House prices back on the rise. The madness returns!

[maxi2100]

Ignore the news reports predicting falls. Went to 2 viewings in London today for 700-900k houses , back to back viewings, 15 minutes max. 3 couples at a time, going to sealed bids etc. My other friends were allowed 10 minutes for a £800k flat. The madness has returned 😂

We live in a boring West Yorkshire town. DS's 2 bed terrace went up for sale on a Tuesday at the beginning of April, at 2pm by 4pm he had two viewings. By Thursday, they stopped taking them. He did 11 or 12 viewings and got 7 offers, 6 above asking by 3.9%.

His is a nice house, fully renovated including roof, windows, doors etc with new kitchen and bathroom.

I would say if it's a good house and well maintained it will still go quickly and won't be reduced. The one he is buying is a nice house in a good area but it needs work, so he managed to get a reduction, he was the only person who put in an offer.

Depends entirely where you are. Nothing is moving where I am at the moment. Beautiful, well maintained houses are just sitting on the market for months.

Housing market where I am in the north west has slowed right down. Houses are literally sitting on the market for months . I guess it'll be the area and state of the house that dictates things but prices still seem high I agree

As always, price falls take a while to filter through. Good houses in desirable areas are always the last to suffer. It feels a bit like 2007 again, with a sort of stand off between vendors, lenders and agents trying to talk the market up and buyers just waiting. With everyone paying more for their mortgages it seems inevitable that prices will slide imo and objective data does seem to support that.

North of England is extremely popular for buy to let investors now. there is much more financial space for the value to rise so its attractive to many. in the south of England prices are just too high, you can touch the ceiling. combined with the price of money I see the south declining before the north.

BBC R4 did a feature on this yesterday.

They said sales are rising steeply and prices beginning to rise again at the start of the spring sales period, especially in the studio, 1 and 2 bed range / ftb . This is because even though interest rates have risen this doesn't look a bad deal compared to rising rents.

Buyers for small and ftb properties will enable buyers for their next / bigger house to move forward.

My bus stop is by an EA so I keep track of what is in the window - everything posted in the last couple of months has sold. ('affordable' area of S London)

I heard the same Radio 4 programme. 1 and 2 bed ftb properties are up 2% over the past 12 months.

That's asking prices not sold prices. But activity is up 4% compared with April 2019 in that sector of the market (down elsewhere).

I'm in the NW too and it seems quite 'sticky' round here. I've been monitoring the market for 18-24 months and there are more houses available in the up-to-£200k bracket now than I've seen at any other time since I started watching (up by about 50%). Houses that wouldn't have been in that bracket before now are, and things priced over £200k, but not by much, are having reductions to drop into it after sitting on the market for a while.

The houses sticking hard in that bracket are the £145-180k houses which need a fair amount of cosmetic work, plus potentially an extension too in some instances. It seems that people really aren't looking to do much / any work.

Wages have increased in my sector by 30-40% over the past 2 years, I took out income protection insurance if anything happens to my job it'll be like being furloughed again, bring it on !