Musings of a London Property Finder

After the 2.6% rise in average house prices posted last month, the Halifax have reported a 0.5% drop in June, which is a sign of sensible buyers in our view.  Anecdotally, anyone looking for a home right now will know there is a lack of property available and some homes are going quickly or reaching sealed bid situations.

Martin Ellis, housing economist for the Halifax said: “ On a quarterly basis, the 1.9% fall in house prices in the second quarter was the smaillest since 2008 Q1.  These figures provide evidence that the underlying pace of house price decline is easing.”

He added, ” Improvements in affordability and low interest rates have stimulated housing demand.  This, together with a low level of properties available for sale, has helped to stabilise activity and reduce the underlying rate of house price decline in recent months.

Overall we expect to see a continuing mixed pattern of monthly house price rises and falls over the remainder of 2009.”

It will be interesting to see what the land registry, the house price index which tracks sold prices reports over the next few months.   Everyone in the know is noticing that the market seems to be stabilising but with a poor economic forecast overall, I would boldly suggest that sellers wishing to sell in the next 9 months should do so now and try to catch the tail end of the summer rush as we are predicting a slower Autumn. 

Longer term, we should also consider politics and if the tories get in next May as expected, then they will undoubtedly pressurise the Bank of England to raise interest rates to support savers who make up a significant proportion of their support.  If that happens, the affordability we are seeing today will reduce.  Whether house prices follow or whether there is enough pent up demand to sustain them remains to be seen.

In my capacity as a London Property Finder, the advice to buyers is simple.  If you find your dream home: buy it if you can negotiate a price you are happy with.  If you are under time pressure, go ahead and buy, but don’t pay more than the property is worth now, particularly if you want to make money.  Is it a good time to invest?  Absolutely, but only if you know what you are doing and you or someone else researches the property thoroughly.  There are more genuine bargains around now than there have been for a while, but there are some turkeys too.  If you need some advice or need an ROI-focused London Property Finder, you know where we are.

Technorati Tags: Halifax, House Prices, London House Prices, London property finders

Tags: Halifax, House Prices, London House Prices, London property finders

Musings of a London Property Search Agent

An article has appeared in The Times today, analysing who will stay and who will go, as the property market remains soft.  Clearly some will falter - sales are down 50% so clearly there is 50% less revenue and 50% less fee-earning work. 

We have been surprised at the complacency which has prevailed with some of our contacts over recent months and the continuing lack of ability to be flexible or think outside the box, particularly at some of the larger multi-nationals.  A lack of morale has been equally evident.

Anecdotally, it would seem that Foxtons have shed half their sales force, but losses at an agency which relies very heavily on commission seems to be newbies with no contacts.  We knew there had been redundancies at Savills but Countrywide, Humberts and Halifax have also had problems with the latter closing 50 offices, according to The Times.

Countrywide, the owner of Mann, Bairstow Eves and John D Wood has had its credit rating downgraded by Standard and Poor, however Chief Executive Grenville Turner has been quick to react, saying:

“At the end of the [3rd quarter] we had around £106 million of cash on our balance sheet to protect us from the impact of this market, which is I suspect more than all of our competitors put together.  We intend to keep it that way,” he wrote.

Perhaps staff should not feel reassured as if there is little business being done, the business will have to shed bodies to retain a healthy bottom line.

Inevitably there were going to be losses and good people will lose their jobs.  Interestingly the credit crunch doesn’t appear to have put enterprising agents off going it alone - we know 3 such cases who have opened shop in the last 9 months.  What should be welcomed is the plethora of small agents with little or none of their own property who turn up when they want, masquerade as (bad) property finders with no knowledge or understanding and have no idea about developing relationships, selling, showing property, in short how to do their job.  Numerous sales agents have moved into rentals, which is fine if they know what they are doing, but adds a lot more work and aggro for us if they don’t, as so often seems to be the case.  This London Property Search Agent works through these difficulties to enable people to fulfil their aims.

http://business.timesonline.co.uk/tol/business/industry_sectors/construction_and_property/article5141895.ece

Technorati Tags: Estate Agents, Estate Agents Close, Estate Agents Go To The Wall, Halifax, Humberts, London Property Search Agent, Savills

Tags: Estate Agents, Estate Agents Close, Estate Agents Go To The Wall, Halifax, Humberts, London Property Search Agent, Savills