Asking Prices Drop For First Time Since 2009 

If you’re looking to buy your first home, you may be able to bag yourself a bargain with the best estate agents Durham has to offer. Current conditions means it really is a buyer’s market and new data reported by Reuters suggests that house prices have dropped for the first time since 2009 at the height of the financial crash.

The statistics, taken from property website RightMove, found that the price of houses and apartments in the UK fell in June, in part down to slower wage rises as well as political uncertainty caused by the result of the general election.

After rising 1.2 per cent in May, asking prices dipped by 0.4 per cent in June. However, this figure is largely led by asking prices in London, which saw a 2.4 per cent drop in house prices, while the majority of areas, excluding the central and south east of the UK, rose.

Rightmove director Miles Shipside said: “The price of property coming to the market had increased in June in every year since 2009, so buyers' confidence has clearly been affected by inflation outstripping their pay packets and current political events.” 

It seems control firmly in the buyer’s court when it comes to meeting asking prices at present thanks to this apprehension, especially with news that three out of eight of Bank of England’s policymakers voted to raise interest rates last week - something described as the closest the bank has come to raising the cost of borrowing since 2009.