ROOF Blog

Research by the Royal Institution of Chartered Surveyors has found that estate agents believe house prices will rise in the coming three months to counteract a drop in supply. It was the first time since May 2007 that agents predicted an increase in house prices. RICS also found signs of an increase in market activity, with the average number of sales completed by each estate agent rising to 12.7 in the three months to June, up from 11.7.

According to the latest National Housing Planning and Advice Unit’s survey on housing, attitudes to new housing developments need to change ‘as a matter of urgency’. More than half of current homeowners (51 per cent) would object to new housing being built in their area, despite continuing home affordability issues where as many as 90 per cent of young people cannot afford an average first-time buyer’s house. By comparison less than a third of non-homeowners (31 per cent) would object. Despite the average house price fall of 22 per cent, almost nine out of ten young people cannot afford to buy an averagely priced first-time home.

House builders are drip feeding homes on to the market so they don’t flood the market and cause further price falls industry experts warned yesterday. The practice is ‘widespread’ among large scale builders such as Barratt, and they blamed a lack of competition between developers of large sites for the problem, as greater competition would bring more houses to the market.

New research from the National Housing Federation reveals north England’s rural population has been ‘overlooked’ by policy makers, while facing the dual challenge of ‘staggeringly’ high house prices and ‘crippling’ low incomes. The research found that 86 per cent of the north’s most expensive house price districts are predominantly rural and almost 66 per cent of England’s most deprived rural areas are in the north. The federation has called for the government to create a ‘northern rural way initiative’ to combat the current economic crisis.

The decline in property values and a drop in sterling has sent London tumbling down the list of the world’s most expensive cities for expatriates, according to the Mercer survey. London came third out of 143 cities in the poll last year, but has dropped to the sixteenth most expensive city this year. Tokyo topped this year’s rankings, followed by Osaka, Moscow – last year’s most costly city – with Geneva and Hong Kong taking the other two places in the top five.

House prices remained steady in June for the second month in a row, while demand from potential buyers outstripped the supply of homes on the market, analysis from Hometrack has found. The average cost of a property remained at £155,600 for the past two months, while the average rate at which house prices are declining in year on year figures has slowed, down 8.7 per cent in June from 9.6 per cent in May. Hometrack said that rising sales, a dwindling supply of homes on the market and increasing demand were ‘underpinning’ prices at the current level.

Latest figures from the Royal Institution of Chartered Surveyors show that the pace of house price decline slowed in May, while sales picked up. Around 6 per cent of estate agents said property values had risen in May, while 42 per cent said prices fell. Buyer inquiries rose for the seventh consecutive month, and at the fastest rate in a decade. The number of transactions completed in the three months to May was 11.8 up from 10.6 in April, although it remained 31 per cent lower than the same period a year earlier.

Meanwhile Communities and Local Government has released figures showing the average cost of a home jumped 1.1 per cent during the month. The annual rate at which prices are declining is easing slightly to 13 per cent, down from 13.6 per cent in March. The annual average house price paid by first-time buyers in April was 16 per cent lower than a year ago, while prices paid by owner occupiers were 11.9 per cent lower.

Borrowers over 45 have been hit by rising unemployment and falling house prices, and declaring themselves bankrupt at the highest rate of any other age group. Accountants Wilkins Kennedy found that 38 per cent of individuals who were declared bankrupt last year were over 45, and this figure had doubled in the past five years. The research found that as house prices fell people no longer have the equity in their homes to rely on in difficult times.

Fewer young people are living independently than ten years ago, and more households in the private rented sector are headed by young people aged 16-24 than in owner occupation and social housing combined, according to a study by the Chartered Institute of Housing (CIH). Young people say that they are excluded from home ownership and shared ownership because the costs are too high for them to meet.