35% of houses will not sell in a year?

Iconic

On Wake Up To Money this morning a guest expert said that of the 900,000 odd houses on the market at the moment 35% of them would not sell within a year.

I don't know if his figures are correct but there must be a lot of overpriced houses on the market or very few buyers!

pardal51

Is it because vendors are asking too much and not willing to negotiate?
Is it because of lending tightening from banks?
Is it????

Davesnave

Seems about right, and both issues you mention are to blame. Banks don't have as much as they once had to lend, while some sellers only want to sell on their terms, or they'll stay put. That leaves 65% of property being bought by people with good deposits and sold by those who are well-motivated.

Away from the panic of 2008, the housing market is still adjusting to very different circumstances. In some areas demand is still very strong, but in others it's a case of going on the market and waiting weeks or months to see a viewing. I know of houses in West Wales that were on the market in 2006/7, never mind a year ago, and they're still cheerfully waving at me on Rightmove!

NEH

Well some particular people have screamed on here that our flat must be on too high but we looked at reducing it and the other flat on with our Solicitor at a cheaper price hasn't had any interest more than us as there aren't any FTB in our area as msot flats are sticking. Somebody posted yesterday about an article in The Telegraph about how the banks weren't lending...

I can prove that of the 5 flats for sale there is no rhyme or reason to selling....

The most expensive one converted into a 1 bed from a studio has been on for about 5/6 months same as us. Another converted one went on the market 4 weeks ago and is now under offer, same price as the most expensive one, in a worse condition block and not as good as the other converted one, why they went for that one I don't know. The cheapest one has gone under offer for the 2nd time in 4/5 months however it has severe timber rot and will cost a fair bit to sort it out so once that is added on it will cost the same as ours or the other one with the same Solicitors as us...(we suspect with the timber rot one that the Solicitors keep putting it under offer to make themselves look better)

So we know it's not the price....With flats you can hardly knock off 20K as there isn't that room for manovere...If we thought dropping the price would make a difference then we would do it but i honestly think the banks aren't lending to FTB in particular and the market is saturated with flats, maisonettes and 1 bed starter homes...

beccad

There's plenty of properties on the market in the search area we're looking at within our price range, but hardly any of them are in streets we'd want to live in. A lot of the properties have been on the market for yonks, and there's very little refreshing of the market.

I'm thinking of putting leaflets through letterboxes if nothing new comes up in the next month!

Philippa36

We've had our house on the market for over a year. We've accepted 2 offers which have fallen through and currently have an offer on the table from a couple who've only just put their house on the market.

All the houses we looked at on Rightmove when we first went on there, are still for sale, there's only 1 or 2 that I had saved that have sold.

We've been advised its currently taking up to 2 years for properties to sell!

tawse57

House prices in West Wales are way over-priced. Some people adding 150K to 200K to prices they bought in 2006/07. Nuts.

But everyday I pass houses that have been on the market for 4 or 5 years now. A friend was commenting the same thing about Swansea houses she has seen for sale for 4 years plus now.

Quite simply, the asking prices are ludicrous and the coming public sector job cuts in that part of the world will probably mean a collapse in prices in about 18 months or so IMPO.

Brallaqueen

Of that 35%, how many will be in undesirable neighbourhoods (lots of those, big cities especially)? How many will be 'in need of modernisation' and not suitable for FTBs or a young family to move into straight away? How many will be only of interest to BTL landlords or builders (repossessions, structural issues)?

Saying 35% wont be able to sell doesn't explain why they won't sell - it's not always price?

myhouse_2

NEH wrote: »

Well some particular people have screamed on here that our flat must be on too high but we looked at reducing it and the other flat on with our Solicitor at a cheaper price hasn't had any interest more than us

So we know it's not the price....With flats you can hardly knock off 20K as there isn't that room for manovere...If we thought dropping the price would make a difference then we would do it but i honestly think the banks aren't lending to FTB in particular and the market is saturated with flats, maisonettes and 1 bed starter homes...

I can't help but think that yourself and many other sellers in many different areas are confused about the cause and effect relationship between buyers and price. The reason there are so few buyers is that for most people it doesn't make economic sense, or it is actually impossible for buyers to buy in at current price levels (no bank loans available).
The conclusion I might be tempted to make from your story is that your house and the other similar house on the market are BOTH too expensive for the current market. Obviously I don't know about your house or area, and I do understand that you wouldn't want to make cuts in the price too quickly if you think the price is realistic, but it may be that the market has moved to a lower level than both houses. If so, you can wait (hope) for it to come up again, or move your price down to meet the new market.

Alan2020

Why do you think they are not selling? Lets take a different product say a mobile phone, because the market is FAST moving the price for a top end phone can be £400 at launch to £50 at the end of its life, even less. In order to sell the phone most retailers have a knack of getting the price right for the quality of the phone.

Welcome to a house market that was always stable and rising, now it is like the mobile phone market, and should rightly be so. There is supply and demand, too much supply less demand. How do you break it, by lowering the prices. We have a free market, so it will mean prices will come to the correct value in say 20 years, if it was a controlled market prices will always be close to the correct value.

Take some of the flats in the UK, a one bed costs £150K in reality to build such a flat, it would cost the builder £15K to 30K with the market value of labour. And if the market was heavily regulated a flat in the UK will cost anywhere from 20K to 35K, but oh no it costs £150K, why?? Because it is overpriced and unsustainable.

Imagine trying to sell a Nokia 3310 (yes the old brick) for £1000, how many people would buy it, no one, £10 someone might. So the 35% of houses are simply overpriced as they haven't moved with the market.

The housing monopoly will only be broken when someone with huge capital gets land in a prime location and builds well designed prefabbed flats in all the major cities in the UK at £35K for 1 bed, £45 for 2 beds and £55 for 3 beds with terraces/balconies. This will crash the overpriced flat market and generate the new Bill Gates of the housing market. Whoever does that will be simply the richest person in the world.

NEH

myhouse wrote: »

I can't help but think that yourself and many other sellers in many different areas are confused about the cause and effect relationship between buyers and price. The reason there are so few buyers is that for most people it doesn't make economic sense, or it is actually impossible for buyers to buy in at current price levels (no bank loans available).
The conclusion I might be tempted to make from your story is that your house and the other similar house on the market are BOTH too expensive for the current market. Obviously I don't know about your house or area, and I do understand that you wouldn't want to make cuts in the price too quickly if you think the price is realistic, but it may be that the market has moved to a lower level than both houses. If so, you can wait (hope) for it to come up again, or move your price down to meet the new market.

There is 5 of us on the market, not 2 and they're flats not houses so we can't reduce that far... Not sure where you thought i mentioned houses??

I have had people say on here that we are all overpriced but given that one has just sold within 4 weeks and that's on for the same price as the expensive one and isn't as well done plus it's communal areas are in bad way so not the best block and the severe timber rot one is udner offer again for a similar price to ours then I'm not sure we are overpriced. As I said we looked at reducing the price and asked our Solicitors whether the lower priced one had had more interest or any offers and they said it had made no difference, people just don't want your kind of flat just now.

We're prepared to drop the price but as it would make no difference what is the point...There is no rhyme or reason as i said with reference to the above examples as to why some sell and some don't in our particular area....

We're going to rent if need be as we can't afford to let it go for a pittance. With flats you can't just drop 20K like you would with a house.