Homeowner confidence grows
2nd May 2012
- 67% of British homeowners expect house prices to rise over next six months
- Average property prices across Britain are predicted to rise 3.9% by October
- Positive signs that lack of mortgage availability is easing over the last quarter
Positive signals have emerged for the housing market in the first quarter of 2012 with a rise in the number of British homeowners who expect house prices to climb over the next six months.
According to the latest Zoopla.co.uk Housing Market Sentiment Survey, two out of three (67%) British homeowners are confident of house prices rising by the Autumn. This is the highest proportion of homeowners predicting property price growth since the first half of 2010 and in stark contrast to sentiment at the end of 2011 when only 55% of owners were predicting prices to climb.
In addition to the rise in overall confidence, homeowners are also more bullish now about how much they expect average house prices to rise over the next six months. At the end of 2011, owners expected prices in their local area to increase 2.2% on average. Over the last quarter this has risen to 3.9% - again, the highest price growth expectation in almost two years.
Confidence amongst homeowners in London is at a near all-time high with 82% of property owners in the capital now confident of property price rises over the next six months. And owners in the capital are predicting that house prices in London will grow by 5.5% by October.
There has also been an improvement in sentiment towards mortgage financing with an increase in the number of property owners reporting that it is now easier to secure a mortgage than it was at the end of 2011. 17% of respondents believe mortgage availability has improved, up from 11% last quarter.
Nicholas Leeming of Zoopla.co.uk, commented: “The property market has been in need of some positive news of late as many indicators have pointed toward stagnant prices. These results show that homeowners feel a lot more positive now than at the end of last year.”
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For further information, please contact PR Team on pr@zoopla.co.uk or +44 (0)20 3873 8770.
Methodology
- Zoopla invited registered users of Zoopla.co.uk to participate in this study.
- The survey was fielded from 26th to 30th March 2012
- There were 3876 total respondents. 3457 of these were homeowners. Statistics based on a sample of this size are accurate to within less than +/- 1.0% with 95% confidence, if the sample is drawn at random from the population it intends to represent
- These respondents represent the perspective of the Zoopla.co.uk user community, and could be considered to represent the population of people interested in the UK residential property market.
- All statistics are based on the full sample unless otherwise noted.
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