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The most common question asked is; "what are house price doing locally?"
To answer this question, it is usually of little use looking to the national news or general media, you really do need local “coal face” experience and just as importantly, cross-market experience.
At Bournes, we are one of the few agents that sell houses across the range, with our average sold price being around £375,000 and a range deviation from £75,000 through to £1.75m. This broad range means we are best placed to notice local price trends across the range.
The following general observations are based on the last 7 year period and provided for general interest only;
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| Village & Rural Price Observations
Village house prices appear far less effected by economic down turn and seem to rise much faster in an economic upturn,suggesting that they provide a more robust investment.
The more desirable the village, the more resilient prices are to economic depression, with quite a distinct local demand for various villages.
The mean price for a house in one of the top 5 villages is about £425,000 (2011/2012) and would equate a character 4 bedroom semi-detached house.
Houses in cul-de-sac locations for which there are more than a couple of, are worth about 10%-15% less than an individual house of the same size in the same village. This is often because of larger gardens that can be associated with individual houses. As a rule, the nearer to the centre of the village or village street in general, the more valuable the house, excludning properties with spacious plots.
Demand for character houses across the range is high, particularly in the £250,000-£400,000 and the £800,000 - £2m ranges. The demand at £250,000 is always enormous due to few houses now being at this level.
Houses over £1m appear to have suffered very little to any change in the economy, but buyers are extremely particular about an exact criteria before considering buying.
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Town Centre Price Observations
As a rule, the smaller the property is in the town, the more it is affected by the economic down turn.
Flats and ex-local authority houses always perform worse, falling the fastest at the slightest news of down turn and recovering the slowest with economic upturn. This is due to a number of facts, not excluding the availability of borrowing to lower income applicants and lack of investors.
The more resilient houses are the older style, period houses in the few leafy suburbs including Croye Close, Winchester Gardens etc and those with a higher school rating, such as Anton Road, Chestnut Avenue etc.
Character houses are generally in greater demand.
There is an upper limit for houses in each type of house in the town and an over all upper limit currently of about £550,000 (2011/2012). You can say for almost certainty that there are currently no houses in Andover that would be valued by a mortgage surveyor above this level.
New developments with integrated social houses are less valuable the more integrated the social plan is, so as a rule the older the development, the less dense it is, the less integrated social housing there is and the more valuable the development is.
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