Will Corona virus cause a house price crash?

[beijingbikini]

Ha, I actually posted on that Mumsnet thread someone linked earlier - I'm the one who's pulling out of a flat purchase. I am really hoping prices lower because of this, because they are crazy.

It's absolutely nuts that 2 people on good salaries who each save half their salary on a good month and live in a small flat, drive an old banger and have SIM-only contracts...have to save for several years......for 15% of a 2-bed flat. And then somehow expect to make money on it! It can't go on forever - what next, a million pounds for a studio?

Going for my daily lockdown exercise has made me realise how much I'd really like a garden, so hopefully after this is over we might be able to actually afford one, not in the council estate part of town.

[PeanutButter]

Potential buyers on here, what position are you in to get a bargain? 100% cash purchase or will you need a (40% deposit) mortgage?

 

Or how much do you need local prices to drop to be able to buy cash?

Edited March 25, 2020 by PeanutButter

[Orb]

13 minutes ago, PeanutButter said:

Or how much do you need local prices to drop to be able to buy cash?

50% to grab a terraced or cheaper semi. 

[longgone]

43 minutes ago, PeanutButter said:

Potential buyers on here, what position are you in to get a bargain? 100% cash purchase or will you need a (40% deposit) mortgage?

 

Or how much do you need local prices to drop to be able to buy cash?

Been advised I Can borrow some money to buy if something good comes up.  Any type of 2-3 bed house for 2-300 would be good.

Hopefully when I'm back working will take a fixed mortgage for as long as possible.

[simon2]

Before the coronavirus I was of the opinion that if prices were 20% lower I would get involved and actively get viewings with a view to getting a bit more off under the asking price. Obviously a no-go back then so only have been bookmarking places in case they did fall.

TBH I am not still not sure we will get a crash like that quickly, and probably this might take years by the stealth method of flat nominal prices being eroded by inflation. 

Forced sellers may be interesting but I can see the government propping things up with more money should this play out longer or worse than expected.

Still, let's hope for some people waking up and smelling the coffee such as this:

https://www.rightmove.co.uk/property-for-sale/property-64679482.html

[Confusion of VIs]

You don't have to do much reading between the lines to see that a HPC will not be allowed if anything prices will be stoked up. 

Arguing that the crisis was of "biblical proportions," Draghi said banks must quickly lend to firms at zero cost and the capital needed for this lending must be provided by governments in the form of guarantees so jobs are maintained. "The cost of these guarantees should not be based on the credit risk of the company that receives them, but should be zero regardless of the cost of funding of the government that issues them," said Draghi, who has spoken rarely since leaving office.

[Voice of Doom]

1 hour ago, Pop321 said:

Banks acting like this they will bring a self fulfilling prophecy and the fall they actually fear.

Probably illustrates how much they are expecting the fall because they must know this is the case. 
 

Just read the article and Barclays state this is a temporary measure. However, how many temporary measures tend to become semi-permanent? Even a short term credit squeeze could snowball as you suggest.

[shavedchimp]

53 minutes ago, Confusion of VIs said:

You don't have to do much reading between the lines to see that a HPC will not be allowed if anything prices will be stoked up. 

Arguing that the crisis was of "biblical proportions," Draghi said banks must quickly lend to firms at zero cost and the capital needed for this lending must be provided by governments in the form of guarantees so jobs are maintained. "The cost of these guarantees should not be based on the credit risk of the company that receives them, but should be zero regardless of the cost of funding of the government that issues them," said Draghi, who has spoken rarely since leaving office.

But this refers to banks lending to firms, not banks lending to house buyers. Currently I'd say the former is more urgent and justifiable

[Confusion of VIs]

29 minutes ago, shavedchimp said:

But this refers to banks lending to firms, not banks lending to house buyers. Currently I'd say the former is more urgent and justifiable

Last time the money given to banks ended up as cheap mortgages, exactly the same will happen this time.

Banks see lending to SMEs as too risky.

[Huggy]

11 hours ago, PeanutButter said:

Potential buyers on here, what position are you in to get a bargain? 100% cash purchase or will you need a (40% deposit) mortgage?

 

Or how much do you need local prices to drop to be able to buy cash?

If any drop brought the average price to 3 or 3.5 average wage, then I could get something (flat, 2nd hand new-build ratcage) for cash, or something better (a decent 3 bed semi or something like that) for cash and a 25-40% mortgage. Back of fag packet calculations but nothing too extravagent.

[HovelinHove]

11 hours ago, PeanutButter said:

Potential buyers on here, what position are you in to get a bargain? 100% cash purchase or will you need a (40% deposit) mortgage?

 

Or how much do you need local prices to drop to be able to buy cash?

20% drop and I can get my forever house cash. I would feel like the biggest tool on the planet if I bought now. 

[msi]

Re Barclays - this is interesting.

Banks tendency with free central bank money is to push it into housing. However, given the demand to support SMEs, I can see Banks being 'forced' to support SMEs. They would then hedge the risk by reducing the domestic mortgage portfolio.

 

As said before, temporary measures have a pattern to become permanent and more widespread.

[Biggus]

With massive unemployment and a credit collapse looming I think house prices will collapse by much more than 20%. A 20% fall would do little more than knock the froth off.

The 1990s are a long time ago now. Many do not remember being offered houses for a few hundred pounds. Rows of terraces in Manchester were being marketed for a few pounds at one point. And nobody wanted them. I can remember seeing three bed semis in Didsbury for sale at 70k and thinking it was expensive.

Sounds unbelievable, I know, but that's how it was. Twenty years of bubble have distorted people's perception of a house's worth massively. If the credit bubble bursts, a lot of people are made unemployed and cannot service their mortgages and some people sadly die I think houses will return to their actual, non-bubble prices.

[Society of fools]

51 minutes ago, Biggus said:

 

Sounds unbelievable, I know, but that's how it was. Twenty years of bubble have distorted people's perception of a house's worth massively. If the credit bubble bursts, a lot of people are made unemployed and cannot service their mortgages and some people sadly die I think houses will return to their actual, non-bubble prices.

Yes, as I may have mentioned here before, a lot of this is simply a mass psychosis. In the 1890's the Australian house price bubble burst, and the next time Australian housing rose at above inflation was in the late 1960's. If you were born in Melbourne or Sydney in the late 1880's and died in the early 1960's- an excellent lifespan then- you would have lived your entire life without a living memory of house prices rising in real terms. 

I remember my father telling me when he migrated to Australia in the mid 1950's that it simply was accepted that Australian house prices rose at no more than the annual CPI and often less. 

That is what I would hope would happen now, in large parts of the UK like London, Oxford, Cambridge, but also around the world in Vancouver, Toronto, Sydney, Auckland, Melbourne, and Hong Kong. 

[Roman Roady]

A good perspective on things...

 

[Will!]

I've received an e-mail from HSBC offering me a mortgage payment holidays of up to 3 months, with no risk to my credit rating.  I don't have a mortgage.

[Pop321]

1 hour ago, Will! said:

I've received an e-mail from HSBC offering me a mortgage payment holidays of up to 3 months, with no risk to my credit rating.  I don't have a mortgage.

Sounds very generous. I wonder if they will offer it to customers with mortgages too ??

[heffsta]

Let's get the tiny violins out. Here is a great read:

https://www.wired.co.uk/article/airbnb-coronavirus-london

[smash]

50 minutes ago, heffsta said:

Let's get the tiny violins out. Here is a great read:

https://www.wired.co.uk/article/airbnb-coronavirus-london

But Government advice is not to move, either buying or renting. LoL

[dances with sheeple]

On 25/03/2020 at 21:35, simon2 said:

Before the coronavirus I was of the opinion that if prices were 20% lower I would get involved and actively get viewings with a view to getting a bit more off under the asking price. Obviously a no-go back then so only have been bookmarking places in case they did fall.

TBH I am not still not sure we will get a crash like that quickly, and probably this might take years by the stealth method of flat nominal prices being eroded by inflation. 

Forced sellers may be interesting but I can see the government propping things up with more money should this play out longer or worse than expected.

Still, let's hope for some people waking up and smelling the coffee such as this:

https://www.rightmove.co.uk/property-for-sale/property-64679482.html

UK credit rating has been downgraded and they have barely started, i can see them losing control financially and socially pretty quickly if this escalates.

[godnose]

On 25/03/2020 at 20:38, PeanutButter said:

Potential buyers on here, what position are you in to get a bargain? 100% cash purchase or will you need a (40% deposit) mortgage?

 

Or how much do you need local prices to drop to be able to buy cash?

I have approx £70,000 in cash. Living East-central London. A flat which offers a somewhat liveable situation (~68 sq. metres minimum with 2 bedrooms) would currently be about £425,000 at the low end. I need a 50% drop for such a flat to be £212,500 to have a 40% deposit (£85,000) for it. I can save £1000 per month. So I would need 15 months' more time to save up the extra bit. I think my chances are probably low of this ever happening, but I am the market, I am the demand goddamnit.

If they would stop throwing money in, interest only btl mortgages (only works if market is basically a Ponzi scheme!) QE, help-to-buy, shared ownership (ffs! honestly, if the whole flat is too expensive, sellers need to lower the price, don't have someone buy a sliver of it and rent the other 80%!!, what madness) then I'd probably be set up to get a place. As it happens, because of the year I was born I am in no position.

I feel fed up and tired of working in an office all day and paying my landlord such a slice (cocksure agent once told me the landlord owns 90 flats in London and "buys flats like we go shopping")... Tired of housemates, tired of having no furniture, tired of being crammed into one room at an age where I thought I'd have married, had kids, have a car (not things I necessarily want now, but it'd be nice to have the capacity)... Honestly, and I know my position is better than the majority of my peers. God help them. My heart breaks. And at the end of your life your like rass, I was doing time but I weren't event behind bars...

[desertorchid]

3 minutes ago, godnose said:

I have approx £70,000 in cash. Living East-central London. A flat which offers a somewhat liveable situation (~68 sq. metres minimum with 2 bedrooms) would currently be about £425,000 at the low end. I need a 50% drop for such a flat to be £212,500 to have a 40% deposit (£85,000) for it. I can save £1000 per month. So I would need 15 months' more time to save up the extra bit. I think my chances are probably low of this ever happening, but I am the market, I am the demand goddamnit.

If they would stop throwing money in, interest only btl mortgages (only works if market is basically a Ponzi scheme!) QE, help-to-buy, shared ownership (ffs! honestly, if the whole flat is too expensive, sellers need to lower the price, don't have someone buy a sliver of it and rent the other 80%!!, what madness) then I'd probably be set up to get a place. As it happens, because of the year I was born I am in no position.

I feel fed up and tired of working in an office all day and paying my landlord such a slice (cocksure agent once told me the landlord owns 90 flats in London and "buys flats like we go shopping")... Tired of housemates, tired of having no furniture, tired of being crammed into one room at an age where I thought I'd have married, had kids, have a car (not things I necessarily want now, but it'd be nice to have the capacity)... Honestly, and I know my position is better than the majority of my peers. God help them. My heart breaks. And at the end of your life your like rass, I was doing time but I weren't event behind bars...

If you don't mind me asking, how old are you?

[godnose]

7 minutes ago, desertorchid said:

If you don't mind me asking, how old are you?

Hey, yeh sure. I'm 33, (going on23!?)

[desertorchid]

7 hours ago, godnose said:

Hey, yeh sure. I'm 33, (going on23!?)

Well you are still very young and one thing that is certain in life is constant change, especially if you live with a level of dissatisfaction you display. It sounds like you just need a different perspective. Evaluate your skillset, think about what motivates you and take steps to move in that direction . This may involve starting a business, moving abroad or career change, but at 33, do something (and OK if that must be a mortgage and a purchase in the next 6 months, just do it, and bargain hard- the governments intention is to get prices higher again). You are still young enough to take risks and come out the other side if things don't work out. It may not feel that way now, but you are.

FWIW when I was 33 I was living in a shared house on Hendon, London and felt very similar to you. I am now 50 and made some big decisions that worked out well. 33 seems a very very long time ago.

Best of luck.

Edited March 29, 2020 by desertorchid

[Simhadri]

6 hours ago, godnose said:

I have approx £70,000 in cash. Living East-central London. A flat which offers a somewhat liveable situation (~68 sq. metres minimum with 2 bedrooms) would currently be about £425,000 at the low end. I need a 50% drop for such a flat to be £212,500 to have a 40% deposit (£85,000) for it. I can save £1000 per month. So I would need 15 months' more time to save up the extra bit. I think my chances are probably low of this ever happening, but I am the market, I am the demand goddamnit.

If they would stop throwing money in, interest only btl mortgages (only works if market is basically a Ponzi scheme!) QE, help-to-buy, shared ownership (ffs! honestly, if the whole flat is too expensive, sellers need to lower the price, don't have someone buy a sliver of it and rent the other 80%!!, what madness) then I'd probably be set up to get a place. As it happens, because of the year I was born I am in no position.

I feel fed up and tired of working in an office all day and paying my landlord such a slice (cocksure agent once told me the landlord owns 90 flats in London and "buys flats like we go shopping")... Tired of housemates, tired of having no furniture, tired of being crammed into one room at an age where I thought I'd have married, had kids, have a car (not things I necessarily want now, but it'd be nice to have the capacity)... Honestly, and I know my position is better than the majority of my peers. God help them. My heart breaks. And at the end of your life your like rass, I was doing time but I weren't event behind bars...

With all due respect if possible with your job, plz get the ****** out of London. Its soulless shit hole. With £70k as deposit, you can buy decent home in Glasgow-Edinburgh belt. Your money goes far here. I can see clearly how stressed you are. No point in trying to stick out in London if it doesn't provide you decent quality of life.