about getting into negative equity as we're planning to move within the next five years. But that hasn't happened, so I'm more or less in agreement with the pair of yous.

[cdonline]

The flat I used to live on Peckham Rye came onto the market last year for the most ridculous price. I know the aim is to get as much money as possible for your property but this was so over inflated, it was a joke. I hear it was withdrawn from the market.

There is a flat upstairs on the market that is on at a totally riduculous price. It looks as though it's been done up to a high standard, but nothing is going to hide the fact that the rooms are small.

I can understand paying full whack for something that is top notch.

[????]

Sean, we may differ in our views on how to get there, but I suspect we're pretty similar on the sort of place we'd like to be at

[SteveT]

Sean wants to live in the bookies too, eh quids;-)

[????]

Yeah, he just wants a well hidden side entry so noone sees him go in

[SeanMacGabhann]

sooner the bookies than the bleedin' slot machine place

(are we in the lounge yet? yes? ok good..)

not so sure we'd end up in all the same places and I'm less bothered about being seen these days

funnily enough Marmora Man said almost exactly the same thing to me last week quids (re: different journey/same destination) and it may be true, I dunno. I'm always surprised by how wantonly aggressive you can be to make a simple point on some of the other threads - but you've been relatively becalmed of late. Suits you...