(1888PressRelease)
May 18, 2007 - The latest figures from the NAEA March housing survey show the housing market appears to have reached a plateau as the numbers of buyers and sellers along the with the amount of completed house sales last month are correlative to the equivalent figures from March 2006.
Despite this, Charles Smailes, the NAEA president, believes that an expected interest rate rise in May and the introduction of home information packs (Hips) in June will act to destabilise the market in the near future.
"It appears that we are finally hitting a period of levelling in the residential housing market," he said.
"However this is unlikely to last. There is a great deal of uncertainty in the market at the moment, the increase in interest rates and the implementation of Hips are set to have a significant impact."
Home owners are rushing to sell their homes now, Mr Smailes reported, rather than wait until June when they will have to produce a Hip at their own expense.
The UK's leading fast property purchase company National Homebuyers says that "the only uncertaintly was that uncertainty was certain". Director Julian King says: "We have predicted this augmenting fear of uncertainty for over a year.
"Ultimately it will lead to a depression in the housing market. Homeowners need to ignore the editors of national newspapers and gather more genuine information about property prices in their area for a genuine feel of what's happening.
"National Homebuyers is receiving more and more enquiries from people who are finding it difficult to sell their property and to whom National Homebuyers is a genuine, quick sale solution."
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