Houses for sale in Oxfordshire now 'on hold' says expert

Gavin West, managing director of Summertown based West - The Property Consultancy, said the Oxfordshire market will experience an ‘Indian Summer’.

With the property market in lockdown due to the government virus restrictions, UK property sales have essentially been put on hold.

But Mr West does not believe it will result in a long-term downturn for the real estate industry.

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He said: “The property market will, like many sectors, experience an unusual freeze in transactions in the short term.

“But it will bounce back in the mid to late summer, subject of course to positive stats being seen in relation to the lockdown and other mitigating strategies.”

Mr West said his team had transformed the way it operates to continue to serve clients.

He said: “We’re using digital technology to continue to support clients.

“Our lettings team have naturally remained busy providing guidance and support to both tenants and landlords.

“The government has temporarily adjusted the process for carrying out right to rent checks.

“They are allowing them to be done via video calls and tenants therefore able to supply scanned copies of documents rather than originals, which has helped.”

Mr West described the Oxfordshire property market as 'resilient' especially within the Oxford ring road.

He also refuted national commentary from buying agents that prices will crash.

“I saw a buying agent in the national media advising their purchaser clients to make offers of 15 to 30 per cent below asking prices at this time, but one suspects that they won’t have much, if any, success with this strategy. There are no compelling reasons for sellers to entertain this.

“This is not a banking, or financial markets-precipitated economic crisis, where typically inequality is exposed, and property prices are consequently pushed down.

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“This is a unique situation in which government economic support is being made widely available and for the most part everyone is therefore on a level playing field.

“This ostensibly puts the property market in a holding pattern. People will hold on and wait to make their moves.”

With the market on hold, financial data will therefore not show price falls, he said.

Mr West added: “Without transactions there will not be any new data and so there will not be a catalyst for house price falls to be based on.

“Our clients who were involved in chains when the lockdown started are being patient and we also have many clients who are waiting to take positive action when sanctions are lifted.”

Mr West said Brexit had injected 'a great deal of realism' into the Oxfordshire property market recently.

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He said: “The Brexit uncertainty led to very low volume trading and pricing had to be sensibly set in order to achieve success.

“This overall picture should protect sellers from vulture like offers from unscrupulous buying agents and their buyer clients.

“The forced freezing of the market, combined with an extremely low interest rate environment for probably the next decade, will serve to protect the residential property market. The UK remains a home-owning democracy and this will not change when this public health crisis is over.”

Mr West said estate agents in the county are naturally adjusting their business operations in order to manage throughout this crisis.

He added: “There is very little sign of panic and actually people are projecting forward three to four months initially, so we all wait to see what happens essentially taking ‘baby steps’ in doing so.

“As a company we have reduced some of our overheads and our suppliers have been incredibly supportive. Virtual ‘Walk-Through’ property tours are performing strongly online, and enquiries are still coming in as a result, so this evidence ‘pent-up demand’.

“We had to adapt quickly to a massive change, but we thankfully have digital technology at our fingertips and this has helped enormously. We’re holding daily team meetings via Zoom and we’re also offering clients video calls at their convenience to keep them updated face to face.”

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He added: “We’re in a period of consolidation and we predict the positive market fundamentals that were driving the housing market, up until just a few weeks ago, will be re-ignited as we enter the mid-late summer months.”