UK house prices almost grinds to a halt
As Brexit uncertainty continues this article in the Guardian draws attention to a few statements from property lenders and estate agents around the UK.
Guy Harrington, the CEO of property lender Glenhawk, blames Brexit for the slowdown in house price growth. “If these were ‘normal’ times, we’d expect the favourable underlying drivers of low interest rates and high employment to be supporting a buoyant market. However these are unprecedented times and the record that is playing housing growth is stuck until the needle bounces over the Brexit bump, although that assumes that’s all it is”.
Lucy Pendleton from James Pendleton points out that house prices have been lagging inflation for over a year. “Such low growth means September is set to be the 14th month in a row in which property has lost value in real terms. The last time growth even equalled CPI was in July 2018 when both measures were running at 2.5% year on year. The last time the property market was ahead was in April 2018”.
This is disappointing news for those who are still waiting to recover from the property crash in 2008 and even those who have taken out 95 or 100% mortgages which have recently been offered these schemes again.
The chart below shows the recent annual percentage change in UK house prices:
With the continuing slowdown and global economic uncertainty the chances of recovering to pre 2008 levels look increasingly unlikely. This problem can be worse for the hundreds of thousands of people who are on interest only mortgages.
One of the most recent reports from the Consumer Council (view it here) discusses there are at least 25,000 households in NI which remain in negative equity. With the average negative equity balance of £32,000.
If you are in Negative Equity there are options:
Negative Equity NI (part of the CD Fairfield group) are the province’s leading provider of property debt solutions. Our headquarters are based near the SSE Arena in Belfast and we have helped thousands of Northern Ireland property owners address their negative equity problem. We are proud to be the highest independently rated property debt company in the UK; you can read our independent reviews (click here) and see why 99% of our clients would recommend us.
Providing you situation is a “fit” for our service you can then instruct us to complete a case review for you to determine what your best option(s) are to move forward:
- Mortgage Mis-selling complaint
- Mortgage re-negotiation
- Negative Equity Settlement
- Property Debt IVA
- Bankruptcy
You can call us on 028 9018 3223 for a FREE no obligation chat with one of our experienced consultants.