Insurance News Archive

Increase in sales ' is seasonal'

The slight increase in property sales is due to "seasonality", it is being claimed.

Housing market expert Mouseprice maintains that sales pick up a little at this time of year.

Selwyn Lim, director of the firm, said: "Another possible reason for the slight up-lift is the end to the speculation of the stamp duty holiday."

He added that a number of buyers who were waiting until the government announced the news before they completed on sales did so after the news was broken.

On September 2nd, the government announced that stamp duty would not apply to residential properties worth £175,000 or less until September 3rd 2009.

Research from the Royal Institution of Chartered Surveyors found that the average house was selling for nearly one-tenth (nine per cent) below the asking price.

The widest gap was in the north (12.5 per cent) and the smallest was in London (2.4 per cent).

31 Oct 2008