To everyone who said the housing market would crash by June.

[BridgettJ]

LOL.

Its gone through the ROOF!

In my town rent is cheaper than a mortgage. You can rent a 2 bed house for just over a grand a month, but that same house would be about 450k to buy, which is about £1800 per month with 10% deposit and a 25 year mortgage.

I agree with previous poster. I'm seeing 2-3 of my UK and European contacts made redundant and looking for work. The tourism sector and hospitality have essentially missed a season. Expect a lot more redundancies in winter in that sector.

@ChippyDucks150 We're in exactly the same position. Sale agreed on our house within a week of it going up for sale...

...Currently getting RSI refreshing Right Move while DH rings round estate agents in a panic. Nothing in our price bracket/preferred area coming up yet.

It's driving me nuts and making me nervous.

@Zhampagne

I’ve been on MN in various guises since 2013. There has always been a consistently vocal faction on this board confidently predicting an imminent property crash. Does anyone remember professional agent of gloom Roneik? He got himself banned in the end.

Zhampagne Yes! He was so infuriatingly funny. A real prophet of house crash doom. Always supported by NoddyHolder, an otherwise really reasonable poster.

Still booming round here. About to exchange and will likely have to rent. Viewed a property yesterday that had 2 asking and over asking offers already on the table before even hitting Rightmove. Wasn’t suitable for us, very little now going on so will have to rent until more houses go up for sale.

Swedish friend tells me prices have rocketed there too, and still are. Her son has been outbid on half a dozen flats. 🙁

@GETTINGLIKEMYMOTHER

Swedish friend tells me prices have rocketed there too, and still are. Her son has been outbid on half a dozen flats. 🙁

Odd isn’t it? Especially with the economy and jobs uncertain. I think people have realised their mortality, become bit less risk adverse and more live for today. Also the months some people have been stuck at home hating their surroundings, wanting more outside space (in the uk), and the stamp duty savings.

We completed our sale yesterday and are now renting. We had an offer accepted on a house a couple of weeks ago - mainly because we are chain free and should be able to complete before the stamp duty holiday ends.

It makes me nervous potentially buying at the peak of a bubble but our money is doing nothing in the bank and so we may as well get the enjoyment of a bigger and nicer house.

In my head I think we should wait and hope that prices drop next year (the house we are buying is top of our budget but we have had to compromise on location a little) but my heart says that the house we are buying Is lovely and we will be happy there - we have not seen anything else in months that even half compares. I worry about supply shrivelling up completely.

Plus we could end up renting for another year which, together with the £15k stamp duty saving, would mean prices would have to fall 5% for us to break even on where we are now.
Money is cheap - we are borrowing at under 2%, fixed for 5 years - I don't think younger people understand just how cheap this is! My first mortgage was 5.5 %, my last one 3.5%, I am only 41! For us, there is just no point having cash in the bank.

Until that changes I cannot see why prices will fall, perhaps in the FTB market and for flats but a decent house in a decent area? Not so sure. Anyway we will be staying put for at least the next 15 years and so it doesn't make much difference to us.

With redundancies - I think there isn't going to be blanket job losses across all industries, some will be more badly affected than others . Brexit though? I have no idea. Our mortgage will be less than the rent we are currently paying and we can manage to live on one salary so I am not worrying too much at present - I think this year has shown me that we do not know what is round the corner and you cannot live your life worrying about things (as, ultimately something you hadn't even considered will be the thing that blindsides you).

I live in London and houses are coming onto the market then going under offer in a matter of days. I wonder if it’s people from the inner zones wanting to move a bit further out (where I am) to get more space and a big garden?

Sorry but I'd be very surprised if you manage to complete before the stamp duty deadline. I've spoken to three estate agents in the last month who all said there are huge delays with mortgage lenders and solicitors due to the high volume of work they have at the moment. Everything is taking so much longer. They all said there's no way a house would complete before the end of March now. Everything slows down at Christmas too. So be prepared to pay the stamp duty!

We bought a new build this year, they were flying off the shelves around the time we reserved, 10 reservations a fortnight at one point at our site, however now completion dates are beyond March when the old HTB ends there's only been 1 reservation in about 3 weeks. The houses here are priced above the new HTB cap, it will be interesting to see what happens because if this continues some developers could really struggle and I doubt they will let the government allow that....it is unfortunate as I know ours were delayed about 3 months so that means about a 1/4 of their houses which were supposed to be completed under the old HTB won't be.

It feels like sales of second hand homes have steadied where I am, not as much coming on.

@BelleSausage

This is a hyper inflated bubble. It will crash hard once job cuts really bite at the end of furlough.

At the moment, people who have vaguely been thinking about moving are going now because of the stamp duty incentives. There is also a lot of divorce around and a lot of people migrating from high density urban areas to the countryside. It is a mass move. It won’t last.

I have two friends in property. One commercial and one residential. The commercial world is already seeing the drop. Companies have looked at what it costs to keep offices in city centres and decided to save money. (See many investment banks asking all staff to work from home indefinitely).

The residential side is lagging because of all the reasons above. My friend who works for a big estate agents is expecting the bubble to burst in about Oct.

It's silly putting a date on it.

House prices will stop rising when the government stops propping them up. Simples.

They will fall if the government starts paying back the debt through tax rises. Simples.

@worriedandannoyed

Sorry but I'd be very surprised if you manage to complete before the stamp duty deadline. I've spoken to three estate agents in the last month who all said there are huge delays with mortgage lenders and solicitors due to the high volume of work they have at the moment. Everything is taking so much longer. They all said there's no way a house would complete before the end of March now. Everything slows down at Christmas too. So be prepared to pay the stamp duty!

I agree. We ordered our searches as soon as our offer was accepted (I am in the legal industry, my friend is doing our conveyancing) as they are taking 7 weeks in our area. They are not due back until mid January due to Christmas closures. Our survey is booked for 17th Dec and the timeline for offer after a satisfactory valuation is up to 4 weeks - so probably end of January. This was with us starting 2 weeks ago.

My friend who is doing the conveyancing has said that she would want to be in a position to exchange by the end of Feb as things are going to be so hectic for them in March.

I hope we can just squeak ours in.

Are you on glue, OP?

The only comments I can recall of that nature were before the government put billions into subsidising the market.

I wonder what you think prompted the Stamp Duty holiday? I wonder whether that might have anything to do with the increase?

I don't think younger people understand just how cheap this is !

I think they do , it probably just gets lost when they are buying houses that cost many multiples of yearly wages.

@Raxer26A it's interesting isn't it, I think if we saw interest rate rises like there were in the 90s that it would be a heck of a lot more catastrophic due to the size of mortgages people are having to take out these days.

I wonder whether they will extend the stamp duty holiday? We need to move next year but suspect the market will be very flat after March....

@Raxer26A that is very true - my wages have basically stayed the same for about 10 years but house prices have gone up 40% round here in that time.

I think interest rate rises will be far more damaging than tax increases for many people.

@Cazzywazzywoo I don't think they will, perhaps for a month or two to get the transactions that are already in progress over the line (can you imagine if any banks' online services go down on 31st March?!?) but I can't see it continuing.

I do think the government will change the capital gains tax rules soon and that might lead to some landlords ditching properties.

Well mortgage holidays are still available, furlough is still available and there has been a rush due to the stamp duty holiday. It’s very naive to think that there won’t be volatility in the coming year.

@Werk you’re probably right...which could mean a very tricky market next year! Wish I’d persuaded DH to move a year early!

The government has been busily propping up the housing market for months and have now extended furlough for 5 months suddenly having said that there would be no extensions previously.
I guess we'll see what happens if they reduce the support they are giving it with taxpayer's money.

I do think that younger people understand how low interest rates are but the huge rises in house prices in the past 25 years has been completely disproportionate to wage increases. Unless FTB are gifted large deposits from their parents, many are unable to buy at all nowadays. It will all come crashing down at some stage when there aren't enough FTB to buy from those who want to move up.

Very ordinary, bit dated house in my road of tiny terraces went up for sale a week ago and is already sstc!! Can't wait to see what it sells for because they were asking for 10k more than the average price if the road.

Plus we could end up renting for another year which, together with the £15k stamp duty saving, would mean prices would have to fall 5% for us to break even on where we are now.
Money is cheap - we are borrowing at under 2%, fixed for 5 years - I don't think younger people understand just how cheap this is! My first mortgage was 5.5 %, my last one 3.5%, I am only 41! For us, there is just no point having cash in the bank.

Yes - we just got offer accepted on a place, it was underpriced and went into a bidding war on day 1 of viewings. Same house down the road, same layout, slightly improved garden/drive went on sale 2 days later for 80k more!

We have been saving for 5 years and have a 20% deposit. In fact about 10 friends I can think of have bought or are about to this year - because everyone in professional jobs has saved a lot in lockdown and now want houses instead of rented flats. I am a LOT more concerned about inflation after Brexit and my money in the bank becoming more and more worthless, rather than house price drops - we are basically buying our forever home so the value of it in the next 5-10 years doesn't really concern me.

My parents lived through a hyperinflation event where people had savings that could buy a car; in a few months those savings couldn't even buy a bike. Whereas with a house you still have a house; we have 20% deposit and are in jobs where there are always more vacancies than skilled people, so I'm less concerned about being unemployed for months on end. We also got 2% for 5 years, will overpay and hopefully build up equity that even if prices fall/interest rates rise in 5 years, a new mortgage will still be affordable.

People can't put their lives on hold forever for the mythical House Price Crash. In fact some people on HousePriceCrash.com have waited for one for so long, that in that time they could have paid a mortgage off. We rent a tiny flat and can't have kids or buy anything because the flat is full.

The proposed changes to capital gains tax, coupled with the end of the stamp duty holiday and rising unemployment will impact next year. I think a 10 - 20% crash is likely by the end of 2021 if they go ahead with these changes and in the absense of continuing support.