Be Patient and wait before buying a house.....

Housebuyers may have to wait a year for better market conditions, say economists

David Budworth


Homeowners hoping for a revival in the housing market could have to wait at least another year, economists have warned, as rising unemployment, a squeeze on household finances and problems in the mortgage market continue to exert pressure on prices.
Economists have cautioned that it is too early to say that the market, which has already fallen about 20 per cent, has turned a corner. Most are sticking to forecasts of a 25 to 35 per cent drop in prices from top to bottom. They think monthly mortgage approvals must double to 70,000-80,000 before prices can stabilise or start to rise.
A barrier to that scenario is the continued shortage of good mortgage deals, especially for first-time buyers. At present, homebuyers with a deposit of less than 40 per cent are excluded from the most competitive deals, while good loans for those with a deposit of 10 per cent or less have all but vanished in recent months.
Easter traditionally marks the peak time for house sales and before this year's holiday there have been tentative signs that the property market is awakening. Nationwide Building Society said house prices rose 0.9 per cent last month, the first increase since 2007. A separate, closely watched survey from the Bank of England showed mortgage approvals jumped 20 per cent in February to 37,937, the highest level since May 2008.

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Adding to the more positive mood, the Halifax index for the first quarter of this year showed the smallest quarter-on-quarter fall in prices since the first quarter of last year. Meanwhile the Royal Institution of Chartered Surveyors (RICS) said that interest from potential buyers rose for the fourth month in a row during February.
But Howard Archer, chief UK and European economist at IHS Global Insight, thinks house prices will not bottom out until mid-2010, by which point they will be 15 per cent lower, at mid-2003 levels.
He said: “Housing market activity is still very low by long-term norms and any pick up in activity over the coming months is likely to be gradual and fitful. Soaring unemployment, muted wage growth and unwillingness of many people to commit to buying a house when they are fearful are likely to continue to weigh the market down.”
Jeremy Leaf, of RICS, said: “Potential buyers continue to come through estate agency doors but without mortgage finance, transaction levels are likely to remain close to all time lows. Worryingly, the lengthy process of obtaining a mortgage, even for those with big deposits, is contributing towards the blockage in the market.”
That could begin to change after HSBC unveiled a 4.99 per cent deal for borrowers with a 10 per cent deposit. A survey from the Bank of England showed that banks and building societies expected to lend more to homebuyers over the next three months. However, this has yet to be seen.
There is evidence that cash buyers have started dipping their toes back in the market. This perhaps explains why new buyer enquiries have been strongest in London and the South East, areas popular with the sort of wealthy buyer with money to spend. Cash sales now account for 40 per cent of transactions as some older, richer buyers turn to property as a more lucrative alternative to low-paying deposit accounts.
However, the critical state of the economy, which is expected to remain in recession until next year, means that even buyers who are convinced that property is cheap are treading warily. Unemployment recently hit 2 million, and some analysts think it could climb to 3.3 million next year, the highest level since official records began in the 1970s.
Household budgets also remained under pressure as food prices have continued to rise. Even though housing affordability is improving it it still not back to the levels at the bottom of the last downturn.
Roger Bootle of Capital Economics said: “There is little evidence that the rise in buyer interest is feeding into sales activity. House prices will fall further.”

UK housing trends ~ Down, Down, Down......

House Price Reports

UK house prices continue to crash at an alarming pace

Well that was short lived, no sooner had the "green shoots of recovery" appeared last month (in relation to house price growth) then the true overall trend re-emerges, downwards...
House prices have fallen 17.7% year on year and approx. 20% from their peak - in September 2007. It's also useful analysing the 'swing' from positive to negative; from 15% positive to 17.7% negative has taken twenty months, this is unprecedented during the (circa) twenty five years of house price data collation.

With falls now accelerating it's more important than ever that first time buyers remain increasingly vigilant ensuring they buy at future 2010 prices; perhaps negotiating a discount of 15% off the asking and or valuation price in order to insulate themselves from further falls.


Martin Ellis;
"The average UK house price declined by 2.3% in February. This monthly decrease more than offset January's 2.0% increase. Prices in the three months to February compared to the previous quarter, which provides a better indicator of the underlying trend, were 3.6% lower...
Whilst market activity remains at very low levels, there are some tentative signs that activity may be beginning to stabilise. The house price to earnings ratio - a key measure of housing affordability - has fallen to its lowest level for six years.

Continuing pressures on incomes, rising unemployment and the negative impact of the dislocation of the financial markets on the availability of mortgage finance are, however, likely to mean that 2009 will be another difficult year for the housing market."

LLOYDS BANKING GROUP HOUSE PRICE INDEX
Ket Statistics
February 2009 (seasonally adjusted)
Annual change
-17.7%
Monthly change
-2.3%
Average Price
£160,237
.
Key facts
House prices declined by 2.3% in February. This fall more than offset January's 2.0% increase (revised from 1.9%). Historically, house prices have not moved in the same direction month after month even during a pronounced downturn. For example, prices fell for seven successive months in 1989 but subsequently increased in three of the first ten months in 1990 even though the overall trend in prices was downwards.

Prices in the three months to February compared to the previous three months - an indicator of the underlying trend - were 3.6% lower. This is slightly below the quarterly rate of decline of 5-6% recorded consistently between June 2008 and January 2009.

House prices in February were 17.7% lower on an annual basis. The annual rate of change (measured by the average for the latest three months against the same period a year earlier) fell from 17.2% in January to 17.7%. The UK average price has returned close to the level in August 2004 (£159,799).

-The house price to earnings ratio - a key affordability measure - is at its lowest for six years. The house price to average earnings ratio has declined from a peak of 5.84 in July 2007 to an estimated 4.42 in February 2009; a fall of 24%. The ratio is at its lowest level for six years (February 2003: 4.41). The long-term average is 4.0.

-Tentative signs of a stabilisation in activity albeit at a very low level. Bank of England industry-wide figures show that the number of mortgages approved to finance house purchase was unchanged between December 2008 and January 2009. Approvals in January, at a seasonally adjusted 31,000, were also identical to the monthly average recorded in the second half of 2008.More details about UK house prices continue to crash at an alarming pace (opens a new window)

UK Biggest hose price drop in History....

Biggest house price drop on record

House prices plunged by 16.2% during 2008 in the biggest drop for a calendar year on record, Halifax said.
Last year's price plummet, which came after the average value of a property in the UK fell 2.2% in December, was the biggest year-on-year fall since the Halifax began recording data in 1983.
Britain's biggest mortgage lender said the typical price of a property now stands at £159,896 - back to August 2004 levels.
The drop in annual house price inflation measures prices in the previous three months compared with the same period a year ago. But if house prices in December are compared with prices in December 2007, the fall is even more dramatic at 18.9%.
And Halifax warned that the property market will come under further pressure in 2009 as the financial crisis continues to restrict lending in the UK.
Bank of England figures on Friday revealed that just 27,000 mortgages were approved for new house purchases during November, which was a new record low.The Bank also said in its credit report that banks and building societies plan to cut back further on lending as the economic outlook worsens.
However, the Halifax offered hope that the downturn in the property market could be limited as housing affordability improves. The lender said the house price to earnings ratio - a key affordability measure - had declined to its lowest level for more than five-and-a-half years.
First-time buyers (FTBs) may also be in line for some relief, with the proportion of local authorities where housing is affordable for FTBs more than trebling in 2008, according to the Halifax.
Economist Howard Archer of IHS Global Insight cautioned that, despite the interest rate falls and property price reduction, the outlook for the housing market remained "bleak". He predicted house prices to fall by a further 15% on the Halifax measure in 2009.
This would see property prices plummet by 32% in nominal terms from their August 2007 peak of £199,612 to stand at £135,912 at the end of this year, he said. House price falls would then ease at the start of 2010 and flatten out in the latter months of the year, added Mr Archer.
Copyright (c) Press Association Ltd. 2009, All Rights Reserved.

Gordo gets this one right!!!!

Brown warns 2009 'won't be easy' ~ True Gordo and you're to BLAME!!

pa.press.net

Gordon Brown has warned the country that 2009 "won't be easy" as it faces up to the economic crisis.

In the Prime Minister's traditional New Year message, he insisted that Britain would pull through - but admitted the challenge was "enormous". He wrote: "This coming year won't be easy, but I am determined that this government will be the rock of stability and fairness on which the British people can depend."

"The scale of the challenges we face is matched by the strength of my optimism that the British people can and will rise to meet them. Because we're not a do nothing people and we've always risen to every challenge. We can meet the security challenge, the environmental challenge and the enormous economic challenge."

Amid widespread pessimism about 2009, the premier sought to strike an optimistic note at the start of what will be a make-or-break year for the Labour government. The prospects for a fourth consecutive term in office are likely to turn on the eventual length and extent of Britain's first recession since the early 1990s.

But Mr Brown insisted the British people, and the Government, had demonstrated their ability to get through similar challenges in the past. He said the task for 2009 was to "build tomorrow", with jobs for the digital age and the green agenda, new transport and communications infrastructure and enhanced skills.

Working together with Britain's world partners, he said, such actions would ensure the UK would "hit the ground running" after the downturn. He wrote: "Today the issues may be difference, more complex, more global. And yet the qualities that are needed to meet them have been demonstrated in abundance by the British people before."

The Prime Minister also set out his ambition to see a new economic philosophy replace the "unbridled free market dogma" which has been discredited by the financial crisis, "I want 2009 to be the year when the dawn of a new progressive era breaks across the world," he said.
That would mean governments investing through economic lows and offering "real help" to families and businesses when they were most in need. In a swipe at the Tories, the Prime Minister insisted failure to act would lead to a worse downturn and a weaker economy in the future.

He portrayed the Government's response to the autumn banking crisis - such as the recapitalisation of high street banks - as a "decisive" strategy to quell people's fears. He said: "The scale and speed of the global financial crisis was, at times, almost overwhelming. I know that people felt bewildered, confused and sometimes frightened. That is why the response had to be swift and decisive."
Insisting that his "guiding principle" was the wellbeing of British families and businesses, he added: "What keeps me up at night, and gets me up in the morning, are the hopes and aspirations of the British people."

Nick Louth predicts on housing

More house price falls to come
By Nick Louth, exclusive to MSN
November 13 2008
The big rise in unemployment this week and the Bank of England's admission that Britain is in recession are clear reminders that those hoping for a quick end to falling house prices are likely to be disappointed.
Whether we look at other housing booms in the UK, experience in other countries, or the relationship between the economy and house prices, evidence suggest we are still a considerable way from the bottom.
The UK economy in depth
Recession for real"It is very likely that the economy entered a recession in the second half (of 2008)," Bank governor Mervyn King said. He said that the economy could shrink by 2% next year, compared with the broadly flat forecast the bank had previously. Earlier, a 140,000 rise in the jobless total in September put unemployment at 1.82 million, the highest in 11 years.
Those who lose their jobs are of course under immediate pressure on mortgage payments, but those who merely fear their jobs are under threat are more likely to act more cautiously too. That means fewer new buyers, delays in transactions and a temptation for sellers to lower asking prices.
Why the recession is needed immediately
Average prices drop, more to comeAverage UK house prices peaked at just under £200,000 in August 2007, according to the Halifax. Prices in October, at £168,000 were 16% down from this, matching levels last seen three years ago.
Nationwide, the largest building society in the country, reckons prices will fall by 25% in total, and there may be no bounce-back before 2010, according to chief executive Graham Beale
Based on the Halifax index, that would put average prices down to £150,000. However, it could easily be a lot worse because of the size of the bubble that preceded the August 2007 peak and the severity of the current economic downturn.
Bubbles past and presentThe last slide in UK house prices was a rather modest affair, though it lasted six years from May 1989 to July 1995. House prices as measured by the Halifax fell by 13%, from an average of £70,000 to £61,000 over the period. That might be a comforting precedent, except that it is already clear that the UK has in one year experienced a house price fall which took six years to occur in the 1990s. And it is still getting worse.
The difference this time is that we have had a major banking crisis which has rationed credit, while a recession is building which looks to be in a different league to the modest economic slowdown of the early 1990s.
Research by professor Morgan Kelly of University College Dublin shows that house price bubble across the world have similar characteristics. On average prices lose 70% of the gains made from trough to peak before bottoming out. This research is backed up by an international study made by the Bank of International Settlements in 2004, which found a strong positive correlation between the size of a housing bubble and the subsequent fall.
The doomsday scenario?So if Professor Kelly's 70% figure is accurate, where would that leave UK house prices? The last downturn in the housing market ended in July 1995, when average prices according to the Halifax were £61,000. That gain, trough to peak over 12 years, is £139,000. So if this is a typical bubble, the fall would be 70% of that, £97,000, taking the price of the average house at the low to just £103,000.
There are plenty who would see this as too much of a doomsday scenario, especially as houses would become affordable long before such low prices were reached. House prices have averaged 4.0 times average earnings over the long term, and since prices peaked the ratio has already dropped from 5.84 to 4.92 in August.
"Housing affordability is improving significantly," said Martin Ellis, chief economist at the Halifax. "The house price to average earnings ratio has fallen below 5.0 for the first time for four and a half years. We expect a further improvement in the ratio over the coming months."
Affordability issueIf average earnings do not change, which is itself a hefty assumption given the recession we are entering, prices would hit the long-term affordability average with a further 20% fall.
The trouble with this argument is that once houses became an investment asset, with the buy-to-let boom of the late 1990s, they became subject to the same speculative forces that drive share prices.
Instead of being guided by "fundamentals" such as the ratio of income to price, they were driven by price expectations. What that implies is that we can expect an overshoot, in which prices having been way above typical affordability averages for several years, then spend some time well below them.
Mortgage troubles drag onOne additional difficulty this time around is in mortgage finance. Though the Bank of England has cut interest rates sharply, stubbornly high inter-bank rates mean that rates offered to borrowers have yet to fall significantly. With buyers having to stump up larger deposits too, and credit generally harder to come by, this augurs badly for those who expect prices to soon stabilise.
Weakening activity underlines this. The Royal Institution of Chartered Surveyors said its sale-to-stock ratio, which measures transactions as a proportion of homes offered for sales, fell in October to the lowest level since December 1992. This seems to reflect a mis-match between the asking prices of sellers, and what buyers are willing or able to spend.
Some commentators, however, see the gloomy headlines as far too alarmist. One is Stuart Law, chief executive of property investment specialist Assetz.
"Our view is that house prices will drop by around a total of 10 to 15% from the peak this time last year, based on the Financial Times house price index data," he said. "We therefore think that prices will fall no further than a further 5% or 10% at most."
The FT Index, which uses the actual mix of property in England and Wales, rather than the mix based on sales, has recorded only a 4.3% fall in the year to September, less than half that recorded by most other indices.
Law noted that the complexities of the housing market produce some temporary pricing effects. "Auction pricing and distressed house builders are selling for much greater discounts than is visible within the house price indices," he said. "Even today we are sourcing property from house builders at greater than 30% discount to current valuation, never-mind from peak value last year."
The good news for most...The one piece of good news is that for most people, most of the time, house prices don't matter. You need a home to live in, and higher or lower prices are reflected both in the home you sell and the one you purchase. For first-time buyers, where they have job security, falling prices remain good news to be taken advantage of.
However, for those who have purchased recently, over-stretched buy-to-let investors, those who are having trouble making mortgage payments and those who have lost their jobs, price falls mean trouble. The fear of negative equity - in which the value of the home sinks below the size of the mortgage - ensures a cash loss if the home has to be sold.
The more prices fall in the months and years to come, the more people are going to be facing that anxiety.

Dramatic house price falls in UK

House prices likely to fall by a quarter in two years
Richard Wachman, City editor
The Observer,
Sunday March 30 2008
Article history
About this articleClose

This article appeared in the Observer on Sunday March 30 2008 on p1 of the Business news & features section. It was last updated at 09:16 on March 31 2008.

House prices in Britain could crash by 25 per cent before mid-2010, forecasters at Capital Economics have warned. That would wipe £45,000 off the value of an average house, currently worth £180,000.
Ed Stanford, property economist at Capital, said it was 'entirely plausible' that house prices would fall by between 20 per cent and 25 per cent in the next two years, particularly if the economy continued to be buffeted by the credit squeeze, financial markets' turbulence and sliding consumer confidence.
Capital has already published forecasts that flag a 5 per cent fall in house prices in 2008 and 8 per cent in 2009. It also expects unemployment to rise from 5.3 per cent of the working population to 7.5 per cent.
Last week, Nationwide building society revised its forecast of no change in prices this year to a modest fall. It changed its prediction after publishing figures that showed UK house price annual inflation at its lowest rate for 12 years. Prices fell for the fifth month running; March was down 0.6 per cent on February. If the trend continues Britain's housing market will soon record annual falls for the first time since 1996.
Other UK housing bears include David Miles, chief UK economist at Morgan Stanley. He reckons the market is due a 20 per cent correction. If he and Capital are broadly correct, a significant number of people who bought two years ago will find themselves in negative equity by 2010.
Not everyone is as pessimistic: JP Morgan's Malcolm Barr envisages a 6 per cent fall in 2008, but then a slow recovery.
The Royal Institution of Chartered Surveyors reports that new buyer inquiries at estate agencies are sharply down.
The market is being depressed by the credit crunch, with banks hoarding cash and demanding that borrowers put down huge deposits.