Tuesday, Jan 26, 2010
Things are about to get worse for the housing market
MoneyWeek: Things are about to get worse for the housing market
Last year was full of surprises. For most of us, one of the biggest was the rise in UK house prices: according to Halifax, they ended 2009 around 4% higher than they started it. But actually, the most surprising thing should have been not that house prices rose at all but that they rose so little. Interest rates were 5% in mid-2008 and 0.5% at the end of 2009. That's important because, in the main, it is not the actual price of a house that determines its affordability to the average buyer but the price of the credit that he can get his hands on to pay for it with.
Posted by damien @ 11:32 AM (699 views) Add Comment
6 Comments
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1. wiltshire said...
Hello?
Hello?
Smugdog?
Where are yoOOOOOOOOOOOOOOuuu??!!
2. luckyjim said...
"Come autumn, newly overconfident sellers will pour in, easing the current mini-supply squeeze and knocking prices down." - Merryn Somerset Webb (MoneyWeek) July 2009.
"But actually, the most surprising thing should have been not that house prices rose at all but that they rose so little." - Merryn Somerset Webb (MoneyWeek) Jan 2010.
3. landofconfusion said...
"Come autumn, newly overconfident sellers will pour in, easing the current mini-supply squeeze and knocking prices down." - Merryn Somerset Webb (MoneyWeek) July 2009.
They, just like my nextdoor neighbour, did enter the market. The only problem was so did a shed load of muppets...
Optimism works both ways. If sellers are more confident then they'll keep prices high and if sellers have reason to be confident, so will some buyers.
4. techieman said...
LJ - nice quotes! To be fair though most commentators only really comment on how they see things at the time, based on conditions at the time being consistent. i.e. all things being equal, going forward.
This was also in the FT at the weekend, on which i commented as follows: [see quiet Guy' post : http://www.housepricecrash.co.uk/newsblog/2010/01/blog-commentary-from-a-property-bear-27380.php]
"A long while ago we had a debate on this site as to whether zero interest rates would make a difference. Granted at that time the Banks / BS closely followed base, so the assumption was the if the base went to zero the Banks / BS rates would follow. That in of itself was a bit silly really, but still.
At the time the monthly Haliwide numbers were negative. And basically someone said ... i think that the HPs would go down even if (mortgage ) rates were zero. I said that the person who said that was getting a bit carried away and that of course that would support prices.
MSW says that the move up in prices on the back of (amongst other things) "zero" IRs is surprisingly small. I concur.
The idea really was to support the monetary system and to buy time for confidence to come back, hence the rise in share prices from the March lows and the correlation to HPs.
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6. luckyjim said...
TM,
By July last year Interest rates had been at zero for several months and QE was well under way. The conditions didn't change for the rest of the year. MSW just called it wrong.
If, back in July, you thought prices were going to rise (and are now suprised they only rose by a small amount) why didn't you say so at the time ?
It's a bit like predicting a 2-0 win for your team before the match and, after a 0-2 loss, claiming to be 'suprised' they didn't lose by more.