House Price Spy Blog

House prices have risen for the sixth month in a row, plus consumer confidence has risen in according to many important indices. The Bank Of England is planning an end to devalation of the Pound Sterling, with £200 BN already pumped into the UK economy in the last year or so. Gross Domestic product rose by 0.1%, overseas orders represent a large part of that amount.

The average house price rose by 1.2% in the last month leading many to say that the recession would be on its last legs, unemployment has bottomed out and consumers find themselves to consider the glass half full rather than half empty.

With tax hikes projected by all major political parties and banks recouping their losses this may not be the time to celebrate just yet, we will feel the pinch during 2010 whatever happens but the worst appears to be over unless you live in areas with closing factories and manufacturing.

The average price for UK homes rose around 1.1% in January 2010, and the latest batch of predictions are that we can expect a 6% total rise during this year. Add to that the fact that commercial properties rose by 3% in December and you have a quite upbeat prediction on where house prices, and therefore the economy in general, will tend to in 2010.

House Price Spy lets you keep up with what your local house prices are doing, or indeed an postcode in England, Scotland and Wales in the last 10 years from official government data. There are no limits on use and you get alerted about any sales in areas you are interested in plus a personalised members statistics system which lets you view, print, compare and keep all sorts of data!

House Price Spy is 100% free and updated monthly with official government data!

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Looking at the newspapers today its clear that there are signs of an upturn in the UK’s financial situation, the Pound is UP against the dollar and other currencies and more importantly new home build numbers are well up on the last few months. Taylor Wimpey and Barratt Homes both show rising numbers of sales, with a record low in sales (at just a third of 2007 levels) this may actually boost the property market.

The actual forecast for house prices is ‘flat’ for 2010 and the medium future, slow rises and small gains rather than any rapid recovery. No surprises there, there were plenty of predictions of doom in the finance sector prior to 2007. Prices rising year on year was just unsustainable, adding 60% to the value of a home in 10 years…

Anyway we will see a more gradual rise in 2010. House Price Spy is a 100% free service that offers you a easy to use way to keep abreast of what is happening in the market with stats, alerts, advice and much more!

As you can see from House Price Spy the gains that have made us all forget our money woes are based on a tiny number of sales and in fact are based on a third of the total number of sales (17,000) than just a couple of months ago. Prices themselves have slightly fallen on average but holding steady. Anyone predicting a rapid recovery will be out of luck, as indeed will anyone who needs to move home during 2010.

Are there hundreds of people waiting to sell? Will there be a spring thaw of prices, seeing sales hit the roof? How will the government unlock the combination that will see the market come to life again? The finance sector is still recovering, with billions of pounds put back into the economy by the Bank Of England and consumer confidence fragile. Taxes and prices are set to rise rapidly in 2010 and the public will shoulder this burden, how will the BOE and government address this?

2010 will certainly be one of change, an election, ISA legislation and various property related bills moving through the Houses.

The Bank Of England have held the mortgage rate at 0.5%.

This rate has been in place since March of last year and is the lowest in recent memory. With the media full of stories about the revival of the financial sector this is unlikely to be changed with all main political parties commencing their election push for summer 2010 the heat will be on to make the finances of the country look as good as possible by the government.

The economy will be the leading vote winner no doubt about it, despite job losses house prices have recovered considerably and consumer confidence is returning.

The phrase ‘quantitative easing’ has entered the public awareness, £200Bn has been added to the UK economy and the opinions are mixed as to whether the impact will sufficient for the money invested. A similiar effort in Japan was judged to be unsuccessful.

2010 is here and once again we will be concerned with house prices and which direction they will be going in, either recovery to 2007 levels or further downward. Just for a change House Price Spy will give you the most festive prediction yet:

Savills the estate agents are predicting a huge long term price rise of 40% in the next few years creating an average property price of £280,000 from the current £200,000. Prices rose by around 68% in the last 10 years before the fall, and Savills are predicting a 6% rise year on year driven by economic recovery and the lack of new build property. With the lull in the building we are not expecting a change to this factor over the next few years, which will be good for home owners. It should be noted that Savills are an estate agent and its their job to promote the market!!!

As with all the predictions this one is based on pre-election conditions, with the campaigning already underway for a summer election it is easy to prodict that everything will change by the end of the year and whoever is in charge will change legislation pertaining to property and finance. And while we are on the subject why are no two predictions ever the same? Every financial and property prediction is made to get attention for the paper/site/company involved as much as anything so its no surprise they are all different!

Happy New year for 2010! Dont know how much movement their will be over the next month but all the best anyway! This was the year the recovery began in earnest after a dire 2008 hopefully this will be the way things keep going into 2010.

We have plans to add to the new features we have added in 2009, with more free members features to be added, we will announce them as we complete them! Thanks to everyone who has spread the word about House Price Spy, please keep passing on the name to your friends, work mates and family. The site is 100% free!!

2009 saw House Price Spy expand the services we offer to include estate agents listings, city useful links and a new nifty graph system with more stats for every street than ever before! All this and its 100% free! We have no plans to start charging for the site and have some planned updates and additions to members features which we hope to release in 2010!

We are giving you even more, with new way to search, and analyse the data plus new alerts and new features that are not offered by any other website in any sector! Tell your friends, family and work mates about House Price Spy the UK’s best property website!

The site has been live for almost 5 years now and we are seeing a great response from members who love its easy to use system and dont fancy paying for something you can get for free!

2009 in house prices, would be a story of recovery, false dawns and fragility. 2008 left us with a third wiped off the average house price across the UK with some areas feeling the hit even harder. During the early part of the year (April for England, Febuary for Scotland and March for Wales) we saw the start of a gradual rise in prices which is still pretty much with us even if the number of sales this is based on is still at 2008 levels. As you can see from House Price Spy England the number of sales has dropped dramatically in the last month leaving the market even more prone to large fluctuations.

The Government and press have been building up the recovery as a masterwork of tactics, the interest rate is still record low of 0.5% meaning every mortgage payer has a very good reason not to move house with the lowest payments they have had for many years creating spare cash for anyone still in employment. Despite the low interest rate paid for savers and the best efforts of the government to make people spend people are still reluctant to spend their new found surplus.

House prices are still rising but are predicted to stall in 2010, the steady rise back to 2007 prices will continue but not at the hoped rapid recovery rate that would have got the Labour Government out of the firing line.