According the the Alliance and Leicester mortgage department there are around 3.25 million homeowners who would like to move house in the coming year.
This appears also to drive the move to home improvements, although that is also being pushed on by those who feel that they will be unable to move and so are improving their homes to make them better suited to their current requirements. The Alliance and Leicester found that around 20 percent of homeowners are making home improvements in order to make their property more attractive to buyers whilst half of them are doing it to avoid the issues associated with selling.
One the key areas people want to improve, said the Alliance and Leicester, is the number of bedrooms, always a key issue, especially with families. This is one of the biggest reasons for moving, especially as it can be very costly or totally impractical to add a bedroom to many properties.
A survey carried out by the Abbey National mortgage department suggests that the general view is of house prices stopping their fall within the next 12 months.
Speaking to estate agents the Abbey National found 61 percent of them believing that the prices would bottom out within 12 months, while the majority of homeowners expect it to be even quicker, the concensus being around 7 months. Even the most pessimistic homeowner cannot envisage price falls lasting longer than a year.
With this market view in mind around 80 percent of property owners are happy to wait and let the prices fall a little more before committing to a move. The Abbey National also found a small number of people planning to make the most of the price falls by stepping in to buy and grab a bargain.
The Abbey National Intermediaries Division has just announced that it will be offering some exclusive mortgage deals for a number of selected partners.
The offers being provided by Abbey National vary from a low of 5.76 percent up to 5.81 percent, with at least a 50 percent deposit being needed for all the special mortgage deals available. A spokesman said that more offers like this would be released over time, dependent on the situation in the mortgage market at the time.
The Abbey National spokesman went on to say that this was a clear indication to the intermediary market that they are happy to lend money still and support for this important element of the mortgage market is very important to them.