Bergy100

I'm going to hazard a guess it was on the Upper Cavehill Road? Would that be right?

Hi Wendyhouse, I'm also looking in the same area (BT15) having sold my first house last autumn and taken a years rental in the meantime. I have to agree with you that the asking prices in the area remain "optimistic" to say the least . The major issue is not knowing what the actual selling prices are so I was interested in reading of the house going 45K below asking you refer to. Can you provide any more details about this one, i.e was it detached, how many beds, recpts it had. Unfortunately I cannot help with any news on bids as I'm not in a position to move yet but I think part of the problem in the area is a lack of supply, There just aren't that many good ones up for sale and any that are; and are good; seem to be going quickly which I think is probably due to the desirability of the area and its closeness to many schools etc.

£275 pm on rates alone. Jaysus wept. Madness. Surely when you add in rates, cost of mortgage, other overheads then you really are talking about a small minority being able to afford this type of property at these prices, doctors and the like? I know Malone was always pricey in relative terms but £300K for that house is a bad joke.

I didn't ask. I would assume it is in general but definitely applicable to Belfast where I am looking.

In my most recent conversation with an EA I was told, w/o any prompting on my part, the middle market was stuck. Obvious inference was asking prices are still too high. With that in mind, I'm anticipating decent sizes drops in asking prices to continue into 2013. Still seeing examples of 20K being taken off houses in one day and continuing to sit unsold. For 2013, I would like to see more houses coming on realistically priced in the first place - think there's still far too many kite fliers. There's a fair bit to play out yet.

To me the report is the continuation of good news even if the headline figure from a VI perspective is a 1% fall in the last 3 months. I think it's pretty certain there are not going to be huge drop figures on a quarterly basis from this report given that it is evident from the graphs a good majority (and I'm stating that by looking at it alone) of the sales recorded are already at £120K - with a substantial amount well below that again. That there are numerous FTB houses, repos etc etc selling in this range is not in doubt. Do these properties have much more in them to fall? Possibly not, though the indication is there will still be drops ahead. When you see the most optimistic result giving £105K for a semi detached and their standardised price sitting at £96K it only further re-inforces what has been stated on here for a while that asking prices still have a lot further to fall to catch up. Yes, I'm looking at you vendors, in 3/2 semi detached's with asking prices varying between 160-180K. There may be the very odd exception but this report only backs up the opinion that they have bob hope of getting anywhere near and that the best option is still to wait. Only the other day I see 20K coming off a house on my shortlist to leave it around £160K (RV) and it's still way overpriced in the current market.

Thanks VI. Personally, I think you call it right on more people entering the rental market, I am hearing anecdotes of people in my age group also doing the same thing and I have to be honest and say that it is the state of the market that has forced me into a rental property - this was not something I had considered as a serious option when I first put my house on the market. The simple facts are that there are a lot of people out there who have been priced out since 2005 - and these are people in good jobs - who are now sitting (like we were) in houses that are too small for their now growing families. When you are still looking at houses being advertised at 150K plus for more space and then factor in the additional costs in rates which in many cases can double then I can only see the trend continuing until the mid market comes down to be around where it should to allow second steppers to afford to move.

You are right - we had added pressure as we were tied to a particular area due to not wanting to disrupt kids too much such as moving schools where they are settled and with which we are very happy. Additionally, the time constraint was in place due to our purchasers wanting to move in and the fact their mortgage offer was only going to last for a certain, short period of time. It is certainly more difficult for young families to secure what they need - as they have to be more choosy and have certain requirements that single people or couples w/o kids just don't have. Stil, I have to say I was amazed at the amount of people that seemed to be chasing properties to rent. I have no prior experience of this so can't really comment on what it was like before. I have to say though, that we did get in first on this property and it was easy enough from there as we were accepted pretty quickly.

Hi guys, just thought I'd give you a quick update on my situation for those who are interested. We decided to sell our house at the offer described back in May and moved into a rental property in the area we would eventually like to buy. I have to say, I am absolutely delighted with the property we have secured which offers more living space and a far better location - all for less than £50 a month more than what I was outlaying on mortgage and rates at my previous house. I now wish I had had the courage to have made this decision sooner. Whilst I still hope to purchase a property outright in the future, as many of you have outlined so well over the years, there is no point in jumping back into a falling market so I am happy to join many of you and take a "wait and see" approach over the next year and hope that prices continue to decline in the middle market. Just a few observations to pass on, which I hope may help someone. The rental market has gone absolutely crazy. Naively, I assumed securing a rental property would be a "walk in the park" but we found around 75% of the properties we viewed were in poor condition to bring young kids too; and the 25% of properties that were not had huge demand with perhaps up to 20 people attending open viewings. In the end there was no room for negotiation on rent, it was a case of getting in quick to secure the first decent property we saw - or risk the sale fall through...We were very fortunate this property came up when it did. I am hearing stories of many families around my age group taking this route now. On the house we sold, I consider myself again to have been very fortunate as we managed to secure a sale at RV + 15%. My EA confirmed I have been very lucky to secure such an offer particularly as I begun to receive offers from others that were below RV, or around it before securing the sale. I know I would not have received a similar offer again though it did pass the banks survey. The first person to ever mention RV to me was my own lawyer handling the sale. Having sold a FTB house now, I would agree with Doccyboy and others that this segement of the market is becoming very affordable now and must be approaching the bottom though prices in my area still seem to be around £25K more than they were in 2002. The middle market has a lot of catching up to do.....

If it's the Newtownabbey area you are looking at I wonder what effect price props such as the Momentum Packages are having. This package offers a 100% deposit; attractive fixed rates and protection against falling house prices and it seems properties offered under this package, in the Aylesbury development in particular, are selling reasonably well at £139K. This has the knock on effect of distorting the re-sale market - owners convinced their property is worth more than the 3 bed semi new builds. They also appear to be being used as comparables by EA's - who of course do not mention the Momentum Package as well. I'm also finding there are very few houses on the market in the N'abbey area that could be described as "step up" houses in general.

that's some mark-up on an opening offer.

Mark Leinster of BTW Cairns in Belfast said: “I don’t think there will be much further price shrinkage in the areas that are performing well, such as greater Belfast, Newtownabbey, north Down and Lisburn.” Any thoughts on this comment? Newtownabbey, Antim Road, asking prices remain stubbornly high - with many unsold as a consequence of course. Interesting, I heard an anecdotal that EA's in N'abbey are using 3 bed semis built in Aylesbury as comparables. These Frazer homes are selling at £150K a piece and they have sold quite a few of them - although possibly not at the advertised price??

I'm starting to see 4-bed detached houses in my search area going sub 200K. Some are at RV; some are lingering just above, This seems to be a rubicon crossed though many still have to catch up. Also, saw a huge £50k knocked off a massive new build detached house in Blackrock yesterday. It has now dropped £70k in 2012 overall.

Thanks for taking the time to respond to my post, Doccy & VI, Your advice is much appreciated.

Yes, I agree with both your comments in the first paragraph doccy, I am inclined to take the offer. My main concern is any economic blow up meaning I no longer have an asset & any equity money I may have put away for a later date being inflated away - but I guess no one knows the answer to that one. On the rental options, I'm looking in the same area(ish) as I'm happy with the school my kid is in and I wouldn't consider moving his school. Would you have any specific advise about negotiating on a rental price or any general tips about things I should be aware of when entering this market? I haven't rented since I moved out of home and the landlord was a friend so this is all new.

Hi guys, I would appreciate some advice from you guys, if you would care to take a look. Basically, I have an offer on the house and this time I am minded to accept it. I don't want to go into too much specifics, for obvious reasons, but basically the house is now too small for the family and as a result we are keen to get into something bigger. It's a good house that I am sure the current bidders will be happy in. We'll be coming out of it with around £18-20K which at the moment is probably not a great wedge for a deposit given current prices. I am thinking about taking up the rental option but a quick survey of prices seems to indicate that it would take something approaching £750 per month to move into a bigger house . I'd appreciate any pointers as to whether I can expect to negotiate reductions in the rental asking price, or any general tips you could give me as to how I should approach this. Moreover, if you want to tell me I should stay put until I see what happens with Greece & Spain (as I see BVI allude to in another thread) then please let me know. I had the old sleepless night last night wondering if I should sell up and go....

This one may be of interest to those looking in the Newtownabbey area. A repossession and it's come on at £4k above ratable value. A lot cheaper than similar properties on the market via private sales - around £175k. Moreover, the developers price of £150k for 3 bed shoeboxes look even more ridiculous when you look at this one - though it seems they are selling quite a few up there regardless.... We need a few more of these to come on around BT36, BT15 & BT14 as it's currently still la la land in this area. http://www.propertypal.com/8-aylesbury-park-newtownabbey/192537/insight

Great, a nice headache for me now since I had flights with bmibaby and holiday sorted seperately for July 27th. Fortunately I haven't paid the full whack on my accomodation but it is due tomorrow. Anyone know what my options are, i.e should I be able to arrange a different destination with holiday nights or am I committed to going to a place where BMIBaby provided the flights?

The housd in Blackrock went SA this morning vman. Did you check it out?

No problem at all, its a really nice house, in fact putting my concerns to one side, it's one of the nicer ones on the market in that asking price bracket in BT36 at the moment.

I also took a drive past that property Vman as it is a beautiful house, only recently built as you say. We decided not to view (I have a couple of kids so it may not be the right upsize for us) and the main reasons for not viewing were first up, I thought the driveway was a litle cramped with two cars in it (maybe a bit pernickity I know) but secondly, and more importantly with kids, it faces onto a road that I have seen drivers speed on around 50-60 mph. The road is not fenced off in any form from the development and on a recent trip up there I asked the dev was there any plans to do so and he said they weren't given permission so I take from that it will never go up. Thought it was a little risky having kids - but that won't apply to everyone... On your price/area query, can only repeat what I said a few posts back that I haven't heard anything negative about B'rock; I think the house prices up there are very very expensive and also it does feel a little remote to me but again that wouldn't bother everyone and there is a bus link into town. I wouldn't fancy your chances of getting 40K off at all but would love to know if you did Have you not thought about looking at some of the older type houses for sale instead of new builds?

Based on the recent reductions I've had to place on my own 3-bed semi just to get people through the door (and hardly a flood at that) 170K is way too much for this house. To me it also looks like a FTB house (smallish living room, smallish 2nd room with a galley kitchen which doesn't appear to have room for a table & chairs). Bedrooms seem smallish too... I'd be reluctant to offwer any more than £135-140 given it's Belfast location & garage w/o knowing what current selling prices are. Maybe I'm dreaming though

Lovely house, insane price.

How are you getting on with your search Vman?

£200k for that house is crazy money, looks damn ugly from the front, garden is surrounded by houses at the back and none of the rooms look anything special.