Land Registry in August +0.2% but London -0.5% MoM and -0.2 YoY

[Pablo]

https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/uk-house-price-index-summary-august-2018/uk-house-price-index-summary-august-2018

 

[hurlerontheditch]

0.5% monthly fall is encouraging in London. this could turn into a fall of 10% over a year if it continued

 

the sales volumes are brutal! down 25% compared with a year earlier. there is so little amount of stock coming to the market too that it is only going to get worse. and it is keeping prices from falling too much as there is so little choice. the hope of higher interest rates forcing overleveraged to cut their losses seems to be disappearing too  

[Smiley George]

45 minutes ago, hurlerontheditch said:

0.5% monthly fall is encouraging in London. this could turn into a fall of 10% over a year if it continued

 

the sales volumes are brutal! down 25% compared with a year earlier. there is so little amount of stock coming to the market too that it is only going to get worse. and it is keeping prices from falling too much as there is so little choice. the hope of higher interest rates forcing overleveraged to cut their losses seems to be disappearing too  

We're at a tipping point I feel, if that supply increases for any reason things will gather pace quite quickly, and if we get a couple more interest rate rises between now and the spring - game on.

Also interesting to see new builds have increased in price by 8.5% over the year...i wonder what's behind that?? ?

[happyguy]

Supply will not increase.  The lack of stock is obvious, the vast majority of people will only sell if they really have to, job move, divorce etc.  That keeps stock levels low and prevents price drops.  

[Harry Sacks]

is that figure inflation adjusted?

 

[hurlerontheditch]

36 minutes ago, happyguy said:

Supply will not increase.  The lack of stock is obvious, the vast majority of people will only sell if they really have to, job move, divorce etc.  That keeps stock levels low and prevents price drops.  

unfortunately so

must start to hitting EAs soon along with the tenant fees

[maffo in oxford]

BTL hit by section 24 will increase the available stock

[Freki]

2 hours ago, hurlerontheditch said:

0.5% monthly fall is encouraging in London. this could turn into a fall of 10% over a year if it continued

 

the sales volumes are brutal! down 25% compared with a year earlier. there is so little amount of stock coming to the market too that it is only going to get worse. and it is keeping prices from falling too much as there is so little choice. the hope of higher interest rates forcing overleveraged to cut their losses seems to be disappearing too  

Sales volume are crap data. They are not indicative since sales for august will added for a large number of months.

[Aidan Ap Word]

Have they changed the order of the colours - red for bad (now denoting increases) and green for good (now denoting falls)?

[ftb_fml]

22 minutes ago, maffo in oxford said:

BTL hit by section 24 will increase the available stock

Indeed - could be the case round here in Oxford (large PRS as you probably know) as my RM search results are up from typically around 110 to 158 properties currently - that's significantly more than I've ever seen before.

[lostinessex]

Very encouraged by this report - while the overall YoY still looks like prices are holding up - round my way - East of England - prices plummeted this month and a similar drop over the next couple of months should see them YoY negative.

Shame the prospect of a second interest rate rise is off the table - that would make things really interesting.

It's all about sentiment.

Hopefully when the BTL brigade do their tax returns in Jan 2019 that might cause a few more to decide to sell off. This crash will be different - owner occupiers hold on for dear life making downward trend sticky, but BTL 'investors'... well we'll have to see. Could there be a rush to the exits?

2019 shping up to be very interesting - just praying the Autumn budget doesn't mess things up with some new prop.

[Killian]

2 hours ago, happyguy said:

Supply will not increase.  The lack of stock is obvious, the vast majority of people will only sell if they really have to, job move, divorce etc.  That keeps stock levels low and prevents price drops.  

Demand might drop from reduced immigration and changing behaviours - where I am most families have at least one mid 20s to 30s child still living with them. Most of these are low skilled with no prospect of high wages.

Once the drops starting taking hold the banks will require larger deposits and most FTBs will be unable to afford this and drops will increase.

More props is there only option

[ElPapasito]

Its got to be more props.  They just wouldn't survive the London Luvvy Feel Bad Factor of plummeting prices given all else that is going on with this appalling government. 

[simon2]

House prices falling faster in the East rather than London? Doesn't make much sense to me.

Would have thought London has all the ingredients for a fall, lots of BTL-type places which could easily drop 10% without being meaningful due to being already over-priced.

Outside of that I thought it was mainly smaller towns with less BTL element and people with greater ties (ie family, schools) so might be more resilient. 

[dougless]

7 minutes ago, simon2 said:

House prices falling faster in the East rather than London? Doesn't make much sense to me.

Its not the usual pattern but its worth considering how poor transport infrastructure is in East Anglia and that may be starting to bite in this particular downturn.  For example, the main road out of Felixstowe, which runs up to the Midlands, is the A14 - if anyone knows that road they will know what an inadequate road it is.  Felixstowe is the UK's largest container port and yet no Government has bothered to update the A14 to a motorway standards.  Main roads in East Anglia are pretty poor which makes traveling slow and tedious.  The main line from Norwich to London is effective but can you imagine the cost of commuting from Norwich each day!

[Fromage Frais]

1 hour ago, simon2 said:

House prices falling faster in the East rather than London? Doesn't make much sense to me.

Would have thought London has all the ingredients for a fall, lots of BTL-type places which could easily drop 10% without being meaningful due to being already over-priced.

Outside of that I thought it was mainly smaller towns with less BTL element and people with greater ties (ie family, schools) so might be more resilient. 

Nobody on norfolk wages without a lotto win or mum and dad can buy a nice house in the good parts of Norwich or Broadland...let alone North Norfolk unless on  3x the average wage. 

A lot of the county is prime retirement/tourism land so 400+ bungalows and holiday homes and we also have family buyers from London and Cambridge (see recent ******** times articles proclaiming Norwich the new Notting Hill).

In a recent survey Brighton then Norwich where the top two places where it is difficult to make a living.

Since the locals cannot pay what is needed is a constant money supply from downsizers and priced out second steppers... otherwise the poor sellers are left with the locals.

So in essence price falls or even no falls + not selling in London means prices are screwed here.

As I have posted earlier previously I was told "have better offers will sell" and now "not desperate to sell will wait".

Stagnation is in 

 

Edited October 18, 2018 by Fromage Frais

[zugzwang]

1 hour ago, dougless said:

Its not the usual pattern but its worth considering how poor transport infrastructure is in East Anglia and that may be starting to bite in this particular downturn.  For example, the main road out of Felixstowe, which runs up to the Midlands, is the A14 - if anyone knows that road they will know what an inadequate road it is.  Felixstowe is the UK's largest container port and yet no Government has bothered to update the A14 to a motorway standards.  Main roads in East Anglia are pretty poor which makes traveling slow and tedious.  The main line from Norwich to London is effective but can you imagine the cost of commuting from Norwich each day!

Tell me about it. I was stuck on the bloody thing for hours last summer going north. Only got away by heading for Luton and the M1!

[Pebbles]

5 hours ago, Freki said:

Sales volume are crap data. They are not indicative since sales for august will added for a large number of months.

Quite we get this every month sales down brutally ignoring the land registry sales lag. Of course august figures are still being added to so it isn't a fair thing to say at all that volumes are well down. We bash the media for being VI and selective reporting then a poster makes the same mistake on here every month claiming sales are down.

[ebull]

Seems to be a lot denying the facts here.

I've been monitoring houses [only] for sale on RM in some N London postcodes [N1 to N8 geographically] monthly since Feb.

Number available for sale [excl SSTC] is up around 25% in that time and is the same number as around a whole years sales. Allowing for duplicate listings for sale I guess there is 9 months supply and rising. For flats there is much more supply.

To get sales and remove the recent sales delay, look at RM sold data and filter:

<last 2 years> and note count, then subtract <last one year> gives total sales per year [removing the incomplete data for the last year].

Use last 5 years min last one year to get an average.

Even with the built in one year time lag from that method, sales volumes are clearly way down around me. The 25% LR are reporting looks correct to me.

[Freki]

To understand volumes I look at lending volumes. Its a proxy but at least a reliable one you can use immediately and not deceiving you after few months have passed and you see that thing flat lining instead of dropping:

https://www.fca.org.uk/data/mortgage-lending-statistics

[winkie]

7 hours ago, happyguy said:

Supply will not increase.  The lack of stock is obvious, the vast majority of people will only sell if they really have to, job move, divorce etc.  That keeps stock levels low and prevents price drops.  

There is plenty of stock, just not plenty of people that are ready, willing or able to buy that stock....many would not want to buy it at any price.?

[LetsBuild]

6 hours ago, lostinessex said:

Very encouraged by this report - while the overall YoY still looks like prices are holding up - round my way - East of England - prices plummeted this month and a similar drop over the next couple of months should see them YoY negative.

Shame the prospect of a second interest rate rise is off the table - that would make things really interesting.

It's all about sentiment.

Hopefully when the BTL brigade do their tax returns in Jan 2019 that might cause a few more to decide to sell off. This crash will be different - owner occupiers hold on for dear life making downward trend sticky, but BTL 'investors'... well we'll have to see. Could there be a rush to the exits?

2019 shping up to be very interesting - just praying the Autumn budget doesn't mess things up with some new prop.

Where did you get the second rate rise is off the table?

Wage inflation is through the roof, exactly the wrong sort of inflation the BoE wants to see. I would have thought a rate rise is due in November due to that!

[Freki]

I am with you, the MSM has been awfully quiet, and failed to point pressure is increasing on the BoE inflation at 2.4%, wages at 3.1%; base rate should not be so distant of those.

[lostinessex]

15 hours ago, LetsBuild said:

Where did you get the second rate rise is off the table?

Wage inflation is through the roof, exactly the wrong sort of inflation the BoE wants to see. I would have thought a rate rise is due in November due to that!

I'd love a rate rise in November but I think if one was on the way the BoE would be dropping hints and making sure the media were setting expectations first. In the run-up to the last rise the business sections were full of opionion peices discussing the possibility weeks before. Earlier in the year the prosepct of two rises this year got regularly mentioned in business articles in the media - but since the last rise I've not heard that discussed at all.