House Price Spy Blog

Hi, I have just found out about a few new features that will be added to House Price Spy in the next few months. Hurray!!!

These will improve the way the site works and personalise the way you can utilise the data we have.

House Price Spy will be adding the following new features: Government statistics for each page (ever wondered what the neighbourhood you want to move to is really like?) and hotspots (where are houses selling like hot cakes?). I have been sworn to secrecy regarding the details of these new features as we dont want to give the game away before we finalise everything…

Everyone at House Price Spy is really excited about these new features, subscribe to our RSS feed to be the first to be notified of any improvements and updates we make to the main site!!!

House Price Spy already has unique features like: alphabetical street search and search surrounding streets by geographical distance amongst others.

The gap between property owners and people who are locked into renting is increasing.

With the average house price in the UK being £178,000 and lending regulators being told to be stricter in who they give 4x and 5x mortgages to, it is increasingly hard for first time buyers to get on the bottom rung of the property ladder. Predictions are that more and more people will either working overtime to make huge mortgage payments or stay locked into paying rent.

With certain lenders now not wanting to give mortgages of more than 3xwages and increasing interest rates there is a predicted crisis with less and less people able to buy property.

What is next? What can be done to stop this process?

Information from Aberdeen and Loughborough Universities

List of the top 10 broadband providers as voted on by the BBC’s Watchdog programme in 2006 top 10 broadband providers.

1. BT
2. Virgin
3. AOL
4. Tiscali
5. TalkTalk
6. NTL (Now part of Virgin Media)
7. Orange
8. Telewest
9. Sky
10. Pipex

I know that this is ancient history but I thought it was still valid data, the largest survey of its kind in the UK etc

Another thing in the news is that Japan now has 26mbs broadband for around £20, which is less than most of the packages listed above. Where the east goes hopefully the UK will follow…

Eventually, techies hope to have over 50mbps connection.

Economists at Lloyds TSB have warned that the Scottish property boom could end in the next few months.

Experts are concerned that the trend, that has seen the average property in Scotland rise by 11.9% since the start of 2007, will end leaving some home owners out of pocket. The highest rising city has been Aberdeen with a 25% increase this year alone with Edinburgh next at 12%. The low number of properties on the market has been a major factor in raising house prices north of the border, however this cannot always be relied upon as a constant factor and may result in a decrease in the next quarter. Rising interest rates seem to have encouraged buyers to take advantage of present lower rates and pay higher house prices due to the demand on a limited number of properties for sale.

These findings were made by Lloyds TSB and covered the whole of Scotland.

Read more here: BBC Property News.

The BBC reports that Home Information Packs are to be delayed until 1st of August 2007 and will start off only for homes with four bedrooms or more that go on sale.

The packs will be compulsory in England and Wales but not in Scotland until 2008, when Scots will get there own version of HIPs.

Packs will include:

• Evidence of title.
• Copies of planning, listed building or building regulations consents.
• A local search.
• Guarantees for any work on the property.
• An energy performance certificate.

Find out more by visiting the article at the BBC News website.

Hi, this is the House Price Spy Blog!! House Price Spy is a free property price site that covers the UK and provides free information previously only held by estate agents and government departments. Due to the popularity and potential of the main site www.housepricespy.com we figured that users would like to hear more about property related stuff such as property related shops, services and anything that has been featured in the media like price trends and interest rates etc.

My Name is Kenny and between myself and Clarke, we will try to keep you informed about property in the UK.

To be the first to be informed of any new posts please subscribe to our RSS Feed.

I hope you like the blogs we will have, please post comments to let us know your thoughts on House Price Spy.