Archive for the 'Main' Category

Nationwide has today revealed its house price results for April, and has found that prices rose by only 0.1% in April, down significantly from 1.1% in March. This brought the annual house price growth rate (the increase from April 05 to April 06) to below 5% at 4.8%.

It goes on to say that the average house price is now £163,573, an increase of almost £7,500 compared to this time last year – equivalent to roughly £20 per day

Despite the distinct lowering in house price inflation, it says that demand is still there, but the rise in oil prices could pinch the public’s pocket as fuel prices continue to rise.

The National Association of Estate Agents (NAEA) has released results of a survey today that reveal that 75% of women will be put off selling their property due to the introduction of compulsory Home Information Packs (HIPs). This interesting contrasts to only 64% of men who would be put off.

The press release goes on to comment on the stereotype that women are more interested in the aesthetics of a house rather than the finances of owning property, saying that this research shows that this does not appear to be true.

Whatever the reason, it is certainly interesting that there is a distinct difference of opinion. What do you think about HIPs? Are they a useful initiative to make house buying easier? Or an extra cost that will not benefit anyone?

Results of the Woolwich’s latest survey have shown that although the cost of moving has risen rapidly over the last few years, it has risen slower than the cost of houses.

By example, Woolwich show that moving from a terraced house costing around £150,000 to a semi-detached house costing around £175,000 would incur costs of around £5,300. In 2000, moving between similar properties would have costed around £3,300 – giving an increase of around 60%. Since 2000, the properties have increased in price by around 95%. Since the majority of property sales occur below the £250,000 Stamp Duty band, Stamp Duty has not had a big effect on most sales.

However, as you move further up the property ladder, the cost of moving has increased significantly – mainly due to going over the 3% Stamp Duty band. By example, moving from a semi worth around £175,000 to a detached worth around £295,000 would now cost around £12,500! Significantly more than the £4,500 it would have cost to move between similar properties in 2000, when the detached would have cost around £160,000 – well below the 3% Stamp Duty band.

These increasingly significant costs of moving house, have led to an increase in people looking to extend their existing property rather than move – particularly if they would need to move up a Stamp Duty band.

This is further evidence that the Stamp Duty bands are terribly out of date – the 3 and 4% bands have not moved since 2000, while house prices have doubled.

Minutes of the Bank of England’s April meeting have shown that 7 of the 8 members of the Monetary Policy Committee (MPC) voted to keep rates at 4.5%, and 1 member voted to reduce the rate by 0.25%.

The MPC would normally have 9 members, but Richard Lambert left the MPC in March to become head of the CBI, and he is yet to be replaced.

Mervyn King, Rachel Lomax, John Gieve, Kate Barker, Charles Bean, Paul Tucker and David Walton were the members who voted to keep the rate at 4.5%, while Stephen Nickell voted to reduce the rate to 4.25% due to there being spare capacity in the economy.

While interest rates around the world had risen slightly since the MPC’s March meeting, share prices had also risen, house prices remained stable, and the exchange rate had fallen by around 1%. Given these facts, the Committee agreed to keep the interest rate at 4.5%.

In response to a current discussion in our forum, I thought I should write a post about codes of practice for estate agents.

The Office of Fair Trading (OFT) has recently given approval to the Ombudsman for Estate Agency (OEA) scheme. Currently only around 40% of estate agents belong to this scheme, but this is expected to rise quickly.

John Fingleton, OFT chief executive, said “Consumers can be assured that when they choose an estate agent that is displaying the OEA/OFT Approved code logo, they will be treated fairly if they have a complaint,”.

As the first code of practice for estate agents approved by the OFT, this is a good step in the right direction for protecting consumers from unscrupulous estate agents. To do your bit in helping the general public (as well as yourself), try to choose an agent that displays the OEA logo. Hopefully this should encourage other estate agents to join the code.