The Month in Numbers.
The Land Registry report last Thursday confirmed the negative trend reported by both the Nationwide and Halifax albeit perhaps not quite as dramatic as the record one month fall of 3.6% reported by the Hailfax. However, it’s the sluggish sales volumes that has most estate agents concerned.
According to the Land Registry the average price of a home in England & Wales is now £166,769, a 0.2% fall from £167,423 last month. This is still 9.3% below the peak of £184,674 achieved in January 2008 but it’s hardly Armageddon.
On average we expect around 82,000 properties to be sold across England & Wales in a single month. In July, the latest month for which we have results from Land Registry 64,411 properties were sold – 1% less that in July 2009.
In direct contradiction to the record fall reported by the Halifax average asking prices rose 3.1% according to Rightmove – to £236,849. The gap between the average asking price (if there were such a thing) and the average sale price (again, if there could be such a property) is £70,080. There may be some debate as to how fast sale prices are sliding but the Land Registry report confirms that the gap between buyers and sellers aspirations are as wide as they were 12 months ago.
The total number of properties on market are 37% up on last year with the supply of new instructions per day up 12% to 3,917. Sales are down 1% and it is this figure of 2,567 per day that causes concern for some. The rolling 7 year average is 3,584 and the peak reached in February 2007 was 5,333 homes sold each and every day.
One section of the market remains in rude health – the sale of £1m plus homes which have leapt 84%. Last July just 488 sold in England & Wales. This year 896 million pound+ sales have so far been recorded.