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The rate at which UK house sales fall through is rising

Tougher mortgage rules have prevented purchasers borrowing as much as they anticipated they would be able to is one reason, according to the research from Quick Move Now.

Also, buyers are increasingly nervous of a potential market crash, said Quick Move Now’s market analyst Donna Houguez.
 
‘We are seeing two clear reasons for the upwardly moving fall through rate. Stricter rules imposed on borrowing by lenders as a result of the mortgage market review have resulted in buyers making offers, confident that they would be able to secure a mortgage and then realising that they were unable to, forcing them to pull out of sales,’ she explained.
 
‘In August and September, the reason for sales falling through clearly changed, and it was the buyers themselves who became nervous. We saw a sharp increase in the number of buyers who had made a generous offer in order to secure a property against the competition change their mind and pull out amid fears of an imminent property market collapse,’ she added.
 
Meanwhile, the Little House Company has compiled statistics from its database of private vendors to evaluate the trends of private sellers from June to August 2014. This data is particularly interesting as the summer months are generally regarded as a bad time to sell homes, yet the findings show a significant number of vendors bucked the trend and listed their homes this summer.

The research shows that the average age of private vendors was 40.3 years of age, which suggests that the majority of private vendors are second time buyers.
 
The research also shows that greater London is the most popular area to sell homes without an estate agent, compared to other UK regions. Central London remains a stronghold for estate agents with direct sales stronger in the suburbs.

Private vendors are not limited to Greater London, and the data shows private vendors listing properties up and down the UK. The second and third most popular areas for private property sales this summer were Cheshire and South Yorkshire, respectively.

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