Tue 19 Mar 2019

West Midlands House Price Trends

Running the Property Race

The best way I can think of to describe the current mood of the housing market is to compare it to an Olympic athletics race.  Probably something like the 400m.  It feels like potential buyers and sellers have been lined up on the starting blocks for some time now, just waiting for the gun to go off!

Why the wait?  Well, on the one hand you could argue that there’s never a perfect time to do anything.  On the other, you could say that people are holding back from making big decisions until they see how the property market settles down.

How is Brexit Impacting on the Property Market?

Brexit is running close to the wire, and people are nervous of making a false start and being out of the race.  This is proved by the latest information released in the RightMove House Price Index.  In fact, the company reports that activity levels on RightMove remain the same as this time last year.  At Oulsnams, we have seen an increase in buyer registrations in the first quarter of this year.  We need more sellers to have confidence in the regional trends and list their properties now to fulfil this demand.

We took a look at the key figures for the West Midlands that have come out of the House Price Index report.

What do these figures mean for buyers and sellers in the West Midlands?  

Well, we think it shows that it’s a keen buyer’s market.  You can see that houses are in demand by the fact that they are selling in the quickest average time in the region.  This, combined with an increase in average property prices, means that the sale prices are clearly at a level that buyers feel comfortable acting on.

It is natural for people to feel a sense of uncertainty in this current political climate.  It’s normal to want to “wait and see” in case an even better market appears once we have clarity on Brexit.  However, it’s our opinion that the current property market in the West Midlands region is pretty good anyway.  So, rather than risk being stuck at the starting line, you might want to consider making your move right now to benefit from the increased prices and overall positivity we’re experiencing.