Those of you who regularly read my weekly articles in the Grantham
Property Blog will know I like to keep abreast of the Grantham property market.
Something attracted my attention this week about the local property market,
something I wanted to share with my many readers.
Over the last month,
there appears to have been an anomaly in the local property market, whereby
asking prices in the town have dropped, yet property values have
increased. The average asking price of a Grantham property, according to Rightmove,
fell 1.4% this month yet the average value
of a Grantham property rose by 0.1%.
So how does this relate in monetary terms? This anomaly has driven the average asking price of a Grantham property
down slightly to £181,100 whilst the average value is now £195,900.
So why the difference? Technically an ‘asking price’ can be any price that a homeowner wants to place his
or her property on the market for. Unfortunately, many times this is done
without research and can result in overpriced properties that don't sell. As
the Summer months are normally slightly quieter those left on the market
wanting to sell often temper their asking prices in these months to try and
generate interest in their property.
On the other side of the coin, the property ‘value’ is the price that a willing
buyer is prepared to pay and a willing seller is prepared to sell at. Therefore,
in a nutshell, Grantham property values are continuing to rise and those homeowners
in Grantham who have properties on the market, last month on average, reduced
their asking prices .. great news for property owners and buyers alike!
In previous articles, I have spoken about the continued
fundamental shortage of property coming on to the market compared to buyer
demand. That is especially true for homeowners wanting to upgrade to a better
house/better location. I can appreciate Grantham
home owners are reluctant to put their own property on the market speculatively
and wait for the right property to become available and some high demand
locations can suffer from a property stalemate.
Most homeowners don’t want to sell and have
nothing to buy.
But that’s the beauty of the much
maligned English and Welsh house buying process. You can find a purchaser for
your property, then ask them to wait. By agreeing a sale (subject to contract)
before you try to buy sounds concerning to many, but with fewer properties for
sale you need to have a buyer for your property or you will be treated as a
less serious buyer yourself. If you cannot find the right home for you, you can
slow the deal with your purchaser until it comes along. If nothing suitable
does comes along and you lose your buyer then the worst outcome is that you
have to find another purchaser or take your property off the market and stay
put for now, and as long as you mention this at the start they must not commit
to any costs until you have agreed your onward purchase.
However, for the landlord/buy to let investors, these
potential problems are nothing further from the truth. As I write this article,
there are over 60
flats for sale, 72
terraced houses and over 40
semis for sale in Grantham. Landlord/Buy
to let investors can normally pick up some bargains in the Autumn months, as
sellers who are selling their homes often have a pressing need to sell by this
time.
The types of houses a Grantham landlord typically buys, are
not the same types as the homeowners wanting to move to a posher area of the town as they are attracted by
larger semis and detached properties. The best types of properties for buy to
let are the smaller flats, terraced and semis (not the big detached ones). There
are in fact too many of these smaller properties for sale .. just look at the
numbers of properties for sale (mentioned in the previous paragraph).
If you are a landlord or thinking of become one for the
first time, and you want to read more articles like this about the Grantham
Property Market together with regular postings on what I consider the best buy
to let deals in Grantham, of the many properties on the market, irrespective of which agent is selling it,
then you might like to visit the Grantham Property Blog
