It was very heartening last week to see Times Columnist Lucy Denyer start speaking about green shoots in the economy and healthy ones at that. She cites the 19 percent rise in mortgage approvals as part of her evidence for this sunny news.
She even suggests that it may be enough for as to conclude that things may be on the up and up for the property market.
It seems that the caution being displayed by homeowners in terms of when to sell has caused a few supply and demand problems in certain desirable areas of the UK. And for once we are talking about there being more demand than supply, a very welcome change.
Of course it depends very much on the type of place you are selling and even more so in which area.
It appears Highgate is one area in London that is in demand. The article quotes Chris Underhill, a partner with Prickett & Ellis estate agency as saying “We have 1,600 buyers on our books and less than 0.5% of the housing stock in the area actually available,”
Savills report the sale of three properties recently that were the subject of a heated bidding war, in Fulham.
Lucian Cook, director of research at Savills says most of these green shoots are being provided, for the moment anyway, by people who are in a very strong financial position. “The cash-rich guys who are comfortable with the prospect of 10-year house-price growth are chasing a relatively low amount of stock,” he says.
Still it is excellent to see some movement on the property market front and there is no doubt that if these guys continue to invest they will eventually be followed by the rest of us.
