..to think a lot of large houses will come on to the market?

[Whatarisk]

AIBU to assume that larger more expensive houses will start to appear on the property market?

My house is currently up for sale. We’d like to upsize. DH doesn’t think the property market will be affected much and if anything, people in larger houses will be put off listing their home. I think the opposite will be true.

Our jobs are relatively secure (in the sense that v few can be 100% confident of total job security right now) and I’m of the opinion that we sell ours, move in with my parents and hope something comes up. There are no properties that we are interested in currently but I’d rather sell before the market dips too much.

Interested in people’s views.

As a PP mentioned, if OP is selling a 1 bed in London & upsizing to Hampshire (still expensive) I doubt she’s talking about the same size of “large houses” as some posters.

Probably more a normal 3 bed ish? Personally, I think that could be a bracket where owners are forced to sell. “Ordinary” families who were getting by on 2 full time incomes, now having to manage on 1 for example. Or small business owners losing the business altogether.

I don’t think we will see this immediately after lockdown finishes however. People are taking payment holidays to hopefully cope short term, and will obviously do their very best to keep on scraping together the mortgage each month for as long as they can. I do think it’s inevitable that some houses in this bracket will end up having to be sold or repossessed etc. Whether this will help OP who will by then likely need a 40% deposit I don’t know 🤷🏻‍♀️.

@Frompcat Yes thats my experience too! i have so many supermarkets within walking distance. Haven't managed to get any online shopping slots (someone teach me how to get them). If I was stuck in the country with only 1 supermarket within walking distance, I would starve because neither DH or I can drive. WE have a communal garden and they haven't closed highgate woods so we can walk there. tbh food is more important than a large private garden.

I have a property and was planning to sell it this year but am going to put off a sale as long as possible now until the market stabilises.
I had it up for sale 6 months last year and it didn't sell with only one offer and everyone said brexit. Property market has been more odd than usual for last year anyway.
As pp have said divorces deaths etc will still occur. I'm wondering how many people will have repossessions as well. That's normally what pushes more houses on the market in times like these and reduces the price.

I also think a lot of people will be selling flats which now seem too small for their circumstances.

I certainly noticed a trend over the last 5 yrs or so of neighbours/friends leaving London in their 30s with small dc. Some of them could have afforded to move up but just didn't want to pay 1m plus for a 3 bed terrace with small garden. They went to Bristol, Edinburgh, Manchester & Surrey

@Frompcat I'm rural. Haven't had to leave my home at all for over a month easily got o ado deliveries once a week and so many options farm shops/butchers and local farms offering to help anyone in need. My neighbours have all had grocery boxes sent to them on request.

I am able to walk for miles without seeing anyone. My dh works in London with a fair commute and we very nearly loved there instead of here last year and I'm eternally grateful we didn't. My friend living in a flat zone 3 says she cannot get away from people and wishes she could come stay with me! She also has a garden but has people t trying to get in it from neighbouring properties!

Perhaps you're in a better zone.

Nearly moved there not loved!*

I literally could not be less bothered about not having a garden. There is an enormous park less than 5 minutes walk away and I have no trouble keeping my distance from people.

It is the lack of good restaurants and takeaways I would struggle with rurally. And less variety of shops. My local corner shop sells a hundred different types of Indian and Thai spices at very low prices. I can get any ingredient I want in less than 10 minutes.

Can you tell food is of primary importance to me 😁

My point was that you can't assume that this lockdown is going to mean everyone wants to jump ship to the country. We are all different.

not sure where your train of thought comes from people in larger houses must need to sell up?

Surely those in the big houses have pretty good jobs to afford them and not work in retail and temp zero hour conditions, more likely Lawers, Solicitors, Dentists etc

if anyones gonna need to sell, it will be those at the bottom end of the scale in their smaller houses I would of thought

Its not simply a supply and demand question.

In general people with big houses are now older. But they are also generally more financially secure. So home loses due to job losses / not being eligible for furloughing are less likely as owners will have smaller mortages so may be more able to remortage. Deaths in older groups are higher so there will potentially be more houses from this - though many deaths are for people already in residential areas (remembering home ownership in older age groups is much higher too).

But there is a big cavet here.

a) I don't think we have had enough deaths to make a huge difference in the number of homes becoming free due to coronavirus deaths when you spread them across the country.

b) You are getting many more (younger) people in the lower / middle steps of the housing market who are more vulnerable to job losses / home losses due to high mortages relative to income (bigger mortage multiplers).

What you will see is the lowest rung of the ladder having relatively sustained demand, so any price drop here will be minimual. Its likely to be more like a slight drop but a prolonged stagnation in price.

The next step is more difficult. This is small 3 bed family properties and this is where I can see problems emerging. Its already a problem with people unable to move up the ladder from this step and many are struggling to move up from this step. You might get some repossesions but its a younger ownership, so there is room for payment restructing rather than repossession / remortgaging (its financially risky for banks to push too hard under these circumstances otherwise the whole market might collaspe so its more in their interest to restructure payments rather than lose money themselves through a wave of repossession).

Those who feel they want to move up the ladder because of more availability of property will struggle to sell though. There may be more demand to, and there may be more opportunity to with larger houses to move to.

c) So your basic problem is that there will be very little movement in the market. There may be lots of bigger properties available but there simply won't be fluidity of movement because not enough people will be in a position to actually move because chains are incomplete.

There might be a lot of people who want a quick sale, but you are still going to need to be in a position where you've sold yourself. And that means people moving up the ladder from lower down. That can't come from wage growth (not happening for some time now) and windfall from inhertience will be limited and not as large as it might of been (precisely because of the lack of liquidity of the market and inability of people to move up). Banks are going to be very wary of risky lending atm, so unless you have a super secure job you may struggle to get a new mortgage or government stepping in to provide lenders with reassurance (more likely).

d) There is less likely to be people moving because 'they want to'. Which could result in less properties being available full stop. People don't want to take the risk to move right now / have the ability to move right now.

The basic problem is the 'vicious circle' problem where the whole market is locked and stagnated through a lack of ability / willingness to take a risk to move.

For things to become more fluid, you need an injection of cash (through wage growth) or a big crash in the market with lots of people with cash in hand and a general lack of demand. We still have high demand for housing at lower levels, so a crash isn't likely - there will be enough demand and a small dip in prices. Your middle tier of the market is the one thats been causing problems for the last 5 years now which hasn't been widely recognised and Covid-19 is only going to make that worse.

So yeah. Middle market stagnation is your problem. Estate Agents are going to go out of business as a result.

I think it makes sense what you’re planning. If you can get a buyer, I would snap it up.

I noticed the only houses coming on the market here are either new builds or probate.

There will be a bunch of people who were planning to sell their houses this year or who now need to, but have put it on hold for now. It would be great if you can be in a good buying position when that stock starts to come on the market.

Presumably there will be houses for sale that were previously owned by elderly people who have succumbed to the virus, the beneficiaries of their wills will need to sell quickly.
landlords who were already being squeezed may be badly affected and have to sell up quickly.

Sadly our elderly neighbour died before the virus, multiple health problems and well over 80. The house sold to an older couple with a grown up child who had already sold their old one, I would imagine cash purchase.

They have now got tied up in the lockdown so the largish house is empty.

Lovely village not commuting area, very quiet not many young children

But what might dislodge middle market stagnation is unemployment.

We have got used to very low levels of unemployment and we are not used to professional people losing their jobs and not being immediately rehired. So our ideas of the housing market does not take this into account.

There are plenty of buyers but following the Great Lockdown there may be shocked or reluctant sellers. These will come through slowly as banks give forebearance for a while and then either the penny drops for the distressed home owner or eventually the bank loses patience.

Banks don’t want to step in but they will step in eventually.

Whatarisk - the Meon Valley is so lovely - Droxford is a great village., as is Bishops Waltham. I understand from a relative that there's a lot of new building going on there too. I had an Aunt who lived in Meonstoke at one time, and also Wickham (that Wickham house must be worth well over £1m now, but they sold cheaply because my Uncle was freaked out about it not being so structurally sound!!!). I'm not sure about schools there any more, as I moved from that area many years ago to Somerset, but I would imagine the village primaries are good. We loved our Somerset house when we were younger and bringing up our family - lots of space in the garden for them to play and great schools. But in the end things move on, and we are so happy where we are now in a forested area in Gloucestershire. I am enjoying making my small walled garden into a woodland garden. But have the convenience of a more modern house now, with much less maintenance than a 17th century cottage!!! I think our buyers thought they got a bargain, but it worked well for us too. We have liquidated extra cash which can go on to our children for their next move as their families increase (so like yourself in some ways!!!).

You can make this happen, stage your flat to the very best it can be and get cracking once the lockdown is over!!! Wishing you all the very best. Keep us posted on progress!!!!

Good solid family houses with a garden will always keep their value. They may dip a bit if prices fall, but they will bounce back, especially in the SE.

The sector of the market which will feel the pinch is the over-priced first time buyer, fancy-pants 'city centre lifestyle' flats. Basically tiny studio flats with a fancy finish and furnishings. These were selling at the price of 'second hand' two or three bedroom, decent sized places a bit further out.

Obviously going to give myself away here but there's a Michelin star restaurant a couple of miles from me. Hardly stuck for choice. Most restaurants near me use locally produced and seasonal products. I can also get takeaways.

As you say everyone's different but I don't believe you're at an advantage being in London right now but only time will tell if a majority believe this as well when it comes to property sales in London.

The predictions I've seen so far have implied there will be very little liquidity in the housing market in the next year and after that there will be a slight depression in prices but only of a few percentage points.

Before I posted, I somehow missed OP’s post about her budget & desired location .

I have since spent the last 5 minutes on Rightmove looking at lovely £800k houses & deciding which one I would buy if I could 😂.

I think what might pose a problem for buyers like yourself OP, is if lenders do carry on with a maximum LTV of 60%. Whether that will happen & for how long, nobody knows.

Best of luck with it all.

It also took 10 yrs to recover from the last recession & even though unemployment was much lower than previous recessions, wages have stagnated. lots of jobs but lots that don't pay well

At one point the doommongers were predicting 500,000-1,000,000 deaths in this country from Coronavirus. Thankfully this hasn’t happened and seems incredibly unlikely. If it had, however, I think we’d definitely have seen a fall in house prices due to the amount of new properties coming onto the market.

As it is, it all depends on what happens with a possible depression/economic crash and potentially increased divorces etc. You find on mumsnet a lot of people will constantly and repeatedly state ‘house prices will never fall’, I imagine because there are a lot of homeowners on here hoping that is the case. Personally I think we might see a drop of some kind, but who knows.

I think there will be a crash and lots of repos, so moving in with family might be good if you could sell now before prices drop. Then you'll get more for your money.
I can't see anyone moving unless necessary atm, most are holding off, including us. We want to downsize, due to two of dc having left home now.

I'm not really talking about michelin starred type places, I'm talking about little independent places with good hearty food. Within a 10 minute walk of my flat we have 3-4 excellent Indians, 2 sri Lankans, 2 vietnamese, 2 Turkish, loads of cafes with good coffee and decent breakfasts, 3 bakeries....etc.

Sorry to keep rambling on about food! There are obviously a million other reasons why I prefer to live in London than rurally. I can't imagine that the threat of another pandemic is going to be most people's driving forces when it comes to house buying.

I think people will stay put if they can. We are mortgage free, dh has retired at 58, we are financially secure, and we have no need to sell. We have ds with us, til he finds gainful employment, but even then, I can't see us moving to anything smaller than this house, just perhaps the same thing in a town as opposed to a village. That isn't in my plans for another 10 years or so though.

I don't understand how people saying "sell now before prices drop" think that is going to happen. You can't sell now. You can't sell until lockdown is over. And surely post lockdown prices will go down immediately (if you believe a crash is coming).

Genuine question, not being goady.

Just what the Meon Valley needs, Another Londoner coming for the pretty lanes and houses.
Thousands of very pretty lanes and cottages up North, You’ll get lots more for your money.