interestrateripoff Posted August 22, 2009 Share Posted August 22, 2009 http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/money/pro...icle6805977.ece Fresh optimism returned to the housing market yesterday as Rightmove, Britain’s biggest property website, reported a record number of visits and as official figures showed that some homebuyers believe that price falls have come to an end.About 76,000 homes changed hands last month, according to HM Revenue & Customs (HMRC), the most since May last year and the fifth consecutive month of increase. The figure is up 17 per cent on the 65,000 sales in June. Rightmove said that record levels of website traffic — with 3.2 billion page impressions in the year’s first half — indicated that price rises that had begun to show in January had sparked a rush of interest from bargain-seekers. However, a lack of new homes for sale has resulted in a fall of more than half in the number of homes newly listed on the site, down from a peak of 167,000 two years ago to 82,700. The website, which has a market share of 80 per cent, recorded the highest number of visitors in a day in its nine-year history on August 10, in the middle of the traditionally quieter summer holiday season. It said that 70 agents a month had been returning to the site since March, after the loss of about 300 a month at the end of 2008. The increase in interest comes after six months of consecutive price rises recorded by Nationwide. Since February, the price of the average home has risen by 7.5 per cent to £158,871. Halifax said that prices had risen by 3.3 per cent since April. Housing market experts called the rebound an “unexpected bounce†and added that the growth was still off abnormally low levels of turnover. They believe that there may be a reversal in the recent upturn in fortunes in the autumn, as owners put their properties on the market, breaking the lock on supply that has acted as a constraint on transactions. All of this happy news if making me feel giddy. Thank god there are no turds lurking in the system. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest KingCharles1st Posted August 22, 2009 Share Posted August 22, 2009 There's just one large floater that refuses to be flushed away. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
XswampyX Posted August 22, 2009 Share Posted August 22, 2009 I wish I could report to my boss, how much more interest I was getting for the company even though my sales figures are shit and then get a 20% bonus! This is the tail wagging the dog. WOOF! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Sybil13 Posted August 22, 2009 Share Posted August 22, 2009 (edited) http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/money/pro...icle6805977.eceAll of this happy news if making me feel giddy. Thank god there are no turds lurking in the system. It would be interesting to do a poll on HPC to see how many times a day members visit RM's website with absolutely no intention of buying a property, or perhaps trawling over and over trying to find something that looks realistically priced. Couldn't all those additional hits just be people searching over and over again for a property valued somewhere near a 2009 value? I have friends that trawl all the time and unable to find anything they would want to live in in the area they are looking have started trawling further afield. Certainly many of the people I know spend a lot of time just looking to see what is going on with Property Bee etc.. I saw RM's shares were us because they have said the market has bottomed but hard to see on what basis that could be given their latest HPI. HPC Link Edited August 22, 2009 by Sybil13 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Sybil13 Posted August 22, 2009 Share Posted August 22, 2009 Would have just added this to my post above but going back into edit on HPC results in a strange format that needs to be sorted. Am I the only one that finds it hard to understand how house prices are reported in an article about RM for instance or the economy with ITS ALL OVER HOUSE PRICES ARE GOING UP AND UP AND UP ....in comparison to how it is reported in an article about mortgages / negative equity etc.? However, even after a more factual report it sitll ends with ITS ALL OVER despite actually concluding by saying "many economists believe that house prices are set for a 'double-dip' and could fall by a further 15 per cent next year." Take the article today in relation to interest only mortgages. Millions of middle-class families are in danger of being unable to move home after they gambled their futures on interest-only mortgages. Four out of ten households have taken out the mortgages, according to figures from the Financial Services Authority. .... ....But with houses having lost almost a quarter of their value in the last two years, an estimated 4.2million homeowners have to confront the prospect that they may not be able to move for many years. ....To compound the problems caused by falling property prices, the credit crunch has left thousands of white-collar workers unemployed and millions facing a pay freeze, so they have little chance of increasing their mortgage payments. Ed Stansfield, from economic forecaster Capital Economics, said: 'With prices having fallen as much as they have already many homeowners will find that they simply won't be able to move home. David Hollingworth, from brokers London & Country said: 'If you are on interest-only the best thing you can do is switch to repayment. 'But if you can't afford to do this then you should either overpay on your current deal or start regular saving. The longer you ignore it the bigger your burden is going to become - it's a ticking timebomb.' So we have property"having fallen so much " and proeprty is down 25% and 4.2 million owners unable to move for many years (which I assume means property prices are going to stay down), we have a "ticking timebomb" and at the end of the article economists expecting 15% falls in 2010 so that is 40% peak to trough, yet still we have at the end of the article : There were further signs of a housing market revival yesterday as property website Rightmove said the 'toughest market conditions for a generation' had gone after seeing a record number of potential buyers visit in one day. AMAZING - IT NEVER CEASES TO SHOCK ME THE LEVEL OF DENIAL ! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
porca misèria Posted August 22, 2009 Share Posted August 22, 2009 (edited) Rightmove has itself a nice position: regardless of the state of the market, it's become the de-facto primary place to advertise. And it has no vested interest in prices, only in there being a healthy market, and even there, it's perfectly happy for there to be hoards of window-shoppers and timewasters. The threat to rightmove's crown comes from the various pretenders to their throne, like zoopla - which could grab the prime spot if they tie-in with someone with market clout, like a google or amazon. But for the time being at least, rightmove has the incumbent's advantage and a nice little earner. Edited August 22, 2009 by porca misèria Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
puppee Posted August 22, 2009 Share Posted August 22, 2009 haven't they heard of window shopping but without wearing out the shoe leather , yes its lazy must get out more i need the exercise Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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