So you’re ready to sell your home with Scotmove, but is the time right for you? This is something you must think about before rushing into selling. You also have to think about buying your new home, are you able to buy the home you want? Is there a property available that suits your needs? There are a lot of factors to think about when buying or selling a home. If you need a fast house sale, then maybe Sell House Fast Scotland can help you. We have found an article which may help understand the housing market. You can find the full article here: https://www.gov.uk/housing-market-and-house-price-information-notes-and-definitions

Housing market and house price information

This guidance is to be read in conjunction with the series on housing market and house price information which includes the latest statistical releases and sets of live tables. The Department for Communities and Local Government (DCLG) is interested in monitoring house prices and housing market information to identify areas of high and low demand and to look at levels of housing affordability. The monthly house price index is a weighted average of prices for a standard mix of dwellings. History and context The data used for this is a survey known as the Regulated Mortgage Survey (RMS). From 1993 to 2002, the sample size ranged from 26,000 to 36,000 cases per year. Since 2001 a number of lenders have started supplying 100 per cent of completions instead of a five per cent sample. This allowed us to launch the more reliable monthly house price index in September 2003, with a monthly series starting from February 2002. The number of cases included in the calculations, currently averages over 25,000 cases per month. We estimate that in 2007 we obtained data for 60 per cent of all UK mortgages for house purchase. The questionnaire on which the survey is based has been revised from time to time, notably in 1982 when the question on the previous tenure of borrowers was extended to identify sitting tenants. The method of analysis was introduced in the second quarter of 1968 and most of the detailed series now published have their origins in this period. A description of the current methodology can be found below. From 1969 to 1992 the index reflected dwellings mortgaged by building societies. From 1981 sales to local authority sitting tenants were excluded and from 1982 sales to all sitting tenants were excluded. From 1983 the standard mix of dwellings was updated annually to reflect the mix of dwellings purchased during the previous three years. In the early 1990s many of the larger building societies converted to banks and an index limited to building society mortgages could no longer be assumed to be representative of all house purchases. So from 1993 the index was extended to include both banks and building societies and was re-named the All Lenders index. Since then the survey has been revised occasionally with the current version, the RMS, starting in August 2005. Buying a new home can be expensive, depending on the housing market, house prices can rise significantly. This is when you must think and decide if it’s the right time to try and buy a new home. But also, you may be able to sell your house quickly but there is always a chance that you may not be able to find the right property for you. House prices are rising all the time which makes it very difficult to get into the housing market, especially for first time buyers. Affordability of housing in the UK seems to be getting worse. A good article to read on affordability is below, read the full article here http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Affordability_of_housing_in_the_United_Kingdom

Affordability of housing in the United Kingdom

The affordability of housing in the United Kingdom deteriorated significantly from the early 1980s and the late 1990s onwards, with house prices rising faster than earnings and the average age of first-time homebuyers increasing. This was a question of rent regulation being removed from English land law, after the deregulation of the rental market in the 1980s, and the housing supply. Affordability was recognised as a social, economic and political problem and generated a number of Government responses. Growth of house prices The increase in the house prices has made the housing market increasingly difficult to enter. The ratio of lower-quartile house prices to lower-quartile earnings, a measure of affordability used in the Barker Review of Housing Supply, rose from 4 in 2000 to 5.2 in 2003 and 7.1 in 2006. At a regional level, the problem of unaffordable housing is no longer confined to London and the South East, but now affects almost the whole of England.[9] In July 2009 the ratio of house prices to first-time buyers’ incomes remained higher than the historical average. The average (mix-adjusted) house price in the first quarter of 1998 was £81,722, but at the peak of the market in the third quarter of 2007 the average price was £219,256 – over two and a half times higher or a total increase of 168%. UK house prices 1975-2009 (adjusted for inflation). Back in the mid-1970s, the average house price in the United Kingdom was just over £10,000. A steady increase followed over the next decade, and by 1986 that figure was in the region of £40,000. However, the economic upturn of the late 1980s saw that figure rise to around £70,000 in 1989, but dropping heavily in the early 1990s due to the recession. However, between 1998 and 2007, house prices in the United Kingdom rose dramatically, generating large increases in home equity for many homeowners but also making housing unaffordable for other people. Most developed countries experienced sharp increases in house prices in the early years of the new millennium. The UK situation was different in two regards. First, the house price boom started earlier and saw more sustained increases. Second, the regional pattern was fairly uniform. Between 2002 and 2007, house prices in the UK rose by 90%, faster than any Eurozone nation except Spain. Between the first quarter of 2001 and the fourth quarter of 2006 prices increased 60%, again when adjusted for inflation (figures from the Nationwide Building Society’s house price data). House prices at the end of 2006 were 35% higher than they would have been if the long-term trend rate of growth – 2.6% per annum in real terms since 1976 – had been maintained. In 2008, house prices started to fall but they have stabilised as of August 2009. This may reflect the housing market’s normal seasonality or it may indicate a genuine recovery. Adam Slater, senior economist at Oxford Economics has forecast that “it will take quite a few years, possibly a decade, before real house prices get back to their peak levels”. The average UK house price hit £274,000 in August 2014. So after deciding to sell your house, checking the housing market, finding out how much your house is worth etc, then maybe its time to put your house on the market and making the most out of your viewings. Make sure you decide whether to buy your new home straight away or whether to take your time and rent a property until the perfect property to buy becomes available. Either way, don’t rush into any decisions.