Housing Market In Limbo

22/09/2008

By Claire West

The housing market has little chance of beginning its recovery until the banking crisis has abated according to Rightmove’s September House Price Index.

The longer term implications of the latest round of financial institution woes are still unclear, though they are a further blow for a housing market where activity levels had shown signs of bottoming out, albeit at a historically low level.

While the Bank of England may bring forward a cut in its base rate, it seems unlikely that this will have much impact on mortgage availability or mortgage rates in the short-term.

Miles Shipside, commercial director of Rightmove comments: “The housing market is in limbo and will remain so until financial institutions address the disastrous state of the
mortgage funding markets. We are now seeing the lowest level of new sellers for years. There’s a baseline level of activity from those that have to sell, but beyond that,
discretionary sellers are increasingly scarce. While this market provides a good opportunity to trade up, it requires a degree of bravery in the face of the ongoing turmoil in the financial markets.”

 

 

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