House prices still have long way to fall
FAT cats certainly won't be rushing out to buy property over the next year-and-a-half.
Over half of the businesses surveyed in the Sunday Independent Business Owners survey believe that house prices will fall by more than 20 per cent by the end of 2009. About four in 10 business owners expect house prices to fall by between 20 and 40 per cent.
Almost one in 10 believe that the fall could be more dramatic -- 8.9 per cent of those surveyed expect house prices to dive by over 40 per cent by the end of 2009.
This is an even gloomier prediction than that put forward by stockbrokers NCB, which last month forecast that house prices would fall between 33 and 40 per cent below their peak in 2006.
About 34 per cent of business leaders believe house prices will fall by between 10 and 20 per cent by the end of 2009, while over one in 10 expect the falls to be lower than 10 per cent. A tiny 4 per cent of the 124 businesses surveyed expect house prices to rise by the end of 2009.
Since house prices fell for the first time in five years in March 2007, the trend has continued. The national average house price fell by about 10 per cent in the year to May, according to the latest house price index from Permanent TSB and the Economic and Social Research Institute. Falls are believed to be steeper in certain areas, particularly in Dublin and the higher end of the market.
- Louise McBride
