008 is shaping up to be an their house for a few years, they
interesting year for the will have to get used to paying
property market. for a Hip to be compiled. It has
Already January has seen a small to contain a number of documents,
decline. Figures out last week all less than three months old.
from the Nationwide building They include a statement of sale,
society showed that house prices energy performance certificate,
fell by 0.1 per cent.
local authority searches and of
And with yesterday's interest course the title documents for
rate cut making mortgages more the property.
affordable for thousands of
The effect Hips had last year
people, who knows what will was to pile on a little more
happen over the next 11 expense to the process of selling
months.
a house. Some property
Of course this year is consultants believed that
following a very unusual one for restricted the supply of houses
the property market in 2007. It to the market a little, as people
started with the introduction of who would once have speculatively
Home Information Packs, which you put their house up for sale to
probably know as Hips.
see if they got any bites would
They were brought in after be less likely to do this.
some research in 1997 showed that
Another key factor that
one in four of all house sales affected the property market in
fell apart before contracts could 2007 was interest rate rises.
be exchanged. They were formally Between August 2006 and November
announced four years ago and last year, there were five rate
phased in over a number of months rises. Even though they have
last year.
dropped twice since, the majority
For anyone who hasn't dived of people who didn't get into a
into the property market and sold fixed deal at the right time are
paying a lot more for their issuing monthly house price
monthly mortgage payment than indexes for 13 years now, puts
they were two years ago. That these changes into perspective.
lack of disposable income is It says that despite the three
bound to have an effect on falls in a row, the price of a
people's willingness to buy typical property is still 4.2%
bigger property, increasing their higher than it was 12 months
mortgage payments again. ago.
And of course there was a
The building society will be
slowdown in house price growth keeping a close eye on how the
last year. It seems as though the recent interest rate cuts and any
effect of that is continuing into more in the months to come will
2008.
affect the market. It's possible
The Nationwide's monthly price that lower rates will attract
survey of the property market for buyers in creating more demand.
January showed the 0.1% fall was The key will be if the demand
the third consecutive monthly turns into actual house price
fall in average property prices. transactions.
They went down 0.5% in December
So what will happen to the
and 0.8% in November.
property market throughout the
The decline has seen annual rest of 2008? It's a tough one to
house price growth fall back to call right now. One thing's for
4.2%, which is not only the certain – it looks like we may
lowest figure for 13 months, but have a year as eventful as the
is down from 4.8 per cent in last one.
December 2007.
And it means that the average
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Article Tags: house, price, property
