If I had a pound for every time I am asked how the housing market will perform this year I would be retired by now! It is a very natural question to ask of an estate agent, but it is a very difficult question to answer as the truth is that no-one knows – but here are my predictions!
The year has started off quite promisingly. In the Tettenhall office we launched far more new properties to the market in the first month of the year than we would normally expect. We received instructions to sell more houses than I can remember for a January, more even than in the post lockdown ‘boom’. This was very unexpected!
The level of sales agreed was also promising. Whilst not at record breaking levels the amount of sales were high and, with more houses coming to the market than normal, the amount of sales will almost inevitably improve.
I believe that one of the main reasons for this is that mortgage interest rates have begun to fall. Whilst a one percent drop in rates may not hugely affect a buyer’s spending power, the cut in rates has certainly increased confidence.
There have been many people sitting on the fence in recent times watching the mortgage market carefully. Whilst they could afford to move, the fear was that if mortgage rates continued to increase they could then have a problem. Seeing rates reducing has given many buyers the confidence to get back into the market.
The media is also being fairly positive about the market, which again is fairly unexpected and certainly very unusual. Property Industry Eye, a respected market commentator, releases a ‘Breaking News’ email everyday with several articles by different writers.
The last issue that I received had headlines including ‘UK house prices and transactions beat forecasts to rise again’, ‘UK housing market shows signs of recovery as demand grows’ and ‘Growing signs of green shoots in the housing market’.
Positivity in the media and buyers alike can only be a recipe for a healthy market, and this is what I believe we will see going forward this year. It is not that long ago that many people were predicting a market crash and prices substantially dropping, but I no longer see any reason to suspect that this may occur. I am not going to be so bold as to predict that house prices will go up this year, but I certainly do not see them coming down.
As I have said before in this magazine, stability is a good thing for the housing market and static house prices will help to ensure that stability is there.
On an entirely different note, the shadow housing minister Matthew Pennycock recently announced plans to prohibit anyone from working as an estate agent unless they had at least one A level and that business owners and managers should be qualified to degree level. Is this right? Absolutely not, in my humble opinion!
Whilst I would not be affected, I know of many agents and business owners locally who would not meet the criteria, and that does not mean that they should not work as agents as the people that I am thinking of are excellent at what they do and are professional hardworking and honest.
Some people are just not that academic and they should not be barred from being an estate agent for this reason alone.
I do, however, strongly feel that anyone acting as an agent should be qualified within the industry. There is no requirement at the moment for an agent to have a recognised property relevant qualification, and this must surely be wrong. The most expensive asset that most people have is their home, and why should an unqualified person be allowed to handle the sale or purchase of that important asset?
Hopefully someone in power at some point will see fit to change this in the future! At Berriman Eaton the business owners and senior team are all qualified so please rest assured that you are in safe hands with us!
