UK Real Estate prices slide

Watching your home lose value is not just a US phenomenon. UK homeowners have seen the price of their homes fall for the last 3 months in a row. Whilst prices on a year over year basis are still up, it seems that trend is set to change in the next 6 - 12months. From Bloomberg:

U.K. House Prices Fall the Most in Three Years

U.K. house prices fell the most in three years in December, and the threat of more declines may cause the property market to seize up in 2008, Hometrack Ltd. said.

The average cost of a home in England and Wales slipped for a third month, dropping 0.3 percent to 175,200 pounds ($348,350), the London-based research group said today. The number of property transactions will fall 17 percent and prices will rise just 1 percent next year, Hometrack forecast.

Bank of England policy makers said this month that a drop in house prices seemed ``more pronounced'' than expected as they cut their benchmark interest rate for the first time in two years. Record debt, higher mortgage costs and the property market's worst performance since 1995 have discouraged homebuyers.

Prices increased 3 percent from a year earlier, the least in 18 months, Hometrack said. The average selling time for a home rose to 8.3 weeks, the most since the survey of real-estate agents and surveyors began in 2001...

...Mortgage lender HBOS Plc said Dec. 5 that home values fell for a third month in November, the worst streak in 12 years. Estate agents and surveyors became the most pessimistic about house prices since at least 1998 last month, the Royal Institution of Chartered Surveyors said Dec. 13.