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West Midlands house prices tumble by a tenth
Saturday 20th November 2010, 11:29AM GMT.
House prices in the West Midlands have tumbled by more than a tenth in three years as the cost of renting soars, figures revealed today.
It is now cheaper to buy a house than rent across much of the region.
The average value of a detached house in Wolverhampton has slumped by £34,614 since 2007, while property prices have dropped 13.1 per cent.
Sandwell saw the biggest slump with values tumbling by more than 16 per cent – more than £21,500.
Properties in Dudley fell eight per cent, £11,332 on average.
In Walsall, where property value has fallen by 6.5 per cent in three years, it is now a third cheaper to pay a mortgage than rent.
Figures published by LSL Property Services today show the average cost of renting has risen 0.4 per cent this month to £691 — a 4.5 per cent rise since October last year.
Estate agents across the West Midlands say home owners are accepting up to 10 per cent less than their original asking prices in a bid to speed up chains.
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I don’t see how you can say the cost of buying is less than renting?!
I moved into my brand new 2 bed rented flat 6 months ago for £500 deposit and pay £500 a month rent.
To buy this flat i would have needed to find about £10,000 to £15000 for the deposit and legal fees, my monthly mortgage payments would have been about £600 and on top of that i would need to find a further £100 a month on maintenance fees.
Buying a non new build house may make the monthly payments cheaper but to do that i would need to find a large deposit from where exactly?! And then find a bank who would give me a mortgage which the way banks are behaving at the moment no one would!
Try speaking to real people rather than going on statistics and you’ll find out alot more!
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It’s very hard to believe that it’s cheaper to buy than rent, and I’m disappointed that the E&S has just printed the findings of this ‘report’ this without any analysis.
A repayment mortgage on a £135,000 loan is in the region of £800 per month. I doubt many people are paying that much rent on a starter home.
Now maybe I’m just being cynical, but isn’t the source of this report (LSL Property Services) one of the UK’s biggest estate agency groups, whose business depends on selling houses?
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This is a joke. Houses prices in this region are still simply too high for most people, and if you look beyond the confines of Sandwell you’ll see an even greater disparity in price. Elsewhere I could buy a ranch surrounded by acres of land for the price of flat (‘apartment’), in Tipton. Honest, hard-working English people simply don’t stand a chance here and if you’re willing to spend hundreds of thousands of pounds to live in a tip like this then you want you head looking at. The banks and the government create this chaos – let’s remember that.
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More VI propaganda and warped logic.
House prices are collapsing, so the property vampires try to talk up rents.
It will be very much cheaper to buy when prices have dropped to their true values. Forget 10% reduction. Try 50% instead. And with less tenants, rents will drop.
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Buying is not cheaper.
Do these sums again when interest rates are not at 100 year historical lows ! As soon as base rate returns to an average 5%, yes 10 times what it is now, many people who bought in last few years will be struggling. Houses are still according to respected international bodies highly overpriced in the UK by maybe 40%. Until house prices sink to levels around 3.5 times salary then they are a risky buy unless you like a large mortgage bugger than your property value or are happy watching your hefty deposit drain away to rich bankers whom we bailed but are happy to keep taking your payments as your property value diminished.
I would guess an estate agents offerred to write this article !
My advice, wait !
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SB, a mortgage would be cheaper for a lot of people if they could get one in the first place because houses are being sold for sod all.
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The houses may be cheap but there’s still a minimum deposit and legal fees to be paid. New builds which might offer deposit schemes/incentives are generally over priced and not in particularly nice areas.
And like you say, getting a mortgage is close to impossible at the moment anyway.
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