| UK
House Prices Situation at 26 10 2007: Short-term fluctuations
but little real growth
UK
House Prices Forecast: Overall weakening trend in most
areas
IMF
Report Highlights Risk of Housing Downturn
A
new report published by the International Monetary Fund
has highlighted the risk of a downturn in Britain's property
market.
The
report's authors found that average UK house prices
are currently nine times average income - up from only
five time average incomes in 2001. The report concluded
that UK house prices were overvalued by around 40%, giving
considerable cause for concern.
Rightmove
Reports Price Rise In September!
Despite
reports of falling prices, Rightmove reported an average
increase in property asking prices of 2.6% in the month
to October 6th.
However,
it should be noted that these are asking prices - not
selling prices - and there is no guarantee the properties
will sell for these figures. Even if they do, this increase
only reverses August's fall of 2.6% in average prices
- leaving a net gain of just 0.1%.
Highlighting
this overall slowing trend, Rightmove's rolling three-month
average growth rate dropped from 1.5% to just 0.5% - probably
a more accurate reflection of market conditions.
Rightmove
also reported a burst of three-bedroom properties being
put on the market in the week before the HIPs programme
was extended to include three-bed properties, and suggested
that this distortion could have been responsible for the
increase in asking prices.
Rightmove
Commercial Director Miles Shipside suggested that many
sellers will need to adjust their expectations to changing
market conditions, commenting that in recent weeks sellers
have "been given an unmissable message that the market
has changed and they need to price realistically."
FT
House Price Index Shows Slowdown
The
Financial Times has just published its most recent house
price index, covering September. The index is
made up of data from several sources and shows a slowdown
in the annualised rate of house price growth from 9.4%
in August to 8.8% in September.
Perhaps
more interestingly, its monthly growth
rate has halved since March - falling from 0.6% to 0.3%
in September.
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