Autumn 2010

We were forecasting earlier in the year, that the market was likely to improve over the final property buying season of 2010 – and there seems little reason to revise that forecast, although there is also little reason to suppose that in any way it will be a bumper market.

There is no let-up in the Credit Crunch, many economic indicators remain pretty dire, the cuts are coming and European banking woes will continue to forced into the open. But properties will change hands, despite the odds.

Markets are about people, and people have to move house – there are now hundreds of thousands of people who might have expected to have moved over the last 3 or 4 years, who haven’t.

Many will continue to sit on their hands and do nothing. Interest rates remain low, people can afford to do nothing. That means a great many houses potentially for sale, but not on the market, so there are unlikely to be as many properties openly available for sale as people expected.

There will also be too many who will put their houses on the market, only prepared to sell for the price that they think is right – eg somewhat overvalued.

The clever ones will aggreesively market their houses with good agents at the right price, a keen, competitive, fair and reasonable price. And, at the same time, will aggressively get out and into the market to find and secure the property they want to move into.

On the assumption that most people have to buy AND sell a property, it’s a great time to be moving. The market is stable, very stable. At the moment.