News Category: Industry News
Published: 11-Feb-2011
Sellers are slashing their asking prices harder and more often in a bid to shift their homes.
New research from property portal Zoopla reveals that both the number of reduced properties on the market and the average amount by which prices have been reduced have climbed over the past three months.
Nearly four in ten (37.4%) of all properties listed for sale today have had at least one price reduction since coming to the market – up from 36.4% in November.
The average discount now stands at £18,475 or 6.9% off the original asking price – up from £15,879 or 6.1% in November.
In London, 31.8% of properties on the market have had their prices cut, by 6.6%. This equates to an average reduction of £45,664.
Zoopla offers a feature on its website allowing users to sort search results by those that have been most reduced in price.
These show that the greatest price cuts are at the top end of the market, for properties listed for sale over £1m, where the average discount has climbed to 10% off the original asking price, up from 8% in November.
Birmingham tops the list of areas with the highest proportion of properties that have been reduced in price, with almost half (48.4%) of all properties on the market for sale today having been discounted at least once from the original asking price.
Swindon (46.8%), Norwich (46.6%), Coventry (46.4%) and Bournemouth (44.1%) are other areas which currently have the highest proportion of price reduced properties in the market.
In terms of areas with the highest average discount to the original asking price, Bolton and Newcastle top the list with an average discount of 8%, followed closely by Rotherham, Liverpool and Maidstone (all at 7.9%).
At the other end of the scale, Chorley (24.1%) leads the places with the lowest proportion of price-reduced homes and Chelmsford (5.3%) comes out on top as the place with the lowest average discount to the original asking price in Britain.
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