miss piggy

We'll be heading home mid 2008 (if all goes according to plan) & keep getting spooked by all the stories about house prices carrying on up into the stratosphere...Then I talk to my siblings who don't live in London & they seem to think provincial UK is slowing ?

From what they tell me people are now borrowing up to 5X their salary to get mortgages !!!! Is this true ? Surely it can not be sustainable - I'm no economist but that must make people incredibly sensitive to any interest rate rise (we got badly burnt in 1990 by this & we were only borrowing 2.5 X salary!).

We'll be coming back on a much reduced salary & will probably be living in either Oxford or Cambridge both of which seem to have horribly expensive housing. Do we buy somewhere little now , just to keep in the UK market, or do we play a waiting game & hope prices come down?

Anyone out there got any good advice ?

Wendy

I can't see prices dropping in the UK, but they could stay steady.

It took us a while to sell at the beginning of this year, whereas it would have probably only taken us a matter of days the year before.


This is my opinion however, and it could be wrong. At the end of the day it's always going to be risky whichever way you go.

honeymommy

We just bought a house in Berkshire. Complete on December 1st. Just 4 weeks after our offer was accepted houses in the same street were 10K more.
We rented when we first got back to save for the deposit. We desperately wanted to get a home of our own.
We have spent the last two and a half years renting and watched the house prices go up the whole time. Basically we have thrown that money (about 30K) at a landlord and not at our own mortgage.

Up or down the house prices will allways go up eventually. The problem I see, is if someone wants to buy and sell in a couple of years, They risk losing if prices drop. If a person plans to buy a house to stay in long term then it's not a problem as prices will eventually rise again.

It's swings and roundabouts. All I know is that this subject of house prices has been going on since we returned and if anyone waited since then they have lost out. A house similar to the one we are buying would have been around 210K then, but are 250K to 260K now.

Noone can tell another what to do in this situation. It's all a matter of choice and decision on taking the gamble or not.

All I do know is that we will finally have a home of our own and can lay down our plans for the future there, without the worry of being forced to move because the landlord wants to sell up. My kids will have stability. The mortgage will get paid, and it won't matter if the house prices goes up or down as we don't plan to move.

Back in the 90's friends had a house that was worth 80k. the crash meant it dropped to about 60k. They got out and lost big time. Now we are in 2006 that house is worth about 250K. Had they stayed..........Just an example.

sinope

Unless the UK economy goes into a tail spin for some reason it is unlikely that house prices will fall. There are too few houses and too many people plus more people owning more than one house and more people living on their own. Oxford/Cambridge is expensive but you will be pushed to find anything anywhere that is worth what you pay for it. Another thing to bear in mind is the council tax re-evaluation due sometime soon. The thinking seems to be that the average council tax bill go up by £250 per year (that will make my bill well over £1600 per year for a 2 bed house).

Craftybanshee

I think prices will continue to slowly climb. They are here in Somerset. It's scary how much they've gone up over the past few years :scared:

sinope

Scary and crazy.

Mercedes

I think it depends on the interest rates, when they are low people tend to buy more which has put house prices up, then when they put the interest rates up people have lost their houses and some have come down. Often in a boom there has been a crash, I would start looking at auctions, because there are people who are losing their houses with back payments of mortgages of only £2500 etc. Since there is alot of people living on plastic and can't really afford their lifestyle, we may see houses selling for less than they were brought for.

Craftybanshee

We bought our house 11 years ago for £63,500, now it's worth around £200,000 :scared:

eurotramp

Its crazy to think prices will only go up...we had already to big crashes and houses are at this moment totally over priced, people borrowing up to 5 times their salary or 125% of the house price..it can not be substaind.
They are 4 houses in our street for sale..4 bed detached for around 400k and they are not shifting...we live 35 min on the underground away from central London and EAs keep telling me that everything is flying of the shelf for at least asking prices...yeah right..spin, spin, spin..

HiddenPaw

There was a house round the corner from us put up for sale 9 months ago at £500k. The owners rejected an early offer of £475k. After no further offers, they dropped the asking price to £450k and sold about 6 weeks ago at £415k.

There are others in our area that have been on the market for 9-12 months. We are in a supposedly buoyant area of the NW, but it does seem to be a buyers market and things appear quite stagnant in places.

eurotramp

Serves them absolutely right..its the EAs fault..they give the seller an asking price and then the seller thinks thats what his house is worth and accepts nothing else..stupid..

We will just wait and see..

honeymommy

An agent came round yesterday to measure up and take pics to put the house we are renting on the market.

We got very chatty due to the fact we both raise money for cancer research. Anyway he said that the plan was to put the house on the market at an exorbitant price well above market value and see what interest there was. They would then take offers. There is some interest from someone allready but they have been hovering... He said they would tell them they have an interested party who wants to buy the house and give them the chance to make an offer.... Dodgy dealing, but it sells properties.

Average houses are moving very quickly here. The larger ones are not, but then theres not as many people with enough money to buy big.

eurotramp

Exactly what I thought...because I always got told that they already had offers on any house I was ever looking at...right

We maybe buying the house we rent..depends on the price because it needs lots of work..never anything done to for the last 20 years..or longer but lots of potential

woodyinoz

My Dads house went on the market in Ringwood at the beginning of the year. Like most he was told that the market is booming and was given a ridiculous over the top valuation for it by the agent. It is a 2 bed mid-terrace. 7 months later it has had no offers and he has decided to stay put.

My Mum owns an agency in Newbury. She often says that the market is great and prices are going up but who can trust her - 'she is an estate agent'

r.bartlett

Like these?

http://www.cricketts.co.uk/index.html

Cheers

Richard