House prices ‘will slump by 3% as they drop in 2012 for the fifth year running’

  • Many homeowners will face an impossible struggle to find a buyer if they want to sell
  • ‘Sluggish’ economy, rising unemployment and ‘pressured’ incomes are to blame

By
Becky Barrow

Last updated at 11:43 PM on 25th December 2011

House prices will slump by 3 per cent next year, marking the fifth consecutive year when they have fallen rather than risen, a report warns today.

It means many homeowners will face an impossible struggle to find a buyer if they want to sell.

The ‘sluggish’ economy, rising unemployment and the fact that household incomes will ‘remain under pressure’ are to blame, says the study from property analysts.

Impossible struggle: Homeowners are facing low prospects of finding a buyer should they want to sell up

Impossible struggle: Homeowners are facing low prospects of finding a buyer should they want to sell up

The report also reveals the dramatically different regional picture due to Britain’s two-speed property market.

On average, it takes ten weeks to sell a home. However, it takes just 6.5 weeks to find a buyer in London, while it takes more than four months in cities such as Stoke, Norwich and Carlisle.

The Bank of England warned last week that many homeowners are becoming ‘increasingly reluctant to trade up’.

Rather than buy a larger home, they extend their current property, or are simply squeezing into a home which is too small.

Over the past year, house prices have dropped by 2.1 per cent, according to the report.

This is the worst annual fall since the depths of the recession in 2008. In December of that year, they had fallen by 8.7 per cent over the previous 12 months, compared to  -1.9 per cent in December 2009 and -1.6 per cent in December last year.

Slump: Over the past 12 months, 78 per cent of postcodes have registered price falls

Slump: Over the past 12 months, 78 per cent of postcodes have registered price falls

Richard Donnell, director of research at Hometrack, which carried out the study, said the national figure is ‘flattered’ by the strength of the London market.

This means that the actual fall over the past year is likely to have been even higher if the price rises in the capital had been excluded.

Over the past 12 months, 78 per cent of postcodes have registered price falls.

By comparison, 43 per cent of London postcodes have risen. Many foreigners are buying homes in the capital, which is regarded as a safe haven for money during a period of such global uncertainty and economic gloom.

Prices in ‘prime’ parts of London, such as Kensington and Chelsea, have reached £3.1million, up £1,200 a day over the past year, according to estate agency Knight Frank.

The Council of Mortgage Lenders said mortgage lending will fall to its lowest level since 1977 next year.

It predicts net lending of £5billion, nearly half the amount handed out this year. Even in 2008, net lending reached £41billion.

Independent housing expert Henry Pryor said: ‘People cannot get a mortgage because they do not qualify for one. They need a huge deposit and a squeaky clean credit history.’

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Property prices will fall by more than 3% in 2012

In one and the same article you seem to see falling house prices as undesirable. Whilst complaining that people can’t get on the property ladder.
Prices need to keep falling so people can afford a home. Those already on the property ladder are no better or wosrse off unless they have bought as am investment rathat than a home. In that case they deserve to lose out.

They need to fall much, much more than 3% in the next year, which they almost certainly will. The pretence can’t go on for much longer….

3% is hardly a slump! Property prices still desperately need to drop. All the time the average house price is more than 3 times the average salary, prices are unsustainable. Most properties WOULD sell if they were priced correctly.

More senseless predictions.

With the proposed end of ‘self-cert’, increased unemployment and European woes this prediction looks optimistic, though the threat of runaway inflation is ever present.

London is a tip. A dustbin for rich rubbish from all over the world. It is incredible that our government doesn’t care who lives here as long as they have money (which real Brits don’t have). I want to puke.

You dined on the rich after you threw Churchill out, six decades ago. The “rich” nowadays are not going to be sitting targets. You best plan on getting up off your flabby backsides and producing your own wealth. And don’t look to Keynes for help.

People think that London is a safe zone, but just wait. It will start next year feom the bottom and rise up slowly until the very rich find they are unable to sell or rent their property. Its happened before and will again.

More likely to be 30% than 3%.

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