It has been revealed that a record number of homes were sold for a figure less than the original asking price in the UK in November, with 84% of properties doing so which is the highest recorded numbers since 2013, so what needs to be done to solve this issue and improve the figures in 2017?
This news comes following information released by the National Association of Estate Agents (NAEA), which has uncovered the figures showing that more than four in five properties were being sold for lower than the asking price, which is a dramatic increase upon the amount for the same month in 2015 which stood at 76%.
October’s figures weren’t too much better than November’s as they stood at 82% of homes going for below the asking price, but the number of house hunters did fall dramatically in November to an average of 344 registered per member branch, compared to the 440 that were registered in the previous month.
“Following the EU referendum earlier this year, we faced a few months of low confidence from buyers and sellers, although in October the market bounced back to full form” commented Mark Hayward, the managing director at the NAEA. “We expect this is still the case, and this month’s slow-down is simply down to seasonality – many sellers hold off until January to put their properties on the market, and likewise buyers are more inclined to start the year with a property search, rather than attempting it over Christmas.”
So if it is the case that the time of the year was the reasoning behind these worrying figures then now is the time that we will hopefully begin to see an improvement, so we will have to wait to see the figures that are released once January and February have been calculated in the coming months.
