damoj

Surely an end to a stamp duty 'holiday' can only serve FTBs better? Assume a house value of £160k. 25 % deposit required = £40k. Now, stamp duty needs paying upfront - i.e. out of the money to hand that could otherwise be used as a deposit. So of the £40k pot, you need to subtract 1.6k, leaving £38.4k available for deposit. If, as we believe, house prices are mainly a function of available credit, and assuming banks are requiring a LTV of 25% at least for a decent mortgage rate, then the max you could now borrow would be 4 x £38.4k = £153.6. i.e. all other things being equal a seller would have to reduce their price by £6.4k. Furthermore, if you assume that over a 25 yr mortgage you're roughly paying the bank a total of 2x the money you're borrowing, that's a total lifetime saving of ~ £12k! Obviously, the real world is not so clean cut but you can see that kicking this 'aid' to FTBs away can only diminish the amount they can spend. How much bank pleading can we expect to 'reinstate' this support? Am i pointing out the bleedin' obvious or have i missed something bleedin' obvious?! Thoughts, Comments?!

GK, Thanks for the update - it seems to match what i've been seeing although i've only been tracking the market for the past month so i've not confirmed the prices at which the houses sold. Do you know how long it takes before sales data is available (e.g. through Zoopla)? Good places do seem to be still selling quickly. Given the likely price falls i'm looking for somewhere that i can add value to (e.g. redecorate / extend) to protect myself against the falls. I went to the future property auctions recently - interesting to see many houses not even hitting their reserves - e.g. flats in Ibrox going for £25k!

Register of Scotland (= Land Registry) shows for Q2, Glasgow City price reductions (YoY for mean / median prices) are: Detached: - 11.5% / -5.8% Semi-Detached: -18.4% / -7.4 % Flats: -1.7% / -2 % Looks like semi-detached properties have taken a big hit! I'm currently looking at semi-detached or flats in the West End area and these reductions seem to be reflected on propertybee's history of rightmove. It also seems like nothing is moving. Anyone got any anecdotal stories of the Glasgow west end market - particularly a feel for the amount over/under the 'offers over' agents are advising people to expect? Thanks