Encouraging further information out at the weekend on the UK property market.
Analysts said house prices fell by less than one per cent in April – and they have not ruled out a small monthly rise. Meanwhile buyers are coming back to the market-returning at the fastest rate in 10 years. Banks have turned the lending taps back on with mortgage approvals rising. Brokers and bankers were yesterday starting to tear up their gloomy forecasts about the housing market-and now say the meltdown could be over by the end of the year.
Vicky Redwood, UK Economist at Capital Economics, said: “I expect to see a small 0.5 per cent drop in house prices this month, but we could see a rebound.
“The sharp falls in house prices are slowing. It is becoming increasingly clear that the worst for the UK economy is over.”
The upbeat news will be boosted by figures this week showing banks are lending again. Mortgage approvals rose to 29,000 in April, according to statistics from the British Bankers Association which was up from 26,097 in March – and up 62 per cent from the November low of 17,895. Howard Archer, Chief Economist at analysts IHS Global Insight, said: “There is mounting evidence that house price activity has passed its low point and is picking up.”
A spokesman for the Council of Mortgage Lenders said: “There is now a broad consensus that we are at least past the worst in terms of the rate of economic decline.”
And home buyers are back. A report by the Royal Institute of Chartered Surveyors shows they are returning at the fastest rate since 1999. RICS chief economist Simon Rubinson said: “April was the sixth month in a row that buyer inquiries increased, and they rose at their fastest pace since August 1999.”
Cheap mortgages and low interest-rates have also boosted the market. Last week Lloyds launched a new 95 per cent mortgage for first-time buyers, and low interest rates of just 0.5 per cent have helped make mortgages cheaper.
Lloyds, Britain’s biggest lender, has scrapped its old forecast that house prices will drop by 15 per cent this year. Stephen Noakes, commercial director of mortgages at Lloyds, said: “For the first time people are thinking that house prices will increase over the next 12 months.”
So all bodes well – and means if wanting the very best of the bargains – better move quickly!
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Tags: lenders, market returning, mortgage approval
June 2nd, 2009 at 7:30 pm
I read on BBC News that in April house prices rose by 1.5%. I personally don’t think that we quite at the stage of recovery. I will probably be more confident when I see house sales increase 3 straight months.