Countrywide, the UK’s biggest estate agency, has issued a stark assessment of the housing market, reporting a severe downturn in the number of sales.
The group said yesterday: “We have seen a further marked deterioration in the volume of transactions as house buyers appear to wish to wait to see whether further interest rate rises will occur and house prices fall.”
Countrywide said that, although house prices had been relatively stable, “at the end of October the number of house sale transactions in the pipeline was down 33% on a very strong October 2003”.
References: Financial Times 20/11/04 page M1, Daily Telegraph 20/11/04 page 31, The Times Business 20/11/04 page 66
